Aftersound

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Written by: Oneimare & Geka

Preread and edited by: Jay Tarrant, IAmApe, mikemeiers

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Tombstone

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Whilst neither Delight nor Flower met my course of action with enthusiasm, they still agreed to it, but on one condition—a detour to an eatery.

Two city blocks later, it became apparent that Flower had almost no strength left in her as she kept tripping over her hooves. Grumbling, she finally agreed to climb on my back and almost instantly fell asleep.

As we neared the border with the Inner City, the scenery gradually changed.

The polychromatic presence of adverts abated, letting gloomy skyscrapers hide the firmament all the same. Rust—the ever-present plight of the metal city—ceded to chrome, if only partially. Delicate combinations of plastic and glass replaced sturdy edifices of steel and concrete.

No more did the ponies try to outshine each other with their bizarre looks—garish outfits gave way to suits. Zebras, gryphons, equinods… all gone; even the neighponese barely had a presence.

Needless to say, we stood out from the crowds to an even higher degree now. More than once Del gave me a doubtful look, but I met it with determination. Flower only fidgeted in her troubled slumber—why she would choose my ridged back instead of the pegasus’ soft feathers was a mystery.

A turn brought us to a dead-end—a little island of the outer districts’ dirtiness and decadence hidden inside the labyrinth of dark towers not so far from Canterlot’s gleaming heart. Only a single glass door cast light into the cramped alley, a simple sign above it reading ‘Black Shawarma’ in elaborate cursive.

Before we entered, Del tickled Flower’s nose with her feathers, producing a sneeze and earning a glare from the filly.

Delight wasted no time, approaching a stallion behind the counter to make an order. The cook promptly busied himself with preparing it; whilst she quietly chatted with him, Flower and I took a seat at the table in the corner.

The cook, and likely the owner of that place, caught my attention with his short body, lanky legs, high-set tail, long narrow muzzle and a horn of impressive length—Saddle Arabian blood showing itself, which explained many things about this somewhat exotic café.

The stallion pointed a small device at Delight’s neck; it cast a pale green glow on her skin to reveal a previously invisible set of lines and numbers. Only when the scanner beeped, did he levitate the steaming rolls to her.

The tinkle of a tray with four portions of shawarma and two glasses of hot tea woke up Flower, who had dozed off, lulled to sleep by the warmth, dim light, and murmur of pots.

She carefully took one of the roasted rolls in her non-metal hoof and sniffed at it, then tentatively took a small bite. Almost instantly, her eyes widened, and she all but tried to shove the entire portion in her mouth.

“You even impress me,” commented Delight, her mouth already full.

The remark fell on deaf ears—Flower continued to greedily gorge on her meal, tears of happiness rolling down her cheeks. The smile fell off Del’s face.

As a being of metal, my only option was to forlornly watch my friends sate their hunger.

“Thank you so much, Delight,” Flower said, wiping the sauce and crumbs off her muzzle. “That was the tastiest thing I’ve eaten in my life.”

“Don’t sweat it.” The pegasus waved her hoof, sipping on the steaming tea.

She choked on her drink when the filly suddenly asked me, “So, after we get you a new body we are going to Stalliongrad, right?”

I simply stared at Flower, wordless.

“Come on, Twilight, I’ve spent years hanging with Scuff. He talks about only two things—how shiny and round the Magician’s butt was and how good it’d be for all of us to flee to Stalliongrad,” she explained with a roll of her eyes.

“Well… it does seem to me like a sensible option. What do you think, Delight?’

The pegasus squeezed out betwixt the coughs, “You think it’s real?”

As I tilted my head in confusion, she continued, “It’s not even on the maps. There’re only rumours started after a Former One was said to have left for Stalliongrad a few decades ago.”

“I reme—” I stopped myself. “I can point it out on a map if I get one.”

To my surprise, Del nodded vigorously without hesitation, “I’m in, then.”

“I’m not going anywhere without Wire,” Flower chimed back in, “and she is not leaving her folks behind.”

And I wasn’t leaving before figuring out how to help Spike.

Before figuring out myself.

Unbeknownst to my ruminations, Del spoke, “We’ll need to get food rations—a lot of them.”

