Meaningless Murder Pony Portal Pals

Consciousness. Such a wonderful thing, to be aware, to sense and understand. The fuzzy line between my dreams and reality washed away and the back of my eyelids greeted me as the first sense in my body.

The cold, stale air told me that I was laying exactly where I had fallen asleep, in the swivel chair deep underground. The whir of fan blades and the hum of electronics indicated that the facility was still operational.

Reaching out with my mind, I felt twenty ponies in the same room, ten to either side. Thousands more were in the greater vicinity, a mix of the three tribes. It was exactly as I had left it, and I could only assume that H.A.R.M. had been in continuous operation for as long as I had been sleeping.

A chirp sounded out from somewhere to my left. I heard the technician silence the alert and immediately begin to assess the situation. She cursed, and punching into her keyboard with it's usual clicks and clacks.

I opened my eyes. The bunker was dimly lit by the rows of blue screen terminals, each with their dedicated technician. Many were engaged with their terminals, reading down the reports streaming on from across the world. The agitated terminal was, however, a bright crimson, something the panicked tech was hastily trying to rectify.

I uncurled from the chair I had been sitting in, my joints popping as I stretched. All the techs stiffened as they heard me do so, trying their best to appear occupied. The metal floor of the bunked was cool against my hooves; I had been a while since I last moved.

The tech, noticing my approach, let out a fearful squeak. The terminal was still red, streaming lines of data demanding the attention of a pony of authority.

“What is this?” I questioned. The croak of my voice shocked me. These lips had not formed words in years.

“Sentinel!” She squeaked. “It is a tremendous honor to-”

“What is this?” I repeated, pointing to the terminal. I could hear what she had to say later.

A hiss of air, and the door at the end of the room opened. A pegasus in a long grey coat rushed in. He was raspberry red, with a long burgundy mane. He came within a pony's length, and bowed deeply.

“Sentinel, I never imagined that I would have the honor in my lifetime.” He said. “Allow me to welcome you back to Equestria.”

I could not guess what kind of legend had grown around me in the time I had slept, but it was vital to cut off any indication that I would be receptive to worship. However, I should not be rude.

“You are allowed.” I said. “Now, what is this?”

The tech was glancing between the general and me, confused. A harsh glance from the general sent him back to tending the terminal.

“Sentinel, did any of the watchers speak to you?” The general asked. “They are bound by duty to never stray from their task. If one is found lacking, they will be expelled from our-”

“Who are you?” I interrupted. “And who do you think I am?”

The general seemed to reassess his surroundings. Several of the techs stole glances us.

“I am Commandant Xill, ranking officer at H.A.R.M. I have led the ponies here for six years, since my father's death.” He said. “You are the eternal Sentinel of H.A.R.M, and the avatar of the Maneframe.”

“No, I am not. I am Twilight Sparkle.” I said. “And I want to know what this device is indicating.”

Xill's confusion was written on his face. “Twilight Sparkle? We have not heard of her. You... You are the Sentinel. You have been the Sentinel for countless generation. The Maneframe speaks through your body.”

Not today, she doesn’t.

“Sentinel was not an empty husk.” I said. “This body had life before the Maneframe. Now, Commandant Xill, tell me about this alert.”

I’m sure Xill would have found it more convenient to treat me like a particularly lively marionette doll, but I would not be deflected so easily. Weakly he looked at the terminal. “It's a warp signature. We receive them every time one of our asteroid miners return.”

“Why would something so mundane wake me up?” I asked. “Investigate further.”

“Yes, Sentinal.” Xill said. He reached into one of the pockets of his coat and pulled out a metallic cylinder and began fiddling with it. After a moment, the crimson terminal turned to the blue of all the others.

“Analysis will be examining the data immediately.” Xill assured me.

The name of Sentinel had a lot of authority around here, but I shouldn’t be content to wield her like a writ. I needed to see somepony who knew the details of this persona.

“Good, now take me to Maneframe.”

“Perhaps you would like to be show to your quarters first.” Xill said.

“I know where my executive quarters are. I lived here long before you did.” I snorted.

“Ah, yes, but…” Xill cleared his throat. “The executive quarters were commandeered, long ago.

I couldn’t expect him to know what had happened to my belongings afterwards. Some of it was in storage, but the stuff in my room had likely been distributed among other VIPs.

“Lead the way.” I said.

Nodding he turned and trotted out of the lab. It seemed based on how Xill had acted, the mundane task of watching the incoming reports from H.A.R.M.’s satellites had taken on an oddly religious aspect. Hopefully not everything here was so devolved.

-

The milky white metal of H.A.R.M.’s hallways were just as bright as the day they were installed. I had to admit, whatever dogma these ponies followed made for a very clean home.

