Chapters A diagnostic readout played in front of the black void that was the vision of a Reploid. It showed that all of her systems that had been damaged were repaired with the addition of several new upgrades to her systems. Her hearing came back on and she hoped that she would hear the voice of her friends, but instead, an unfamiliar voice spoke up, "Someone go get Midnight, our guest is starting to reactivate."
A single thought floated in the head of the Maverick Hunter, "Where am I? "
The cameras she used as eyes flickered back on, she couldn't move, but the lab that she was in was far more advanced than what Twilight Sparkle had used. Something was wrong, she wasn't in the year 2018, she wasn't even in the same century. She recognized this technology, it was the same as late 22nd century tech where she came from. A tear ran down her face, something that surprised her. It used to be that only her commander was able to cry, but the diagnostics told her that she had been upgraded with that ability as well.
Her vocal synthesizer came online as did her motor functions. She snapped free of the bindings she was in and triggered the release for the capsule door, stepping out and scaring all of the scientists there who only knew that she was a Maverick at one point. "Where... where are my friends?" she asked.
One of the scientists worked up the courage to respond, "Your friends?" he asked.
Leila looked at him and started to walk over to him, believing that he would have some kind of answer. The scientist started to walk backwards away from her and the other scientists called in security Reploids who pointed their weapons at the Maverick Hunter. "Call off security, I just want to get closer so we can sit and talk. I have no interest in harming a human when my prime directive is to protect humans," she said, obviously annoyed by this display.
The green skinned scientist gulped, "O-okay," he stammered.
The security Reploids lowered their weapons and green armored Reploid grabbed two chairs, one for the scientist and one for herself. She removed her helmet, knowing that it tended to make humans more comfortable talking to her. "I am Leila, an A-Rank Maverick Hunter. I'm a veteran of the Maverick Wars and I fought and disappeared in the Elf Wars, when I awoke. I woke in this world, according to my memory banks, I found myself about six miles from this very spot. For the next month and a half, I lived among the humans here... until... I saw Flim and Flam. Everything goes blank after that. Next thing I know, I woke up here," she recalled.
A voice from behind her spoke up, it sounded like Twilight, but the pitch was slightly off, "Aunt Leila, we have a lot to catch you up on. First off Flim and Flam passed away in prison in the year twenty-eighty. They were locked up on charges of attempted homicide, charged for all the crimes you committed. You went Maverick and tried to kill your friends. They were able to stop you, with Sunset Shimmer landing the blow that deactivated you. We removed the memories from you of having been a Maverick to not overburden you. But we can restore them if you'd like."
The Third Generation Reploid turned around to see another Reploid standing there, looking almost like her own sister, Twilight. "Who are you?" she asked, confused.
The First Generation Reploid nodded, "I am Midnight Sparkle, I have overseen the project to restore you to life, like my creator and mother wanted," she reported.
Leila sighed and shook her head, she couldn't believe this, she started to walk towards the door, but two security Reploids tried to stop her. She gave them a look that told them that if even if they wanted to, they couldn't possibly stop her. Said security Reploids decided to take this as a challenge and one of them reached for their weapon. The Maverick Hunter noticed this but knew it would be best not to escalate the situation. She walked out of the lab and onto what was the front yard, but was now part of a bigger complex. Towers loomed around her and she dropped to her knees in revelation of what was going on. She was in a time similar to the era in which she was first brought online. She didn't need to be told the exact year.
"I was going to tell you, but you insisted on seeing it for yourself," Midnight Sparkle told her, placing a hand on the Third Generation Reploid's shoulder.
"They're all gone... all of my friends are gone once more," Leila said in anguish. She placed her hands on the ground and punched with enough force to crack the concrete underneath her, tears formed in her eyes and then started to fall to the ground. "Twilight, Applejack, Rainbow, Fluttershy, Rarity, Sunset, Pinkie, I never got to say goodbye to them," she lamented.
Midnight's hand gripped slightly firmer, "Aunt Leila, you did say good-bye to them. Your systems were shutting down one by one when Sunset Shimmer hit you with your beam saber. Your memory unit was the first thing to malfunction, it stopped writing new memories almost immediately. That's why you don't remember any of this," she said.
