Mechanic Sapiens

THE SEVENTH DAY "THE GOLDEN OAK LIBRARY" (THREAT LOCATED) 7:30AM

The high pitched shriek of an alarm clock broke the silence in the library. Anonymous turned over in his cot, not acknowledging the noise. Spike quickly stumbled down the stairs, trying to turn off the alarm as soon as possible. It took a few seconds for him to find it and restore the peace of the Library. He looked down at the resting alien and noted how undisturbed he looked.

"It's seven thirty in the morning. You never wake up early." Spike rubbed his eyes while talking to Anonymous.

Upon hearing the time, Anonymous jumped out of his cot and ran for the stairs, tripping due to tangled up in several blankets. Spike trailed behind, still wanting an answer to his question. Anonymous ran in and out of every room in the building, probably looking for something. After checking all of the rooms, he stopped for Spike in the heart of the library.

"Where's Twilight at?"

Spike let out a yawn. "She got up even earlier than you. She was really distressed, saying she had to go to Canterlot to tell her family goodbye. You should talk to her when she gets back."

"I intend to," Anonymous said while making his way towards the kitchen.

"You know, you've been acting strange lately too. What's going on with you guys?"

Lying wasn't something Anon enjoyed. Especially if the person he was lying to was someone he cared about. Spike and Twilight were really the only people on this planet he could trust. But Spike looked up to him. Whether it was because he had advanced technology or because he had taken an interest in Spike, he didn't know. It didn't matter that much.

"I'm in the middle of a feud with Twilight."

"Really? What's it about?" Spike inquired, resting his head in his claws.

"I argue that life is frail and easy to reconstruct and not worth much at all. Twilight believes that there is something more to life. Something she can't put into words. Whenever she finds the meaning of it, that's when we'll stop feuding. I promise."

"You're like a twisted Princess Celestia." Spike giggled.

"Excuse me?"

"You're teaching her things. And you're making her find the answers for herself, just like the Princess."

Anonymous shook his head, thinking about it.

"I like 'Anonymous the Alien' better."

THE SEVENTH DAY "THE GOLDEN OAK LIBRARY" (THREAT LOCATED) 12:30AM

"I can't believe she's not back yet. It's really unlike Twilight to throw off her schedule like this." Spike told Anonymous, who was fiddling with a circuit board.

"Yeah. Well, better not waste our lives waiting for her. Let's go do something fun."

"What do you want to do?" Spike asked him.

Anon pondered what to do for a while before he snapped his fingers in realization.

"Rainbow Dash wanted to race my ship."

"How are we going to get up to her house? Neither of us are Pegasi."

"Pfft, we'll fly, of course." Anonymous stood up from his chair and walked with Spike out to his Mini-Screw.

The graffiti on the spaceship had only gotten worse. The rusty golden exterior had transformed into a bulletin board system for delinquents, ponies sharing their addresses and spreading gossip. Anonymous stopped opening the door as he read some of the writing. While he was messing with the control pad, trying to open the doors, an unfamiliar Equine approached the both of them.

"Excuse me?" She said.

The duo turned their heads to face the pony who spoke.

"I'm Mayor Mare, and it has come to my attention that you've been staying with Twilight and Spike."

"Yeah... So?" Anon remarked.

"So, I was wondering if you could help me diffuse the tension you've caused by giving a speech later today. After all, not that many ponies know that you're friendly."

"Uhh... Sure. I guess I can come up with something that'll inspire kindness and compassion or whatever across the world."

"Excellent! The speech will be given at six-o'-clock in the town hall. Don't disappoint us!" The Mayor explained as she walked away from the alien and the dragon with a smile on her face.

"That was odd," Anonymous stated, finally getting the doors to open.

"What are you going to give your speech about?"

"No idea. I'll improvise something about friendship. Ponies here like that stuff, right?"

"You bet," Spike said as he climbed into the Mini-Screw.

"Speaking of bets, who do you think is going to win, me or RD?"

Spike laughed. "Please, if you can get to Saturn in twenty seconds, she doesn't stand a chance."

Rainbow Dash was flipping through the pages of her favorite book: Daring Do and the Quest for the Sapphire Stone. The words on the pages seemed to come to life as she read them. Her imagination created the world around her. It was a world of adventure, a world full of booby-traps and creatures who would eviscerate you as soon as look at you. Rainbow Dash loved adventure. It was what got her out of bed in the morning.

"Rainbow!"

Dash muffled a scream as she turned around to see who was intruding her privacy. Outside of her window was the Mini-Screw with its metal doors open. Spike and Anonymous were in plain sight, relaxing in the spaceship.

"You up for a race today?" Spike asked her.

"Uh... Sure. What time do you want to do it?"