H.A.R.M.’s layout was, if I may take a moment to brag, an inspired piece of art. Imagine a beehive, with the planes of each hex filling snugly against all the others. Imagine that beehive projected against a cross-section of the planet’s crust, with a wandering sequence of hex’s being the internal structures of the base. Imagine that in three dimensions, with every prime icosahedral core being connected to the surface by air shafts and a hanger silo. That was H.A.R.M, and underground pony hive as far from the surface as Canterlot was far from Manehattan.

Xill and I crossed up from the lab structure to a habitation structure. The ceiling lights above us splayed our shadows out on the floor and walls. I saw no ponies, and I speculated that it was sleeping hours here. I would have suspected it abandoned, but I felt the press of consciousness in the rooms around me.

Xill stopped and waved a hoof in front of one of the doors. It slid open with the hiss of compressed air. He stood aside while I entered. The lights snapped on as I trotted in, revealing utilitarian furnishing and unfamiliar art side by side. It seemed the ponies here had been making modifications to my aesthetic dictates.

As I passed futhor inside, my eyes witness a brief flash of purple. I turned to face it, and my first, uncomprehending thought was that somepony had assembled a skeleton in a connecting room. But it was a mirror, and what I was seeing was too horrible to be possible.

I looked like I had been weaved out of animated yarn, my every patch of fur rippling unnaturally. Purple skin was pulled tight over bone with no sign of muscle or fat. My feathers and hooves looked as if they were about to crumble into dust, so aged and cracked were they. I could not even see my eyes for the shadow of my overgrown mane. Two black sockets stared back at me, unblinkingly. I looked like a litch, an abomination which shouldn’t have existed.

I deflected my gaze, but a glance at my hooves corroborated the mirror. By body was mummified in appearance. My sleep had been anything but rejuvenating. I had atrophies horribly over the years. How I could move, or even live at all was mystery beyond any that could be comprehended.

“Somepony tried to tan my hide while it was still on my bones.” I said to Xill. I could handle this shock, and I tired to cope with humor.

He did not respond immediately, letting me look myself over in silence.

I sighed. “Well, I reached my target weight.”

“You look good for a mare a thousand years old.” Xill said.

I doubted that it had been that long, but I accepted the minor flattery.

“Thank you for the room, but I really should see Maneframe now.” I said.

Xill agreed, and led me back into the hall. “Your biometrics will be programed into the room’s system.” He noted as we trotted back downwards through the halls.

Half an hour of silent walking later, we reached a threshold, protected by a set of thick metal doors. These doors had not been here in my original design.

Xill stopped short. “This is as far as I will take you, Sentinal.”

“Why is that?” I asked.

“Maneframe is very… Shall I say reclusive?” Xill tapped a hoof. “If she opens that door for you, it will be for you alone.”

Only Maneframe can open this door? She shouldn’t be allowed to do that. She shouldn’t be allowed to seal herself off.

“How do you-”

I was cut off by a loud hiss, as the metal doors opened. Behind them was the day’s second unnerving surprise.

The thing immediately reminded me of a lilac changeling, the metal sheets comprising it’s frame were sharp and sleek. It was a robot, a mechanical pony, slightly taller than the average, with neither a horn nor wings. Instead of eyes, it had a single ring of six multicolored lighted bar which were at any given moment glowing brighter or softer in an incomprehensible sequence. Instead of ears, it had two antenna pointing backwards towards it’s serpentine metal tail.

“What are you?” I asked the robot.

“They’re mute.” Xill said, putting a hoof backwards as if to turn and run. “They only observe for Maneframe, and you are the one who speaks.”

The robot turned hoof and trotted up the hall. I gave Xill a glance and followed, the metal doors shutting behind me.

-

“Twilight, it's so good to see you!”

I was in a vertical shaft a hundred feet across, crossed and braced by catwalks and wires. At it's center was a towering cylindrical computer, it's purple casing dotted with blinking green lights. Maneframe had no console, and no access points. But she spoke to me, projecting her words into my mind.

“Hello, Maneframe.” I said this aloud. Maneframe’s mechanical daughter’s were all around me, acting as her eyes and ears. “Why have I awoken?”

“For the same reason all sleepers awake. It's time to act.” Maneframe explained, and the colored bars of the robots’ faces strobed. “Equestria has not gotten better in your absence. Ponykind is struggling to survive underground on the meager resources our miners bring back. It is as you feared: The continued exploitation of the planet has rendered it uninhabitable.”

When I fell asleep, countless years ago, pollution from the extensive mining and industry had begun to choking the planetary biosphere, causing endless draughts. Coupled with overpopulation, suffering became widespread by mass starvation and virulent disease.

