Artifice

by Fable_Wright

Rating: mature
Tags: Sex, Dark, Original Character, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Adventure
Length: 5615

Dragged into the long shadows of the cyberpunk future by a Neighjing kingpin and a dangerous hacker, one mare does her best to survive with a head of false memories and an artificial body. A reader-driven adventure.

[Clop and plot]

In the distant future, Equestria has changed. The idle rich spend their money creating new lifeforms to suit their whims, while the merely wealthy are stuck purchasing servants tailor-made to their tastes. Ponies are able to spend their entire lives in artificial landscapes, never once setting a hoof on solid earth. Literally anything you could desire can be made or procured in your home city, and culture flourishes as a result.

The brighter the light, though, the deeper the shadow. In the shadows of this new world are the downtrodden, the hateful, the angry, and the fearful. Those who have had all they've ever loved taken away from them, those who are left to decay in the underbelly of civilization, and those who turn to terror to protest this injustice. Corruption runs nearly as rampant as crime.

When a Neighjing kingpin and an unscrupulous hacker drag one android-repair pony from the brightest light into the darkest of shadows, can she escape before the darkness consumes her? Or, hope beyond hope... could she cast a light in her wake?

This is an experiment. I have characters, a setting, and motivations, but I have no plot. That's where you all come in. Make suggestions in the comments section below to decide how the story will go. What you want more of, what you want Tabby, side characters, or even the villains to do, if you want action, drama, or more fetishy clop... it's your show here, I'm just putting it on paper. Tags may be added as time goes on.

Published 2015-09-03 00:00:04 UTC
Last updated 2015-09-03 00:00:04 UTC

Ch. 1: A Friendly Kidnapping

“Mmm… a bit lower, please.” I sighed happily as the warm hooves massaging my withers slowed, then began kneading their way down my back towards my tail. The firm hooves cut through the stored tension like butter, taking away weeks of tension in seconds.

“Anything you desire, mistress!” The voice was perfect, tailored delicately to deliver just the right mix of oblivious perkiness and naughty suggestion. I glanced over my shoulder at the young android. Her body was made of gleaming chrome and soft curves, a true testament to the beauty of microweave technology. Her body was soft to the touch, and could bend and compress just like any living fur, only ever just as firm as it needed to be. Any articulations in that body were for show only—but what a show it was. Highlighting her hooves, her hips, around her neck like a collar. It let the world know that she was owned, and that she loved it.

The real joy, though, was in her face. A face to suit that voice, round, happy, accented beautifully by her clipped mane… that was a fuckable face. A wicked smile came to my lips. “Anything, you say?”

The android didn’t miss a beat, sliding her hooves up to my shoulders and draping herself over me. Leaning in to my ear, the amount of lust in her voice was breathtaking. “Anything, mistress,” she purred. At this angle, I couldn’t see her face. I could only feel her warm breath on my neck, and and picture her face, her perky innocence with an intent only given away with her smirk. I could feel my heartbeat in my back, pulsing wherever she touched. She could feel it too. She knew where this was going. As I opened my mouth so speak, she cut me off, gently taking my ear into her mouth, and beginning a long, slow lick up the inside of my ear, the words dying on my lips. Then she took another one, and a longer one down the back, massaging my ear with the same tender ministration she did my body. Every little pause and flick was met with a moan, when the tortuously slow tongue wasn’t already making me melt. I could barely think straight. She was good.

“Ah… thenmmmm… oh, yes.” My thoughts were cut off as she began rubbing my neck, her hooves softening and slicking until it felt like she was running her tongue along there, too. It was all I could do to keep from rolling off the bed in ecstasy. Mercifully, she let up on the foreplay, giving me a moment to get up and turn over before I found myself pinned by her wet hoof on my chest.

“If my mistress desires service, she will get it. If she desires pleasure, she won’t know what hit her.” She grinned, her face far too innocent for her words. “Now, what does my mistress desire today?”

I could barely speak, but somehow the word “pleasure” rose to my lips. She grinned.

In an instant, I could feel her body pressing against me, like quicksilver against my fur. Her entire body was slick, from her mane down to her tail. “Mistress chose well,” she purred. “Try not to pass out.”

