Stress. We all deal with it in different ways. Whether its day-to-day 'I have to get all this work done' stress, or 'I can't handle this social situation' kind of stress. It needs to be handled the right way or it will drive you up the wall and around the ceiling fan a few times for good measure. And everyone has various ways of alleviating the problems brought on by its troubles.

My dear friend Fluttershy tends to block out the world around her, hiding away until the problem passes on its own. Twilight has gone off the rails a few times, causing her to lose sight of her mental anchors: logic and reason. Rainbow Dash lashes out at those around her with a reckless disregard to her self. Pinkie changes her own view of reality until the stressful corners have been rounded...and dear Applejack focuses so much on powering through troubles that she often loses sight of the most obvious and simple solutions.

It may not always be the most healthy of methods, but it's how we cope.

I myself, am known for the dramatics. A flair for theatrics. I know this because no-one is unaware of their own actions and crying out the wrongs of the world to any who would listen is not something you do idly. Having those actions then called out by your friends also helps.

Alas when I awoke on a cloud after being pushed off of an industrial docking station by a killer robot in a strange future, all things conducive to stress I might add, I may have been somewhat...shall we say...stressed.

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I awoke with a gasp, staring straight out and across the sky towards the far horizon. My body was stiff and heavy as I slowly came to. The events prior slowly coalesced in my mind as I struggled to remember how I had fallen unconscious.

With the gracefulness that only a brick could match, I managed to flip myself onto my belly. My eyes widened as I took in the scene around myself, "Wha..uuh...ooh...oh goodness!"

The dock I had been run off of was some distance far above me. The robot which had been most likely charging at full speed was nowhere to be seen. I could only assume it had sailed past, could only hope.

I mustn't have been out for too long. While I still couldn't directly catch a glimpse of the sun, the sky had not turned dark.
Of all the things around me which demanded my attention, only one was so inquestionably incorrect that I was unable to tear my eyes away from it.

The cloud which I sat upon.

Really, it begged the question, how was I even still alive and not plummeting to my dreadful death? My hooves were softly supported by the spongy cloud below me. Which should have been impossible. I was a unicorn after all...and I had certainly not cast any cloud walking spells. At least that I could remember. In fact, now that I thought about it, I didn't even know a cloud walking spell! Twilight was the one with all sorts of spells up her custom fitted sleeves.

...But of course, Twilight! I spun about on the spot with a burst of renewed energy. She had to be here! She must have been the one to cast the spell, saving me from my untimely demise!

I cried out to her, "Twilight! Darling! My rescuer! Thank you ever so much!" Sadly, my wails fell on deaf ears and no reply was returned. There was not a single living soul in sight or sound, "Twilight? Where are you...?" My bottom lip started to tremble, my excitement crumbling fast, "...darl..."

"Rarity? Is that you?" Twilight! She was here! I knew she would never leave me!

"Oh Twilight! You're still there!" My relief was palpable; you could palp it!

"Of course, I'm always here," she sounded equally relieved, "Where did you go? I saw you get thrown off the edge by that thing and then I lost you. I still can't find you anywhere."

I took a mental recap of my surroundings, there was very little that would make a good landmark, "I'm fine...I'm on a cloud. Thank you so much for casting that cloud walking spell, darling! I don't know what would have happened had you not acted so fast."

"Uh...well...I didn't cast any spells, Rarity."

No, hold on, "You didn't? But..." I took a step forward, only to feel my hoof brush against something solid. I could only blink as I stared down at the fractured, in-two, and clearly broken device below me. It actually took a moment to register what it was that I was even seeing.

Laying on the cloud, in two pieces, was my ear piece and mic which had fallen out during the fall, "But...I don't understand."

"I'm not sure why you're able to sit on that cloud either, but you need to get to-" No.

"You do," I announced bluntly. "You do know what's going on but you won't tell me!" And I was sick of it. The lying, the excuses, the vague information I've had to blindly trust. This had been the closest I had come to death so far, a few meters here or there and it would have been too close, yet Twilight continued to keep me in the dark.

"And I can't even work out why you're not telling me anything," I continued, "Why can I still hear you?!"

"And why can I walk on clouds?!"

"What happened to Equestria?!"

"I don't understand!"

"I just don-"

Something cracked and everything went black.

I wasn't even able to cry out from the pain. Instead I just held myself stock still, clenching my jaw. The ringing encompassed me. It drowned out the rest of the world with its pitch. And although pain faded quickly, the shock lingered.

As the whine evaporated away like rain after a storm, all that remained in its wake was the whistling wind. There was no distortion, there were no more electrical zaps, there was no Twilight.

There was just this cloud.

Then, as quickly as it had left, my vision returned. I felt wrong. Something had changed but I couldn't work out what.

In my peculiar limbo, I slowly stretched a foreleg out before me, and observed the black rubber material which now encased it. Small seams and ridges where the material folded over itself ran the length of the limb. Metal clamps were fitted above and below my knee for support. And a scruffed steel horseshoe was embedded into the hoof.

Worst of all was the artificial looking vine creeping throughout the whole article. Small growths glowing shades of aquamarine to cyan along its length. It pulsed in a way not unlike a heartbeat.