Flower readily supplemented, “We can’t just walk out of the city, either. We’ll have to go through the Edge and the Dump.”

“And even if we manage that,” Delight added, “those who failed to get to Stalliongrad spoke about permafrost and deep snow.”

The pegasus and the filly were eager to delve further into the discussion of the potential challenges, yet I had to cut them off.

“It’s all solvable, but there’s no point in fretting over any of this until I have a body that can survive such a journey.”

Somewhat discontent with my intervention, they still nodded in agreement.

And before we could start working on that, we had somewhere to visit first.

A well of glass, steel and concrete loomed above us—another blind alley.

Looking around in search of a number plate, Del muttered, “We should be close.”

“Is that the building we need?” Flower suddenly pointed with her metal hoof.

Del squinted, then turned to the filly, me following suit. “How did you know?”

Somewhat abashed, she replied, “It’s where I found your crystals.”

We all exchanged glances and an uneasy feeling settled in my proverbial gut as we warily trotted to the entrance into the Royal Archives.

Low and bulky, the modern cradle of information gave me the distinct impression of a small warehouse. Nestled betwixt two black skyscrapers, squashed by their rears, it barely had any presence on the main street. A weblike mosaic formed by countless cracks, disrupted in many places by fallen plaster, marred its façade with the rusted number plate as the only indication of that edifice being our destination. It gazed at us with near darkness through the dirty windows—deep inside something glowed faintly with a pale blue.

The sonorous protest of corroded hinges greeted us as we entered the foyer. Neither the guard post nor the large table housed anypony. A lone blinking gas lamp spilt its dim cyan light on the dust resting undisturbed on the floor and furniture.

Looking at Flower and Del, I was met with concern. We huddled closer before proceeding to the next door.

It opened into a chamber vast enough for its ceiling and walls to be lost in the near blackness; blue blinking lights of large box-like machines weakly disrupted the overwhelming murk. Countless crystals residing on the shelves lazily reflected the coruscation.

Not a single pony came to meet us; save for the mysterious devices faintly rustling with their insides, no sound disturbed the tomb silence of the Archives.

Stifling an urge to turn back, I took a tentative step forward—to the opening amidst the labyrinth of shelves and machines, right in the centre of the room. Flower pressed to my side and feathers brushed against my metal skin.

We emerged into an island of cold light cast by a lantern on top of a box full of rectangular crystal plates. A dozen lanes submerged in shadow radiated from the circular clearing, leading into the depths of the library.

From one of them came the measured sound of horseshoes clinking against tiles.

“Welcome to the Royal Archives!”

The voice froze me to the place as a tidal wave of horror crushed upon me.

A pair of glowing eyes was the first to appear and then their owner emerged from the void.

Purple paint peeling from tarnished metal plates; metal bangs of the mane, coloured in indigo with a streak of magenta, embracing a horn; sharp and delicate features of a young unicorn mare.

“Good afternoon. My name is Twilight Sparkle. How can I help you?”

She kept rigidly smiling, staring at us listlessly.

“Alright,” Twilight then said in an emotionless dull voice, “if you need any assistance, I’ll be nearby.”

Moving machinelike, she hauled the box on her back and left, dissolving into the shadows she had come from.

“Did you know her?”

Yanked out of my stupor by an unfamiliar voice I abruptly pivoted—an equinoid leaned on one of those large machines, regarding me curiously.

In my shock I barely paid attention to his strange looks—generally equine, he appeared as if made by someone who had only seen ponies in pictures. Whilst his voice had a strong buzz to it, he sounded male.

He took my stunned silence as an answer and continued, “We rarely have guests and none ever reacted like that.” Seeing my ability to speak failing to return, the mechanical stallion rolled his eyes. “Anyway, as she said, welcome to the Royal Archives. I’m Thirteen—the head archivist here, by the way; or the only archivist, for that matter.”

I forced myself to look over my shoulder, where, in the darkness an angular shape moved like a puppet, softly clicking with gems as she placed them on the shelf from the crate.

I was a machine, but it was Twilight Sparkle who acted like one.

My speaker rustled with a horrified whisper, “What happened to her?”