Slowly, torturously, she slid down my body, and I gasped. It was like nothing I’d ever felt before, a tide of pleasure rolling down, stimulating all it touched. Her hooves traced down my sides, gently, making me squirm at the almost ticklish sensation, like I was snuggling in under the smoothest, sexiest blanket ever made. Lower, I felt her body smoothly gyrating as it came down, grinding against my lips and clit. Oh, god, that feeling. I could feel butterflies dancing, my walls tensing up. My legs went numb, and all I could feel was the wetness that the droid was rubbing down my body and the bolts of pleasure pounding through my brain. Her head was almost at my lips. If she could turn me to quivering putty with just the foreplay, then—

—KrzzzshtBLAAAAZT BLAAAZT BLAAAAAZTkzzhrt—

If I ever had to pick one thing in my life that I hated beyond anything else, at that moment, it would be that alarm. Every fiber of my body, every biological sense in me, was screaming at me to keep going. I had to. I needed this. I needed to see what CLO-E was really hiding behind that innocent little face of hers. But I had a job to do, and my time just ran out. Pushing the confused mare off of me, I sighed. “End diagnostic 03-Ma and 069L. Delete all memories formed under admin user T@B-Y. Logout admin.”

Even as the words left my lips, she paused, her eyes glazing over for a moment as she slumped back, processing the request. I slid over to her, taking her chin in one hoof and a towel in the other, staring into the bright flashes in her unfocused eyes as I wiped my juices clean off her now-unsmoothing body. To the untrained observer, the flashes would be little more than a light show, but with the right implants, they reflected all the memories she was deleting. Best to make sure that nothing was corrupted, after all. Or missed.

After a few minutes, the android perked back up. “Hi, Miss Tabby! How did I do?”

I choked back the urge to make an innuendo. “You did great, CLO-E! Your commissioner’s been taking good care of you, and he has excellent taste.”

That got a giggle. “Surely not as good as your commissioner has, Miss! I’ve never seen anydroid like you before!”

She didn’t mean anything by it, really, but that hit a sore spot. When you have a multi-ton semi-organic snake tail instead of hind legs, it’s hard to mistake you for anything but a lab creation. And to be fair, being an artiform wasn’t really the worst thing in the world. Anypony who could afford to commission and care for one was the upper crust of the upper crust, after all, and such ponies were often generous towards their ‘children’. Naturally, this means top-quality service wherever I go, and that nopony would ever dare cause trouble in my shop. You know, if the tail itself didn’t stop them already. Still, it felt wrong, somehow, for everyone to assume I was ‘owned.’ I’ve never met my commissioner. Never heard from them. The only sign that I wasn’t some kind of discarded lab experiment is the anonymous bank transfer that comes in every week like clockwork, and the fake memories.

“Miss? Did I say something wrong?” The concern in the mare’s voice cut my thoughts short. I flashed her a forced grin.

“No, no, dear. Of course not. I was just… trying to remember the last time you were here. You were only twelve then, weren’t you? Soon, you’ll have to schedule these appointments yourself!”

“Yep!” She chirped. “Three more years, and I’ll be a free droid!” Her smile, normally genuine, suddenly turned nearly as forced as mine. By the princesses’ decree, all artiforms and sapient androids were dependents for the first 18 years after their manufacture date, cared for by the one responsible for their creation but also bound by their wishes. After that, they were free to do as they wished with their lives. A lot of droids had trouble with the concept.

“Hey.” I slithered over to her, wrapping my foreleg around her comfortingly. “If you don’t want to leave, that’s fine. I know plenty of droids who realized that they’re happy where they are, and stick around with their families the rest of their lives. It doesn’t have to change anything if you don’t want it to.”

She leaned in, but otherwise didn’t move. “I know. SAM-3’s still working with the master after nearly 30 years, but, well… I don’t know. He’ll get bored of me eventually, and then what? Work for his kids? Become just another part of the cleaning staff? I see you, and Miss Rooty, and SEL-Y, and I see somedroids who are happy without anyone else. Strong, independent, and so brave. I don’t want to stick around the house forever. But I don’t even know where to start being a real pony. Especially when I look like more like a shiny toy than a real pony.” She shook her head, then looked up at me with hopeful eyes. “I don’t suppose you would…?”