The tears started to slow down, but they didn't stop, "How did they... pass?" the Maverick Hunter asked.
Twilight's creation sighed, "I watched mother peacefully pass away at the age of ninety-five. Everyone else went peacefully in their nineties, they lived long and fulfilling lives. Fluttershy founded a shelter of her own for animals and later would go on to open an orphanage. Sunset Shimmer went on to become a defender of the innocent. Applejack discovered new methods of farming to help feed the growing population. Rainbow Dash became a famous athlete in her own right, using that money to help her friends with their dreams. Pinkie Pie would go on to spread laughter and joy wherever she went. As for Rarity, she taught everyone the meaning of generosity, helping my creator usher in this new era of peace and prosperity. Every last one of them had passed away peacefully in their sleep at a ripe old age," she reported.
This eased Leila's mind a bit, but she still wanted closure for herself. "Is there some way I could go back. Go see them one last time, just to record memories of myself saying good bye to my family?" she asked.
Midnight Sparkle sighed, it was natural for a human to go through the grieving process and hypothetically, Reploids should be able to do so as well, but she had never seen it until now. "There isn't any way for technology to send you back yet, it's still all theoretical," she replied.
The Maverick Hunter stood up, dejected. Her body started to emit a barrier that she hadn't recognized, but this caused the other Reploid to step back slightly. "Ah yes, this was one of your upgrades. If you looked in the mirror, you'd notice that your armor was a bit different. It was upgraded based on schematics given by a mysterious benefactor that called himself X. Saying that this world would need a defender like your world did," the blue haired Reploid told her.
Leila's eyes lit up, she let the barrier down and turned to her niece. The two of them looked at each other for a moment. "What are the other functions of this armor?" she asked.
Midnight Sparkle smiled and produced a datapad from seemingly out of nowhere, "Your body frame has been upgraded to reduce damage to your systems by an additional fifty percent. Much like all of the armors that this Doctor Light gave to this X person. As Third Generation Reploids are not designed with the ability to dash in mid air, you were given that capability in your redesigned boots. The upgrade in your arms and your weaponry give you the ability to charge them even further. The upgrades in your head allow you to cry and increase the speed in which you are able to charge your weapons. We've also installed a chip in your boots that allow you to be able to jump a second time in the air, no idea how that works. As for the barrier you emitted, that was the schematics for something known as the Rolling Shield. Because of your lack of a Variable Weapon System as he put it, you had a choice between the charged version or uncharged version and we figured a barrier would be far more useful than a rolling ball on the ground. With the Fire Chip installed you have access to a flaming dash known as the charged version of the Speed Burner. With the Thunder Chip, you have access to the Lightning Web which has been modified to unleash a disabling shock before it unfolds. You'll be able to wall kick off of it when it does. With the Ice Chip, you have access to the Ice Burst which was modified to fire off a block of ice that you can use as a stepping stone. Your cognitive neural network has also been reinforced to prevent any damage to it so that you'll never go Maverick like that again, that was an upgrade that Mom designed for you. That's about it for any significant upgrades, anything else is minor such as reinforcing the helmet gem that you have for some unknown reason," she reported.
All of this information was a bit much for the Maverick Hunter to process, she grabbed her head with her hand and shook it a little. "That's a lot of upgrades and if Twilight Sparkle really did create a utopian world like my Commander wanted, then there's no reason for the vast majority of this," she stated.
The purple Reploid pressed a button on her datapad and memories came back to Leila's mind. They were of her time as a Maverick. She saw that she had hurt several people and a bear, but didn't kill anyone. This, she was thankful for, but her memories suddenly cut off the moment she was damaged by Sunset Shimmer. Just as she had been told. The red-haired Reploid looked at her hand and noticed that it was a dark green, this prompted her to herself. The black portions of her bodysuit had become a soft green, while the majority of her armor was white with dark green highlights. She activated her buster to see red on the barrel of it and when she raised one of her boots, she saw a gold ring near her ankle. She had seen armors that her commander had previously worn and the color scheme was close to that, but the blues had been replaced by greens.
This was such a contrast to her usual armor armor coloration and set up. "This is... so different and new to me. I know that Commander X, Zero, and Captain Axl all had upgrades like this, but I never did. My creator never intended for anything like this to my knowledge and if he did, he died before he could create them," the Maverick Hunter said.