"Right now," Anonymous demanded.

Rainbow raised an eyebrow. "Right now? You don't need any time to get ready?"

"You versus me. Right now." He repeated.

Dash let out a laugh as she flew out of her window to line up with the spaceship.

"I hope you're not a sore loser. You see the castle over there on that mountain? Whoever gets there first is the winner."

The spaceship rotated around so that its front was faced towards the giant mountain in the distance. Hydraulics whirred as the metal doors closed up. The sound of engines powering up could be heard throughout the sky.

Spike sat on the couch of the spaceship with a seatbelt on, looking a bit worried.

"We're not going to explode like we did last time, are we?"

"Pfft, Like she can even get up to 'C one'," Anonymous cracked his knuckles and started typing away on his keyboard. Various mechanisms could be heard operating inside the walls of the ship.

"All right! Counting down from five! Four!" Rainbow Dash shouted so that Anon could hear her.

"Three!"

"Two!"

"One!"

A very violent explosion almost blew away Dash's house as the two of them powered up and blasted off towards Canterlot. Almost immediately, Rainbow took the lead by several hundred feet. But what Anonymous lacked in starting speed, he made up with in acceleration. It didn't take long for him to take the lead, leaving Dash far behind.

"How fast are we going?" Spike shouted out, trying to project his voice over the sound of the wind flowing against the chassis of the ship.

"Around half a mach. I thought she had more in her."

As soon as Anonymous had taunted her, a blue streak shot by the side of the ship like a bullet. Rainbow Dash had a look of utmost determination on her face that could have been seen from the ground. Her fur became cloaked with a white-hot glow as another explosion happened in front of the ship. A rainbow-colored circle shot out across Equestria, almost blinding Anonymous.

Her distraction didn't last long. Anonymous quickly throttled up to a speed that could rival Dash's. Soon they came head to head, neither of them bothering to look at the other. Halfway to Canterlot and the victor was still uncertain. Anon was about to speed up again before a message blocked out the console.

"YOU STILL INTEND ON FIGHTING. NOW YOU WILL SUFFER."

"Get out of my way!" Anon shouted over the deafening sounds of the wind.

He throttled up anyways, leaving Dash in the dust yet again. Victory seemed certain, but the terminal went black and all of the lights inside the Mini-Screw shut off, leaving them in total darkness.

"What's happening?" Spike asked, feeling much more concerned.

The sound of the engines deactivating could be heard through the cabin along with the sound of the wind blowing against the walls. They were still moving very fast, but now they had no way to control themselves. Anonymous ripped the side of the terminal open again and started smashing any of Allos' circuit boards that he could find with his hands. If the ship didn't come online soon, the walls would be caked with Spike's blood.

It was too late, they had already hit something. Thankfully, it wasn't the ground. Whatever it was, it sent the ship into a violent spin. Spike and Anon became glued to the walls. Spike threw up, there was too much force and too much spinning for him to keep his stomach calm. Another impact slightly slowed down the rotation and the falling, but they hadn't hit the ground yet. Then the ship stopped on what they assumed to be ground, but the ride wasn't over yet. The ground beneath them crumbled and the ship fell down for another fifty feet before finally stopping.

On the outside of the walls, muffled shrieks and screams could be heard. Anonymous was sliding his hands against the wall, hoping to find the lever that opened the doors. The screw was gently rolling around on the ground, which made finding it all the more difficult since the walls had become the floor. Finally, the doors opened and a sick Spike and dazed Anonymous walked out of the ship and into the new room.

The room was made of grandiose columns that transformed into arches at the ceiling, which was now raining bits of rocks onto the ground. From what Anon could make out of his surroundings, there was some type of banquet going on. At the opposite side of the room's doors stood a tall throne fit for a Princess.

There was something off about it all, not including the crashed U.F.O. in the middle of the room. There was some kind of fluid that was oozing across the floor. At first, Anonymous thought he had ripped a liquid hydrogen line, but the color just didn't match up.

It was a sticky red liquid.

A mangled hoof and broken ribs peeked out of the space between the U.F.O. and the ground. Spike threw up again, hyperventilating at the sight of the fluid. Most of the banquet's partakers had run out of the room, screaming and crying in fear. However, there were some who had stayed and were getting closer to them. They were white colts dressed in golden armor.

"Stay right there!" One of them shouted, pointing his spear at Anonymous.

Princess Celestia walked around the side of the Mini-Screw with her mouth wide open. There was blood all over her legs. Apparently, she had been close to the victim, seeing as how distressed she was.

"What have you done?!" She cried out, looking at the crushed body beneath the spaceship.

"Uhh... Can't talk now, Princess. I've got a race to win."