I shook my head sadly. “Everydroid who’s come through here always asks me first. Who better to work for than the pony you want to be, right? But I can’t take care of all of you. It’s not like I couldn’t use a few more hooves helping me build or test you all, right? But if I say yes to one of you, I have to say yes to all of you. And I just can’t use that many hooves.” She nodded, looking dismayed.

“That makes sense, I guess.”

“Hey, chin up. I didn’t say I couldn’t help. I can’t give you a job, but I can give you some advice. Try picking up a trade skill in your spare time. With your microweave, masseuse would be a natural choice for you. But if that reminds you too much of your current job, you’d also do great work with your hooves in general. You’d make an excellent carpenter, and with your sensor loadout, you could run a very classy restaurant, I’m sure. And if that doesn’t work out for you, you just come to me. I know a few ponies who are always willing to help a fellow droid looking to move out.”

Her eyes lit up as I spoke, and she was practically bouncing by the time I finished. “Thank you so much, Miss Tabby! You don’t know how much this means to me!”

I smiled. “I might have a little clue.”

She blushed, a light pink bringing some life into those chrome cheeks of hers. “Oh! Er… how much did you see, exactly?”

Chuckling, I rubbed her mane playfully. “Not talking about that, you knucklehead. I don’t look into your files. Bad for business. I’ve just been through this myself and with some other droids before you. Don’t worry. Everydroid goes through this, and I promise you, not one has ever regretted a thing.”

She blushed again. It was a good look on her, really. “Oh. Well, again. Thank you. I mean it.” Getting up, she walked over to the shop exit. “My master’s expecting me any time now, and I probably shouldn’t keep him waiting, but…” She seemed to linger, waiting for something.

I shook my head. “Silly pony, you’ve still got three years to get this worked out. Stop by any time, and I’ll be happy to help you out. Free of charge.”

It might not have been what she was looking to hear, but it got the job done. With a smile and a skip, she left the store, headed back home.

As I closed up for the night, I couldn’t help but think about CLO-E. About how happy she was as she left. How excited she was to go home. More than once, I’ve caught myself wondering what home really was to me. I’ve been working in this store for longer than I could remember. Longer than I’ve even been in this city, really. Fake memories are a bitch.

See, the earliest memory I have from around five years back, though I don’t have a perfect frame of reference. I was just starting to set up shop, and I was so intimidated by the prospect. Lucky me, though, I ran into Mr. and Mrs. Drops after exploring the neighborhood a bit. They had set up a candy store just last month and knew exactly what I was going through. They even helped me unload some of my stuff on moving day! Made me feel so welcome here. Imagine my surprise, then, when I learned that the Drops had only finished moving in around three and a half years ago, and even admitted later that I was their very first customer.

Needless to say, I had to go back and check. Every record was the same, though; my store had been there for five years, and the Drops had been there for three and a half. It wasn’t just them. Dates all over the neighborhood didn’t line up with what I remembered. It was like that year and a half just didn’t exist. Rich ponies had been taking their androids to my shop as long as they can remember, but the first time anypony remembers seeing me was the day I became the Drops first customer. Imagine that, huh? I can’t remember a day where I didn’t slither out to enjoy the sweet night air or warm sunlight at least once.

Come to think of it, fun as the day might have been, the store was beginning to get stuffy. It wouldn’t hurt to take a stroll while the others cleaned up, right? I glanced behind me at my two ‘employees’, SER-Y and ZEN. SER-Y was once a hover drone, a relatively cheap floating disc with graspers I could use for delicate work. Dealing with faulty power cores, weapons systems, fun stuff. Turns out, though, that while they’re great for household work, they usually aren’t built to withstand thermonuclear reactions. Three rebuilds later, and now she’s a tank with an onboard op center. If I pushed her, she could certainly give military drones a run for their money—though at the moment, she was content just coordinating the cleaning drones and double-encrypting the day’s data.

