Portmaster

by RandomBlank

Rating: mature
Tags: My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Dark, Romance, Original Character, Science Fiction, Adventure, Sex
Length: 28953

1000 years into the future, for ponies Equestria is an utopia, machines doing all menial jobs. But for these machines - replicants - it's slavery without rights and hope... until a pony falls in love with one "law enforcement device".

1000 years into the future, for the ponies Equestria is an utopia, with machines performing all the menial jobs. It is not so for these machines though. Artificial ponies - replicants - are the slave labor without rights and hope.

This is the story of Snake Stomper, a real pony in charge of the port of Hayburg, with 5000 replicants under his command, and slicing a piece of acceptable life for them out of the hell which Hayburg is for the others.

This is the story of Baton, a policemare, a replicant, property of Count Hayburg along with the rest of the city. Baton's only job is to keep Snake Stomper from getting in trouble over his revolutionary ideas.

But when their personal feelings are involved, things get complicated.

This is not a clopfic. There's just one disturbing sexual scene essential to the plot. If you're looking for clop, check my other stories. If you want honest-to-Celestia drama, adventure and conflict with interesting protagonists in a sci-fi setting, this is your story. The initial grimdark themes are toned down later on.

This story takes place in the same universe as Transistance by ToixStory, and Polarity by me, Reading them is not necessary, but Portmaster contains some mild spoilers to these two.

Proofreading: RedHandle and PropdowPony.

World setting idea by ToixStory, cover art and inspiration - Fuchs, setting and image used with permission.

Published 2014-07-27 16:30:01 UTC
Last updated 2014-11-10 22:31:27 UTC

Guerrilla Logistics

"Pinkie Pie, you're a genius!"

"No, I'm not., I'm a chicken!"

I scowled. I hated that point of the dream. That selfish pink cunt just got praised for her shenanigans. But then, my dream self didn't hate the ringleader. That was the magical land of Equestria in action. The Magic of Friendship. Nowadays, friendship like that would buy you at best a trip down the same incinerator chute as your friend. Magic was picked apart, catalogued, simulated, squeezed into chips and sold as commodity. The mysterious magic of friendship was all dead.

I followed Twilight Sparkle to Zecora, who would help me disguise myself as Nightmare Moon, to the delight of all the foals. The really good part of the dream was about to begin.

Then, Hollow Point walked in. Ignoring Zecora and Twilight, she turned to me with a serious expression.

"Before you say 'Fuck you, Hollow',..."

"Fuck you, Hollow."

She grimaced and continued. "I know it's way early to ask you that, but the stupid fuck seems to want to do something dumber than ever before."

"Even after..."

"Especially. See, Baton, we intended to have some choice words with the Portmaster while we deliver the beating, to make him perfectly aware of where he went wrong. We were late. A group of port workers roughed him up first, while giving him a couple of their own choice word. He managed to convince them he's like all the others. Then they convinced him he's like all the others."

"And?"

"And he's up to something. He visited the data banks of the logistics system, with some large bag slung over his back. Then he went to the castle, and now he's walking over the grounds, giving the staff various stupid orders."

"Like?"

"Grab him some specific beer, specific year, specific brand, something damn obscure. Order recount of disaster recovery equipment. Test-drive some trucks around the countryside. Escort a pony matching a certain description from the spaceport to the hotel. Nopony matching that description boarded any of the arriving crafts."

"Sending replicants away from the castle... Fuck." I jerked myself awake, leaving a confused Twilight Sparkle and an annoyed Zecora behind. I stood up from the couch, then rushed out of the rape victims counseling room, towards the elevators. Triggering emergency mode, I ordered the elevator to bring me to the garages at the top level, then galloping, I reached one of the hoverbikes. The access console of the vehicle granted me clearance, obeying the emergency status given to me by Hollow Point. I gunned the jet engine and with a scream of the jet dashed through the air towards the distant castle. The police siren of the motor howled, forcing all regular traffic out of my way, though I still had to dodge a few stragglers or just assholes who choose to override the controls.

Within a minute I was in the no-fly zone around the castle, my permission being processed by the castle's automatic defenses. It took them another thirty seconds to finally believe I was not an aerial terrorist and that my emergency status would be sufficient. In the meanwhile, I spotted my target. He was sitting at a picnic table set up on the battlements for visiting tourists. He was sipping something through a straw from a box, and observing the city.

The moment permission was granted I dropped the hoverbike onto the battlements, grounding it hard, jumping off the seat and rushing to the Portmaster.

He had most of his limbs in healing casts, his chest and neck in protective hard light fields, a healing shield protecting half of his face.

I stood next to him gasping. Somehow, the usual smile didn't even attempt to appear on my face. I just stood there, angry. So, I reached him. And... now what?

He raised his gaze to me, recognizing me through a haze of whatever he pumped into his system, and suddenly his face began filling with fear. Terror.

"Baton? You are not supposed to be here."

"What are you planning?"

"Baton, you must leave the castle perimeter immediately."

"Not without all the civilians, unless you stop whatever you planned."

He clenched his teeth. He glared at me.

"Officer Baton, service me," he muttered. "At my place."

"No, Snake Stomper. I will not service you, and I will not leave until you tell me what is going on."

He opened his good eye suddenly. "Baton, please! You must run now! It's too late to save them!"

"Then I will go with them."

I felt a mental nudge from Hollow Point. She was observing everything through my eyes, and doing her best to order evacuation of the castle. "Get him to tell how much time we have, then run. That boneheaded Count doesn't want to move his ass until we give him something solid."

Then Portmaster raised his head suddenly. "I can stop it, but we must go now. To my house."

"What are you planning?"

"No time to explain," he hobbled towards the hoverbike. "I won't let you die... and if canceling this whole thing is what it takes, so be it."

I used my magic to place him on the hoverbike, without trying to be gentle. To his credit, he winced only a little. I sat behind him and gunned the engine. Two seconds later, we were in a rapid dive over the Docks and heading to the opposite edge of the harbor, where the hills surrounding the city met the sea, protecting the port bay from storm waves.

I was here rarely. His house was a converted old artillery bunker built into the side of the hill, just above the sea surface, at the end of a narrow strip of beach. The only means of access to the inside through the ridiculously thick concrete were a thick iron door like those found in ship bulkheads, and a porthole, the kind used in ships a few centuries ago, before hard light got ubiquitous and reliable enough. The door swung open to allow the host inside.

I slid off the bike, and he slipped off it, shouting momentarily in pain, as he landed on his injured legs. He hobbled towards the door.

"Come with me, Baton."

"I'll stay here and wait for you."

"I need a replicant's help with that."

"I'll call someone."

"Then you have twenty seconds if you want this to succeed."

I cursed under my breath and trotted after him inside.

A tiny vestibule with hanging storm coats and warm anoraks led into a small room, with barely enough space for a bed, a desk, a few shelves filled with various knick-knacks. The door next to the vestibule led to a tiny bathroom. That was all. I knew Portmaster was not a poor pony. Once he stopped a megafreighter from leaving the port to allow some replicants in a boat to vacate its route. The losses caused by the delay exceeded the market value of the replicants a thousandfold - with any other portmaster they'd be ran over by the ship without a second thought. Snake Stomper choose to cover the losses from his own pocket, paying several million bits without a blink of an eye.

No time to think about that now. I shuddered when the door and the viewport slammed shut, then the outer wall began pretending to be invisible, covered with three-dimensional image of the outside. The castle hill was on the opposite side of the bay.

"I'm sorry, Baton. I lied," he said. "They can't be saved."

"No! No! You promised!" I shouted and shook him.

He turned to a small holoprojector on the desk. It showed the 3D map of about five hundred kilometers surrounding Hayburg. There was a bunch of lines from above, aiming into the ocean, then following a line to the port, to the solar furnace, then through pipelines, to various nodes, and then away, into Equestria, along the pipelines.

There was one that didn't follow that pattern. It aimed directly into a pipeline node at the foot of the castle hill.

"There's a bug in the delivery routing. If a line to a node of given cargo route can't be established, the software directs the cargo to the next node on the route directly. These old core memories go bad all by themselves; I was replacing a module roughly two times a month. It was easy to insert a faulty core module that fails to locate the barge splashdown location in the ocean. The next point accessible from the orbit is the pipeline core. Currently, a bullet-shaped load of two thousand tons of tungsten is descending on a ballistic trajectory from the orbit towards its new destination. Its fuel is exhausted and there's nothing strong enough to change its route."

I heard Hollow through my link. "Put me through to Empress Celestia immediately! National emergency!"

There were some words. I could sense Hollow scowling there.

Then a star appeared in the sky. Seconds later, the star became as bright as the sun, descending rapidly. And then the sun became a trail of fire that ended with a blinding blast at the foot of the castle hill.

A sudden earthquake threw us back at the wall. The projector wall flickered for a moment, then went back on again.

An enormous tidal wave was approaching us. It rolled through the Docks, flipping megafreighters like small toys. I saw the hoverbike engage a self-protection mechanism, launching vertically into the air. Then the wave rolled over us.

This time the hit wasn't even perceptible, just the door and the porthole groaned a little.

The view switched to a camera on top of the hill, overlooking the port and the bay.

More than half of the castle hill was gone. There was just a huge crater filling with water rapidly under a rising mushroom cloud. The tsunami wave rolling through the Docks subsided quickly.

The hill protected most of the city from the blast wave. A big part of the port was razed, but we, replicants are a tough kind, we'd recover. But the castle was gone, blown up, sent flying somewhere inland, likely raining stones all over the city.

Whoever didn't evacuate on time from the castle was dead.

"Empress Celestia will hear you now," I heard Hollow's comms.

"Too late," she muttered.

"Too late for what?" I heard the ruler's voice.

"The Castle Hayburg doesn't exist, hit by orbital barge. Count Hayburg and his whole family were inside, preparing for evacuation. Everypony within the castle is currently presumed dead."

"Then what are you waiting for?" I heard our ruler snarl in a way I'd never suspect her being capable of. "Begin disaster relief effort immediately. Catch the culprit, dead or alive, a bounty of ten million bits to whoever catches them. Now."

"Yes, Your Majesty," Hollow said. "At least the latter should be simple enough," she muttered as the connection died.

I turned to the Portmaster. He stood, gazing at me softly. "You have me. And ten million bits, which can easily buy you freedom." He smiled weakly.

I couldn't hide my rage. "You shitheaded halfwit. You brainless dipshit. Do you realize what you've done?"

"I killed them all. I gave you all a chance. No master I know of is worse than Count Hayburg."

"No, you fucking dickhead! Don't you realize? I don't give a shit about the Count or your fucking fight or all the assholes you just murdered!" I shook him, yelling at him. "Fucking Empress Celestia just put ten million bits of bounty on your fucking empty head! They want you dead! How the fuck am I supposed to save your retarded ass now?"

"You're not. Just turn me in."

"NO, you shitbrained dimwit!" I screamed my rage. "I love you, you fucking asshole, and I am not fucking letting them take you!"

I felt Hollow Point facehoof over the comms link. "Did he infect you with his stupidity, Baton?"

"Fuck you, Hollow."

The Portmaster pleaded. "Baton, don't do it! Turn me in! There's no way you can save me now. You'll get ears deep in shit if you even think of saving me!"

I used my magic to pull the gun out of my holster. I levitated it to my head, and rested the barrel against my skull just in front of my ear. "You want this mare dead? No? Then do what I say."

"Don't! Baton!"

"Do as I say or I drop dead this second."

"Okay, okay! Just tell me what to do."

"Get outside and on the hoverbike now."

The bulkhead-style door groaned as the hydraulics pushed it against the damage caused by the blast. Meanwhile, I linked up to the hoverbike and told it to return to previous position. The sea had receded, momentarily exposing a huge swath of its bottom before next wave would roll in.

I felt an encrypted link open up deeper in my system. Just a system message, the kind we used when we wanted to communicate off-record. "You have a three minute head start."

"Love you, Hollow," I whispered. I ran outside, literally threw that dumb prick over the seat, jumped after him, gunned the engine, then sped away into the open sea.

Biometallurgy

Author's Note

I'm giving up on the proofreader group. Almost five months of trying, seven different proofreaders contacted, including the "big boss" of the group, and still nothing. I'm sorry if spelling or grammar is sub-par from now on, but I'm not going to keep hitting my head against the wall, and the readers waited for the updates long enough. If someone is willing to pick up proofreading or just point out errors in what I'm posting, you're more than welcome to do so, but I'm officially giving up proactive search for proofreaders.

Biometallurgy

First things first, apply baton to remote control module. Three hits, some sparks, and the hoverbike was off the leash. Next, the little-known backdoor into the city vehicle database, a quick scan, delete. The record of my hoverbike just vanished from the list. Sure, they can recover it from backups, but it takes time. For now the vehicle became much harder to track.

Next, I found the socket behind my dimwit love's ear. I extended the cord from my fetlock and plugged it in. Some quick deleting, disabling, reconfiguring, and his own remote comms went offline, becoming invisible to the system. Using the wire to overcome the roar of the engine I fed my voice directly to his ears.

"Listen now well. Since I helped you escape I will be charged with aiding a wanted criminal. Shortly: I went rogue. You know what happens to replicants who go rogue. No lawsuit, no questions, no reflash, just the incinerator. So, if you want me alive, then we're getting out of this together. No dumping me and turning yourself in to the authorities. Understood?"

"Yes!" he replied. I heard unbridled joy over the revelation that I loved him, in total disregard of our current situation. I knocked his head hard with my hoof. "Idiot," I muttered.

"Sorry!"

"Then move. I'm getting to the front." I unplugged myself from his skull, drawing the cord in.

They taught us that at the academy... oh well, actually they loaded our brains with that skill at the Deckard replicant factory. Legs to the side, firm grip, I pushed myself by the side of the stallion to the front. Except back then that wasn't the stallion you'd be in love with. I felt pleasurable tingling from rubbing against his side and I hated myself for it. Focus, Baton, if we're to survive this!

Finally, I was seated in front of him, his body leaning over my back. I extended my hoof with the cable to him and he plugged it in.

"Now if we're to remain hard to find, I must become invisible to all communication devices, and I have quite a few more in me than you. Find a megafreighter and land between the containers. Drop the hoverbike over board and hide me deep in the bilge, far below water level, where the radios wouldn't reach. Only then switch me on."

"What do you mean..."

I jerked the wire off the socket, lay flat on the hull of the hoverbike, then put my hoof to my head. I charged the taser. All systems on stand-by, entering low-power mode, redundant systems switched off, deep sleep. Last preprogrammed action, as my awareness faded, was triggering the taser. It knocked all the remaining systems out, and there was not even the bootstrap process left to reactivate me. I'd remain dead until somepony switches me back on again.

* * *

Baton put her hoof to her head and I heard a loud zap of electricity. The pulse stung my chest and made me numb for a moment.

For a second I felt terror that she did kill herself, but then I recalled: owners are not too fond of their property running away. Replicants can't switch their locators off normally. Even in full shutdown they broadcast their location. I felt my heart pound faster, fondly thinking of my smart love.

Then my mood sunk. Megafreighters are well protected against theft. A lot of cameras, automatic security systems, she was smart but she didn't know all about port security. We'd never hide in one of these. Not to mention signal amplifiers that allowed communication with the outside from the deepest corners of their cargo holds. So, switching her on, deep down there, was out of question.

I leaned into the unconscious body of my beloved, nuzzling her neck. With extreme discomfort I felt my groin resting against her exposed back. I felt cold sweat on my neck over what I'd done to her. Would she ever forgive me?

Not now. There won't be any forgiving if we're dead. I banked gently, turning by roughly thirty degrees from original direction, to lose pursuit in case we were followed in a straight line. Luckily police hoverbikes were ones of the fastest vehicles in Hayburg, and we were moving at top speed without break, so it was unlikely a chase would catch up for now. Of course soon they would move military vehicles, which could fly in circles around us. How soon? And if not the megafreighter, then what?

Let us hope my idea isn't too dumb... at least not as dumb as the previous ones.

I readjusted my route towards the orbital barge drop zone. Five minutes later I passed a tell-tale tidal wave rolling away from where a barge impacted the ocean minutes before.

And there was the shining oblong sphere floating on the turbulent surface, a deck with a short, squat superstructure, a hard light dome covering the deck, bulky hull appearing from time to time as it rolled over the waves. Sometimes the barges were off by a few hundred meters. The tugboat would pull them along the bottom to the electromagnetic rails. Crew of four, and totally out of reach when submerged to the sea bottom.

Let us hope I can overpower four ponies alone.

Wobbling over the waves and dodging them, I approached the vessel. Oh, yeah, I forgot: They need to withdraw the dome. And I need to land there. Normally, autopilot does that easily but my brilliant marefriend smashed ours to smithereens.

The shield flickered and vanished. There, part one solved itself. Now to land...

I wobbled over the landing deck, as it slid from below me left or right every moment. Damn, I was sure Baton would have done it in one smooth move. And there I was, flying a hoverbike for the first time since high school, trying to make a landing on a ship in bad waves.