“So, you do know she wasn’t an equinoid once.” Thirteen squinted at me. “Twilight Sparkle was the first ever pony who tried transferring her consciousness into an artificial body, subsequently discovering the Transference Paradox.” He hemmed. “Not that she would ever know that.”

Twilight noticed my attention and smiled at me.

“Is she…” That grin erased all words from my mind but one. “Dead?”

Looking at me intently, the quasi-equinoid said levelly, “The only memories she now has are those she made working here. And Twilight Sparkle’s organic body was cremated.”

“May... I talk to her?”

Thirteen shrugged. “Sure.”

A snowy-white wing stopped me.

Del met my confused and distraught look with a deeply worried expression; over her shoulder Flower kept glancing at me nervously.

“We can turn and just leave.” The pegasus softly said. “I can try to get in touch with Former Ones if you need information.”

Carefully pushing her wing away, I uttered, “No, I need to do this.”

However, Flower took the place of the feathered limb, looking at the floor.

“Twi—” the filly cut herself short, biting her lip; she raised her eyes and they glistened. “I’m sorry.”

I almost wondered if Flower even understood what she was sorry for or fully realised the gravity of what she had done. Yet, I managed to curb the frustration born from the sheer torrent of emotions assaulting me.

My hoof gently stroked her mane.

“You couldn’t have known.”

“Twilight Sparkle?”

“Yes.” She instantly stopped mid-movement and beamed at me hollowly. “How can I help you?”

I opened my mouth and promptly closed it.

She was Twilight Sparkle only in name, whilst I… My hooves touched my chest—below the plates, my crystal heart beat, the memories I owed to her. Metal quietly scraped against metal as I considered tearing my ribcage apart and…

I’d become what Twilight Sparkle was now. She would leave behind my walking corpse and continue to live her life after five hundred years, except…

Thirteen told me that the machine still dutifully waiting for my decision had no memories of Twilight Sparkle.

I was what was left of Twilight Sparkle.

Some of her recollections still evaded me, hazy visions I dared not to explore; some parts had been missing—whatever happened between the trial and her ‘death’. The pony resurrected in me wasn’t whole.

One thing was as clear as Her day—the thing I was looking at would be my fate, were I to reject Twilight Sparkle’s gift of life, deserved or not.

And I didn’t want to die.

‘Twilight’ tilted her head as my gaze found her empty expression.

“How do I access information from the Royal Archives?”

The keyboard keys refused to cooperate with my clumsy hooves, nor did the unfamiliar layout of keys help. The glass screen flickering and spasming with visual artefacts added a layer of frustration to the satiation of my curiosity…

…Which never came. Five hundred years had changed very little about the actual nature of archives—saving any knowledge for the sake of it. The technology allowing to commit to ‘paper’ half a millennium worth of data might have been a mistake.

Each inquiry resulted in the terminal loading data from the so-called server for agonisingly long minutes only to present me with hundreds of files having little actual relevance to my request. A search for a name—Twilight Sparkle, for an example—would bring up a thousand pieces of bureaucratic garbage, pre-dating even the Great War. I literally found the record of Twilight’s grades from her first year in school, but not a mention of her life after the trial or even the event itself.

Whilst visiting the Royal Archives had granted me an invaluable insight into my nature, the time to decide whose plan to follow now—Flower’s or that of Delight—had come.

Surprisingly, my attempts to find the snow-white pegasus in the black shadows failed utterly. Locating Flower proved much easier; however, she wasn’t alone when I finally stumbled upon her.

Looking much more invigorated—she must have had a nap as I battled with the terminal—the filly quietly but vividly discussed something with Thirteen, ‘Twilight’ sitting by them; the machine appeared to be offline—the light had faded from her eyes and some of her plating rested on the floor, revealing her inner workings.

Holding one of her crystals, Flower pestered the archivist, “These are solid gems, right? The old tech?”

Engrossed in conversation and with her back to me, she failed to notice my approach; Thirteen, on the other hoof, gave me a shallow nod before patiently explaining, “When the transference attempt happened, clusters of microcrystals weren’t invented yet. Since then, nopony has bothered to transfer her data.”

“She doesn’t seem to have much of it anyway—my left leg has more personality,” the filly grumbled, her words reverberating as her muzzle disappeared inside ‘Twilight’. Her head came back out of the half-disassembled torso and she spoke again, “Hey, Thirteen, do you or ‘her’ have owners?”