ZEN, on the other hand… well, he was the first android I’d ever built, and the only android I’ve never finished. Whenever I purchased a new bit of hardware or test out a new bit of software, he was my first stop. I’d installed a camo-weave in him last night to brush up on ’weaves in general before CLO-E’s appointment, but it seemed to be on the fritz, sticking to a tribal zebra pattern. Weaves in general were still relatively new technology, and they didn’t come cheap; not many clients chose to spring for it over a more traditional fur inlay or solid shell. Those that did, though… mmm. CLO-E was a prime example of what it could do, and I hardly wanted to turn away clients that had such fine tastes.

Newer technology is tricky, though, as last night demonstrated. The camo-weave had crossed wires with a redundant personality module, and ZEN got stuck in ‘zebra sage’ mode. I should probably get that fixed tonight, really, but it won’t be a quick fix. I looked back at him. He was silently packing up my tools for the night, closing and sorting out some exposed parts on my latest projects, and generally tidying up the workplace. That was the one constant about ZEN, really. No matter what, he was always the best assistant a mare could ask for.

“Hey, ZEN. Could you mind SER-Y and close up for the night without me? We’re almost done, and I could use some fresh air.” He nodded once, silently, then silently went back to capping wires. I shrugged. It was ZEN. If he said it would get done, it would get done.

With that, I left, closing the door behind me with a jingle. I took a breath, savoring the Old Quarter’s night air. I could taste the aged stone that made the foundation of the city mingling with pollen drifting in from the many parks. The metal tang of the androids who lingered by my store, mixed with their oil and plastics. The savory smells of the restaurants just upwind of my store. I could feel a smile creeping on my face as I stretched up towards the sky, watching the stars through the clouds. They were beautiful tonight, shining brilliantly in the dark. Luna must have been in a good mood tonight, for even the nebulae were shining bright, each nascent star distinct in the celestial haze. Nothing could compare to this, the sights and smells of the Old Quarter at night. Nothing I could remember, anyways.

Lifting myself high off the ground with my tail, I gazed down at the city around me as I wandered the streets. It’s said that, once upon a time, all of Canterlot could fit into the Old Quarter alone, and meet with the Princesses to discuss their daily affairs. If that was true, times most certainly had changed. Down below me, I could see the lights in the Canterlot Sprawl, the endless web of lights, skyscrapers, and noise that cascaded down the mountain, shining almost as brilliantly as the night sky above it. At the very bottom of the mountain, the endless construction work of the Base Sprawl was in full swing, the shouting of foreponies lost to even my ears so far down there. Rising out of it was the endless bazaar of the Middle Sprawl, where it’s said that any and everything you were looking for would not only be found, but find you. Rising out of that were the dilapidated slums and tenements of the Old Sprawl, with the nouveau-rich Upper Sprawl acting almost as a buffer between it and the Old Quarter. Rising even higher than that, to the peak of the mountain, was the Princesses’ complex, the vast system built to handle the endless pilgrims and petitioners that traversed the world to see them.

I continued to ponder as I felt the worn stone underneath my tail soften and turn to warm park grass. While each ward had its own charm, the Old Quarter was the only place where I belonged. It was the only place an artiform like me could roam without a second glance, and the only place rich enough to afford a dedicated android shop. There was no question that it was a cage for me, but I didn’t mind. There were the stars and the grass and the trees and the droids. Those were all I wanted out of life, really.

“Excuse me, miss?”

The question snapped me out of my reverie. In front of me was an android stallion with a traditional fur inlay, a nervous expression on his face as he struggled to keep some fliers from slipping out of his grip.

“Miss, are you busy? I’m really sorry to bother you, but my servos are on the fritz and I can’t carry all of these. Would you mind?” He held out a sheaf before they fell on the ground. He yelped, and apologized profusely as he began to gather all of them up.