Midnight Sparkle nodded, "Why don't you go around the city for a bit on one of the Ride Chasers. Also I have a package that needs to be delivered to Equestria, if you would like to take that there yourself, I can give it to you," she offered.
Leila gave a thumbs up and the door to the garage opened up, she saw a white and green Ride Chaser parked in a corner. The Maverick Hunter walked over to it and climbed aboard. "What's the package?" she asked.
The purple Reploid handed her a small scroll and the red-haired Reploid opened the storage bay of the ride chaser and placed it in. The two Reploids shared a smile before the First Generation one finally spoke up, "If you go to where Canterlot High School once stood, you'll reach a statue with four mirrors. Go in the north facing mirror. Humans that enter Equestria find themselves as ponies, but Reploids like us keep our form from being inorganic," she said.
The Maverick Hunter nodded and waved to her niece before starting the engine of the Ride Chaser and driving off onto the highway. It was as Midnight Sparkle had told her, everything was peaceful and the traffic was much to her surprise, light. This gave the white armored Reploid time to think about things, she had no idea what this Equestria was like or why she was given a scroll. As she passed by, some Mechaniloids and Reploids looked at her, confused as to what kind of Reploid she was, but she didn't pay them any attention.
Leila started to wonder what a pony was and what Equestria would be like. Her processors allowed her to easily multitask and she was effortlessly able to weave in and out of traffic without incident, one of the benefits of being an Artificial Intelligence. It allowed her to focus on multiple tasks at once.
She arrived at where the high school used to be and noticed that it had become an embassy instead. The Reploid parked her Ride Chaser in one of the designated parking spots and retrieved the scroll. She walked over to the statue in question and touched the mirror that she was told to touch. Her hand entered the mirror with a rippling effect and much to her horror, her sensors were unable to pick it up in this dimension. The Maverick Hunter quickly retracted her arm and a voice said behind her, "First time, huh?"
The Reploid turned around to see a pale yellow human with hair that were streaks of black and pink, "The first time any Reploid tries to enter the portal, their sensors freak out and can't sense what part of them they put through it, but I assure you it's safe," he said.
Leila nodded and turned to scan the portal. There was a massive amount of energy that indicated an interdimensional rift. Whatever this was, it led to a world different from the one she was currently in, but where it would ultimately take her, she didn't know. She had been told that it was Equestria, but there was only one way to find out. She closed her eyes and walked through.
Author's Note
I didn't mention this in the chapter and I apologize, but every part of her armor is capable of being removed. The Speed Burner is located in her Leg Parts. The Rolling Shield is located in the Body Parts. And both the Lightning Web and Ice Burst are located in her Arm Parts. The only upgrade that is not as easily removed is the double jump chip, which is installed directly into her legs, but it could be damaged or removed.
On top of this while she can't go Maverick by a tree branch falling on her head again. She's not immune to all types of computer viruses, just the Sigma and Zero Viruses. Something like Megaman X6's Nightmare Virus or the Dark Elf would be capable of overwriting her programming and turning her Maverick.
Leila found herself being launched from the other side of the portal at a high velocity. Whereas an organic being would be thrown to the ground and roll a bit, her internal gyroscopic systems attempted to right herself. She placed her hands on the ground and flipped back onto her feet, locking her knee joints to prevent herself from being carried any further. The Reploid didn't know where she was or how she got here, all her memory banks could offer was a void of swirling color that had colors that the human eye could both see and not see. It was a surreal experience, but diagnostics told her that none of her systems were damaged. She looked at her hand to make sure that it was still a hand. As she was told before, she retained her human appearance. A guard looked at her with blue eyes and a spear in a magical grip, "We weren't aware of a visitor from the human world, let alone a Reploid," he stated.
The Maverick Hunter grabbed the scroll from the holster she had placed it in, "I have a message for someone here," she stated, holding the scroll in front of her.
The white furred guard looked the Reploid over, he could tell that she was heavily armed. "Not many messengers come fully armored and carrying at least two different weapons," he told her firmly while pointing the spear at her.