“We’re property of The Crown.” He then narrowed his green glowing eyes. “Why?”

“Does that mean you don’t have to follow the TCE’s rules?”

“We’re the Crown—we are the rule.”

Cracking a sly smile, Flower patted the unmoving metal body on the back, “Is ‘Twilight’ free to come and go as she wishes, then?”

“I’m in charge of the Archives, not her.” Thirteen narrowed his eyes again, threat clear in them this time. “It has to be on her volition, however—not your coding. Do it, and you’ll be charged with theft of royal possessions. It’s a death sentence or the Crystal Mines if you are lucky enough to choose.”

Considering the filly’s tendency to ignore the law, it sounded like a perfect time to intervene.

“Flower? What are you up to?”

She energetically turned to me, beaming.

“Oh, here you are... um…”

The smile faded from her lips as she trailed off, casting her gaze at the floor.

“Twilight,” I offered firmly.

Though she said nothing, light returned to her expression.

“You didn’t answer my question.’’

The filly nonchalantly waved her hoof in dismissal. “I just thought about transferring your memory crystals into that body.”

“Now, wait, both of you.” Thirteen perked up, frowning deeply. “What is this all about?”

“This equinoid here has the memories of—”

Flower found my hoof over her mouth and I sheepishly smiled at Thirteen, dragging her away.

“Could you excuse us for a minute?”

I let the filly go only when we were out of the archivist’s earshot, though still spoke in a harsh whisper, “Flower, stop doing that!”

“I thought you accepted who you are,” she barked at me, rubbing her offended muzzle.

“It’s not about that—I’m unsure anypony should know that I have the memories of Twilight Sparkle.”

Flower rolled her eyes at me. “I’m pretty sure Thirteen already knows.”

“Then we should leave now.”

Even before the last word had left my speaker I was already trotting in a random direction, to search for Del once again, but Flower materialised in front of me, her hooves pressed to my chest. It wouldn’t have stopped me, but the message went through.

“You don’t understand—it’s our only chance!”

“Chance for what?” I hissed. “To be caught by the police? Or the Royal Guard?”

“Don’t be ridiculous, they’d have been here hours ago if he wanted.” She pointed at ‘Twilight’s’ slumped form. “I’m talking about the body—it’s all old metal and in perfect condition. If we want to make it to Stalliongrad, we need it.”

With that, she tugged on me, but my hooves might as well have been riveted to the floor.

My first thought was simple—murder. She wasn’t Twilight Sparkle, but was she an entity? Yet the more I stared at ‘her’ unmoving silhouette, the more I realised she wasn’t, and never had been, alive.

The filly pulled me again and I followed this time.

The archivist regarded us with suspicion and curiosity when we returned.

Without missing a beat, Flower addressed him, “Thirteen, I’d like to restore ‘Twilight’s’ memories.”

He gawked at her.

“How?”

“This equinoid here is Twilight Sparkle,”—Flower pointed at me—“and I want to transfer the memories she has into her true body.”

Thirteen gave me a prolonged, yet expressionless stare. When it almost became really uncomfortable, his eyes seemed to flash.

“I’m not stopping you,” he finally said. “But you better be prepared for whatever happens next.”

Since Flower had turned off all my body systems, save the ‘brains’, as she put it, I couldn’t even speak—only shot discontent glances at Thirteen who stubbornly refused to elaborate further on his enigmatic warning.

The archivist himself leaned on the terminal, patiently watching Flower do work, occasionally commenting on the process—giving the savant little mechanic tips and tricks.

Delight’s eyes gleamed from the shadows atop one of the large terminals and just like me, she kept glaring at Thirteen—he’d found her napping on a shelf, amongst some papers. Offended by such treatment of his beloved archives, he awoke the pegasus by shoving her out of the newly-made nest with the full force of two mechanical hooves.

“Alright, Twilight. I’m gonna turn you offline and put your memory crystals inside the new body. You shouldn’t even notice anything… I think.”

I didn’t even have the time to react to her words when everything went black.

My eyes opened, line after line obscuring my vision until only the words ‘Welcome back’ remained.