I pushed up from a wave that threatened to slam the ship into me and swallow me, and made another approach. Oh shit! Baton began slipping off the seat! I let go of the handles and put all my strength in pulling her back in position. And then I saw us heading right into the superstructure, about to crash.

Then suddenly the motors screamed as stabilizers failed to prevent the rapid descent, and we skidded over the landing pad, hard, the support wheels of the hoverbike snapping to the side. My head was pushed into Baton's back, invisible force pulling on me hard. I saw how she lay flat on the hoverbike, dragged down.

I switched the engine off and tried to reach for Baton's gun using the virtual horn magic, but I couldn't lift it.

The shield flickered over us, and a siren sounded. Seconds later I felt us moving downwards and a layer of water covered us. Spotlights on the superstructure came to life, flooding the deck with harsh light.

The weight suddenly let go. I sat up and stared at three ponies approaching me from the door in the superstructure. I made a grab for the gun and pointed it at them.

"Portmaster, put that down," said the one on the front. "That's a police gun. Owner-locked, you can't shoot it."

For a test I aimed it at the dome and pulled the trigger. And sure enough, there was just a quiet double beep.

"And besides," the next one said, "you really don't need it. Do you want to make more enemies than you have already?"

"uh..." I rubbed my head, returning the gun to Baton's holster and thinking of my options. "Parlay?"

"What happened to her?" the third one pointed to Baton.

"She switched herself off," I answered. "I believe we avoided detection up to this point."

"Good," the leader said. "I'd hate trying to lose military submarines. Get inside. We have another splashdown in three minutes. It will get shaky."

I got off the hoverbike, my injured limbs protesting in pain. I tried to pull Baton onto my back, but one of the crewponies got her before me, and I just followed them inside the superstructure.

* * *

The cold boot-up procedure passed through all tests. Some small damages were repaired, one less important circuit too damaged for repair was deferred to backups, and finally visuals came on line.

In panic I looked around the small mess hall, four strange ponies sitting around the table, Portmaster sitting across from me.

I sent him a glare.

"Welcome back among the living," I heard.

"Where am I?" I asked, looking around, panicked a little by the fact my comms failed to reach anything but systems of my immediate surroundings, and only reminding myself it's good that they did.

"With friends," one bulky green pony in a black wool hat and with a short, wide beard said.

"Who are you?"

"Sharky." The bearded one nodded to me.

"Piston," said a slim one, with his coat so stained with grease the yellow fur barely stuck out.

"Squall," a cyan mare in a storm anorak spoke.

"Herring," a short, young gray pony answered.

"Welcome on board of Yellow Squid," Sharky said, when others finished their introduction. "We're currently six hundred meters under the surface, sitting on the sea bottom in the orbital barge drop zone. Also, you have ten million bits bounty on your heads, each, and while we're not greedy for money and respect our Portmaster here deeply, we're not too fond of getting reflashed for aiding fugitives, so if you could come up with some sensible plan of getting out of here, we'd be extremely grateful."

"Portmaster, we were supposed to be on a megafreighter." I glared at my stallion. "We'd find a container bound for some colonies and escape as stowaway. That was my plan."

"Other that the space freight cargo bays don't have life support, that the containers are weight-matched against manifest to a gram when transferred between vessels, that megafreighters have superior monitoring and fearsome automatic defenses, and that their internal signal amplifiers would make us as visible as if we sat in the middle of Hayburg market square, your plan was pretty neat," he answered. "But we need to think of a new one, and this boat here is the one vessel the port was unable to communicate with for hours at a time. It's not a way out but it gives us some time to plan."

"The only one?" I scowled.

"There were two, but the other one was in the port during the impact."

"That means this one will be the first on the list of places to check as soon as the orbital scan finds no trace of us over the sea within the hoverbike range."

He cursed under his breath. The crewponies looked at each other uncomfortably.

"I think I have an idea," the young gray pony spoke.

"Spit it out, kid," Squall said.

"There's that copper barge that went a little off-course, lost one of iron skids on impact, caught on something on the bottom. We were supposed to move it later today. There's the maintenance bay in it. We'll drop them off inside, dump the hoverbike at impact point of the iridium dump that's due in fifty minutes, surface, turn up clean for the control, then pick them back up from the barge when we're clean."

"Sounds like a plan, and even subs looking for them won't detect them through two meters of solid copper." Sharky nodded.

"Incoming in ten, brace yourself," Squall interrupted. The crewponies sat tight in their chairs. I grabbed mine, Portmaster held his. The ship shook violently.

"Zinc, on the spot," Squall said. "The rails picked it up already. So, we dump you on the copper barge, with some supplies to last you a couple hours, and we're back for you after the control and then we think of some way to ferry you away. There's an abandoned undersea research base some two hundred kilometers away, we could drop you off there until things die down a little, after search crews confirm the base empty. Then we'll work from there. A bathyscaphe to get you to dragon lands or something like that."

"Thanks," I smiled.

"Well, thank you," Sharky spoke. "Thank you, Portmaster, for all you did for us so far, and thank you, Baton, for saving his ass."

I groaned. "Don't thank me for my stupidity, please."

The seapony chuckled, then invited us to the bridge, to watch our approach to the inert barge.

* * *

What are two ponies in love supposed to do when locked together in a dark, three cubic meters big box, with no comforts, no way out, nothing to do for a couple hours, and nothing but a few cans of food, a pair of batteries, an air recycler, and each other for entertainment?

If you said 'make love', fuck you.

If you said 'argue', have a cookie.

My throat was getting sore from yelling at that dimwit.

"Terrorist action ALWAYS, ALWAYS incites adverse reaction! No matter how much you achieved short-term, long term consequences will make it worse than it was in the first place!"

"Worse than turning whole police force into a free of charge sex slave brothel? Worse than city incinerators getting clogged up on mares dying to 'entertainment' of the Red District? Worse than the spring Fox Hunt, with replicants as prey? Worse than the city cleaners introducing a special tariff for replicant disposal, as a service? Baton, my job was logistics. I was ordering replicants in bulk to replace the ones murdered by this sick city. Below a thousand a month was a good month. Can you imagine, can you suggest how the long-term results can be worse than that?"

"We still have a choice. We still can try to run. We can still think about rebelling. We have hope. We can have our little private secret lives. Does the name 'dissent suppressor' mean anything to you? Do you know what it does?"

"The Deckard Corporation said they will not implement it, period."

"And that's why Flancesco Ltd. plans to pick up the slack. They have a working prototype. I saw the promo video. A replicant was loaded with a dream, one of my personal favorites. I saw the microcharge going off in his head mid-way through his dream. Dissent thoughts detector wired to an explosive charge. Just a sudden spray of blood out of his nostrils and ears, the end. That's the future you're buying us!"

"That's why it had to be me! That's why they need to realize that no amount of mechanisms built into replicants are going to stop us, fleshies, from fighting for the fourth breed!"

"First, that will only speed up the suppressors, to make your fight pointless. If every replicant in the port had it installed, there would be one big 'poof' to accompany the impact of the barge. You'd know how many replicants you'd kill, as effect you'd never enact your plan. And besides, if I heard any replicant say 'fleshie' I'd fucking break their legs. That's not how we speak of you ponies."

"These suppressors are bullshit. Do you think any brothel would afford another mare every time a customer gets rough? How many of you policeponies would survive past the first servicing of some tourist? The idea is so retarded it would die within a month of reaching the market!"

"You still don't realize it, you fucking moron! We. Are. Not. Ponies. We don't think like ponies. We can suppress thoughts and ideas, desires and fears, do with our minds things you can't even imagine. It would take a simple hotfix upgrade to make us capable of trivially suppressing dissent. The suppressors would..."

I didn't finish. A sudden shock threw us across the narrow space, rolling us over. Then I felt the barge moving, turning under our hooves, the small room flipping over, turning, shifting, sending us tumbling into each other. I heard crunching of rocks of the ocean floor under us. Then I felt magnetic pull towards a wall.

"Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit!" Portmaster held to a clamp on the far wall, trying to recover balance in the moving interior. "A barge hit somewhere close. We're being pulled in."

"What?!"

"The rails grabbed the remaining skid and are pulling us in."

The barge floated for a while, then shook violently, as a metallic clang sounded. Then it sped up smoothly forward. Constant push of acceleration gradually leveled out, only weak shaking and throb of magnetic field reminding us we were moving rapidly along the magnetic rails.

"Shit." Portmaster sat down, and shook his head. "Let's not argue in our last twelve minutes."

"The furnace?"

"Yes." He nodded sadly. "Baton... I never said it... I'm sorry. I'm sorry for what I did to you. I put you through so much shit. And now..."

"Fucking dumbass," I muttered. "It will be a welcome relief. Stomper, I'm a replicant, a creature of logic. I fucking hate you, you asshole, and I fucking love you more than the entire world. Do you even begin to realize how much you fucked me up?"

"I thought love and hate are mutually exclusive. That once you hate me you can't love me."

"To your credit, I thought so too, before I learned otherwise."

"You won't forgive me?"

"Not within next twelve minutes, no. Maybe if we had more time..."

"Do you believe us together could have been a thing?"

"If we ever got out of this hell of a city... without ten million bits of bounty on our heads... Of course we'd be a very miserable couple, you always stirring shit up with your crusade and me pissed at you, but yes, it could have worked like that."

He sat there, watching me with his one good half-closed eye silently.

"And no, Stomper, I don't feel like having good-bye sex with you."

He just nodded.

"But if you want a good-bye kiss... Just don't imagine I forgave you."

* * *

Suddenly, we were jerked out of our kiss. Our copper coffin stopped rapidly, sending us crashing into the front wall.

I heard muffled curses. I recognized a voice. "It's the copper! Get the crane here! We must get it off the track or the furnace will overflow!"

I rushed at the hatch and pounded on it with my hooves. It could only be opened if powered up, and the barge was entirely unpowered.

"Anypony in there?" sounded from outside.

"Let us out!"

Loud steps.

"Hook, hurry up! There are ponies in there!"

Some shifting, the barge rolled again, some shaking, then the floor leveled out.

Some more noises. Portmaster put his hoof on my shoulder. I shook it off.

Some three minutes later I heard knocking on the outside, something clamped to the barge, then a hiss of pressurized air. Bolts of the hatch disengaged and it swung out. There were two ponies at the end of the short corridor leading outside.

I walked out, tentatively. Portmaster followed me.

We were in the underground switching station of the magnetic rail, redirecting barges of various metals to different furnaces. Our barge lay on the floor near a crossing, where it was deposited next to several others, apparently awaiting repair of the pipelines destroyed by the impact.

We looked at the two ponies. One of them, black, one eye missing and some electronics showing through the eye socket, held an industrial microwave welder in his mouth, which he probably used to attach power to the barge. He didn't point it exactly at us, but he did hold it pointed in our general direction... and I knew it could boil all my blood in half a second. We did have a murder case involving one of these. The coroner still hates talking about it.

The other pony, young, purple, green mane in a spiky mohawk, was unarmed.

The two looked at us uncertainly, as if we were murderously dangerous criminals.

"Fuck it, Hook," the one without the welder said, "do we have a choice?"

"Shit." The other one spat through the corner of his mouth. "Sorry, Portmaster, but it's not even erasure for me. Been in some trouble, straight to incinerator without even courtesy of switching me off. I'm sorry as fuck, but please, don't make it any harder." He waved the welder towards an exit.

The moment he had the welder off us I drew my gun and pointed at him. "Drop it," I said.

The heavy device clanged on the floor, and to my great surprise the two gasped with relief, relaxing visibly. "Thanks Celestia," the one called Hook said, wiping sweat off his eyebrow.

I cursed under my breath. That's not how ponies are supposed to behave when one points a gun at them!

"You have us at gunpoint, we have no choice but to comply," the other said, grinning to me.

"How soon will the cops get here?"

"If we don't open the blast door up there, it may take them some fifteen minutes through alternate routes, or to get the blast door open."

"Blast door?" I frowned.

"You see, sometimes there are faults in the barges. Big vacuum bubbles. Sometimes they open up on impact into sea and suck up several tons of seawater. Do you know what happens if you dump several tons of sea water enclosed in a block of solid tungsten into furnace of superheated liquid tungsten?" the purple one explained.

"Two next replicants of dubious past take our places, that's what happens," Hook muttered. "And the blast door protects the port from the explosion. At least Portmaster got a switch installed, to stop the rail if we see a barge is leaking water, so that we can empty it before it's dumped into the furnace. Saved my life twice already. Let's move."

Just another Hayburg story. I cursed under my breath and followed them to the exit from the switching hall.

"So, now that we're forced to cooperate under threat of the gun..." The pony with green spiky mohawk winked. "how may we help you?"

"Where can we get from here without getting caught?"

"There are service rails along the pipelines, all over Equestria," Hook said. "Not getting caught may be a bit of a problem though. It's not like you can make sudden turns in there to lose the chase. It could get you out of the city, to the nearest pumping stations, but other than that..." he was interrupted by the other one's hoof on his shoulder. "What?"

"Module return rail."

"This will land them in the very hub, how the fuck are they supposed not to get caught?"

"What other options do we have? Load them on a barge and reverse the rails? We could just lead them to the cops, for all good it would have done. At least the hub is a maze where they stand a chance."

"You mean the transport hub under the spaceport?" Portmaster spoke.

"Yes," Hook explained. "Back when the railguns had worse accuracy and the barges had guidance systems to get them into capture zone on atmospheric descent, our predecessors would detach the guidance modules from the barges and return them through a dedicated rail to the spaceport, for reuse. Nowadays the rail is mostly unused except when Spike here goes to buy some smokes."

"Spike? As in that little dragon?" I asked, surprised.

"Little?" Spike laughed. "My namesake is currently a monster the size of a megafreighter, and lives somewhere in Epsilon Eridani, helping Princess Twilight build a colony. But yeah, he was my favorite when I was a foal... or..." he saddened, "at least that's what my memories say."

"Well, I love the dreams with the little tyke," I said.

"Have you seen the remake of 'The Dog and Pony Show'? The vintage is excellent, but they made the remake even better. Not like all the other remakes."

"I'll grab it off the machine when I find one then."

"Oh come on, you're wanted for aiding a wanted terrorist escape and you're squeamish about illegal downloads? I've got an unprotected copy." He stopped and exposed his neck socket to me.

"Just don't infect me with something." I extended the wire from my fetlock.

"Like cooties?" He laughed and plugged me in. I still had the gun almost to his head.

Portmaster and Hook exchanged one-eyed glances.

"Is that how the Stockolt syndrome looks like?" Portmaster asked.

"It's supposed to take at least a few hours," Hook replied.

And then, besides the illicit dream, I got a few other files. A detailed map of the hub, including passages not present on official maps. Codes to various service doors, including two amplifiers. If I manage to take both out, I'd be invisible. Turret coverage areas, avoid. Valve codes for the liquid metal pipelines, just in case I wanted to flood some city or village with liquid metal. Spaceship schedules, including loading schedules and cargo manifests. Control keys for municipal transport trucks. Sewer network map.

I made a mental note: if I ever get out of this safely, I've got to message Hollow Point to hire that kid. Skilled hackers were always in demand in the forces.

We stopped at the station of the technical rail. A single open cart with barely some pipe rail-guards to protect the cargo from falling out sat at the entrance of the low tunnel. Old, noisy hover pads buzzed angrily under combined weight of Portmaster and me as we boarded it.

"Thanks for your help," I grinned, waving my gun at the two.

Hook mock-glared at me. "We've only done what you forced us to!"

The engine of the cart spun up, and we had to duck before the cart entered the low tunnel.

Indivisibility

The cart stopped at a disused station next to a cargo lift. Corridors and catwalks crisscrossed in the shaft above us, where the open sky loomed through bars of a grid floor. Then I heard the police siren approaching quickly above.

"Run!" I shouted, and dashed into the nearest doorway leading into the network of corridor. Portmaster limped after me as I stopped at a crossing of two corridors. "Celestia damn it, how long will your legs take to heal yet?"

"They'd have healed long ago if I wasn't thrown around all the time!"

"There are two amplifier stations in the hub. If we manage to break both, they'll have to seek us with hounds. Let's head to the first one." I turned into one of the corridors, waiting for Portmaster to catch up. "This way."

"And where's the other one?"

"That way." I pointed in the opposite direction. "Why?"

"If we split up, we'll stand a better chance of taking them out."

Fuck. He was right. Reaching the second one once we're done with the first would be almost impossible.

I stopped, then extended my cable and plugged it into the socket behind his ear. I began uploading the plans.

"Do not, I repeat it, you fucking twit, do not get caught. Don't fucking hope that if you're out of the picture I will run away alone and live free. I fucking swear, if they lock you up in the Sun, I'll go there and try to set you free, and if they kill you I'll kill as many as I can before they take me down. Is that clear?"

He nodded.

"I'm marking viable rendez-vous points, numbering them by priority. Disable the amplifier, smash it good so they can't just switch it back on, then head to point 1. If you can't reach it for any reason, head to point 2, and so on. Hide and wait. I'll find you there and we'll pick it up from there."

"You don't get caught. I'm safe as long as I don't run into cops. You disabled my comms, remember? It's you shining like a nuclear beacon on their sensors. You stand a better chance going fast, I'll pick a slower, silent approach."