I rotated my head about to check if anything else had changed as dramatically. As far as I could examine, I was covered from head to flank in the same material and synthetic vines. I was even complete with rubber fibre hairs to fake the tail. With a hoof, I went to press against my face. Only for my hoof to tink against the glass panel in front of my eyes.

It didn't take Twilight to put this and the small robot I had seen before together, but frankly I had no desire to.

Honestly, I expected myself to scream, or to faint, or really to emote at all in some way. Instead I just sat there, unable to think through the numbness. I had hit my limit, and couldn't bring myself to accept what my eyes were seeing. Instead I turned my attention to the other matter.

"Twilight?" I rasped with an almost inaudible voice. There was no reply, "Twilight, please. I'm sorry. Just talk to me," I tried again, but only to the continued silence from my friend. Turning my head up towards the delivery bay above me, I traced the path between it to where I currently was through the cloud city.

"I just need to get to you, right? Then you'll tell me everything. Just like you said you would." It looked like it would be a significant trip. Certainly I was further away now than I ever had been, "I can do that."

I quickly checked the basket which remained on my back, only to find the last of my cans had rolled out and through the clouds. I ignored the voice in the back of my head telling me I didn't need those anymore anyway. The only thing remaining was the ID card of the dead stallion which had fortunately caught between two braids of the wicker.

The cloud I had landed on had a small bridge to the nearest building, and with a walk, I was in front of a door with the words 'Sparkle IO' painted onto the front.

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The inside of the building was dark thanks to the turned off electric lamps which limply hung from the ceiling. This was a reception area if the oversized desk, waiting chairs and framed paintings of landscapes was any indication. Entirely empty, as I had come to expect during my time here.

Growing down the corner was more bio...gunk. The growth was just as disgusting as before, leaking black goop was coating the floor. I cringed inwardly knowing I was now acting as a walking pot for some of it. I didn't want to think about what it was doing to me. Twilight had said it wouldn't hurt me, but I wasn't sure how far I could trust her words right about now.

A moment of silence passed to listen out for trouble further in. But when nothing rose to the bait, I willed my legs to carry me forward. My hesitation was a result of Twilight no longer keeping lookout over my shoulder. I would have to rely on my own instincts from here on in. If I even had those anymore. My eyes purposefully avoided looking down at the elephant's legs.

Looking back, I still wasn't sure what had actually happened. All I was able to piece together is that Twilight was no longer responding. I refused to believe she would purposefully ignore me after everything that's happened. So I had to concede it was a technical fault, on her end, that was causing our separation. Which meant there was very little I could do to fix the issue.

Removing myself from the room, wandering down the attached hall, and entering the first room on the left, found me in some sort of office for one.

The first thing I noticed was how the floor was a bird's nest of paper. To be completely honest, it looked as though the entire room had been ransacked by a pair of ruffians. Books torn off of shelves, curtains pulled from their windows. The only thing untampered with was the monitor on the desk, and the keyboard which oddly lacked any noticeable traces of dust or debris that was quite present everywhere else.

I left a trail of impromptu origami as my hooves crumpled the paper floor to get a better look at the computer. It was still turned on, but asleep. With a press of a button, the screen lit up and I gasped. A quick scan of the electronic mail on the screen, and more specifically the recipient and author fields, let me know that these were Twilight's letters.

Which meant this was Twilight's computer.

This was Twilight's office.

Really, it made sense now that I thought about it. This was the head building for Twilight's research group, of course her office would be located here. But I certainly wasn't expecting to just walk right into her personal work space. Then again Twilight would want to be close to the action, and an open door policy wouldn't go amiss on her. She was very much a hooves-on leader and Princess.

Before, I had been hesitant to delve into personal information. Now, however, I just wanted answers. And being upset at Twilight made it very easy to quickly take a peak. And really, emails aren't as personal as medical records...right? Besides, it could contain information pertinent to my very survival.

I decided to read the email that was already opened on the screen. Which was in the outgoing mail, oddly.

Dear Chairmare of the A.I. and Neurological Studies Oversight Committee,

I write to you via email instead of in-pony or through company representatives as an attempt to professionally re-direct these conversations of conflict from the public eye. I'm sure neither of us feel these discussions are beneficial to our image.

I am sure these discussions will not take much longer, however, and I feel we should be able to come to an agreement in short time. Especially given that my research group has made every possible effort to fall in line with the severe, and quite frankly needless, limitations you have placed upon us.

Signed,
The Director of Sparkle IO, Twilight Sparkle

I remembered Dr. Membrane mentioning they had been lacking funds, but I had no idea they were being pressured from an above committee. What would a computer research group need an oversight committee for in the first place? Even as I posed the question, I immediately thought to everything I had seen in the previous facility. Perhaps stricter limitations would have been a good thing after all.

"I thought I heard somepony up here."

My head shot up to find a pony-shaped robot staring back from the door. Before I had a chance to think any further, I screamed, grabbed the nearby pen holder, and magically threw it towards the intruder. The robot ducked back into the hall and the cup collided with the far wall, pens exploding out on impact.