She slowly reached for the hilt of her Beam Saber and he tensed up, the guard was afraid that there was going to be a conflict, but she removed her weapon from its holster and placed it on the ground. She reached onto her back and did the same with her Buster Shot. The Reploid used one of her feet to slide them over to the guard. This put the pony at ease, but he was still tense, "Your Buster, too," he stated.
Leila rolled her eyes, "You're asking me to detach my left hand from my body," she stated. Then she realized one thing, she hadn't revealed her L-Buster. "How do you know that I have a Buster installed?" she asked.
The blue maned guard smiled, "You're not the first combat model Reploid to come through that mirror. Almost all of them had an internalized Buster system of some sort," he informed her
"Yeah, I'm not removing my left hand. I require it for more things than just a weapon, if you would like for me to lock the arm into arm mode to prevent me from changing it into the Buster, I can," the Reploid informed the guard.
This caused a bit of tension between the two of them. A large pink pony with a mane like the sunrise walked into the room, "Iron Spear, what seems to be the problem?" she asked.
"This Reploid here will not give up her last weapon, Princess," the guard replied.
The pink Alicorn looked at Leila with her orange eyes and a smile, "Apologies, we don't get a lot of combat-type Reploids here in Equestria. You're the first, but if you were sent here by Midnight Sparkle, I'm sure she had a good reason for it. You may retrieve your weaponry, I trust that you won't use it," she said.
The Maverick Hunter walked over to her Beam Saber and her Buster Shot, picking them both up and holstering them where they belong. She walked up to the Alicorn and noticed that this being was taller than she was, a curiosity to be sure. The Princess however started to laugh a little, "Reploids are always confused when they first see an Alicorn compared to the usual ponies. I assure you that I'm real. My name is Luster Dawn, by the way. What is your name?" she asked.
"Leila. My creator gave me the designation of Leila, I'm an A-Class Maverick Hunter..." she said just before something triggered in her databanks, "Correction, I'm a GA-Class Maverick Hunter. When did this happen?" she asked, confused.
The name Leila caused Luster Dawn to gasp, she had heard stories about a Reploid known by the same name and had the same A-Class Maverick Hunter ranking. But surely the one standing before her was different. "Follow me. Queen Twilight would know what to do," she told the Maverick Hunter.
The red-haired Reploid followed the pink Alicorn through the castle and into the throne room. An even taller purple Alicorn sat in a throne, a blue mane with a purple and magenta stripe flowing in an unseen breeze. Leila reached out with her right hand, as it seemed that her memory unit malfunctioned again. A hallucination appeared, the Twilight Sparkle that she knew seemed to be looking back at her, but the human quickly returned to the pony. "Twi-Twilight... how can it be you? It's been over one hundred years..." she stated in disbelief.
The pony queen looked at the Reploid, curiously, "How do you know my name?" she asked.
Luster Dawn was quick to answer this question, "She calls herself Leila, my queen. You once told me that Sunset Shimmer once wrote to you that a Reploid named Leila went Maverick and attacked them. But I don't think this could be the same one."
The Maverick Hunter looked down, the guilt was written all over her face. "Yeah... that's me. I went Maverick, I attacked my friends, I attacked my sister, and I attacked several others. I'm glad that they were able to stop me before I was able to cause any harm," she reported.
The guards in the throne room immediately rushed in, pointing their weapons at the Reploid. Her proximity sensors had been tripped and she triggered the installed version of the Rolling Shield to protect herself causing every pony to gasp in surprise.
"What is this new shield that you have?" one of the guards asked.
"Put away your weapons, if she wanted to do us harm, she would have tried to do so the moment she exited the portal," Queen Twilight ordered the guards.
The six guard ponies hesitated for a moment, but obeyed the orders of their queen. This caused the Maverick Hunter to relax a bit and the Rolling Shield vanished into thin air. She remembered the scroll that she had been carrying and walked closer to the purple Alicorn. "I have a message for someone in this realm," she reported.
Twilight's horn lit up and the scroll was gently lifted from Leila's hand. It floated to the Alicorn and seemed to unfurl itself. The pony looked over the message and smiled, "So you are the real Leila, I have to say that it is good to meet you. For a while, Sunset Shimmer spoke about how you made my human counterpart happy," she said.