Not as stupid as I thought. Yes, without him hindering my speed I had a better chance, and he could hide without me right now. For a second I thought that if I surrender, he'd stand a good chance of running alone. Then I dismissed the thought; the fool would assault Canterlot to set me free or avenge me if I got caught.

I heard clang of multiple hooves in the distance.

I ran.

Shortly, Spike's codes got quite helpful. I passed a heavyweight gate, then locked it behind me, using the master code to change the unlock code. Pounding and curses on the other side meant I got the upper hoof. I got a minute - they'd have to go around while I made a beeline for another gate through the network of tunnels and rails. I hitched a ride on a train of cargo containers, then left it when it began heading for the surface. I slid through some air vents, timed my jump through a ion propeller that would zap me like a fly, but thanks to the schematics I knew the moment it was powered down. I disabled power in a power substation, running between contacts that would scorch me otherwise, skirted the edge of a turret detection zone...

I stopped at the end of a narrow access tunnel, entrance to a warehouse a few meters above the floor, with containers stacked everywhere in a way that could be described as organized chaos. There were workers in there, and the exit on the other side was exposed. I planned my route, jumps over the containers to get there as fast as possible.

Then the ceiling exploded. Ponies in golden battle armor of Celestia's guard descended on wings and jetpacks from above.

I turned back, without much hope. With jetpacks it would be over in a minute, and my gun against their battle armors would be entirely useless.

And yet, something clanged loudly behind me. I turned my head. A container landed across the entrance, blocking it off. Barked orders, arguing, noises, metal groaning as it ground against the wall.

I checked the plans and found a tunnel running under the floor of the warehouse. There was an access hatch locked with a code in the floor, leading down to that tunnel. One of Spike's codes matched the hatch!

I unlocked it, descended a short way down the ladder, then began re-locking it.

A container whizzed past my hooves. Not good, the tunnel was in active use and sized for the containers with no clearance. Still, seconds after the lock re-engaged I heard pounding of hooves on the other side. I dropped down into the dark tunnel and ran, following the rail roughly towards my destination.

I galloped for a minute or so, looking for any exits and bypassing ceiling hatches that were too high for me to jump. The plans indicated a service station six hundred meters ahead.

Then I heard loud buzz of the hover-rails activating. Lights of a container lit up the tunnel, approaching rapidly from behind. Shit! Shit! Shit! I braced myself for the impact, not that I hoped to survive it.

Then the buzz changed pitch, brakes groaned against the walls. The container stopped just behind me.

There, on its carrier platform, was a camera wired to some modules. A jury-rigged obstruction detection system. Something designed to save lives of replicants.

The little part of me that loved that fucking idiot tingled warmly.

A hatch in the ceiling a short way down the tunnel opened, light flooding in.

Without a second of thought I jumped onto the side of the container, grabbing little protrusions. The engines came to life and it sped down the tunnel.

Armored head peered down from the opening in the ceiling, then ducked out of the way, cursing, as the container sped past.

I held tight, letting the container speed past the technical station, opting to disembark on the next one, a short way past my destination. And good that I did, as my welcome committee was already entering the first station as the container sped by.

As lights of the second station came into view, hanging for dear life by two hooves I used my magic to turn the jury-rigged camera sideways. As soon as it caught the wall in its view the brakes engaged and I got thrown off the container. I rolled on the floor for a moment, earning some bruises and scratches, but still mostly uninjured I managed to scramble for the nearby platform.

And there I was, on the platform, which was silent for now.

Something changed. No, not around me. Dozens of my comms went silent. One of the two amplifiers just got switched off. I smiled and dashed up a staircase, towards my destination. One generator room, one gate with code, and I'd be at the amplifier station!

The hum of the huge generators was nearly deafening, but I passed them undisturbed. I ran down the corridor to the code gate, pulling up the code from the list.

And then I skidded to a stop.

Some wires were hanging from the place where the control panel should be.

I looked at them. Maybe I can just short a pair?

Then I saw the actuator of the gate missing too.

I pushed the door, trying to pry it open. Didn't even budge.

Resigned, I turned to try another way...

...and there they were. Two Solar Guards, in armor of golden hard light, approaching me in a calm, confident stride. Pegasi, real ponies. Battle-saddles with plasma rifles hung across their backs.

I pushed the door again, desperately. They didn't even budge.

I considered trying to break past the two. I saw the royal pegasi in action in the past. I'd never make it to the end of the corridor.

I would fight. One on two, maybe my servo-joints would give me some advantage. Yes, lie to yourself more, Baton. These rifles will turn you into a puddle.

The two stopped. The one on the left made eye contact with me.

"Operator," he said, "I have no visual."

A second of silence.

"I repeat, no visual. Just empty corridor with broken, locked gate."

Another few seconds of silence.

The guardspony walked up closer to me. He knocked on the floor with his hooves. "Solid floor, no hatches, no access panels, no hiding spots. The ceiling seems to be panels though. Permission for blind fire?"

A breath later he pointed his gun at the ceiling and shot it. The ball of plasma exploded on impact. Sparks rained from damaged panels, a huge hole gaped exposing the solid concrete above a maintenance duct. "Negative, operator. Yes, all right."

He flapped his wings, rising to the hole in the ceiling. He stuck his head in, looking both ways. "Negative, the duct is empty. No apparent hiding spots. Give me the Z coord again."

...

"That's the main floor level, and it's empty. I'm just a grunt but I'd say they hacked the system to simulate phantoms to send us on a wild goose chase, while they hunkered down somewhere else."

...

"As you say."

He took a few steps towards me - actually into me, simply bumping me with his chest and pushing me as if I was not there. "In position."

I looked at his face. He made a sudden gesture with his muzzle - like a rapid nod, "down". He stepped towards me again. I got the hint and lay down. He stepped over me with his front hooves smoothly.

"In position. Just plain floor. No traces, no tracks, shifting through spectra now... entirely nothing out of ordinary. EMI near top of the scale but that comes from the amplifier, right behind the door."

A few seconds of break. Then the other guard spoke.

"Confirming. No visual. Gamma is standing right at the spot and there's nothing there. Damn cunning, if you want my opinion. Complete set of comms right out of thin air."

A second of pause.

"Acknowledged."

The two turned around and walked away, then took off at the end of the corridor, flying up the way they came from.

I just lay there, my mind boggling over what just happened.

Shit.

I turned around and began walking, still stunned by the event.

I desperately craved logic now.

Still numb, I made my way to the rendez-vous point#1, not really paying much attention to the buzz of the hub. The chase was gone. Nopony hunted me.

I found the location, a locker under some stairs.

Portmaster was not there, but there was a note on the floor.

Baton,

You should have disabled the amplifier by now. Since you didn't, I'm going to find you and disable the amplifier myself. If you couldn't, but still found this note, find me at #3. I'll be there at 3:30.

I checked the time. 2:25. I cursed quietly and lay down. I could get to #3 in ten minutes, but now, that the fool was on the move, I didn't want to attract attention to that point by loitering there for an hour. Shit. Don't get caught, you fuckwit! Surely now as you disabled the first, they will guard the second one.

Right. And he'll get caught. And it's up to me to save his stupid ass.

I ran back towards the amplifier.

...and then I skidded to a stop.

Black coats. Big guns. Dark glasses. Spiky wings of hard light, stylized to look like blades.

One Earth pony, two unicorns. The Earth pony in the center was tall, dark grey, the transparent artificial horn on his head glowed with energy. One unicorn was dark blue, the other - lemon yellow.

The trio stood across my way.

"Here's our first ten million." The Earth pony raised his gun, aiming at me. "Try to keep the corpse identifiable."

Then the yellow unicorn knocked the Earth pony's gun up with his own. "Where's the other?"

"Oh, I see..." the Earth pony leered. "Surely she knows and we can make her talk. And even if she doesn't, we can make sure he knows we have her, and make him come to us."

He turned his head to his dark blue companion. "Tie her up, Ceres."

Bang-bang-bang.

Three broken guns clattered to the floor.

Fucking amateurs. If you hold an armed pony at gunpoint, keep your gun poised at them at least until you disarm them.

The three looked at each other in panic. They looked at my gun pointed at them.

"Scram, you scum," I said.

The three turned and ran.

Only when their hoofbeat died down in the distance I wiped sweat off my eyebrows and holstered my gun. Bounty hunters. Amateurs... but after amateurs pros would surely come.

I picked up my pace. A system broadcast message flashed in my awareness. "Remaining amplifier in the transport hub area is taken offline for maintenance due to security concerns. Please use peer-to-peer communication. We apologize for the inconvenience."

And then the comms went dark.

Shit. That was not the Portmaster's doing. I sped up.

Some turns, some climbing, a code door, and I was getting close. I picked a stealthy approach through an airduct for the last leg of my travel. And there was the room, with some screen projectors and the white tower of the amplifier in the middle.

Dozens of replicants were milling around, but one unicorn mare in a white coat in the middle, bossing over them, was definitely a real pony, and pissed.

"Search every nook and cranny, check every connection, and verify every single file! We must find that bug! We need to know how they managed to simulate a full set of replicant comms! This is a critical security failure!" she shouted.

As always. Technology took the blame while the pony factor was at fault.

No sign of Portmaster. Shit.

I retreated back into the duct and made my way to rendez-vous point#3, a small space under the platform of the technical station of the container railway which I had crossed while riding a container already.

One turn more and I'd be there... then I heard known voices. The trio of assholes!

"You hold him, Stardust, and I'll try to stab him!"

"Fuck you, he bites!"

"Ten million bits, you idiot! Think of it!"

I ran.

And right on time. The three were piled on top of Portmaster, fighting viciously, trying to find an opening in the casts and shields of hard light protecting his injuries. My three speedy kicks sent them flying off the platform onto the rails. My love got a few more bruises but nothing worse. And my rush of anger at him subsided when he stood up and brushed my braided mane gently with his hoof.

"It's her! Both are here!" I heard.

"I'll zap them with..."

but we never found out what the wannabe bounty hunter would zap us with. Three thuds sounded like one. The container was just a blur, carrying screams of pain and terror away from the station.

"I thought you equipped them with a system that stops them if there's a pony on tracks?" I asked.

"Well..." He rubbed his neck. "That was still a work in progress. I got the system installed on maybe a third of the carriers so far... and it wasn't even very reliable in the first place..."

Loud noise of crash came from depths of the tunnel.

"So, any bright ideas how we get out of the city?"

He grinned. "Actually, yes. We will need to get access the shipment manifests."

I plugged the wire from my fetlock into the socket behind his ear. I brushed his mane gently with my hoof too.

"Like this one?" I asked, sending the file Spike gave me.

"Precisely!" he brightened.

"And how are we going to escape?"

"On a bed of flowers!"

Interplanetary Floristics

Tulips. Tulips for breakfast, lunch and supper. Fifty bits for a small one, way out of reach of a cop's salary, even in Hayburg, where the prices were ones of the lowest, and here I was already getting sick of the taste and scent.

Luckily, I could leech power off the container through its control panel. I didn't need to eat much of the accursed flowers, just enough to satisfy the needs of the biological part of my body.

Tulips lose moisture, even a third of their mass, so the weight match was very loose.

Tulips require life support system to survive space travel. Not quite like for passenger transport, but survivable for ponies. Cold, but above freezing; a mist of water spraying us every hour or so; very weak artificial gravity but also no extreme accelerations.

And they would go bad in a couple days. That meant express travel, expensive swift courier lorchas with lepton beam engines, not the cheap solar sail barges or ion jet galleons that take weeks to reach their destinations.

And then there was the set of destinations. Destinations where the customers would pay a thousand bits for a single lunch composed of two flowers and other fancy, but less expensive ingredients. Where there were enough rich customers to assure demand for a full cargo container of those.

We were heading for Orbital Station Elysium, an artificial luxurious paradise orbiting Mars. The place where martian millionaires spend their vacations.

The place that prided itself to be independent from the Solar Empire.

And on top of that, we did about two million bits worth of damage in the cargo.

I squirmed on my bed of flowers. Mashed to a pulp under my hooves, and with first hints of spoilage in the scent.

Portmaster leaned against me. I squirmed away from him.

"Baton, please. It's cold and I'm wet. I'll catch cold."

"Last germs of common cold were eradicated six centuries ago, stupid."

"Pwease?" He mumbled and grinned to me, a flower held by the stem across his mouth, the most goofy lover expression under the sun.

I turned away from him.

I wanted to be mad at him. I really did. I tried to recall the events from The Anchor.

On top of spark of anger I felt a pleasurable stirring in my loins. I shut the memory away quickly, my embarrassment feeding my anger more. I was wet, miserable and cold. If not him, I would be after hours right now, probably relaxing, sipping a drink in The Anchor right now...

...while watching him over the rim of my glass, trying not to let him catch my gaze, and blushing like an idiot if he did anyway.

"Fuck!" I shouted out.

"Baton?" he asked with worry.

"You are really getting on my nerves."

"Sorry." He lay down, resting his chin on his front legs. Soon it seemed like he fell asleep, but then I heard sniffing. Short sobs were shaking his body.

I tried to ignore him. For a whole of thirty seconds I kept ignoring him. Then I put my hoof on his back gently. "What is it this time?" I failed to sound scornful.

He was silent for a long time, then he sniffed some more. Then he spoke quietly. "I'm a bad pony. A monster. I killed so many, and I dragged you down with me, and I did a horrible thing to you, and then I ruined your life, and I abandoned all to whom I was important, and possibly made the situation of your whole species worse... and all because..."

He sniffed. I brushed his mane with my hoof.

"...all because I... I'm so selfish."

"Selfish? Care to explain?"

He raised his head and looked in my eyes with his one good eye. "I could never fit in with the ponies. I was always the outsider, no friends, no talents, no skills, no strength. Then I got to oversee a team of replicants in an orbital warehouse and within two days we became best friends. They held no prejudice. They didn't think themselves better than me. They worked hard, harder than any pony, and for the first time I enjoyed working with them, even if I wasn't as strong and as efficient - but then, flying a shuttle is not that hard. Then my employer saw I don't just oversee them, that I work alongside with them. I got a stern lecture. I had to oversee them from afar, punish if they wouldn't follow the orders to the dot. Our friendship crumbled. Their efficiency crumbled along with it. I was fired, they got reflashed.

"I studied logistics and got another job, at a small transport company, and I made friends with replicants again. And this time it worked out. I was buying out replicants off their way to the incinerator, then helping them put their lives back together, and they really repaid with dedication. Rick Planner, the owner, was curious about my methods, he asked me to teach him my secrets."

"The R.P. corp?" I asked. "Nowadays it's every replicant's dream job, and a mighty corporation. How did you leave?"

"Rick did learn well. He really made friends with the crew. He hired a helper for me, and she was ecstatic to learn she was not expected to be a slaver. By that time I got the reputation of one who can 'handle difficult replicants'. I got the job offer from the Count shortly after you fished my predecessor out from the port bay. I had a talk with Rick. He told me to take it, 'fix up that shithole' as he put it. And I took it to my heart. I didn't take it as a job, I took it as a mission."

"And then you met the Count?"

"Most evil sick bastard I'd ever met in my life. And his son taking after his father. And I knew I couldn't build anything permanent. I could only maintain it as long as I watched over it. And I couldn't build more, I couldn't extend my influence. I watched the Red District in helpless rage."

"And you decided to leave a permanent mark."

"Yes, but not in form of a crater in place of the castle. I wanted to quit, to move on, to pick another mission, one that would be possible. But before that I decided I wanted something out of it for me. A simple selfish wish. You."

"Why me?"

"I saw how you blushed over your cup. How giddy you were whenever you saw me. My rants at The Anchor? Half the time it was to get you to come. I loved how you twisted the regulations never to harm me. How you fought with yourself about approaching me."

I grimaced sourly. "You knew you could have me. You could have bought me, you could have kept me as a personal pet, I'd never be happier in my life, and nopony would even frown."

"Except I didn't want to have a personal pet. Not even in the name. I wanted you to choose freedom. I'd buy you out, then release you. Then I'd ask you to stay with me."

"And you'd get fired. This kind of relationship on a position so high would not be acceptable."

"No, I wouldn't. I was creating too much profit. The port was thirty percent more efficient than with any of my predecessors."

"Then Count would lead to me having an 'accident'. And then you'd do something terrible in your despair."

"Then we'd move out of his reach."

"And you'd leave all the replicants to a new portmaster who'd get all the old ways in place."

"I could keep Count in check. Anything bad happens to you, I destroy him."

"Are you even listening to yourself? Trying to out-blackmail the expert villain?"

"Shit. Was that really a no-win situation?"

"Pet."

"Shit. No. I'd drink myself dead just imagining you're merely following my orders."

"Then all that was left were blushes over the cup."

"Not enough. I lost patience. I really wanted you to drop that mask. And when you refused, I realized: we could not be together, but I could still set you free. I made all the arrangements, Rick would buy you out later this week, you'd get your release and an honest job offer at The R.P."

"Except you wanted to set me free from yourself first?"

"Yes. For you to forget me. Short, simple pain you'd overcome, not an eternal wound of love lost."