"Woah! Is that you, Twilight?! I thought I said you weren't welcome here!" The robot barked back, and I flinched in response. I must have misheard. It shouldn't be possible! But that voice was unmistakable. I had listened that scratchy tone near daily for years.

"R..Rainbow Dash?"

"Rarity?" The robot poked its head around the door frame, staring in, "What year?" It asked, hostility front and center. It was certainly not the response I had been expecting.

I blinked, "Sorry?"

"What year is your scan from?"

My scan? My brain scan? "Wha..what are you talking about?"

The robot took a cautious, yet forceful, step forward into the room, "That early, huh? Did Twilight put you up to this?" She was getting worked up, and fast.

"I...I don't..." was all I could stammer, unable to avert my gaze from the piercing electronic eyes.

The head tilted, it scanned my frame, properly looking me over the first time. The eyes moved back up to match my own, then with a softer tone it spoke again, "You really don't know? Do you?"

I shook my head. What was it going on about? The Rainbow imitate crawled the rest of the way into the room, almost like it was seeing a new creature, unsure if it was about to be torn apart. The only sound was the crumpling paper under-hoof. I tracked it the whole distance.

She stopped within a hoof length from myself. Slowly, a foreleg extended and was pressed against my chest and gave a gentle push. Another press against my face...plate. Then, with the carefulness of a balloon threading a needle, it reached its arms up and placed them around my shoulders, softly pressing her whole body into me in an embrace.

It was cold, and stiff. But I kept perfectly still. Until, that is, she spoke, "Rarity...it's been so long..." With that, she was no longer a machine. A walking abacus. She was Rainbow Dash. Regardless of where she had come from, what had happened to her, or if she was even a pony. My friend was here and in need of comfort.

Extending my own arms, I held her in return. We sat like that for a good minute before she started talking again.

"You shouldn't have come here," Rainbow Dash whispered, almost in disbelief. She pulled herself away and held me by my shoulders, shaking my frame, "You shouldn't...you shouldn't even be here, why are you here? How can you be here?"

I sighed, "Honestly, I've been trying to figure that out for the past day. I'm afraid Twilight hasn't told me too mu-"

"Twilight!" Rainbow interrupted, "I bet she brought you here, that'd be just like her! Throwing her friends into a death pit for her own sick ideas. What did she want you to do?"

"I'm...not really sure to be honest. She just wanted me to reach her. I almost made it but ran into some trouble around the docks." Rainbow looked in thought for a few moments, and I took the break in conversation to ask what I'd been hesitating on, "Is...that really you inside there, Rainbow?"

She nodded, "Heh, I guess this might be pretty strange if you're really from before...you know...any of this started..." she gestured to herself and the surroundings, "But yeah, it's me. Me from O' fifty two anyways. Not really sure what's happened to the uh...other me, since."

"Other you?" I inquired while examining Rainbow's suit. As far as I could see it was somewhat similar to mine. With a couple of notable differences. Firstly, the material was a lighter shade, although that was most likely through ageing than any desire for a lighter texture. Second, was that the seams were differently placed, perhaps a different model? Thirdly, was the roughly aligned stripes of chipped paint running through her false tail and around the helmet, one stripe for each colour of a rainbow. Definitely a later add on and not part of the original design I concluded.

I wondered if I looked anywhere close to this bizarre.

And finally, there were no blue bio-mechanical vines growing on her. Although, the suit was significantly more scuffed up and damaged. Small cuts through the rubber and glass littered the suit and visor. Scattered abrasions wore away at the contact points. Also, I hadn't noticed it from the door, but from up close her left eye light appeared visibly dimmer than the right one. She had clearly been through a lot.

"The other me," she explained, "that kept going after my scan. Like, you've got another you somewhere. When was your brain scan done?"

I thought back to the records I had found in the medical database. My original had lived a whole life. My life. "Well, if you mean the one for Twilight's research, that was the year eight."

"Woah," she said, wide eyed.

Finally, I had to ask, "Darling, hmm, please don't take this the wrong way, but what are you...and I suppose myself?", I stretched my foreleg alongside hers. Rainbow appeared to have at least some idea of what was going on, surely she would know.

"Hey!" She took my shoulders once again and pressed her glass face right up to mine with an intensity I had never seen from her. Then she said in a low, yet strong, voice, "Listen to me. We. Are. Ponies. Don't let anybody else tell you otherwise."

My eyes drifted to my hooves, "But, what about..."

"Doesn't matter...you feel real don'tcha? You're here. You're present. We are real and alive..."

I looked back to Rainbow. Pure determination was breaking through cracks in her featureless face.

"...so very very alive," she completed, "You don't want to die do you?"

Shaking my head, I managed to croak out, "No, of course not."

She leaned away from me, I could almost see that confident trademark smirk on her face, "Good. 'Cause we're not gonna! Because I know how to live forever."

Author's Note

Hey look it's a new character!

It's been a little bit since the last update. It's not because I haven't been working on this, but that I've been working on a one shot which ended up not really going anywhere. So this is being actively written again!