The Reploid nodded, fighting back tears at the reminder of the Twilight Sparkle that she knew. "I know that I'm not a replacement, but..." The pony queen started. She climbed down from her throne and walked over to the armored machine. The size difference between the two when they were finally face to face was apparent, with the Alicorn towering over the Maverick Hunter. Leila wasn't one to normally be intimidated. But the queen wrapped her into a hug, "You've been inactive for one hundred and sixty-two years according to this message. There's so much in your past that you've missed, so many wonderful experiences with your friends that you could never be a part of. I was fortunate that I got to spend as much time with my friends as I did, before we all parted ways," she said.
The Maverick Hunter didn't return the hug, she just sighed sadly being constantly reminded of this. "Is there some way that I can see them again? Even if only for a little while?" she asked.
The Alicorn broke the hug and stepped back a few paces. There was a silence between the two of them and Leila felt an intense sorrow well up from inside of her. It was a long shot for her to be able to ever see her friends again, they had passed away long ago according to her knowledge of the human lifespan. The only way she would ever be able to see them once more was to violate the rules of space-time and travel backwards through time, but from what she knew, that wasn't possible. At least if it were possible where she had originally came from, there wasn't any surviving records of it.
"There is one way, but being inorganic, I'm not even sure if the spell would work on you. If it did, it'd have a very limited time that it would work, probably around twelve hours or so and only once ever at that. However, you must know that you need to avoid changing any events in your past as that could drastically alter your present. Where are you looking to go?", Twilight informed her, ending with a question.
Leila's eyes lit up a bit, hope welled up within her. There was a chance for her to see her friends one last time, another chance to get the closure that she desired so desperately. "Two thousand and twenty in the human world. They should all have graduated high school by then. Last time I was there, Vice-Principal Luna threatened to have me escorted out by the police. And after tossing her effortlessly after she tried to restrain me, I think regardless of if I sign up for a visitor's badge, she'd call the police on me. I don't want to take that chance," she replied.
The purple Alicorn nodded and her horn lit up, a portal appeared between the two of them. "If you are capable of going through this, it will only last for twelve hours regardless of what world you are in. If you stay in Equestria, it'll last for twelve hours there and if you go to the human world, it'll last for twelve hours there. You will be returned to the point in space-time where you left, so you will arrive here almost immediately from our standpoint, coming out of the portal in the opposite direction you went in," she informed the Reploid.
The Maverick Hunter nodded and took a deep breath even though she didn't need to breathe. She walked into the portal and found herself in front of Twilight Sparkle once more, but this one looked surprised. There was a purple dragon near her as well. "Twilight, are we expecting any strange visitors in the throne room today?" the dragon asked.
The Princess of Friendship looked down at the new visitor, "No, but something tells me that she's not here to cause trouble. Tell me, why are you here?" she requested.
Leila's sensors told her that the portal behind her vanished. For better or worse, she was stuck in this time for the next twelve hours. "Can I have a cloak to wrap around myself? I wish not to have my identity compromised when I go to the human world," she requested.
This got the past Twilight curious, "Why do you want to go to the human world? Do you have business there. Furthermore, why aren't you a pony right now?" she asked, her mind full of questions.
The Reploid's brow furrowed and she sighed, "I wish I had the time to answer all of your questions, but my time is limited. I want to go see my friends one last time before I can't ever see them again, now please, can you grant me a cloak. All I can promise you is that all will be revealed to you when we meet again, but for now, I'm in a hurry," she stated.
The Princess' horn glowed and a brown cloak formed around Leila, the Alicorn instantly knew the identity of the Reploid upon hearing her mention her friends, "Do you know where the mirror is, Leila?" she asked.
The Maverick Hunter's eyes widened, there shouldn't be any way that this version of the Queen of Equestria knew who she was. "I do, but how do you know my name?" she asked.
"Sunset told me," Twilight Sparkle said with a smirk.
The Reploid nodded, "Please do not tell them that I'm coming, I want this to be a surprise," she said as she adjusted the hood over her helmet.
The Princess' smirk turned into a soft smile, "I will respect your wishes and wish you the best of luck," she stated.