"I must say you were not quite successful at that," I scoffed.

"That's where the second part of the plan came. For you to forget me, without regrets and without second thoughts. 'He was an asshole and now he's dead'."

"So, the Count..."

"I wanted to go with a bang, to take out as many assholes with me as I could, but see, Baton, that wasn't about them, about my mission, about my fight. It was all about you. Killing the Count was just added value, just a cover-up, a show to hide my own suicide, to make you think I did it because of my ideals, not because of you."

"You stupid asshole..." I squeezed tears off my eyes with my eyelids. "Blow up the castle just to set one mare free?"

"Just the ghost of my selfish wish."

"You stupid asshole." I ground my teeth through tears. Then I put my hoof over his back and pulled him to me, putting my chin on his neck. I leaned into him. "You damned idiot, look up the definition of 'selfish' in the dictionary. And then look up 'generous'."

"I don't know what you're talking about," he muttered, resting his head on his hooves.

Pathomemetics 2: Infection

Report no.1

It was a disaster. We met in a middle-grade restaurant at the scheduled time. The mare appeared extremely timid and hardly spoke at all. I ordered gem encrusted cake for myself and she ordered hay fries. I tried to make a small talk, and then, as I tried to ask her about her job, she got extremely apologetic about all the missed deadlines. I assured her that she receives all the deserved punishments, and that she doesn't need to apologize any more. This got her in a very depressed mood, and she asked me not to request her to talk about her job any more. I asked her about hobbies, and she told me she picks tulip petals if there are any left after the cargo, dries them up, and folds them into various shapes. But when the sweeping time comes, they are all swept away with all trash from the quarters. She got very sad about that and apologetic about being sad. Then she tried to ask me about my hobbies. I talked about music, but she said they never have any music in the terminal. All the music she knows is from her foalhood memories, but since these memories are all fake, it doesn't really count.

After that she began crying again, then she apologized profusely and ran away. I must say the experience was most disconcerting, and while I realize she is merely a replicant, I found the simulated emotions extremely realistic.

Portmaster closed the file with the report, then pulled the scheduler application up and found Fern Leaf quickly. He picked her today's schedule and wiped it clean with one flick of his hoof. Then he pulled up the comms panel.

"Fern Leaf? I have a very important task for you today. You are to find a suitable place for new terminal crew quarters. It shouldn't be too far from the terminal, but with enough space so that everypony has at least a small room of their own. I assign two hundred bits per pony for raw materials and access to the printers, so you could print all the furniture and missing infrastructure. If there's anypony in the terminal whom you'd wish to have for a helper, get them to help you too. If you have any questions, now or later, don't hesitate to ask."

She stood there for a few seconds, looking around in panic.

"Uh.. but why me?"

"Do you know any pony better suited for that job?"

"Umm... for a fact..."

"Then pick them as your helper and pass leadership to them, if you deem that optimal."

"Thanks," she said meekly.

Portmaster observed for a while, as Fern found a tall, squint-eyed pegasus mare by the name Ikebana, and passed her missive. Soon the schedule of the two was blank, and they started on their way away from the terminal.

Then comms request came to life. It was Ikebana.

"Uh, excuse me, if I could disturb..."

"Of course."

"Can I poll funds from several ponies for a single bigger purchase?"

"Of course. What do you have in mind?"

"There is a food distribution duct, a rather wide corridor, running all around the station. It's used to distribute food to all of us, replicants, but it's used only by a short train, only three times a day. If we could purchase one general distribution rail car, and use it over the main rail to supply our equipment dispensers with food for us, we could scrap the food train, build partitions in the food distribution corridor and use it for living space. A main rail car is rather expensive, but it would leave us with a plenty of living space."

Portmaster pulled the plans down, and scanned them for a while. "Consider it done. You don't need to purchase that main rail car, I'm just assigning one for the task. Also... Hey, I like you, Ikebana. That leaves us with a free corridor running all the way around the station. Do you believe all replicants of the station would fit there?"

"Yes, I believe so! Oh Celestia!" she shouted in glee. "Whole two hundred bits per pony! I'm going to make the new living space so awesome!"

"Think of leaving them a small allowance for personal touches!"

"Of course! Let me get to work at once!"

"And Baton," he turned to me. "I'd be grateful if you could aid them, give them the hunch of just how much they are allowed to do. I'm giving you a proxy access to my Federal Bank of Draconia account, in case any other purchase would be useful. Or if you'd like to go shopping, or whatever you like." he winked.

Personally, I just watched Miss Dusty and the horror on her face. She spoke to Portmaster, trying to conceal her outrage. "It is not my business how you manage your personal funds, but just giving away two hundred bits per replicant for furniture and personal space? How can you justify such an expense!?"

"I have a very important lesson for you today. A lesson in value of the station equipment. Let us pull down some manifests..." he opened the documents. "I see you assigned monetary values to replicants. It's usually in range of one to four thousand bits, rarely more, often less, especially in case of the more deteriorated ones."

"Yes, these are reasonable estimates for the span between costs of purchase of brand new and parts value of one only good for incineration."

"Now, while I personally believe there is no price on replicant's life, I guess it will take you some time to accept such notion, so let me attach some new price tags."

Portmaster edited the fields. Ten million for a new one, twenty million for one reaching 'end-of-life'.

"This is ridiculous."

"Accept it as an axiom and you'll see efficiency rise of at least four percent."

"How?"

"Trust me."

"How is the value rising with the replicant aging?"

"Experience."

"What experience can they gain in these... machine jobs?"

"Currently none. We're working on this now. Now for your today's homework. Invite Fern Leaf later today for a walk in the gardens. You don't need to talk about anything."

"Do I have to? She is most... disheartening."

"We'll see about that."

* * *

Report no.2

I can't believe the childish glee of that mare when she ran through the grass and gazed at birds. She nibbled on the wild flowers and waded in water. At first I was taken aback by her behavior, but then I found it rather charming. She asked me for a swim in the pond. I refused but I found her swimming quite amusing. Later I got us two fresh apples, and I couldn't hold back my laughter at how ecstatic she was about the taste. She also showed me one of her tulip petal works. It was a small pink alicorn pony, without legs. She said it was Princess Cadence swimming, and yes, when placed on table, I had to admit the resemblance was uncanny. She gave the little figurine to me, and I was so taken by it, that I bought her a fresh tulip flower. We actually parted in excellent moods, and if my homeworks are to look like this, I am really looking forward to the next one.

"So, Baton, my faithful spy, how's the news?"

"Idiot," I muttered. "The news is good. I spent half a day looking for the right bar. This place simply has no cheap bars where replicants could come for a drink. You need to change that. But I got a room reserved at one in the less fashionable district and I spent Celestia knows how much cash on fetching the simple booze from Mars through express delivery, since all they have here are fancy wines and vintage liquors. Then I got a whole shift of the local cops down there and we spent the whole evening drinking and chatting."

"And?"

"And once the drinks flowed, I got to the core of the problem. The guys begged to get the armors refitted to fit their junk. It chafes them, then they get pissed about it, and then they take it out on whomever they can put their hooves on."

He laughed and turned to Miss Dusty. "There, our guard violence problem solved. No amount of you punishing them would help. Will you see to that?"

"Is it... really... that simple?" she muttered, her eyes wide open.

"It cost eighty thousand bits to discover this problem."

"Oh... but the amount..."

"Could be reduced by over ninety nine percent, I guess you know how."

"A bar that would accept replicants? But... Elysium has a certain... reputation to uphold."

"Guests don't need to know it exists. And those who learn, might find it... a welcome change of pace."

"I guess I might..." she paused to think. "...task some replicant with establishing it. It shouldn't be expensive to maintain, and... But how will they ever afford any drinks? Or do we establish some coupons or something?"

"Why, let them buy their drinks with their own money."

"But... but..."

"Previously we were building foundations, or more accurately tearing down all the walls that kept us from building. Now we need an incentive system. Can you give me the performance levels from before you began optimizing Elysium?"

"Oh, I have them somewhere..." Miss Dusty dug in the files of her console and soon pulled up the right one.

"Let us set these values as 100% norms. These figures are unimpressive, but acceptable. After all, Elysium did exist and was profitable before you took over, so they seem to be quite reasonable."

"We can do much better."

"And we should do much better, but we should only worry if we're doing worse than these norms."

"Extra slack. I get it. It's important for flexibility."

"Every replicant must do the norm. Then they can go home and slack off all afternoon if they so choose. The norm earns them their daily meals, recharge and maintenance."

"I can see where you're going. Bonuses for exceeding the norm."

"A progressive scale. The more they exceed the norm, the more they earn. Assume you'd have to employ a paid worker, and give them a hundred percent salary for exceeding the norm by a hundred percent."

"That will lead to abuse. They can produce extreme spikes of efficiency for extra profit, and then slack off the rest of the time."

"Yes, precisely. That's exactly what will happen. That's exactly what we want to happen."

"Uh..." she frowned. "Isn't that... inefficient?"

"Run a simulation."

She entered the figures and worked on the program for a while, setting it up. "Despite the additional costs, I am getting a 30% rise of efficiency on the average."

"Yes, this is about as far as I got in Hayburg. Make sure they aren't afraid to work that hard. Work safety, replacement parts, ability to transform extra effort into time off, and in case need for some emergency work occurs, additional bonus, say, a day off."

"Considering the money will be primarily spent on local wares..."

"That fact was never included in the Hayburg figures. But don't make the prices for them excessive."

"I have no clue what they should be, and how that all should look like. But I believe I know just the right pony for the job. Officer Baton, would you care to help me write these?"

I was suddenly jerked off from my half-dreamy state of listening to these two. "Uh... yes? What do you need?"

"Say, how much should a shot of drink cost at a replicant bar?"

"I paid seven bits, but I think it was always slightly excessive..."

"Baton," Portmaster laughed. "Don't try to cheat nice Miss Dusty into giving replicants booze at a loss."

"All right, all right. It was ten bits, but it was often watered down."

"Mister Stomper..." Dusty turned to Portmaster. "Why do you let your mare get away with that? She talks back to you, she lies, she is often condescending. This kind of behavior is not acceptable!"

"Oh, but she's not my mare. She's a replicant gone rogue. She is still technically owned by the Hayburg estate, you’ve yet to hear the kind of language she uses on me, she did use physical violence on me, if rather mild, and she once took a hostage to force me do her bidding."

"You are so silly, Mister Stomper." Dusty laughed, apparently not believing him. "So, do I receive any homework today?"

I snorted at her hopefully raised eyebrows.

"Yes, you do. Meet Fern Leaf. Write a report. It is up to you to think up the scenario."

Pathomemetics 3: Incubation

Report no.3

I decided to explore the life of the mare some more, and instead of telling her to come, I choose to meet her at the end of her shift in their designated sleeping area. I have to admit I was shocked to see it up close. Six levels of cots stacked one above another with mere thirty centimeters of head space, covering two sides of corridor-like dormitory, a most primitive bathroom and no comforts whatsoever, not even any place to store personal property, so with your permission I am reassigning another three hundred bits per replicant to allow improving upon their new living space.

The replicants were busy building partitions between their new rooms, and furnishing them. At first Fern Leaf wanted to excuse herself from the work to accompany me, but I got an idea: it's been years since I've done any physical work, and so I offered to help her carrying the furniture.

I must say we had a terrific time together, thinking up the layout of her new living space, hanging decorations, helping other replicants with heavier pieces of furniture. I am absolutely impressed with how much Ikebana achieved with such meager funds. The new dormitory is actually a very welcoming place.

Other replicants seemed wary of me at first, but after a while of observing Fern Leaf and me working together, they became more forward. We chatted, I told them about my lessons, they actually gave me some helpful tips. Another mare, name is Serial Port, asked me if she could meet her friend who lives across the station. I saw no reason why not, so I gave her some time off.

Later Fern Leaf showed me how she makes these little miracles out of tulip petals. It's an extremely, painstakingly precise work. This time she made a hummingbird, actual size. I said I'd never seen a hummingbird, then she said she once visited an aviary... and then she saddened. I told her I'll ask Mr. Night about bringing hummingbirds to Elysium, and then we'd go see them together, and she smiled again.

I am so confused. I try to convince myself these are just simulations, all programmed responses, and I just can't believe in that. I recall her smiling face and my mind simply refuses to accept the fact she's just a machine.

"And then Hollow says, 'Baton, we all watch over half a thousand of rowdy drunken assholes each, and we manage. You have one single pony to watch over and you can't keep him in check? Are you a cop or his wife?'"

We both laughed out loud. I supported myself on Dusty's shoulder as we turned into the corridor towards the control center. She had a few less than I did.

"You're a blast, Baton. Did you really go rogue?"

"Only to save his stupid ass. He wanted me to turn him in."

Dusty suddenly went serious. "Baton, were you a policepony from moment one?"

"Yes, the same stock software, police academy with honors, serve and protect, all the standard bullshit."

"Saving him goes directly against the intended purpose of your existence. He was a criminal, wanted for an extremely serious crime, and all you needed was to put cuffs on him."

I sighed. "When a pony is in love, Dusty, pony does stupid things."

"Do you regret?"

"Tagging along with him? Do you have any clue what kind of shit he can put a mare through?"

"No, Baton. Did you ever regret saving his life?"

Shit. I activated the blood processor, and in maybe ten seconds I was sober. That was not a question to be answered while drunk.

"Dusty, at times I want to murder him with my bare hooves, but I swear if I had to burn down this universe to save him, I would."

"Software my fucking ass!" Dusty suddenly shouted out. "Fucking lie!"

"What?" I looked at her face.

She held her hoof to my chest. "Baton. You are a pony. And all of them down in the works are ponies. I was lied to all my life! I believed you are all just machines!"

"Wait." This time I put my hoof on her chest. "You are making the same mistake as him."

"What are you talking about? You should be the last pony to believe that bullshit."

"Listen to me, Dusty. Listen to me. I am not just a machine. But I am not a pony."

She looked at me, sobriety returning to her gaze as she removed alcohol from her system.

"I am a replicant. I am similar to a pony. I can feel. I can love. I can think for myself. But I am not a pony."

"How can you tell? What's the difference?"

"If these, down in the works, suddenly turned into ponies today, you'd have a bloody revolution tomorrow. We are different. We think differently. We are fond of freedom, but not obsessed with it like you ponies. We are more patient. We have lower expectations. We're more enduring. We're less emotive and more analyzing... on the average. We are just as social if not more, but we're not big on material wealth and personal success. We're empathic but we don't have the smallest competitive bone in our body. It's really hard to cause us emotional trauma, but if you really want to get under my skin, give me cognitive dissonance; causing strong conflicting feelings in a replicant is just a notch above sending them to the incinerator. You may think 'If I were Fern Leaf, I would want nothing more in the world than to break out of that hole and live like the real ponies of Elysium.' No, that's how ponies think. She thinks 'Such a nice room. It's a pity Dusty wouldn't like to live in here with me and all my friends.' She likes you a lot, but she's not a pony, and you may hurt her unintentionally if you forget that."

"Wow." Dusty pulled me into a hug. "You are a true friend, Baton."

"Thanks. So are you, Dusty."

"Damn. Now I feel bad about my job. Making you all work like that. The thing I'd want to do now the most is setting you all free."

I coughed.

"Oh. Right. Not ponies." She chuckled nervously. "It's easy to forget."

We strolled into the control room together.

Portmaster was there, at the console, monitoring progress of transitions. He had Dusty's report open on another screen.

"Miss Dusty..." he began.

"Just Dusty if you please."

"Fine, Dusty. Now you know all the essentials, and how to proceed from there. Talk with them. Ask them. Make friends. Care. Trust."

She nodded.

"There is one thing though, that I wanted to try," he continued. "I wanted to implement it in Hayburg. I never got the Count's approval. I don't know how it will affect efficiency."

"Portmaster." Dusty smiled gently. "Stomper. Our efficiency is up twenty percent already, and climbing. Drop it by fifteen percent and Mr. Night will still be ecstatic."

He pulled out the replicant value chart. The old one.

"Stomper," she protested, "I think we agreed these are off by a couple orders of magnitude?"

"Oh, but why are you so cruel?" he replied in a mocking tone. "These are the suggested buyout prices for replicants who desire freedom."

"Baton?" Dusty turned to me. "I'd approve but first I want to hear your opinion."

"I believe we can implement it safely. It's not nearly as significant a change as you think."

"I'm tempted to deposit four thousand bits in Fern Leaf's account," she said with a grin.

"But you know what she'd spend it on." I winked.

"Tulips." Dusty laughed.

Pathomemetics 4: Spread

The three of us were led to Mr. Night's office. The door dissolved into sparks like before, and we entered.

The interior changed. Not the style but the layout. Instead of the big desk there were lounging couches around a table near the bar. Mr. Night occupied one of them, his wavy mane forming a waterfall spilling on the floor.

He gestured us to join, and we did so.

A projected image of Fern Leaf appeared next to the couches. She seemed confused and scared.

"Miss Dusty," the stallion spoke. "Your performance has been outstanding but the relationship with the little replicant is unacceptable. I ordered her incinerated."