Anonymous retreated back to his ship, grabbing Spike and taking him along. He closed the door behind all of the angry guards who ran for the ship's door. Unfortunately, the Mini-Screw had taken off before any of the guards could get close to the door. As the two murderers took off into the noon sky, a large red splatter could very apparently be seen in the middle of the throne room.

Rainbow Dash was still going at her peak speed, approaching the Mini-Screw. She would have won the race while they stood still, but she stopped as soon as she saw the hole in the roof. The race didn't matter to her anymore.

"Did you do that?" She asked in a somber voice, already knowing the answer.

"Who do you think won?" Anonymous asked through the ship's loudspeakers, ignoring her question.

"Are you serious!?" Dash shouted.

Rainbow turned her back on the ship and descended down into the throne room to find out exactly what happened.

"I feel so... impure," Spike said with a trembling voice. It was the first thing he had said since he saw the body.

"Welcome to my world. Now, let's get back to the Library and brag. Today we are winners!" Anon proclaimed, feeling fulfilled for today.

Spike looked up at the alien. Any respect he had for him was lost.

"What's wrong with you? Why don't you appreciate life like everyone else does? And why do you have to be so careless about it!" Spike was screaming at him.

Anonymous' joyful face decayed back into its expressionless state. Whatever meaning was behind Spike's words was going in one ear and out the other. His blank face slowly turned to a frown. He tapped three times on the keyboard, and the door opened to inexplicably reveal The Golden Oak Library.

"Get out."

Spike wasn't going to argue with him. He never wanted to see him again. The doors shut behind him without remorse as the Mini-Screw disappeared into thin air.

Spike erupted into tears outside the Library for everypony to see. They had killed somepony and Anonymous didn't even care. The grief and sadness that Spike felt was unending. He needed to do something about it. There wasn't much to be done about it, though. So Spike did the only thing he could do to make himself feel better.

He wrote a letter to the pony's family.

THE SEVENTH DAY "TRANSPORTING..." (THREAT LOCATED) 1:14 PM

Having a teleporting and light-speed spaceship, Anonymous could have chosen to go anywhere in the universe to run away from his feelings. He didn't pick his homeworld, he didn't go to see Sarah, he didn't even go to talk to Twilight. He reappeared in the most random place he could have.

Sweet Apple Acre's living room.

The Mini-Screw was too big to be inside the house, so when it teleported in, the ceiling and the floor dented to accommodate its size. The event did not go unnoticed by the Apple family. Big Macintosh, Granny Smith, and Applejack were all present, looking at the ship's vandalized exterior. The U.F.O.'s doors slid open and Anonymous walked out as the ship disappeared behind him, leaving a bent ground and ceiling. Anon didn't make contact with any of the Apples. Instead, he sat down on the couch in the middle of the room and stared off into the distance.

"Why, go ahead, make yourself at home." Applejack sarcastically remarked, looking up at the damaged roof.

Anonymous sighed and turned his head to Applejack.

"I get tired of breathing."

Granny Smith rubbed her head, not understanding his point.

"I've been alive for an unimaginably long time and I've breathed more times than anyone could ever count."

He laughed at himself.

"I get tired of breathing."

Big Macintosh frowned, not appreciating his sudden intrusion. He nudged his little sister, which she took as a sign to say something.

"Why are you in our house, again?" Applejack inquired.

"I grew up in the south on my planet. This reminds me of home." Anon responded, closing his eyes and taking in a deep breath, groaning while he exhaled.

"You don't look too good, Mister Alien. Even though you look so youthful when you're really old." Granny Smith said, sitting down next to Anonymous.

"I think I've done something horrible. But I'm not too sure because I don't feel bad about it, but..." He stopped himself.

Applejack looked at his face. He was blushing and looked guilty, and for that, she felt a bit of sympathy.

"Sugarcube, everyone spends their life pleasing others. You do what you think is right for everyone and that guilt will clear up faster than the sky after a tornado."

"Eeyup." Big Mac agreed.

Anonymous struggled to listen. So many lifetimes were passing by his eyes as he was trying to find the answer. Everyone everywhere thought life was worth living, but why? Maybe Twilight was right... Maybe life was worth living. He'd do anything for the answer. Trade anything.

The alien sighed and stood up from the comforting couch.

"I'm sorry to intrude."

Anonymous walked out the front door without a word. The blue sky above him, the green ground beneath him, it looked beautiful and yet wasn't satisfying. Several septillion years had taught him so much about how things work, but not a single thing about why. He felt envy for the simplicity of these Equine's world. Then it occurred to him that he was ruining their simple life. All this technology, immortality, having absolute power, it was distracting from what was important.

He had to focus, and quickly.

He had less than four hours left before it was all gone.