Leila gave a thumbs up and walked through the corridors of the castle until she reached the chamber with the mirror in it. She placed her hand on the surface of it and watched as the mirror rippled. It was going to work, it was going to take her to see her friends again. She closed her eyes and steeled herself for the trippy experience between the two worlds and stepped through, ready for what was going to be on the other side.
Author's Note
I didn't really think of how a hood would fit over Leila's helmet. I just figured that Twilight Sparkle, being the intelligent Pony that she is, would design a cloak that would be capable of doing just that.
Two hours had passed since the Velvet family had sat down to watch television to wait for the others to arrive. The Reploid in the center of the couch started to seem a bit more restless as the time went on, something that didn't go unnoticed by Twilight Velvet, who held her mechanical daughter close. "Say, to pass the time, why don't you tell me a tale of what your world was like, before you came here?" she asked.
Leila's mind flashed back to the Elf Wars, the constant fighting, the constant running. The screams, the bloodshed, her stare went blank and it was as if she wasn't looking at the TV, but rather staring through it. The gray skinned woman realized that she had made a mistake by asking the Reploid about this. "Um, before that time dear. Twilight told me that there was a time of peace in your world," she stated.
The Maverick Hunter nodded, "I was there when the world governments tasked Commander X with using a newly created Mother Elf to cure the world's Reploids of the Maverick Virus. I was also there when one Doctor Weil proposed something known as Project Elpizo. Project Elpizo was a plan to control all Reploids by combining the Mother Elf's abilities to alter reality and rewriting the code of a Reploid with a singular Reploid leader. His intentions were to rob us of our own free will. Humanity supported this, yet Commander X tried to keep the peace, tried to enact a philosophy of coexistence. Humanity on the other hand had different ideas. They didn't care if we lost our free will. They didn't care if we were nothing more than slaves. My commander who had fought for them for almost a hundred years was being treated as if he wasn't even there. Just because one of their own had chosen to come up with a plan to make sure that we Reploids would've never been a threat again. But yet, even though I was angry at them, the Commander told me something that I never forgotten. He told me to not give into my anger, to not give up on the humans. That we can show them that it is possible for humans and Reploids to live in peace and harmony together. For a full year, we tried, but then... the conflict started. It probably ended by now, hopefully by peaceful means. If it didn't... well, everything on the planet would be gone," she stated, her tone becoming sorrowful near the end.
The two humans hugged the machine between them with a smile. "Mom, Dad, I'm home," called out Twilight Sparkle's voice from the front door.
Leila gently broke from the hug and stood up, removing her helmet and placing it under her arm as she walked towards the hallway. The two of them locked eyes and the purple human's mouth opened in disbelief as she just stared at the Reploid, "You're here, but how are you here when you're in my lab. I just saw you this morning and why do you look different?" she asked, confused.
"Hey Twi, ya sound like ya seen a ghost, what's wro— Leila !" Applejack said as she rounded the corner.
The farmgirl remembered what had happened two years prior on the farm and placed herself between the two of them, "Ah don't know who ya are or what ya are, but Leila is still in Twilight's lab!" she yelled.
The other five walked into the room without much fanfare or words, Applejack's yelling gave them all the forewarning that they would need. Aside from Twilight and Fluttershy, they were all glaring at her to some degree. The Reploid chuckled a bit at this and formed her left hand into a buster, causing them to gasp. She grasped the left elbow and twisted until she heard a click and then detached the weapon from her body, letting it fall to the ground with a clang. She then reached for her Buster Shot and Beam Saber, placing them both on the ground. "Now that I'm disarmed, literally in the case of my left arm," she said, raising her left arm to show the joint at the midsection of her lower arm, "You can all relax. I'm not here to cause any trouble, I'm not some Second Generation Reploid using my DNA Soul to copy myself. I'm the genuine article," The Maverick Hunter stated while really wanting to reattach her left arm.
"Oh yeah, well if you're the real Leila, tell me something only she would know!" Rainbow Dash chimed in.