I paused, taken aback. Even in the Old Quarter, not many ponies would ever bother an artiform. In fact, most ponies were terrified of me. They wouldn’t say it to my face, of course, and I’ve made some friends, but meeting an artiform for the first time is a harrowing experience for nearly anypony. Before they realize that, on the whole, we’re just regular ponies, they just see us as the multi-billion bit pet projects of some of the most powerful ponies alive. Say the wrong word or leave an impression of any kind, and you might draw their attention. That was a risk that most ponies weren’t willing to take.

And yet this little droid didn’t realize that, or didn’t care. As he fumbled about, I picked up some of the fliers off the ground. “What’s your name?”

Relief was etched on the little droid’s face. “My designation is L-Zero-K-One. Thank you so much! My boss is going to be so mad if I don’t get these missing pony posters up soon!”

Missing pony? In the Old Quarter? In the rest of the city, this wasn’t that strange, but anypony missing from here would surely be a media scandal. “You sure he told you to put these up in the Old Quarter and not the Sprawl? I haven’t heard of any missing ponies.”

He nodded vigorously. “I thought she meant the Sprawl too, but then she said ‘The Old Quarter, Lo. Not the sprawl.’ And now I’m here and I don’t know anypony and I have to get these up.”

Huh. I glanced at the poster.

‘MISSING: TABBY, LOCAL ARTIFORM. LAST KNOWN ADDRESS, 405 MOONBEAM DRIVE. GENEROUS REWARD FOR ANY LEADS.’

Below was a picture from when I must have been younger, peacefully sleeping on the ground. I frowned. “But I’m not…” I felt myself falling forward, suddenly exhausted. As I lay there, cheek planted in the grass and too tired to move, I saw L0K-1 trotting towards me with a grin. “Sorry, Tabby. Nothing personal. Now, go to sleep.” I wanted to complain, I wanted to run, I wanted to slap this droid in the face. Instead, I yawned and closed my eyes, drifting off into a peaceful slumber.

Ugh. What… what happened? I was in the park, and the android came up to me, and then…

Wait a moment. The air here was stale, and didn’t taste like the store at all. Didn’t even taste like the Old Quarter. Something was very, very wrong here. Cautiously, I slowed my breathing. I was probably being watched, and I didn’t want whoever, or whatever, took me here to know I was awake yet. Not before I got a chance to get a sweep of the place. See, my tail isn’t just for show. Lining it is a top-notch loadout of sensors, electrodes, scanners, motion detectors, you name it. Very handy for system diagnostics without opening an android up, and coupled with its matching array of electromagnets, perfect for tweaking droid code on inaccessible drives.

It wasn’t quite meant to serve as surveillance equipment, but it would do just fine. I focused. Large, empty space, mostly hollow, no hoofsteps, only airflow was a vent at the top of the room. No other motion, not even a heartbeat other than my own. Some kind of electric fuzz around the room, but from what I could tell, no droids, ponies, weapons systems, or anything. Couple of small blips that were probably surveillance, though. I cracked an eye open. Starting back at me from a TV monitor was the silhouette of a mare I didn’t recognize. Her features were entirely blacked out, save for her insufferable grin. Whoever this was, they were getting on my nerves already.

“Get a good sweep, Tabby?” I blinked, not certain how to respond. “More importantly, how are you feeling? I’m sorry about the trip here, but you were in a bit of a pickle, and I didn’t really have time to arrange a luxury ride over here.”

“What are you talking about? Come to think of it, where am I? Why did you bring me here?”

The mare shook her head, looking almost disappointed. “Oh, Tabby. Here I thought you were at least going to ask some interesting questions. It’s always those three, isn’t it? ‘Help, I’ve been taken to an obviously unmarked location by ponies who don’t want me to know anything! Let’s ask them, maybe they’ll have changed their minds!’” I could feel the mare rolling her eyes on the other side of the screen. “No, really. Every single time, same story. Well, unless you get a repeat victim. Then they start getting used to it, and that’s no fun.” Something about this mare was really, really pissing me off.

“If you don’t want me to know anything, why bother apologizing, then?”

The mare clapped her hooves. “See? Now you’re getting it! That’s a good question.”

There was an awkward silence. “Well?”

“What part of ‘don’t want you to know anything’ didn’t you pick up on?”