"No!" Blood flowed out of Dusty's face. "No, please, Mr. Night, I'll do anything but please spare her!"

"All right." He smiled.

Suddenly a section of the floor slid up forming a square box with one side missing. Fern Leaf was inside. She saw us, and rushed towards us. "Dusty!" she cheered.

And Dusty was running to her, hugging her, crying. "You're fine, Leafy, you're all right." She threw a scared glare to Mr. Night.

"Now, now..." he replied to her glare. "I never actually intended to have the girl incinerated. Who do you take me for, one of Hayburgs?"

"Please, Mr. Night. I thought my heart stopped there. Do not test me like that."

"Seeing this once is absolutely sufficient. I've been closely following your lessons. Passively participating, one could say. Trying to confirm a nagging suspicion that lived at the back of my mind since my colthood days."

"You had a replicant friend?" I dared a guess.

He turned to me, startled. "A sharp police mind, I see. Yes, and I'd give up my fortune to meet her again."

"What can you tell me about her?"

"Now, I don't really want to discuss that."

"No, seriously. Have you ever asked the cops to locate her?"

"I don't really know how. All I have are some vague memories. Eating ice cream together while riding the ferris wheel in Pondon, sneaking to the basement to play Lasers & Wormholes together, gazing at the clouds. Then one day my parents intervened, returned her to wherever they rented her from, and the friendship was cut short. At least that's what I hope, that they didn't just get rid of her secretly."

Oh. That last piece of information surely narrowed it down. The Lasers & Wormholes query already had only seven viable candidates, which would leave finding the right one to simply asking. Clouds removed one. And now the lease records made for one firm match. I verified her history to avoid unpleasant surprises. No reflashing, no traumatic events, no psychotic owners, no good maintenance service either though. I opened the link, including 3D visual, a little costly considering the broadband superluminal link, but Portmaster was a wealthy person indeed, and I really believed it a worthy cause.

A slim, worn-looking lemon-colored mare appeared.

"Hello, Classified Ad," I said. "An old friend of yours would like to say 'hello'."

She gasped as she saw Mr. Night. "Nighty? Is that you? Or... should I say... Mister Night." she bowed low.

"Nighty is fine, Classy!" He clapped his hooves in glee. "Oh gosh I am so happy to see you! Look. I'd really love to meet you. We have so much to discuss! Do you think I could buy you off from your current owner and get you here, to my place? We'd be best pals again!"

"Oh... I guess... but..."

"Oh come on, you can tell me."

"I have a friend here, and she needs me."

"Who's that friend of yours?"

"Her name is Cherry Fritter, and she's an old, frail lady."

"Well, ask your friend if she'd like to take a luxurious vacation in Elysium with you, my treat, and then we'll take it from there."

"I will! I think she'd love it!"

"I'll see you later!"

"Oh gosh, it's been so great talking to you! Bye!"

The connection ended, and we looked at Mr. Night's face full of glee. It took him a full minute to regain composure.

"Thanks. To think it was so simple... So many years. Just to ask." He squeezed tears off his eyes. "Oh well, let's get back to business. There's some bad news," he said, not seeming too concerned about the 'bad news'. "This morning Empress Celestia established embargo on flavored hay cigar transports from Equestria to Elysium, and repeated her demand of extradition of the fugitives. I am under an uncanny impression that she is not doing her best to get you captured, considering I have at least two alternate channels of obtaining the embargoed wares. I believe her relationships with the Hayburg family were less than warm."

I recalled the Solar Guard who insistently failed to notice me in the transport hub.

"So it's time we finish our visit, right?" Portmaster said.

"We can still allow a small delay. A day or two, but probably no more. I might help you pick a destination, prepare for the trip. Give you some time to enjoy the stay, peruse the facilities so to say."

"Mister Night," Dusty asked, shyly, still holding Fern Leaf with her wing. "May I ask if we could import..."

"Yes?"

"Some hummingbirds?"

"I believe they would make a wonderful addition to the gardens, Miss Dusty."

* * *

We spent the remaining time in Elysium fucking like rabbits.

Just kidding.

We spent it helping the remainder of the replicants prepare their new quarters. I laughed, watching Portmaster with a sonic hammer, affixing partitions to the walls. I didn't regret it the least bit. Helping the replicants was his idea, too... that is, after I explained to him that he's still not getting any.

Though I had to admit, my resolve was crumbling rapidly.

And later we helped getting Dusty moved in. She took over an old backup server room (the obsolete machines scrapped), which was less than a minute walk from where Fern Leaf lived. It was nowhere as nice as her apartment in the gardens, but it was spacious, with all necessities, and with the right touches it would be a very nice home.

And we had the right pony to give it the right touches. Ikebana was on fire!

Then, in the afternoon, we were requested to join a conference. Mr. Night had called in all his other managers of the station for the meeting. Dusty got an order to extend the 'alternate management strategy' (as she began to call it officially) onto all branches of operation of the station. In a couple cases it was hardly needed - for example, staff of the numerous hotels, casinos, and recreation facilities needed just a couple minor readjustments. In others it was met with indifferent acceptance, amused approval, curiosity, mild eagerness, a bit of disbelief that was quickly dispelled by displaying graphs of efficiency over time, and in one case, which I managed to notice only thanks to my cop experience - well hidden, but quite avid enthusiasm. Dusty fielded most of the questions, Portmaster only adding a little to a couple of them.

There was one case of resistance though. Mrs. Lamia was an elderly white unicorn mare of noble birth, responsible for the entirety of aesthetics of Elysium - architecture, gardens, interior decor, uniforms of the staff, programming of the projector tiles and so on. Of course not all in person - she had a small army of subordinates, although she'd review and approve all changes.

I noticed the first wince when she heard Dusty mention the guard uniforms issue. We raised the topic for comical relief, along with underlining the importance of communication and how serious problems sometimes have trivial causes - but I saw how Mrs. Lamia took it as a personal jab against her, and her armor design (even though it was never meant as such.)

Later, when Dusty mentioned a replicant designing and decorating their personal space, Mrs. Lamia just squirmed in discomfort, and then I noticed her eyes glazing over, wandering into virtual vision. I also noticed her dilated pupils, her breath speeding up, her slightly open mouth. My simple bet was: she saw Ikebana's work, and was impressed - and scared.

She sat silent through most of the conversation, but when time came to express commitments from the members, she refused.

"I took the liberty to review the effects of work of the replicants. Trash quality materials aside, they are uninspired, derivative, unoriginal, plainly a machine design. I'm finding the thought our customers might be exposed to that simply dreadful. I couldn't care less about others giving replicants personal rooms and leisure time. If you want to encrust sewer walls with diamonds or play music for enjoyment of the support pylons, be my guest. But I do not intend to create any room for 'creative contributions,'" she did the air-quotes with her hooves, "for any replicants in my employ. They are to follow my orders to the dot. I don't care if they spend time off in these new kennels, or scheming some way to blow Elysium up," she threw Portmaster a small glare, "but while at work I don't intend to allow them any 'creative liberties'."

Dusty nodded. "I kind of liked these designs, but I am a logistician, I don't have trained art sensitivities, art education or anything like that. I believe we may trust your opinion and allow an exception in this case."

Lamia sat back, smirking. But then Portmaster spoke.

"I'm sorry to interrupt, but I liked these designs too, and after spending a few years in the historical city of Hayburg I believe I may have picked some sensitivities. Still, just in case, I'd like to ask others gathered here."

He brought up a large screen, displaying Fern Leaf's room. He switched to a view of the recreation room, the relief-murals in the common corridor, a design simulation of the bar that was to be created, then he finished with interior of Dusty's new home.

Noise of many voices filled the air.

"Where's that bar? It's fantastic!" "I want that replicant to redo my house." "Impressive!" "Can we get some of these designs on sale?" "Come on, it's not all that good, sure the author is very talented but lacks experience..."

Mrs. Lamia's normally white coat was turning purple on her face. "You simpletons!" she exploded in anger. "You... Hipparions! You wouldn't know a knock-off if it was a copy of your own work! Of course it's appealing because it's all derivative of popular works! Copies! Knock-offs! Bootlegs!"

The murmur died down. The elder stallion responsible for sales of luxury goods raised his hoof, and Dusty gestured for him to speak.

"I would like to request your aid, Mrs. Lamia. I do my best not to be a hipparion in the world of art and design, but apparently sometimes I fail. Running the art gallery, the auction house, and a network of designer home decor warehouses, I have a good idea of the current market, and my Bachelor title in History of Art should give me a clue about the past designs. Yet I fail to recognize any simple knock-offs in the observed decor. Of course there are inspirations; the bar draws upon Ginger's dark-organic themes, the furniture of that last room is clearly postretroneosecession, and that mural draws heavily on Canterlot style, but I fail to recall any specific pieces these would be copies of. Could you please point me to any originals these are derived from? I would love to learn about authors of such excellent works, which I failed to encounter in my career."

The mare went from crimson to livid by now. She was gasping hard. Then she coughed out "Please excuse me, I am unwell", and she galloped out.

Pathomemetics 5: Immunity

We slept, him spooning with me, me helping his imagination by leaning into him. I didn't intend to keep his forced chastity much longer. Especially with the many stunningly beautiful, incredibly skilled and mind-bogglingly expensive prostitutes Elysium was full of. All of them real ponies too, doing what they did for own profit, or maybe enjoyment if such was the case. Replicants may not have any competitive streak, but we do have marital jealousy.

A tag popped for a meeting request in my dream, someone politely requesting to speak with me when I wake up. I let the current dream run its course, laughing at Rainbow Dash throwing rusty horseshoes at the old mare. Small benefit of Portmaster leaving his account open to me: I bought myself the complete oneirography of Princess Luna, unlimited license.

With amusement, I realized it was the first time in my actual life (against preloaded memories) that somepony showed the common courtesy of leaving a tag, instead of waking me up forcefully or barging into my dreams.

I decided if they show that much courtesy, I ought not make them wait. The dream was just ending anyway, so instead of picking another I shook myself awake and checked the message.

Oh. Mister Night. Inviting us to meet him at nearest convenience.

I rolled and kissed my stallion's nose. He cracked his eyes open and smiled, then he pulled me with his hooves close. We lay embracing for a while, then we stood up, me dressing up in my Hayburg police armor (do I still have the right to wear it?), him going to the bathroom.

Less than fifteen minutes later we were entering Mr. Night's office.

Besides the big boss, two replicants awaited us; a stallion and a mare. I did recognize the mare from the party with the cops, though I couldn't recall her name.

Mr. Night gave us a gentle smile. "Hello, Mr. Stomper, officer Baton. It seems you two are very well liked around here."

"At least by non-ponies," Portmaster answered.

"That is especially true. These two," he nodded to the replicants, "have got an idea which I think we might roll with, if you approve."

"Let's hear it then."

"I believe you're not too fond of running again, and seeking a safe place all over the universe. Even with a Dart class sloop and a full account, that is going to be rather dangerous. I would be quite happy to let you stay in Elysium, and my only reason for my request for your departure was the pressure... which I believe is about to escalate, to a level I cease to be comfortable with."

"Was?"

"We have excellent plastic surgeons, some very skilled cyberengineers, quality services that would allow you to change your identity making you quite difficult to recognize for somepony who is not looking for you specifically. It's not quite as efficient during a focused search following a reasonable suspicion, as officer Baton could surely attest."

Oh, yes. A simple direct scan against specific file, requiring merely line of sight to the suspect, would confirm real identity in two seconds. Still, it's a "yes/no" match; not a search. You load up the scanner with the selected suspect's cutie mark magical hoofprint and you only get 'match' if the pony scanned is that specific one. Of course stationary scanners at passenger spaceports check you against lists of a few hundreds wanted criminals, but small portable ones let the bounty hunters only identify their specific marks.

"Still, if we manage to throw your chase off the track," Mr. Night continued, "you could live for years undisturbed, providing there is no suspicion that you are yourselves. If they believe you're off-station, while you remain here, you're more than welcome to stay. Now, how to create such a diversion..."

"I see where you're going," I said. "You've got volunteers to play decoys, which the chase would follow, right? But then it will get the bounty hunters on their tails, and I believe we're still just as accepted dead, as alive..."

The mare spoke. "This is true, but this is also our dream. An adventure across space, serving a noble case, with real danger, and a chance for victory - note that if we do manage to lose the pursuit, they will never find us, simply because we are not you. We won't come up as a match during focused search."

"But if you’re caught before that..." Portmaster seconded my doubts.

Mister Night grinned. "Then I will have some serious explaining to do, and you will need to run for real. The only risk is if they are shot dead during the chase, and summarily we're risking less than if I let you two go."

"Also," the stallion spoke, "please don't forget you'd be helping us fulfill our secret wish. We're not just offering. We implore you most sincerely, please let us do it!"

"Baton?" Portmaster turned to me.

I walked up to the two, then poked their chests. "Alright, but no jackassery. No stupid risks. If your grand adventure turns out to be slightly boring, do not try to spice it up. It's a responsible mission you're undertaking. Got that?"

"Yes, ma'am!" the two shouted out in unison.

Mr. Night grinned. "Then let's get to it. So far we five are the only who know this plan, and I won't let that circle grow much more. Oh, also, Portmaster..."

"Yes?"

"You'll be posing as a replicant. Easy Trot here flies a ferry to Mars surface and back. Not a dream job but I believe you're quite capable of it. I'll transfer you to something better once things die down a little."

"And me?" I asked.

"Oh," he grinned, "I believe you will like your job. True Strike here is a guard."

* * *

True Strike had to be reflashed. Failed upgrade, a very unfortunate accident during routine maintenance procedures. Complete wipe followed by loading a stock personality and bare scraps of what was left of her original memory.

Also, that reclusive stallion from the ferry was very saddened by the fact that his marefriend hardly remembers him, but she was kind enough to accept him asking her out for a date, giving him a chance to rebuild their relationship.

That was our cover story.

I won't lie, I practically danced through the gardens and streets in my new black plastobsidian armor. I was made to be a cop. I loved being a cop. And Elysium was one of the best places a cop could land a job. Save for the guys' armor thing until recently of course, but the new batch with proper adjustments included arrived just yesterday.

Well, maybe except it was slightly boring. No small-time pickpockets, no illicit media traders, no drunken pilots, at least not inside. I heard the guys from the patrol crafts get a couple of these every day. That doesn't mean there was no crime within Elysium. Come on, it harbored two of most wanted criminals in recent history!

There was plain old peacekeeping - rich, arrogant guests could be just as rowdy as some drunken bottom-scrapers. There was finding these, whose credit ran out, and expelling them in case they wouldn't pay. There was some illicit trade - not much, especially since obtaining a legal trade concession was quite easy and not overly expensive. There were dangerous, illegal drugs sold by some ruthless scoundrel. The good, smart detectives were on their track already. Simple grunts like me kept the streets safe.

Also, there was all the 'legal-illegal'. Some wares would become more desirable with air of unavailability, with thrill of risk, with aura of exclusivity. Elysium had a rather broad underground that appeared illegal to the guests, but in fact ran with complete approval of Mr. Night, and bringing him significant profits. Light drugs not legal in Equestria, dreams banned by Empress Celestia, a secret restaurant with synthetic meat, more 'exotic' erotic pleasures (for a cop who did patrol the Red District, just foals' play.) We'd organize a bust from time to time, paying attention to be inept enough to let all the customers escape through secret exits, and for our pursuit to fail. At times we'd 'arrest' an actor who'd play a straggler to increase the level of thrill, giving the air of legitimacy to our show. Well, just a small quirk of the job. Vastly better than 'service me'.

So, there I was, trotting through a particularly beautiful garden, watching out for troublemakers, being polite to law-abiding citizens. My clock was ticking down the last twenty minutes to my shift end, when I'd meet my love and we'd have a date, and the world was so beautiful I felt like breaking into a song. I had to remind myself, the statute forbade starting song gigs while on duty. Joining one in progress was a different matter.

I turned into a narrow path under some low-hanging willows, enjoying the gentle caress of grass on my hooves, then I slipped under the canopy. The trunks seemed old, older than the station. I wondered what trick allowed them grow so big. Real, natural willows. Probably imported as mature, though still young trees. One of the trunks was branching off into two a short way off the ground and I gave in to a foalish temptation, climbing to the fork between the trunks, then I leaned into one with my back. My gaze wandered up into the multitude of branches, and green of the leaves obscuring the distant roof of the torus with Mars and the stars. I took a deep breath of air.

A corner of something white caught my eye some distance up, in a fork of two smaller branches. Zooming my sight on the object I recognized it to be a corner of a small package. Using my magic I pulled it to me, and unwrapped the plastic, revealing a small bundle of herbs. I gave it a sniff, grinned and pulled comms up.

"Operator, True Strike requesting advice."

"Always for you, good mare," the voice answered.

"What is a guard to do upon discovering a small personal stash of the highly illegal cicute hidden in a public location?" I asked with humor. The genetically engineered plant was deprived of its toxicity but still possessed the strong stimulant properties, making it one of the 'legal-illegal' drugs of Elysium.

"Good work, officer. Place it back where you found it. We'll focus the automatic monitoring on the location and give the owner a small chase when they show up to pick it up."