"Second Generation Reploids are able to copy the exact mannerisms and memories of the Reploid that they copied. So that wouldn't be able to work, they can also copy the systems of other Second Generation and First Generation Reploids. We Third Generation Reploids are too advanced for them to copy. We don't have a constantly shifting DNA Soul, but we have something more advanced than that. Unlike previous generations, we retain our consciousness after we die. We go to a place known as Cyberspace. I know this because some of the Cyber Elves I worked with talked to me about that place before... they died too," Leila replied.
Fluttershy gasped at this and the Maverick Hunter picked up her buster, reattaching it to her arm and changing it back to her hand. She walked over to a window and then turned to look at the others, "When Cyber Elves use their ability, they cease to exist. I primarily worked with Hacker and Animal Elves. Specifically the Bee, Stoc, and Stick families. It never felt good watching them use their abilities, but I never had to ask. They would use their abilities, knowing that they were fighting not just for the survival of their kind, but the survival of all of our kinds. Like us Reploids, they were willing to make the ultimate sacrifice to ensure that the world would continue on. It was truly admirable, and I wished that they would have survived. They made excellent conversation partners when there weren't any Reploids or humans to talk to," Leila told them with a sigh.
"I saw all of that when I touched you two years ago, Leila. Some of the Cyber Elves that gave their life for you were your friends," Sunset pointed out.
This caused the rest of the group to turn towards the Reploid in the room, realizing that she was the real deal. "No wait, let me guess. You're really from really far in the future and you went to Pony Twilight's world to ask if they could send you back in time and you used the mirror to come here to meet us!" Pinkie exclaimed, causing everyone to look at her like she was crazy, but the Maverick Hunter was stunned at this.
"What? It was just a guess!" the pink human cheerfully stated.
Leila had to test a hypothesis that floated to the surface of her mind, "Pinkie, who started the Elf Wars in my world?" she asked.
The cheerful waitress shrugged, "I don't know that, silly!" she said with a smile.
The Reploid sighed, "Damn." If she had known who had did it, then perhaps she could've told her Commander about it. Perhaps they had already known, Midnight Sparkle had told her that they were in contact with X, so she made a mental note to talk to him about it.
Rainbow Dash looked at her, "So if you're from our future, what's the world like where you come from?" she asked.
The Maverick Hunter folded her arms and smirked, "It's a war torn world, everyone's scrounging for food in shelters. Mechaniloids have all gone crazy and turned on their human masters. It's a terrible place," she lied.
Applejack picked up on this immediately, "Yer lyin, and don't be surprised. Ah can tell if a machine is lyin too," she stated sternly.
Leila smirked and then started laughing, "I was hoping you'd be able to pick up on my lie, AJ. The future is a wonderful place, a peaceful place that my Commander and I fought for the likes of in my world, but without any of you... it just feels empty and soulless," her voice took a somber tone at the end.
The humans all moved closer and hugged their friend tightly, they were glad to see her again and she was glad to see them again, but she had a limited amount of time to be with them, "Hey, instead of moping and just catching up since I only have about eight hours and forty-three minutes left with you guys, how about we all hang out somewhere. I'd like to go back to Equestria Land if that's okay with you all. That was the site of the picture we all took. Also I'd like to go out and eat, generally, I just want to spend time with you all," the Reploid stated.
"Darling, that's not a lot of time to go to Equestria Land and do all that you want to do," Rarity pointed out.
The Maverick Hunter pushed away from them and sighed a bit, tears forming in her eyes and rolling down her face, "I just want to spend one last day with you guys and finally get to say a goodbye that remains in my databanks. I know that it's not a lot of time, but I don't care what we do, I just want to spend that time with all of you," she stated.
Sunset Shimmer grabbed her hand with a smirk, "Then let's go to the arcade, we can spend some time together and we can all play some video games, even though you'd have the advantage, being a machine and all," she said in a calming tone.
Leila nodded and the rest of them smiled and nodded. She returned their smile, video games wasn't something she had the luxury of playing much in her life, but it would be fun and hanging out with her friends would make it extra special. "Let's do it," she said.
The eight friends left the house to climb into their various vehicles with the Reploid climbing into the same car as Twilight Sparkle. The two of them looked at each other with a smile, "It's good to see you once more like this, sis," the purple human said.
"Likewise, sis," the Maverick Hunter replied.