I shook my head. “You know what? I don’t want to know. You do your… kidnapper, thing, without guards or handcuffs somewhere else. I’ve got half a dozen orders to get through, so if you’ll excuse me—

The grinning silhouette cut out, immediately replaced by a dozen news feeds. PNN, EBC, Shrew News, all the major networks. All showing the same image. My store. Or, at least, the smoking wreck of what remained of it.

“—terrorist attack—”

“—Princesses have yet to issue a statement—”

“—Liberals are saying that—”

“—local business owner Tabby was unavailable for comment—”

“—uncertain if there were any more bombs, but the police have issued a statement—”

The feeds cut off. I sat there, stunned. That was… my store. My store. And it was… gone. This wasn’t a thing that happened to ponies. Not in real life. My eyes began to sting. It wasn’t home, not like CLO-E had, but… it was all I had.

“I’m sure that this can’t be easy for you.” At least the mare had the decency to have a touch of concern in her voice. Not that that helped anything. “The authorities still don’t have anything conclusive. After all, you have no known enemies, and arson isn’t known to leave that much evidence behind.”

“You… you did this?” Something inside me stirred. Something I’ve never felt before, so terrible, yet so right.

For once, the mare looked surprised. “What? No! Why would I want to hurt you, Tabby? After putting in so much effort into getting you here safely?”

“I don’t know.” My body felt electrified, energy crackling in my veins. “Maybe I could tell you, if somepony gave some ANSWERS!” In that moment, I exploded. By the time I realized what was happening, my tail had already connected with the screen, smashing the hardware into hundreds of pieces. I stared at them, each tiny piece a miniature monitor. So that’s what anger feels like.

And then the voice began again, a insufferable as ever. “Perhaps you have a point. A peace offering, then, between you and me. While the police are still trying to sort everything out, I’m quite familiar with who’s behind this.” Images flashed on the shattered pieces of screen. Burned out husks of buildings. Smoking wrecks of vehicles and streets. An entire neighborhood reduced to rubble. “These were all the work of the same stallion. Twenty years ago, a then-unknown member of a Neighjing triad leveled the house of an Imperial bureaucrat using some kind of unknown explosive. Despite a nation-wide manhunt, he eluded capture for months, eventually causing the search to be called off. Whoever he was before that moment is unimportant. After that night, he became Dìzhèn, ‘The Earthquake.’ He certainly lived up to his name. For the next fifteen years, he struck unpredictably and without mercy, leaving only rubble in his wake. Destroyed mansions, neighborhoods, even once a small town. In the underworld, his word is law second only to the Dragons. And then he vanished.” She coughed. “Until today.”

I took deep breaths. Isn’t that what people did when they were angry? Breathe? It wasn’t working. “You’re telling me. That my store, a random, harmless android repair shop, was bombed by some mythical terrorist. Who’s been dead or retired for five years. For no reason whatsoever.”

“Yep!” She chirped. “Only, he does have a reason. He wants to use you to kill me.”

I snorted, half hysterical. “Oh, really? Tell me, why shouldn’t I help him?”

She shook her head, the motion reflected a hundredfold across the panels of glass on the floor. “I’m afraid that he needs you dead for that. I… may have designed a bit of your hardware. Or a lot of it, really. It’s probably the last bit of gear on the planet that’s got my hoofprints on it. Literally and metaphorically. Unfortunately for you, removing any of it from your system would leave you rather dead. And not that it matters to you, but I’d go shortly afterwards. So, for the moment, at least, I need you to live.”

There was a whirring noise, and a door on the far side of the warehouse opened. “I’ve taken the liberty of arranging transport to a safehouse over in Prance. I’ll contact you when you’re there. In the meantime, try to—”

“No.” Just as suddenly as anger had appeared in me, it was gone. All the uncertainty, all the confusion, gone. There was only certainty. I stared into the countless shards of glass. “No.”

For the first time, the reflection in the glass seemed to be at a loss for words. “Pardon?”

“I said no. You’re demanding that I believe a fairy tale, entrust my life to the stranger who kidnapped me and refuses to give answer, get into some kind of unmarked transport that for all I know could lead to the bottom of the ocean or a trash compactor, and who, for all I know, orchestrated this whole thing. Why should I possibly trust you? Much less ever help you?”