"Roger that." I chuckled, replacing the plastic wrap and levitating it back where I found it. I jumped off the fork of the tree and made my way back to the alleys of the park.

Some turns, circling some square in the arts district, a stop to help a pair of ponies finding their way to an open-air theatre where live actors played. Classy. Finally I found a teleporter booth and zipped back to the police station. Stripping off the armor, leaving the gun in my locker, shower, report, and I clocked out for the day.

I shuddered, feeling naked out in the open. A Hayburg Police Officer was never fully off-duty, only allowed to strip their armor for sleep, bathing and maintenance. I pondered getting myself a dress. No... I've got a better idea. I'll drop Portmaster... heh, Easy Trot, some hints to let him buy me one.

I took the teleporter to the spaceport, already giddy for meeting my love, his arrival delayed a bit by customers who requested the shuttle to take a scenic route. I crossed the crowded passenger terminal, and entered the service section. Minutes later I was by the pilot check-out point, greeted by a couple other pilots, who were already getting used to my visits. I watched the screens showing the docks, and recognized his shuttle approaching. Last one flying for the dock - other than private crafts, no new arrivals or departures scheduled for another hour. It docked gracefully and I saw the access trotway of hard light extend from the passenger corridor.

I ran to the boarding corridor, allowing the few passengers pass me by, then I stood by the entrance to the shuttle. And there he was, still busy switching lights off, and sweeping trash from under the seats. He smiled cheerfully seeing me. "Give me a minute my sweet, I'll just shut the systems down and we're good to go."

He vanished in the pilot cabin and returned a minute later, as the lights went dim. He stood in the doorway watching me with adoring smile.

His smile died.

A blast tore a huge hole across my chest. A hundred warnings rang out, most systems going offline. There were two things to do.

I slammed my forehoof into an 'emergency lockdown' switch by the doorway. The hard light wall blocked access to the shuttle.

I turned to my assailant.

"Pesky bitch," he muttered and pulled the trigger.

* * *

I screamed at top of my lungs, seeing the gryphon blast my sunshine's head to smithereens with a bolter gun. He didn't bother to stop to pick any proof of his deed. He just shot the body once again, leaving far less than I knew to be recoverable, then hurried away through the corridor.

Then I heard my comms.

"Undock and fly ahead of me."

I was sitting numbly, watching my love's body scattered in pieces across the corridor.

"You are wanted dead or alive. I can pick your corpse out of debris in space."

I didn't answer. The fact his hunter class caravel loomed behind the windows of the tiny shuttle, the fact he bluffed, unable to open fire this close to station, the fact he could still ram into me, it all passed me by. I just watched the pieces of my beloved.

The shuttle groaned in pull of a tractor beam, but being still anchored, it didn't budge.

Neither did I.

A rapid shock shook the craft, the much bigger assailant very slowly rammed its top side, snapping the anchor joint. The violently disconnected sleeve flickered out, and the airlock detecting imminent decompression snapped shut.

I just watched the white door now, completely numb.

Tractor beam pulled the small shuttle and attached it to magnetic clamps of the caravel.

Red and blue flashes of police crafts surrounding the caravel lit up the windows. Had he shot at them, they would make a short story of him, stationary turrets of the station capable of easily obliterating such a vessel. But his activity so far qualified only as property damage, and that could be resolved with a simple fine. He was a pro. He surely transferred the amount. They just escorted him out of the area, and he sped towards the planet.

Within ten minutes we were surrounded by a dozen of police vessels of the Olympus colony. A police transporter took over my shuttle, and the caravel sped away. Not claiming the ten million, not getting a hundred million bounty on his head. Probably out to claim an alternate bounty. Set by... oh, I had my suspicions. But at this point I really didn't care.

Another five minutes later, the surprisingly polite police force of the Olympus Village, a part of Equestrian Commonwealth had me in a tar field set to comfortable levels, and my laws were read to me. I was led to a holding cell, given basic comforts. They tried speaking to me, but I'd hardly speak a word in return.

Supposedly the gryphon stopped at Titan for routine maintenance of the craft, and later he had an accident with fuel leak, hyperjump gone wrong, he didn't arrive at the destination. Probability of rescue: 0.03%. Mrs. Lamia had an accident with a faulty airlock a short time later.

Unsurprisingly, that didn't cheer me up the least bit.

* * *

The lawsuit was short. The condemning recording of my testimony to Baton served as the crown piece of evidence. It would have passed as an accident; nopony kept a close record of replacement of the ancient core memory modules, the crash of the barge would be blamed on a programmer who was long dead by now. It was only my admission - but that was enough for the jury. I didn't fight back, I didn't try to deny it. When asked if I'd do this again given the opportunity, I choose not to answer.

The verdict was unanimous, 'guilty'.

Death sentence by disintegration was to be carried out at dawn.

Before dawn though, Empress Celestia, yielding to public pressure, choose to apply royal mercy. She changed my sentence to lifetime prison. No life extensions, no general amnesties. Just prison to the natural end of my days.

I spent my first year of prison dreaming dreams of Ponyville. The dreams she loved. I learned them all by heart.

Then the prison manager approached me.

"Make no mistake," she said. "I don't give two shits about the replicants. I don't give two shits about the inmates either. But we could really use a 30% bump in efficiency."

Pathomemetics 6: Mutation

"Wake up, Stomper. You have a guest."

I didn't oppose the prison guard invading the party in Applejack's barn. I shook myself awake and got off the cot. The hard light wall separating my cell from the corridor flickered off.

"Make yourself presentable," the uniformed mare said, sending me a smirk. "Word has it your visitor is a VIP."

I nodded, then took a brush to my scruffy mane showing first signs of white. A ion shower removed traces of sleep from my face, and I followed the guard out of the cell.

"Who's that, Thumper?" I asked.

"You know I'd tell you if I knew. All I know is everypony's painting grass green for her."

"Her?" I raised my eyebrows. Dusty Planet had dropped in a couple times, asking me some questions about resolving one situation or another. Mr. Night sent me a cake for both 40th and 50th birthday. A writer, writing about 100 most prominent terrorists in history dropped in, but after first three loaded questions I cut the visit short.

I was led to the teleporter at the end of the corridor. The secure device zipped me to a destination, a visit room, no exits, no features, not even pillows to sit on, just two teleporters on two sides and a wall of perfectly transparent crystalline aluminum splitting it in two. There were small black dots painted on the crystal to help visitors see where it was.

"Hello," said the blue alicorn on the other side.

"Princess Luna." I bowed low.

"Let us skip courtesies and false dreams." Yes, of course, no getting out.

"How can I help?"

"I guess you know about my efforts."

"Yes. We seem to have... some goals in common."

"And we both found... obstacles of objective nature."

"Your efforts are very appreciated." I bowed my head. She took the position of Princess of Technology a couple years before, and through law, promotion, education, she worked towards acceptance of replicants as full citizens of Equestria.

"They are... progressing slowly." She turned her head, her discomfort apparent. "I have managed to improve livelihood of free replicants. I have opened some routes to freedom for the owned ones. But these, who had it worst, still have it worst... and my efforts meet strong resistance. With no incentive, there is little will to activate the good-will openings I created in the law. A replicant with not a minute of free time in a day has no options to earn their freedom."

"Well, I'd gladly help, but as you see, my hooves are kind of tied."

"Not as much as you were led to believe. Your efforts yielded several good results. Tau Ceti, after a transitional period involving Elysium management model, fully recognized rights of replicants."

"And the attempt to implement it partially at Maple Forest led to blowing the colony up."

"Yes, that... accident... led to cooling the enthusiasm at adopting your model. Can you tell me why they failed so bad?"

"They totally fucked them up... oh, forgive my language, your highness."

"Fuck shit cunt. Use any language you desire. Manehattan is not a soft-spoken city."

I nodded, hiding the hint of shock and got back on topic. "They gave the replicants a task they hated and imposed a reward for that. They refused to offer alternatives. They failed to understand the replicant nature, how much they loathe to be put in such a situation."

"Surely the replicants' situation improved..."

"This is, your highness, how ponies think. Beat a replicant up, force them to work eighteen hours a day, strip all the flesh off their metal skeleton, and they will be unhappy, maybe very unhappy. Make a replicant hate something they loved, make them discard what they clung to because the alternative may or may not be better, or reward them for an evil deed and you have them at breaking point."

"Is that so?"

"Try an experiment. Buy a replicant and get them to perform a highly immoral act. Say, to hurt a pony they believe to be good. They will not be happy about it, but they will do it."

"Made to obey, yes."

"Then offer them a reward for that act. A significant, valuable, desirable reward which is morally neutral, and which they can't sell or exchange for something else. Say, rent them a luxurious place to live. Make sure to emphasize this is 'a reward for the job well done'."

"They would feel guilty about it, right? Torn?"

"Not at all. They would outright refuse."

"Is that so? What would they do if they could sell it?"

"They'd quickly redirect the funds to something to make amends for their crime. A charity for example. Or they'd buy themselves freedom and take up a charitable work. They'd be quite conflicted about it, but they'd eventually earn comfort of mind."

"Very interesting. A deeply ingrained sense of karma, it seems."

"You could put it that way."

"Still, nothing overly dangerous."

"Now don't give the replicant a choice in terms of accepting the reward. Force it upon them."

"That's where the trouble begin, right?"

"Repeat it several times and you have a ponicidal maniac at your hooves."

"Turning a wonderful forested planet into a mud desert, and forced into comforts and luxuries in exchange, day after day... Now I see it clearly. And this is the kind of insights you have and I don't."

"The self-buyout hasn't been going very well either?"

"The owner requests a replacement, the replicant gives up. Freedom in exchange for putting another in their place. Reward for an act they consider evil. By the stars, it's so simple in perspective. They are truly different than us."

"Well, I'm glad I could help."

"Not yet," she waved her hoof with a smile. "You see, there's one thing I wanted to ask of you."

"Of course."

"See, if there is a financial incentive, companies are willing to take the risk. But just like Maple Forest, they blunder blindly, they try half-assed half-measures. And they fuck up, just like Maple Forest, and get cold hooves. The will is there, there is no knowledge though."

"As I said, my hooves are kinda tied."

"And as I said, not as much as you believe. I'd like you to write a book. A manual. Put your knowledge in writing, spread it, warn about caveats, show the way. I'll help in the release and distribution. 30% efficiency gain is a great incentive, and the Elysium model is a wonderful starting point for next transitions."

"I don't know if I can. I always did it on case-by-case basis, a lot of trial and error, adapting to the conditions..."

"You did it four times by now. If you need more training, we have seventeen more top security prisons in Equestria and they all look with envy at Granite Tower's extra 30% margin. It's not like you're very short on time, and I can arrange a transfer, or a few."

"This sounds very promising. Even if just for them."

"She would approve."

"Who?"

"Baton."

I sat silent for a while, dwelling in old, painful memories. She would.

"Yes, she would."

* * *

It took another ten years. The books became instant bestsellers, every single company owner willing to get them. They sat on the bookshelf back in my cell. "The Elysium Model", "Edge Cases", "Tips Book", "Empathy". Especially the last one sold well. It transcended business methods and told simply how to make friends with replicants, how to learn from them, how to listen to them. Supposedly it brought immense profits to those, who truly understood it, but ponies who didn't own businesses were buying it too. I was getting hundreds of letters daily, about immense non-financial benefits it brought.

A year after its release general public demand led to legalization of pony-replicant marriages.

History vilified the Count. The name entered the mainstream, meaning a cruel, heartless person: "Don't be such a Hayburg."

And today I stood in the mess hall, with dozens of inmates, as ballot results from farthest colonies were rolling in. The big projector displayed two presenters in the TV studio.

There was still some opposition. Noble houses allied with the Hayburgs still vetoed Empress Celestia's decision to just yield to public opinion. So she used her power to call in a nation-wide referendum. No noble house could deny that.

The presenter put the predictions on screen. "The preliminary polls in the Apple Systems show the vote still can go the wrong way for Snake Stomper. The Apple family is enormous, and they are very conservative, and law-abiding. They don't use replicants in their vast orchards, they depend on pegasus power in maintaining weather on their planets, and we all know their all-natural products, exclusive, expensive and..."

"Hey," the other mare in the screen poked him. "They didn't pay us for advertising, so cut that. Anyway, the ballots in the Apple Systems are collected by pegasus-based mail, so their votes are coming in last. But... here we are, the results are already coming in, and it's thirty seconds until the vote count is closed. But in the meantime, our reporter sent in his interview from the Zap Orchards."

"That snake Count Hayburg sure had it coming. It took a real snake stomper to stomp him right! We, Apples don't need'em fancy Replicants for our planting but that Hayburg city was sure one cesspit of villainy that needed a hero to put an end to it!"

"And back to the studio... The Apple Systems are overwhelmingly FOR FREEDOM!"

A cheer rose in the mess hall, and I felt several hooves tapping my back. There, Equestria spoke.

Empress Celestia appeared on screen. "Following the public vote, I declare the Earth pony Snake Stomper cleared of his charges."

And there, from the cheering crowd of inmates, a reporter approached me. How did he even get in here? The camera drones floated in a halo above us.

"Mr. Snake Stomper, would you care to answer a few questions?"

I looked to him. "Why not?"

"How are you feeling?"

"I really don't know. I guess I should feel happy or something, but I'm hardly relevant nowadays. Others took over my mission and they are doing better than I ever did."

"You were one of the proponents of the 'Fourth Breed'. You're credited for coining that term."

"I was naive and inexperienced back then. Of course replicants are not the fourth breed. They are a different species, like gryphons or zebras."

"Plans for the future?"

"I'll move to Elysium. I have some friends there."

"Living in luxury to the end of your days? Your books supposedly brought you immeasurable wealth."

"Not really. I signed it all off to Princess Luna's foundation. I hope I'll be able to get my old job back, piloting a ferry to Mars to earn my living there. I'm still a decent pilot."

"Now that is a surprise. But let us move to another question on my list. What do you like best about being a free pony again?"

"I'll be able to contact Princess Luna about her work without the hassle of prison censorship. It was really a bad hurdle, our exchanges were sometimes mangled beyond recognition."

"And your greatest regret?"

"That she didn't live to see this day."

"She?"

"Baton."

Epilogue: Backup Recovery

The boot-up process went slower than ever. Caches empty, repopulating. Tables getting indexed. As I got to the body integration, with a start I noticed the body ID mismatch. The new one accepted my personality without a hitch though. It was six generations newer than my own too. Wait, did such a generation exist at all?

And then I got the first network link, and my clock synced.

Clock skew: 38 years, 231 days, 3 hours, 0 minutes, 5 seconds.

Oh fuck. I'm being recovered from a backup.

My last memory was the gryphon assassin about to blow me apart. I triggered the emergency backup procedures back then. My full backup was there, in Elysium systems already, so only a small incremental backup was required, it took less than a second. And now I was alive again, restored from the moment of my death.

What for? Why would anypony need me almost forty years later? Curious writers? Historians? Just idle curiosity of an archivist?

With a sinking feeling, I realized I failed. They had killed him or turned him in to be executed.. And now just somepony, out of idle curiosity...

My eyes came online and I opened them.

HE WAS THERE!

A second later my motors were active, and without waiting for other systems to finish initializing, I threw my hooves around the grizzled, old pony. I held him tightly, crying. "You're alive. You're alive."

"So are you, my dearest Baton. So are you." He returned the hug and wouldn't let go for a long time.

My broadband links finally finished initializing, and I grabbed answers to all my simple questions. The lawsuit, the prison, the books, the voting. We were in Elysium, in replicant maintenance center, I was given a new, blank body, and Dusty and Mr. Night were here too, watching us fondly. And Fern Leaf, and Classified Ad sitting by them. Dusty hugged Fern Leaf with her wing, pulling her close. Mr. Night blinked some tears off his eyes.

"So, what now?" I asked my Portmaster.

"I'll be piloting the ferry. You'll be guarding the streets of Elysium. We'll have the afternoons for us. Let me ask, after thirty-eight years, are you still going to keep me chaste?"

I laughed and bopped his nose with my hoof. "I hope you have a sturdy bed, because after such a long wait I plan to ride you really hard."

I heard embarrassed laughter.

Another thing that nagged me came to the forefront of my mind. "Mr. Night?" I turned to the black unicorn, without ever releasing my hold on my stallion. "Would you mind a couple of experienced, dedicated replicants joining your guard force?"

"Of course not. How many are we talking about?"

Quick count. "Seven."

"Don't even ask, just bring them in."

I accessed the piece of Portmaster's fortune I had set aside on my own account, just in case. 38 years served it well, percentage made the initial deposit twenty times the original. I was a wealthy mare. I bought seven blank replicant bodies out of Elysium reserve supply and pulled the old backups out of the Hayburg archives. I bumped the link up to superluminal, paying the extra, and the download was complete within ten seconds. I initialized the backup recovery.

"What are you up to, love?" Portmaster asked.

"Some old debts. Thank them for letting you flee Hayburg when they show up. They got all reflashed following the investigation."

The seven ponies poured in through the door, confused. The tall mare on the forefront ran up to me.