They faded and I took a sharp breath, blinking.

Blinking! Breathing!

From her perch Delight chuckled. “You look much better now—not like you are going to start a rampage any moment.”

My previous body, a sordid vessel of rust, bloodied and stained in oily rags glowered at me with a single dead eye.

“Thanks. I’m glad about it too.”

“If you hadn’t been smashing into walls and trying to kill ponies,” Flower grumbled from my side, a small wrench in her teeth, “you would have looked fine. What the synth-hay is that?”

Her hoof pulled a small object from inside my chest—a crystal.

“Isn’t it just one of ‘not-Twilight’s’ gems?” Del commented.

“It wasn’t connected to anything.”

My hoof stretched out and the filly reluctantly passed her find.

An amethyst with classic unicorn facetting, set in a silver case encrusted with tiny semi-precious stones of rich magenta and deep blue. The violet depths unmistakably and softly glowed with magic.

“It looks like a recording crystal, but I can’t be sure until the enchantment is checked.”

Which wasn’t happening with the company present.

Idly rolling the gem, I was struck with a theory about its elaborate casing, “However, it might be activated by non-magic users...”

Eager Flower stretched her hooves to snatch the gem from me. “What are we waiting for, then?”

“I just said that I don’t know what enchantment it holds. And even if my guess is correct, do you remember what happened last time?”

“Don’t you want to know?” She pressed on, not giving up on trying to reclaim the crystal. “It could be your last message or something...”

Of course, I craved to know.

My eyes found Thirteen and the strange equinoid met my unsaid question with the tiniest of nods, vivid curiosity clear in his expression. Yet somehow I couldn’t shake off the impression he had known what was recorded on that gem already.

Taking a deep breath (it felt so good to finally be able to do it) I pressed one of the smaller gems in the casing.

To my great relief, nothing exploded and the crystal remained in my hooves steadfast, whispering with faint static and softly pulsing with magic.

The recording began to play.

“I haven’t used these recording gems for so long, I almost forgot how to enchant them.” That voice belonged to Twilight Sparkle, however, it possessed a distinct rasp.

Then another pony spoke—Moon Dancer, not spared by time either, “Weren’t you supposed to say the date and other boring stuff before you start? You’re losing your edge, Twily.”

“So are you!”

“Sheesh, relax. Stop being so nervous—it’ll work perfectly.”

“Yeah, and then I will throw you a party! ‘Welcome-to-a-new-body Party’! Wait, does it count as a second birthday? Do I need to plan two birthdays for you from now on? Twice as many parties!” Pinkie Pie’s words faded as if she’d walked—likely hopped—away.

“You know, you can at least try not to look so gloomy and wish us luck.”

“I’m still uncertain about these enchantments.” The vaguely familiar voice of the mare who replied to Moon had a strange echoing and distorted quality, denying my attempts to identify her. “Many ponies have tried to achieve immortality, but it doesn’t work through conventional magic.”

“It’s not immortality, it’s a transference.”

“There is no reason for it to fail,” Twilight snapped. “We checked them—they are impeccable, just like the gems!”

“It’s not about how correctly they were cast, it’s about the enchantments themselves. I still think you should have included my suggestions.”

“No way! No dark magic! Look at what it has done to you!”

“At least, it worked. If it was so easy to make what you want to, then we would be surrounded by undying ponies.”

“You almost sound like you don’t want us to succeed.”

“It’s because I want you to, that I’m doing this. It’s just… one can’t bend Harmony’s rules using its own tools!”

“We are not resorting to dark magic! Nothing good ever comes out of that!”

“Alright, alright, we’re all nervous, but we need to stop this bickering. It’s too late to change anything, anyway. Listen, if something happens and we were wrong, then you can do whatever you deem necessary. What do you say, Twi?”

“Fine. But there isn’t going to be any need for that.”

“Now let’s go to Pinkie’s party. She has even managed to get a cake somewhere...”

With a sharp crack, the recording died.

It loaded me with questions, yet the silence taking reign belonged to the three other equines rather than myself—Flower, Del and Thirteen stared at me, their eyes wide.

I was prepared to ask them what was wrong—perhaps, the events of the recording or the mysterious mare somehow meant more to them than to me, but then I noticed the glow persisting and it came not from the now dormant gem.