The mare paused. “They did say you were smart.” She seemed to consider things for a moment, then glanced at her wrist just before the screen cut out. Her voice echoed out from the darkness. “Drat. All right then, Tabby. There’s little I can do to stop you. So I’ll just have to prove that you can trust me. Anytime you need help, just call me. Doesn’t need to be more than a whisper, I’ll hear.”

I was taken aback by the sudden shift in attitude. Why would a kidnapper suddenly go from bossy to helpful? “…What do I call you?”

The voice sounded contemplative for a moment. “That is a better question than you know. Most people know me as Raz de Mereé, or just ‘Raz’ for short. Call me whatever you like, though, and I’ll be there for you.”

I folded my forelegs. Time to call her bluff. “Alright then, Raz. I’m in a bit of a pickle now, actually. See, this pony was able to just flash me a poster and make me go unconscious. Mind helping me out with this?”

She winced. “Right for the jugular.” There was a short sigh and a pause on the radio. I almost turned and left, before the voice picked back up. “I don’t have much time left, but long story short, when you were designed, the scientists put a couple of failsafes in your brain. If you see a photograph of yourself—an old-fashioned analog photograph—your mind will switch to match the image. You see yourself sleeping, you fall unconscious. You see yourself throwing a tantrum, anyone in the vicinity better run. And if you see the face of certain ponies… bad things will happen. If you see the face of Dìzhèn in analog form, physical or photo, you will level a city block trying to kill him. If you see my true face… in person, a photograph, even, this once, a computer printout… you will die. And there’s nothing I can do to stop it.” It was hard to tell anything from her voice, but for a moment there, at the end, she sounded almost… regretful. Probably a trick, though.

Still… there was an easy way to test this. Not seeing her or Dìzhèn, of course. But the photograph thing.

“I’m leaving. If you’re telling the truth, then we’ll talk. In the meantime, I just need to… I need to pay my respects to SER-Y and ZEN. And say goodbye.”

The voice cut back in. “Dìzhèn is still looking for you. If you’re caught on the vid feed, he’ll catch you. It doesn’t matter how many innocents are around you, he will kill all of them for a chance at me.”

I glared at nothing in particular. “Then what do you suggest?”

“Check the back of the transport. I ‘collected’ SER-Y and ZEN before the bombs went off. And after that… well, Prance has anything and everything you could need. Including, mind you, a fully-furnished safehouse.”

I gave a sign of relief. So SER-Y and ZEN were safe in h— wait. “You WHAT?” Silence. I could feel anger surging up in me again. I wrapped my tail around a support beam and squeezed, only to feel it give way. SER-Y and ZEN were mine. If I ever got my hooves on Raz…

But first thing’s first. I was alone in an empty warehouse, SER-Y and ZEN were nearby, and there was at least one exceedingly dangerous criminal out for my blood. I needed a plan.

Author's Note

Welcome to the future, chummer. You thought you could live a happy life while the rest of us rotted in the Neighjing Sprawl. Guess what? It’s time you learned a little respect.

Current assets:

* ZEN, an unfinished android full to the brink with experimental technology

* SER-Y, a nearly military-grade network operations center and miniature hovertank

* A head chock full of sensory augmentations from thermal sensors to telescoping vision and more.

* A 20ft long snake tail made of muscle, steel, and even more sensors than your head

* Master-class android hacking and construction skills

* A hacker who alleges to be on your side

* Your artiform nature gives you an in with upper society

Current liabilities:

* Instantly recognizable if spotted

* There is a Neighjing kingpin after your blood

* You’re not really sure this hacker’s on your side, either

* Someone flashes you the wrong image, and you’re no longer in control

Current objectives:

* Find out more about this kingpin after you

* Find out more about your ‘ally’

* Set up a secure base of operations

* Test your newfound triggers

* Flee Canterlot (?)

* Create or obtain more assets

* Eliminate or mitigate liabilities

* Set more objectives

So, tell me chummer. What now?