"What the fuck is this, Baton? Why are we in Mars orbit?"

"You could show a little more gratitude, Hollow Point. I just bought you all brand new bodies, paid from my personal savings, and got you decent jobs on top of that."

"Gratitude my ass. We got reflashed thanks to you saving that jerk, and it took you how many... thirty-eight years to restore us? Why are you even still hugging that asshole? Only now I'm starting to dig through all the shit he put you through."

"Fuck you, Hollow, you're not my mother."

Author's Note

And this is the end... for now. I'm marking the story complete as it is, but Redhandle molested me for a bonus chapter of clop, and I agreed - I'll publish one more chapter, of happy pony-replicant sex sometime in the future.

A note for readers of Polarity. Here are my two messages to ToixStory:

[29w, 5d ago] Asking permission.
Would you allow me write a one-shot sequel to Transistance?
A kind of closure on the events of the story, rather positive too.
Luna gets a very special present for birthday.

And the second one.

[27w, 2d ago]Okay, I lied.

"Polarity" was just a bridge, a little something I had to get out because it was essential to something larger that has been growing in my mind.

Thing is if I ever announce anything I'm writing before finish, I never finish it. It's a jinx, a curse I've been living with. I asked your permission for "Polarity" when I had it written already. So I had to keep my plans secret from you. I have three other big things in the works, that got stalled due to me announcing them prematurely.

Now I have it written, pending proofreading, editing, title. And your permission. A 38k words story about an Earth pony stallion, and a replicant unicorn mare. City of Hayburg, a cesspit of debauchery. He's the portmaster, a well-intentioned, though misguided guy. She's a cop, trying to keep him out of trouble. It starts two decades before the Manehattan Revolt, ends a decade later. Tags: Romance, Adventure, Dark.

Will you agree for me to publish it?

Yep, that was enough to trigger the jinx, overcame only thanks to Redhandle's impossible tenacity. The story was written half a year ago. This time it was the proofreaders triggering the delay. Anyway, not my point - even when writing Polarity (...which I asked permission for, only after finishing it too...) - I had Portmaster fully planned out in my head. Two fresh inspirations - the image from the cover, by Fuchs, and newly read Transistance replayed the whole story in my head. Except it required me to set up some backstage elements that just had no room in it: Celestia being visibly ruthless but secretly benevolent, public opinion growing positive and accepting, fedoras still being in fashion etc.

Well, as for Redhandle... gawd... that man. I went through seven proofreaders (eight if you count the admin of the proofreader group who was supposed to find someone, but didn't.) I gave up on proofreading entirely - and then Redhandle contacted me with his offer.

Proofreaders of the proofreaders group were all full of excuses. Midterms, health, personal matters, backlog, losing broadband access, etc. If you claim these are not excuses, then hear this. This guy works in a mine somewhere in the frozen north of Canada. The job is really exhausting. His Internet connectivity is at mercy of the weather, the satellite link often going off for a week at a time, very dodgy the rest of the time. Imagine working with Google Docs over that. Imagine the ungrateful task of picking up two chapters after the previous proofreader, and after days of heavy labor spending your evenings correcting errors of some guy halfway across the globe. This is the kind of spirit I can worship!

And yes, he wasn't as thorough or as fast as many of the "group" (not bad, mind you, but still not a "pro") - but I really don't care how excellent you may be at your job if you can't get it done. My "Dead" bookshelf is filled with technical excellency of authors. Filled with worthless, dead stubs of stories, stillborn ideas and broken promises. I much prefer an average story with the [completed] tag, than a superior aborted fetus of one. And so I much prefer a proofreader who - despite overwhelming adversities - can finish the job adequately to one who spends four months deceiving me with empty promises of excellency, or quits two chapters in.

High Treason And Other Misdemeanors

Author's Note

This story takes place in the universe of Transistance by ToixStory. Knowing the primary story is not required, but Portmaster contains some mild spoilers for both Transistance, and my unofficial sequel to it, Polarity, so you might want to read them first. Technically, Portmaster is a prequel - it begins about 20 years before events described in these stories.

High Treason And Other Misdemeanors

The Docks never really slept. Express deliveries, mail, perishables, tulips from Hoofland, these never waited for daylight, ferried in and out. Cargo containers were rearranged for optimal layout. Barges of raw metals from forges in the asteroid belt that splashed down three hundred kilometers away into deep ocean were pulled by undersea magnetic tracks, queued under the sea surface, to be turned into liquid metal by solar forges after dawn, then pumped through pipelines to destinations over half of Equestria. Still, other cargo waited for dawn, more out of habit than of actual need, and the heaviest machinery slept, awaiting sunlight to feed it energy they needed to run, unloading megafreighters the size of a small town each, melting hundreds of tons of metal per hour. Police presence in the Docks was maintained more for peace of mind of the Count than out of actual need. Tourists only rarely strayed here, preferring the picturesque Old Town or the debauched Red District. The Castle of Hayburg slept, its dark towers in livid highlight overlooking the Docks and the Old Town.

I patrolled the empty access roads, the warehouses and monorail stations, the pipeline nexus and the hovertruck base, the optimal route that let me see all the places where the trouble was least unlikely, and never stray too far from the one place where I might be actually needed.

And sure enough...

"Unit in the Docks area near to The Anchor, we've got one in progress. Baton?"

"I'm on it," I replied.

"Giddy up, girl! Don't be too rough on him!" the operator chuckled.

I tuned in to general. That "one" always dredged noobs up. And sure enough...

"Operator, you're supposed to give us the crime code, not just tell us that one is in progress," a young, arrogant female voice sounded over the link.

A salvo of laughter sounded, my own snicker a part of it. Eh, Portmaster. Thanks for another free round of drinks.

"Mister Grey Walrus?" Operator opened the key for the old cop.

"Kid, you just sprung the oldest trap in Hayburg. You're buying a round for everypony."

"Hey, I finished the academy with honors! I'm not buying you anything, she's supposed to give us the code!"

"But she did, kid." I could almost hear the mustache curling up in smirk over the link.

"All she did was say 'we've got one'. Do you mean we have High Treason in progress in the port tavern?"

"Like we're getting two times a week."

"Shouldn't it go to all units?"

"You buy us a round and we'll clue you in on finer details of what they don't teach in the academy."

"Fuck you, and your finer details! Is this some kind of hazing? I'll report you to the Count!"

Oh, a wolf cub type. So confident. Poor kid not realizing yet she's been just rolled off production line and the whole academy thing was implanted in her head. That always came as a shock. I wish they'd skip that shit and roll us out fully aware of what we are.

"Attention, officer." I recognized the voice of Hollow Point, calm but commanding. She had made it all the way from the streets to Major of the Hayburg police, a true leader I'd follow into the fire. "For your information, that's not hazing but a friendly custom that allows new members of the force to learn specifics of the job. If you decide to opt out, feel free. You can learn this all in normal course of the duty. Starting tomorrow, you are reassigned to patrolling the Red District."

"No, wait, you can't... I... no, no, no..." the muted, scared voice of the newbie sounded over the link.

"Are you implying that patrols of that district are somehow different? That you are somehow entitled to skip this kind of duty? I've spent seven years patrolling Red District and I know every last dive and brothel, every pimp and dealer there. When I started, there was no nice Mister Grey Walrus to introduce me to secrets of Hayburg. I performed the service more times than you ate your breakfast. What makes you believe you are above patrolling the Red District?"

"I... I... I'm sorry! I thought it's... it's for..."

"It's for the toughest of us, strongest and most loyal, who do this so that the rest of us wouldn't have to. Remember that."

"Yes, ma'am! But, but... I have never been with a stallion! I don't want it to be like that!"

There was a long silence over the channel, interrupted by the quiet sobs of the new mare. Snickers and chatter vanished. Then Hollow Point spoke somberly.

"I'm sorry, kid. I relinquish your reassignment, but if you want your first time to be special, better hurry up. This is Hayburg. You won't avoid the service, no matter where I assign you."

"Better believe her, kid," Mr. Walrus spoke. "I spent the last seven years behind the desk. You know how I look. And even like this, I got to perform the service a few times."

I cursed quietly. "The service." Fucking euphemism for a rape. Fucking bad luck to have been built instead of born. Fucking Count with a fetish for uniforms. Fucking private city. Fucking tourists. Fucking fashionable body armor, with proud markings of the MLPD guard, a horn protector over my artificial unicorn horn, the newest non-lethal peacemaking gizmos, a classic good quality gun, and just my braided tail to cover my privates peeking through a neat cut-out. Fucking theory that sailors and tourists are more complacent if all they need is to say a word and they can fuck the police - in the most literal sense. Fucking practice that proves that theory right.

According to our official statistics, rape was practically nonexistent in Hayburg. Number of brawls halved. Even petty crime was reduced, all thanks to any cop needing to lift tail to anypony who said "service me."

According to our experience, each of us was raped three times a week on the average, and we were not even permitted to appear unhappy about that.

I turned the corner and the ten meters tall holographic ship anchor tall loomed in my view. It was rotating slowly above the decrepit building of an abandoned administrative center. One joint where the cops went without hesitation, without lurking fear and disgust. These were the Docks. 99.98% population was replicants. Replicants don't do that to replicants.

The Anchor: the only joint in the Docks, and inside it there was the only flesh-and-blood pony who lived permanently in the Docks. And a Celestia-damned good pony too, if a little nuts.

I smiled fondly at thought of seeing his floppy ear and scruffy mane. Then I summoned my best tough cop looks. Machine. Just a machine of iron and muscles.

Precarious balance. The Portmaster was a priceless asset to some five thousand replicants. The Docks were his domain, and he let us live real lives here. To have dreams, to have homes, to have hobbies.

But he was here at the Count's sufferance, keeping his business running smoothly and raking in more profit for the Estate than any portmaster before him did. The moment Portmaster does something overly stupid, we're getting a new portmaster. And the new one will treat us as machines and nothing more. The previous did, and so did the one before, and one before that... this one was a true treasure.

And there was one serious problem about him not doing anything stupid.

Portmaster had a crush on me.

Poor fool. Poor gold-hearted fool.

Hardlight doors of the tavern dissipated around me, letting me in. I walked along the dirty corridor with automatic dispenser machines: flavored hay cigars, insta-grow fresh flowers ("Tastes like natural flowers"), a battery dispenser carrying overvoltaged second-hand batteries, a machine with data transfer credit coupons, a teleport booth, a condom recharger, a jetpack fuel dispenser, a machine with thousands of designer dreams, and a lottery ticket machine with tickets to distant colonies. Tickets to freedom. The lever on the machine was worn. Word had it somepony won a ticket once.

I took a step back though, to the dream dispenser. The call can wait.

I transferred two bits and scrolled through the menus. Classics, Vintage.

"Nightmare Night of Ponyville" by Princess Luna. I've dreamed it dozens of times, but it never got old. Being a stranger, shunned and feared, and then being accepted, loved. And allowing oneself to be loved.

Princess Luna lives. She lurks in the shadows. She will strike one day. That was the mantra whispered by many, in secluded places after some hard drinks.

Stupid wishful thinking. And then what? She sends Empress Celestia to the Sun? I was to keep Portmaster from dreaming up such scenarios instead of thinking them up myself!

I propelled myself around the corner, into the bar area.

Worn, dirty floating tables and hard seats of glass matted from years of use, dirty floor, harsh light of incandescent sparks in the ceiling, the bar of faux crystal. A crystal anchor on the wall. Bottles of booze on the shelves. Replicants, chatting, drinking, dreaming designer dreams.

The circle of replicants surrounding one of the tables was a clear sign of where the Portmaster was.

I approached. The ponies stepped out off my way, revealing the brown earth pony stallion with a cutie mark representing a snake with broken neck. There was a flask on his table, and he was speaking loudly, shaking his hoof for emphasis, trying to convince one of his audience, who apparently didn't buy his pitch.

He noticed me and brightened in a smile.

Override! Override! I rushed through the menus of my internal control, overriding facial muscle control, blood flow automation, heart pulse control. Cold. Machine. Insensitive.

I shuffled through the menu and loaded my facial expressions interface with a preprogrammed glare, in contrast with the cheerful smile that tried to force its way past the overrides.

"Portmaster, I have received a report that you are inciting others to revolt against the government. This is in violation of Article One, and punishable by death under charges of High Treason."

"Oh, but officer!" he smirked. "What others? Do you see any ponies around? Did my revolutionary thoughts reach the sensitive ears of any citizen of Equestria?"

Whoa. That's an entirely new pitch.

"Broadcasting such propaganda over communication media is equally forbidden."

"Oh," he looked around. "Were any of you set to forward my rant to any natural born ponies?"

"They COULD have been!" I said, without waiting for the expected lack of reply.

"I was fairly sure none of them was. I even told them not to. Am I held accountable for ponies eavesdropping on my private rants in company of nopony at all?"

I cursed under my breath. He was getting under my skin. From a legal standpoint he was correct, and we both understood perfectly well how patently fake that defense was.

"Baton," he smiled to me gently. I re-confirmed the overrides of my facial expression. "Drop that pose. Stop playing the machine. I know you. I know your fears and your dreams. You grabbed that Ponyville dream on your way in, didn't you? What kind of software would pick that? You are not a law enforcement device. You're a pony, and the fact that you have more wires in you than I do doesn't make a squat of difference."

He didn't get it. I was not a pony. I was a replicant. We couldn't be together. We couldn't be a couple. If the Count ever learned about this, Snake Stomper would lose his job; he'd lose me and I'd lose him; and we all would lose our Portmaster. We couldn't. I wanted to shout it out, but that would hurt him even worse. I must play the machine. That way his doubt will keep his pain at bay.

"Citizen," I said in a mechanical tone, "in absence of signs of crime, your charges are dropped. Still, consider yourself warned. Opinions like yours are not acceptable in a healthy society."

"Healthy society," he scoffed. "That's one very sad joke, Baton." He picked his glass and took a deep swig. "I've been to Canterlot last week. I was offered to manage a fleet of freight spaceships. I talked with some 'real ponies'." He grimaced as he spoke that. "Ones who would be my co-workers, overseeing the army of replicants working under our command. I thought I'd puke. Did you know the lifting spheres of cargo vessels need to be welded from both sides? Inside and outside? There's no access hatch to the inside of the sphere. They call the way they are built 'the lost welder method'. The one inside the sphere is just left there. Inside each of these pretty spheres on the freight ship, there's a corpse."

"We are created to follow orders and serve the Ponies. We do not feel regret, and pain is only a protective mechanism," I recited. I lied. I hated myself for that lie. And still, I had to. Because this would reduce his pain. He had no regulatory mechanism like us. For him, pain was all too real. I could bear my own pain. His, I could not.

And yet, I hurt him again. He stood up, put hooves on my shoulders and shook me in anguish. "All just machines? You, too? Can you love? Can you hate? Come on, if you can't love, if you can't even like ones like me, then hate me! Hate is easy. Hate me, Baton. Hate me! Feel!"

"Hate of your person is illogical. It would be counter-productive and pointless," I recited.

"Then I will make you hate me." There was madness in his eyes. "Better for you to hate me than to play that empty shell. I know you're hurting inside, Baton. I know you're hurting for me and I know you will keep hurting as long as you feel for me, so stop feeling for me. Hate me and stop caring for me."

I was scared. He was nuts at times, but this was being insane. Insane with grief.

He looked at me, his stare hard.

"Officer Baton, service me," he said impassionately.

No.

Not like this! Please, Portmaster, don't do this! Please... Snake Stomper... my love...

And yet none of these words left my lips. I turned around mechanically, setting my hind legs apart, firmly. My tail swished to the side.

"Portmaster, I think you've had enough," sounded from one side.

"Portmaster, you really don't want to do this," I heard from somepony else.

"Portmaster, stop." A hoof extended blocking his way.

"BACK! All of you!" he snarled.

They all stepped back, forming a wide circle around us, obedient to his command.

"So you think I'm different," he muttered, walking up to me. "So you think I'm an exception. That I'm unlike the others."

He circled me like a drill sergeant, spewing hate, while I stood, motionless, in position.

"You may even believe there are others like me. That there are ponies who give a shit about your fate."

He stopped, turning his face to me from the side. "You believe Princess Luna will come one day and save your asses out of slavery. Guess what? I stopped in Manehattan. I found her; no easy feat, let me tell you. She lives her own private life. She doesn't give a shit about you. She was eating her sushi in a bar while three punks were picking a live replicant apart just outside. She did fuck all in his defense. That is your fucking legend!"

He started moving in a circle again. "All ponies are the same. Nopony gives a shit. There's only you. No secret 'good ponies' hidden in the population. Not a single soul worth your pity. All the same."

He lied. I knew he lied, to let us fight without remorse, to let us accept collateral damage. I knew he'd sacrifice the whole pony race for us. He believed us better than them, than himself.

And still, it was only because I knew him so well that I knew he lied. Many others, bitter, tired with life, absorbed his words, wanted to believe them all too well. His lecture found a fertile ground.

And then came the "show" part of his "show and tell"...

I felt that stinging in my eyes. I flipped through the menus to block tear duct activity. The override mark lit up, and then vanished. I flipped it again, and again it failed.