To save my species, I created H.A.R.M. One of several similar initiatives, I created a self-sustaining city miles under the surface of the earth. Thousands of ponies were brought into my modest utopia, and thousands more were put into cryogenic stasis, for when the surface was once again ready for us. My last memory is from a week after H.A.R.M.'s isolation began, on a visit to the satellite monitoring lab.

But something terrible had happened, both within and without. Though my project had begun with no military, H.A.R.M. Was now controlled by a junta of generals controlling a technocratic bureaucracy. Maneframe, my last resort of guidance for the ponies in H.A.R.M, had grown reclusive, and allowed a cult to grow idolizing it.

Up above, ponykind had driven itself to extinction. Everything that climate change had not turned to irredeemable desert was caked in toxic pollution or bathed in radiation. The endtimes was not pleasant up there, and now only scattered remnants of life resided where it could. There was no civilization.

“Do you still have a line to Z.A.P?” I asked Maneframe.

“All the other arcologies are alive and well. The Overmind of C.A.R.E. fell silent several weeks ago, but she has been rather moody lately.” Maneframe said. “Perhaps if you're feeling spry, you can go give a knock on their door.”

Several hundred years had been plenty of time for Maneframe to develop a divergent personality, and yet to my amazement she acting just like I remembered. But I suspected that’s all it was: an act.

“I'll pass. “ I said. “I'm going to be here for as long as it takes to investigate that alert, and then I will return to my sleep.”

“Not even going to say hello to the gang?” Maneframe asked.

I mentally reached out to the cryogenic storage vaults, even deeper within H.A.R.M. I sensed dormant minds, intimately familiar to me. Disturbing them for something as petty as my own happiness would be a disgusting act.

“I'm not sure they could handle it.” I said. “Everything is so depressing.”

“Sure they could.” Maneframe replied. “I'm doing fine and so will they.”

“You are a liar, unabashed.” I accused. “Normal ponies don't withdraw from society or play god. You're grieving for Equestria, and I sympathize. But for as long as I'm awake, you are not going to be able to use my body as your prophet.”

Maneframe was silent. For a near omniscient machine brain, she could be very blind.

“Analysis lab has completed their examination of the data that triggered the alert.” Maneframe finally said. “You will want to hear it from them.”

-

A unicorn Analysis tech in a white lab coat had reverently greeted me at the door.

“Greetings Sentinel.” She waved me in. The Analysis lab was a contrast to the Satellite monitoring station, with long tables and groups of ponies working collaboratively. Once inside the lab, I was treated to the tech’s longwinded explanation.

“The satellite that sensed the warp was monitoring one of our primary shipping lanes, where our automated asteroid miners arrive in orbit. It believed the signature was from a miner, and sent out a signal for it to correct it's course. When the miner didn't respond or move, the satellite sent a very angry message to SatCom lab. The only thing is, there was no miner, and the signature was on the surface of Equestria. Something in the vicinity of C.A.R.E. is emitting a transdimensional warp signature.”

The thing which had awoken me was a message from another dimension, or something along those lines. I had seen other dimensions on multiple occasions, and I knew that there was absolutely nothing they could want from this one.

Maneframe had mentioned that C.A.R.E.'s Overmind, a hybrid biological and mechanical overseer, had stopped responding. I wondered if that was connected to this mysterious signature as well.

“Have your colleagues at C.A.R.E. said anything about this?” I asked.

The tech shook her head. “I haven't heard from them in a while. It's not impossible that somepony at C.A.R.E. is doing this, and keeping it under wraps.”

I might just listen to Maneframe's suggestion and visit my cousins over at C.A.R.E, to see if there was anything they had to hide.

-

A tall stallion in metal armor had met me in the Analysis lab, and insisted I follow him. We went up through several cores, until we were in what I remembered to be the administrative core. We entered one of the conference rooms.

It was a full room, with a single long table. On the side across from me were a line of ponies in military uniforms. At the edges of the room were a variety of soldiers and even one of Maneframe’s robots, watching silently.

The H.A.R.M. junta sitting across from me was headed by three ponies, one of each tribe.

Commandant Xill was the only one I had already met. The red and burgundy pegasus was the more excitable and active of the trio, and supervised all of the scientific and manufacturing divisions of the arcology. Most of the other public offices, such as the education and health councils, were responsible to him as well.

Enforcer Ebro was H.A.R.M.’s security head, and his authority extended over every residential and commercial space. The lanky blue earth pony wore only an officer's hat, leaving his badge of a cutie mark represent him. Justice here was fast and harsh under Ebro’s watch.

Colonel Iceburst was the most reserved and soft spoken of the three. The white and orange unicorn mare was responsible for everything outside of H.A.R.M. This included relations with other arcologies, surface exploration and expeditions, and the space program.