Purple light radiated through the gaps in my body’s plating.

I sensed… something.

The horn on my forehead served a purely aesthetic purpose… or did it?

Concentrating on the familiar sensation, I discovered a pattern in the trickles of arcane energy—from my crystals and to my horn.

Could I disrupt that circuit and funnel the magic into a spell?

I tried and everything exploded.

In my excitement, I committed the most foalish of mistakes—directing a current into itself. My artificial nature had saved me from a nasty headache and probably an inability to cast magic for a few days; if that ability had truly manifested in me.

My metal frame offered me another clemency—being able to ignore the journey into the world of pain when a shelf crashed upon me as the magic discharge knocked me into it.

Through the tinkling sound of broken crystals still bouncing off the floor, a steady flapping of wings came and a moment later panting voice joined it:

“Up here!

Delight hovered under the ceiling, Flower dangling from her hooves—both dishevelled, but overwise unscathed. Thirteen was nowhere to be seen, however.

A loud bang echoed from the darkness of the Archives, our heads whipped around, trying to locate its source.

It wasn’t hard—standing against the light of the entrance four ponies clad in blue armour scanned the room with flashlights.

Attached to gun barrels.

“Freeze!” an angry voice screeched, but we were already on the move.

Del soared over me, loudly whispering, “To the windows!”

Correcting my course, I made a sharp turn and a crystal plate crunched under my hooves.

The beams of light instantly converged on me and a moment later the gun reports claimed the room with their cacophony. Stone tiles exploded around and bullets sharply pinged off my plating.

However, the fire abruptly ceased with a bark, “It’s a socket fucker, don’t waste the ammo, morons! The EMP’s!”

A metal cylinder flew over my head, landing right in front of me. Skidding, I tried to dash for cover—too late.

A wave of iridescent light washed over me with a whoosh, filling my vision with static.

Nothing changed.

Wasting no time in figuring out what was supposed to happen to me, I continued to navigate between lop-sided racks, barely avoiding slipping on the strewn around shards.

“Why the fuck is it still moving?” came from behind me, closer than I expected—and found comfortable.

To my luck, I all but crashed into Del and Flower the next turn.

The pegasus instantly recovered and wordlessly leapt above the jagged teeth of broken glass. Hesitating only to realise it was the ground floor, I followed her, smashing through the shards.

She landed into the middle of the small street with much more grace—my arrival sent sparks flying from under my hooves. By the moment I recovered, she was tugging breathlessly on my shoulder, her wing pointing at the commotion in the crowd.

A group of police officers fought through the uncooperative masses, heading straight for us.

I couldn’t be shot, not immediately. The ‘EMP’s’ might not actually work on me and I might have magic—not a completely hopeless situation.

For Delight and Flower—‘a death sentence or the Crystal Mines’ if they weren’t shot down right away.

“Del! Take Flower and flee to the Edge.”

They gasped, staring at me.

“But what about you!?” Flower regained her senses first.

“I’ll be alright,” I lied. “I’ll meet you there. Now, go!”

Before Flower could abject, Delight swooped the filly from her hooves and took wing, to soon be lost amidst the reflections of neon.

I picked a direction with fewer blue-armoured ponies and ran.

My heavy frame gained speed agonisingly slowly, but once I reached steady gallop, I became a train mercilessly ploughing through the mob, practically hurling ponies aside; once I even heard the crack of bones.

Stopping my charge became an issue when an officer materialised before me, whipping out a gun.

“Stop right there, criminal scum!” the stallion shouted at me.

With my inertia only partially lost, I still rammed into his navy-blue armour, making the shots go wide.

Leaving the stunned pony to struggle on the pavement, I resumed my escape, now actively looking for the alcoves with hatches leading underground—I couldn’t run forever. Sooner or later, the police would find a way to surround and overpower me—they had weapons deadly enough.

A sharp turn led me to a dead-end—deserted, narrow, short, housing nought but garbage containers and a trapdoor.

I threw it open and dove in.

Author's Note

Special thanks to Jay Tarrant.

I hope you've enjoyed reading this story so far.

If you notice any mistakes sneaked in through the editing, let me know.

Stay awesome.