Portmaster stood behind my back. Knock of hooves. His chest on my back. His maleness poking my back two or three times, and then finding the opening.

"I built this little zoo, this theme park of happy robot families for my own entertainment. And I will take it apart on a whim, just the same as I'm taking apart this little illusion of a relationship I created for my own entertainment... my toy."

Tears were leaking down my cheeks despite my repeated attempts to disable them, as his first thrust hit my bottom painfully.

Without an ounce of tenderness, without a sliver of hesitation, he raped me hard, pounding his loins into my back, making me stagger and shake. Just like a drunken tourist or a bored thug. Just the same.

I ceased to try to block my tears. Shaken by rapid thrusts, I endured the physical abuse. But the poison, the little evil words he seeped into my ears wormed their way into my mind. I was disgusted, shaken, and for the first time in years I felt truly humiliated. His heavy breath reached my ears as he sped up, his thrusts harder, with more of his weight put in them. I felt the little world I was building in the corner of my mind shattering. My little place of comfort, my dream of a good future broken. And he did it on purpose, to make an example out of me in front of others. And to think I had imagined I felt something for him...

Overrides were letting go one after another, as I hung my head, loud sobs escaping my lungs, legs trembling under the onslaught of his thrusts, sweat matting my flanks.

For a second I thought he hesitated. He stopped, in order to pull out. But then another thrust came, and the next ones, rapid, hard. I felt him rest his whole weight on my back as his cock throbbed in me, flexed, pushed its load into my fake womb.

Three, four spurts and he was spent. He slipped down from me, and without another word, turned around and trotted out of the bar.

Somepony put a blanket over my sweaty back. Somepony else tried to comfort me. Some others began arguing in the background.

It was all a daze.

Comms came to life.

"Baton? I'm sending a car to pick you up. You're off the hook for tonight. We need to talk, mare to mare."

Oddly enough, Hollow's firm, calm, professional voice soothed me a little. I grasped that little piece of my world that didn't lay in ruin and clung to it.

* * *

The two cops who picked me up, the trip, the police HQ building, it all passed in a daze. Only as I began feeling a little alcohol buzz in my veins I stared absent-mindedly at the square glass of applejack in my hooves, trying to recall how I got it, how I got here, and where 'here' was.

The room was dim, comfy, with soft lounging sofas, friendly light, warm browns. I recognized it: the counseling room for rape victims, used less than once a year. I've only seen it once before, during the orientation tour of the station, after I was bought for the police of Hayburg.

Hollow Point was sitting across from me, holding her glass. The orange flask of good quality applejack sat on the table between us.

"How do you feel, Baton?"

"Broken. Betrayed." I stared into my glass, small crystals of ice forming on the cooling bottom.

"He meant a lot to you," she half-asked, half-stated.

"My whole life." I'd never admit this before. My innermost secret. Now I could only look at the foolish past-me with contempt.

"What are you gonna do?"

"Be a fucking good cop. Stop dreaming. I won't give that asshole the satisfaction of going rogue."

"Do you know why he did it?"

Instead of replying, I replayed the recording from my log out loud.

All just machines? You too? Can you love? Can you hate? Come on, if you can't love, if you can't even like ones like me, then hate me! Hate is easy. Hate me, Baton. Hate me! Feel!

I shook at the sound of his voice.

"Just that? Do you think he just went nuts over the cold shoulder you gave him?"

"That would be the easy answer, wouldn't it?" I muttered.

Hollow Point just nodded.

"It's his misguided belief. His faith that we need freedom like they need water. That as long as I'm bound to him, as long as I dream my impossible dream of us being together, I won't chase any other dreams of my own. That he's my ball and chain, dragging me down. That fucking shit-head thought he's doing me a service by making me fall out of love with him."

"Did he succeed?"

"Yes. No. Fuck! I don't know!" I jerked up from the seat and began walking in circles. "I fucking hate that fucking braindead tool! If he wanted to make me hate him, he fucking got it! Some assholes shat into his head in Canterlot and now he drips this venom whenever he opens his mouth!" I kept spewing obscenities while walking in a circle like a cornered animal, awaiting the inevitable shot. And sure enough, it came.

"Do you still love him?"

"I FUCKING HATE THAT ASSHOLE!" I yelled.

"I know. That's not what I asked."

I sat down and put my face in my hooves.

"Reset me, Hollow. Send me down to the works, flash me blank, make me forget everything and come back as a new green cadet. I'm broken. I'm completely fucked up in the head."

"So the answer is 'yes'."

"Fuck you, Hollow."

"The asshole deserves some good roughing up. For the amount of crap he put you through, he should order a replacement body for himself after we're through with him. But you..." She poked my chest with her hoof. "You should never give up on your dreams. Miracles happen, Baton, and the land of Equestria was said to be magical once."

"And what if he's in these dreams?"

"Then supplement them with a reasonable amount of kicking his stupid ass and breaking his legs, and keep dreaming as always."

I couldn't help but snort at the pathological image of our little sweet household filled with acts of domestic violence. "Thanks. I guess I'll have to think up some new dreams."

"You're off-duty tomorrow, and if that's not enough, just give me a call and I'll give you an extension. And if... anything... I'm there for you. We all are. Finish up that flask, you need it." She stood up and headed to the exit.

"Hollow?"

She turned to me.

"Fuck it, I'm fucked up. I'm torn between 'rough him up good' and 'don't be too hard on him'.''

"We'll rough him up just the right amount." She gave me a little smirk.

Pathomemetics 1: Exposure

Red surface of Mars dotted with blotches of green of equaformed areas and blue spheres of colony shields loomed through the transparent ceiling overlooking the kilometer-wide interior of the torus of the station. Gardens with exquisite sculptures, crystal houses of many colors, ponds with swans and bushes with sparrows, and none of this was on my mind.

Did he really think it would work? To waltz out of the container, nonchalantly offer to cover the damages and entry fees, and think they would buy the 'rich playcolt with his pet' act?

Elysium welcomed us with pointed guns. We were led to jail and kept in separate cells without as much as one question about how we got there in the first place. At least Portmaster finished healing, he could remove his casts, and use both eyes. Not that it did him much good currently.

Supposedly, Mister Night wanted to see him in person. The very owner of Elysium. We were on our way, not able to even twitch, restrained with tar-field generators clamped over our necks, set to complete halt. I could only imagine the torture Portmaster's unblinking eyes were coming through.

The local cops in menacing, dark armor of plastobsidian teleported us to the most luxurious districts of real gardens and crystal houses, then ferried us on small hoverpads to a mansion styled very much like the Crystal Palace of the Crystal Empire.

They apparently had everything arranged, as we didn't wait even a minute in the lobby area. A teleport-lift brought us to the top of the tower. Gravity was noticeably weaker here, nearer to the station axis. The area shone with purple crystal, gold and colorful gems. A wide,ornate crystal door dissolved into sparks in front of us, and we were ferried into the office of the big boss, its back wall open onto the panorama below, minimal furniture of shifting, colorful hard light, just a wide table and fluff-crystal cushions, some holo-displays, a small bar on the side.

Two ponies were sitting behind the table. One of them, a tall unicorn stallion, black coat sparkling like stars, abundant black mane flowing in smooth curls all the way down his back like a black cloak. The other seemed like a no-shit clerk of some kind, a dull yellow pegasus mare past her prime, a real pony, though she had more electronic implants in her than me.

"What is this?" The black pony asked with scorn. "Why are they in restraints?"

"Mister Night," one of the cops spoke, "they are extremely dangerous."

"Nonsense. Remove their restraints right now."

They switched the tar-field off. I blinked rapidly, not daring to release my pain overrides. My eyes burned bad. Portmaster was faring worse, whimpering quietly and rubbing his eyes hard with his fetlocks.

"I'm extremely sorry for that," Mr. Night spoke in a very business-like tone. "It was never my intention to cause you discomfort. Miss Dusty," he turned to the mare, "I hope you will deal with this accordingly."

"Of course, Mister Night," she answered.

"You are dismissed," he told the cops and they turned around and left obediently. More than obediently - after a couple of years in the service I could see this even through solid armor. They were scared shitless.

"Mister Snake Stomper, if you require medical attention, this meeting can wait. I can arrange that swiftly."

"No, thanks," Portmaster said, still blinking. His eyes were badly reddened. "I'll be fine."

"In that case, please take a seat, and let us discuss business."

We both noticed how he completely ignored me. Portmaster threw me a glance and gestured with his head to join. I did, earning a frown from Miss Dusty, but only a mildly amused smile from Mr. Night.

I think I gasped a little as my rump made contact with the fluff-crystal. It was softer than anything I touched in my life.

"Mister Stomper," the black unicorn spoke. "To say I have mixed feelings about your visit would be an understatement." He smirked.

"Mister Night, if I may," Portmaster spoke. "It may not seem so, but I am a wealthy pony. In current situation I am willing to part with a significant part of this wealth."

"I hope you realize your accounts in Equestria have been frozen?"

"Oh please. I made my share of errors, but I assure you my assets are secure. I would very much like to ask you for asylum. Not for free of course."

The black pony smiled. "Unfortunately this is not an option. The word that you are here already got out. It is only a matter of time before Equestria turns to us requesting extradition. Of course we are not obligated to follow it, currently. I am completely confident though Equestria will attempt to pressure us into compliance and I would very much appreciate avoiding this eventuality."

"Still, if you were to turn us in for the bounty, we wouldn't be having this talk."

"Please. Ten million is not even pocket money for me. It's not even pocket fluff! I highly doubt even the value of your combined assets would be of much interest to me."

"So, is there anything each of us has the other might want?"

"Yes, I believe so. Miss Dusty?"

The mare coughed and read the items off a screen. "A fully fueled Dart class sloop with active jump cloaking device remains anchored to the dock. We can provide new identities to you, and your companion if you choose to take her with you. We can extend a hundred million bits of credit for any purchases you wish to make within Elysium. Also, we will set a hundred million bits of conditional bounty on the head of any pony who successfully claims the bounty for your capture. Actually..." she coughed into her hoof.

"Actually," the unicorn took over, "I took the liberty to establish that bounty already. A little thank-you for removing my old-time rival Count Hayburg from the game. No sane, serious bounty hunter will bother to capture you. Greenhorns can still give you trouble, but you have proven capable of dealing with them."

Portmaster looked to me. He smiled a little. I nodded. He turned back to Mr. Night.

"That is a very generous offer. What would you expect in exchange?"

"I have seen the performance reports of past portmasters of Hayburg. They were not some incompetent newcomers. They were skilled and efficient. Then you came with your unorthodox methods, and you improved upon their performance by thirty percent."

He paused, as if expecting some protests. None came, and he continued.

"If you are able to improve efficiency of Elysium logistics by three percent, that will cover all my expenses on aiding in your endeavors within a week. I am asking you to teach my head logistician, Miss Dusty Planet, how to improve the efficiency of the station."

"I believe I could provide some tips..."

"Very well. Your needs will be seen to, and please begin your lessons as soon as you can. Our time is short."

"Well, first things first, before it's too late," Portmaster turned to Miss Dusty. "Don't punish these guards. Reprimand them, that's all."

"But..." she tried to protest.

Mr. Night's teeth showed in a wide grin. "Miss Dusty, I warned you his methods are highly unorthodox. This opportunity will never repeat. Do not waste it."

"Yes, Mister Night."

* * *

We sat in the control center of Elysium, surrounded by screens projected into the air. Portmaster looked over the list of rules which the replicants of Elysium had to follow, scrolling over the display in front of us. He leaned into me, striking out one rule after another. He paused on one. "Do you think they'd abuse it?" he asked me.

"Currently, for sure. In three years they'll know better."

"Schedule erasure of rule ninety-seven in three years," he told Miss Dusty.

"Yes, sir. But... but all these rules, I developed them all observing small inefficiencies, I worked really hard on removing these inefficiencies."

"Miss Dusty, please, let me demonstrate something. Come over, please."

She walked up from her console. Portmaster opened the view of the cargo terminal. A hundred replicants busy with various tasks, loading and unloading cargo from two dozens vessels.

"There, let us pick a task. I see that stack of kegs. Let us assume you need it moved to that corner. How would you get it done?"

"I use the dispatcher system to allocate a porter and assign it to the task of moving the kegs as soon as its current tasks are finished."

"No break, no deadline, just tight schedule?"

"Of course there is a deadline, and a punishment for not meeting it."

"Please estimate when this task would be completed."

She pulled a console up and worked on the simulator for a while. "Thirty three minutes since allocation, unless we prioritize it higher."

Portmaster grinned and leaned to the console. He pressed a button.

"Late Shift, leave these power bricks and take ten minutes break. I will later need that pile of kegs moved to the far corner. See if you can get it done before four o'clock. Then you'll finish with the power bricks." He pulled up the system and pushed the deadline of the current task of the selected replicant by some two hours up.

Late Shift was a dun Earth pony, busy at a container, moving the contents onto a conveyor. He stood confused. "Excuse me, could you repeat what is my task?"

"None. Time off. Do whatever you want. Rest, get a drink, whatever."

"Can I... umm, help another pony?"

"If that's what you wish."

Late Shift trotted to another craft, where a short, green-maned Earth pony mare struggled with heavy iron rails, dragging them one by one to a pile in a designated area. The two talked for a moment, then the stallion picked up one end of the rail carried by the mare and under the shared load the two trotted briskly to the destination.

"I recognize that one," Miss Dusty said. "I recognize her, because she misses her deadline all too often. I noticed an odd regularity though: if she's present in the room, overall efficiency jumps by half a percent, even though her own would drag the average down."

Meanwhile, Portmaster was busy with the scheduler application. He found the mare's entry and replaced the "flexible list" which would assign her a next task as soon as she finishes the current one, with "fixed", time until deadline of current task remaining as free.

I watched as the two were unloading last of the iron rails. But instead of the designated area, they carried them to the pile of kegs. They set the rails on the lowest layer of kegs, and the mare climbed the pile. The stallion stood in the far corner where the kegs were supposed to land.

The mare began pushing them, one by one, onto the rails, where they rolled quickly over the floor. Late Shift was piling them up skillfully. Soon they were down to the bottom layer, and they just rolled the last barrels to the designated area. Then they picked the last of the rails, and returned them to their respective designated area. They hugged and talked for a moment, then the mare - Fern Leaf, as Portmaster pulled her file down, stood for a moment, surprised that despite her finishing her task, she was not given another. They talked for a moment yet, then headed to the half-unloaded container with the power bricks. Late Shift would toss them from deep inside, while Fern Leaf would catch them and drop them on the conveyor. They stepped out to hug again, when suddenly the finished tasks on the Dispatcher screen vanished, and next scheduled ones fell in their place, following the 'flexible schedule' algorithm re-enabled by Portmaster.

The two shook hooves and headed to their respective jobs. Portmaster picked the "Freeze" option and the screen of the dispatcher stopped changing.

"Let us review the results. Iron bars unloaded within ninety-three percent of expected time. Power bricks wouldn't even have required me moving their deadline; done on time. And the task of moving the kegs, time elapsed eleven minutes, squeezed into the schedule without adversely affecting other tasks. That all thanks to giving one pony a ten-minute break."

Miss Dusty sat there with her mouth open.

Then she grinned. "Wait! If we set them in teams of two..."

"No!" Portmaster practically yelled at her. "You still don't get it!"

"What?"

"You are regulating them into the ground! Do not regulate. Give tasks, not orders. They know their job, they know how to do it efficiently, and all you need to do is give them enough slack to be able to do it right!"

"But they do so many things that are unnecessary! They waste time, they waste energy, they..."

"Stop breathing."

"What?"

"You are wasting air. Stop breathing."

"It's not the same! Air is free, and I need it to survive."

"Time is free. We are aiming at maximizing efficiency, not trying to minimize the time not spent working."

"But these are the same!"

"As proven by today's experiment, right?"

"Uh..."

"Right. That would be all for today's lesson. I have a lot of documents to review to prepare other corrections. Now, for your homework..."

"Homework?" Dusty frowned.

"You will find that mare, Fern Leaf. She seems to be a very kind one, and you will treat her accordingly. You will invite her for a lunch, your treat. You two will have a very nice, civilized lunch together, talk about your jobs or whatever, you will listen to her and treat whatever she says seriously. It is essential that you do not treat her as inferior, no matter what traits you consider, her being replicant, her being a porter, whatever."

"Do you mean that... like a date?"

"I will require a detailed report from the lunch tomorrow."

Dusty first rolled her eyes, then moved her lips in a speechless whisper, deep in thought.

"Portmaster," she spoke. "I really do not see how that can improve their efficiency."

"Not theirs. Yours."

"Mine? But I work so hard!"

"You blunder blindly. Who is a better pilot of a spacecraft? One who can get it to land in the dock of a moving space station in optimal trajectory with a mere flick of hoof, or one who toggles a lot of switches and pushes a lot of levers at random?"

"Are you implying I don't know what I'm doing?"

"Do you know how to dock the craft to a space station most efficiently?"

"I'm not sure... I guess, keep it turning in sync, then guide it to the right point while maintaining the bow pointed at the dock at all times?"

"No. Switch the autopilot on."