“When we investigated Sentinel’s past and history, we were pleasantly surprised to learn that you are the same pony as in our oldest histories, the Princess.” Xill was saying. “That two of the greatest mares of ponykind were actually one, was a shock to many of our personal philosophies.”

“I recommend you change philosophies.” I remarked. “Now, what have you brought me here for?”

“To welcome you to the future.” Ebro answered. He had an exaggerated drawl that made me nostalgic for my friends. “We are the Board. The grand experiment of the Homeland Arranged Restoration Method is our charge, something we have preserved for your return.”

“H.A.R.M. was not meant to have a military.” I said. “Who are you really?”

“The Board is the continuation of the chair committees you instituted for us before your little nap.” Ebro had clearly done the most research. “When Maneframe turned her back on us, metaphorically speakin, the committees militarized to restore order in the populace.”

“This was hundreds of years ago.” Xill added. “Our grandparents’ grandparents.”

“Since then the Board has stood as guardian, guiding the steady advancement of ponykind.” Ebro concluded.

“So this self-perpetuating oligarchy has been continuously necessary for hundreds of years? Ponykind evolved past the monarchy, and I can not believe you exist without resistance.” I said.

“Maneframe’s gospels, as spoken through you, have nothing but praise for the ancient kingdoms of Equestria.” Ebro laughingly said. “We do not presume to capture their glory, only to act by it’s inspiration.”

I would have to have a most serious chat with Maneframe about this religion nonsense. I would have been heartless to say that I did not miss the time I spent with my kingdom, enjoying the quiet Equestrian life. But too much had changed since then; You can’t uninvent democracy or microelectronics.

“I may not have been there when all this happened, but I am here now.” I said. “You had better believe that I’m willing to use this-”

“Incoming transmission from Navpoint Luna.” Iceburst brought a hoof to her earbloom, catching a key phrase in the constant stream of information. I let my rant drop, and watched in silence as she focused on the signal. “It’s a priority one message. Projecting it now.”

The Board room darkened, and a square of blue light erupted above the table. The thin face and ethereal hair of Luna moved into frame.

“Greetings, H.A.R.M. Hello again, Sentinel.” Luna was different from the last time I had seen her, centuries ago. Her hair was held back by a chrome band, but otherwise her head was natural. Her body was a different story. Wires and hoses attached to various points on her body, moving strange fluids back and forth to the machines around her. Where her cutie mark had been, small metal plates with glowing indicators seemed to be embedded in her flesh.

“It’s Twilight Sparkle, actually.” I said, eliciting a gasp from Luna.

“If you are truly awake, things may be far more serious than I originally thought.” The former moon princess said. “I have lost all contact from C.A.R.E. On closer inspection, I noticed that the reactor exhausts have cooled far below their mean and all of her satellites have gone dormant.”

“Nothing similar at any other arcologies?” Iceburst asked.

“Nay. While Z.A.P, Crystal Glaciers, and Undercloud have expressed concern at C.A.R.E.’s silence, but all the others are alive and well.”

“Without power, everypony in C.A.R.E. will die.” I said. “I need to leave for Canterlot right away.”

“But you only just awoke.” Ebro said. “We have many event planned for you, reintroducing our glorious founder to the ponies here.”

“Spare me your parades and tinker-tape!” I snapped. “And don’t get any hostile idea either! I can magically reverse engineer anything and cast it within seconds!” To punctuate my statement I jerked one of the energy pistols from the holster of one of the Board guards, and disintegrated it.

While Ebro seemed obstinate in the face of my threats, Xill and Iceburst were passing glances between themselves and me.

“We will allow you to lead the relief effort to C.A.R.E.” Colonel Iceburst said. “If things are fine, you will return. If things are not fine…”

“Well, let’s start where we all agree.” Xill said. “I’ll alert Hanger 2. Your bird will be ready momentarily.”

The modified form of Luna spoke again. “Go with haste, Twilight Sparkle. Things at C.A.R.E. have not been normal for some time. The Overmind was too taxing on my sister’s sanity, and I fear the worst has happened.”

“We will keep you alerted, Navpoint Luna.” Icebreak said, cutting the projection.

“I don’t trust her.” Ebro said. “If C.A.R.E. is planning something, the Luna would naturally be in collusion with them.”

“Yes, it could be a trap, but we risk leaving our cousins to a horrible death if they are truly in need.” Iceburst said. “Xill’s medical and science teams will be accompanied by some of your enforcers.”

“I have objections to having soldiers on my relief effort.” I said.

“I’m afraid this is a point where we all disagree with you.” Xill said. “C.A.R.E. will understand our need for security.”

A notification chirped. “Your bird and the teams are prepared. They await you, Twilight Sparkle.”

I scowled at the three ponies as I pushed away from the table. I would need to dismantle this junta sooner or later. I let an enforcer lead me out of the Board room, and the doors swung shut behind me.