The human stepped on the gas pedal and pulled out of the driveway, they were going to head for the nearest arcade and Leila made a note to herself to ask them if they could all spend the last half hour to an hour of her time in this time period here at home so that she could say goodbye to all of them and give them all a goodbye hug.
Author's Note
Sorry for the delay, I got the Zero/ZX Legacy Collection and have been more or less marathoning it. So far I've beaten Megaman Zero 1, 2, 3, ZX, and ZX Advent and I'm halfway through 4.
The eight of them had arrived at the arcade and they each got about twenty dollars worth of tokens. Leila chose to test her skills at one of the light gun games, her sensors and reflexes would be able to help her. She placed two tokens into the machine and pulled out both guns, noting how they felt lighter and were shaped differently from her own Buster Shot, which she had left back at home. Her armor could be considered some form of strange cosplay, but her weapons would get her and her friends into a lot of trouble. The game started and she watched as the movement happened automatically, this was an on-rails shooter, something she hadn't been quite aware of existing. Enemies started to pop out and with the precision and speed of a machine, she started firing at them. Making sure to reload every time she either had to or there weren't any enemies left.
She easily reached the first boss and started to fire at the weak point, instead of using both guns at once, she used a strategy where she would fire one until it was empty and then quickly swap in the other. Her skills and precision quickly started to draw a crowd around her. Mutterings quickly started that she was some kind of machine, which was correct, but she quickly filtered out the mutterings of the crowd from her mind, making it to where the only sounds she registered came from the game in front of her as she needed the sound cues to tell her about things happening off screen. There wasn't any distraction to keep her from the game itself. She continued to play with absolute perfect precision that only a machine could muster. By this time, Sunset Shimmer had joined the crowd, but the Reploid couldn't hear her.
Leila reached the final boss of the arcade machine, years of fighting Mavericks, the two years in the Elf Wars led to this point. She was able to quickly and effortlessly dispatch it without losing a single hit point. She turned her filters back off and the crowd was in an uproar, everyone was cheering her name. But she smiled and inserted not her initials into the high score, but the initials of her friend, Sunset.
The Maverick Hunter then joined Rainbow Dash at a racing game. She was unfamiliar with cars and how they handled, wishing it was a motorbike racing game. "You think you can beat me at this?" the cyan human boasted.
"Not at all, but I don't care, you're my friend and I want to enjoy my time with you," the Reploid replied.
The game started and the two of them took off from the starting line with Rainbow Dash getting an early boost. The lack of experience with cars bit the Maverick Hunter in the butt in the first lap of the race. While Rainbow Dash was effortlessly drifting through the turns, she was slamming into the sides of the track. But her programming started to adapt. Within the second lap of the three lap race, she started to corner through the turns better. She didn't know how to drift or get the boosts, but she started to gain ground on her friend who was still way ahead in front. Within the third lap, she wasn't hitting any of the sides of the track, instead, she was cornering like a professional. "Wow, I never seen someone get so good so quickly!" the athlete stated.
"Well, I can rewrite my own programming at will. It's not a difficult task for a Reploid. It's how we learn and adapt to things and grow as individuals," Leila replied as she lost the race.
The two of them shook hands and smiled at each other as the Reploid went to the basket ball hoops. She was surprised to see Applejack of all people shooting some hoops, but the Reploid quietly inserted a token into the machine and grabbed a ball, but she didn't throw any. She instead watched the hoop as her mind went through unseen calculations. "Uh, Leila, are ya gonna throw a single ball?" the farmgirl asked.
The Maverick Hunter let the timer run out and placed another token in the machine. She grabbed the first ball that rolled to her and immediately threw it based off her calculations. The ball went in, then the next, and the next. She kept throwing shots that kept making it through the hoop with frightening accuracy which stunned her friend. "Well Ah'll be. Ya were figurin out how to properly do this, weren't ya?" the blond woman asked.
The buzzer sounded and Leila nodded, "If you want to put it into layman's terms, I guess. I noticed that the hoop moves back and forth and I wanted to calculate the optimal throwing power and angle to make it in no matter the position. One wasted token was worth it, I'd say," she stated.
This left the farmgirl confused, but the Reploid's attention was gained by a flight sim. It was something interesting to be sure, she wanted to see what was up with this and she noticed that Rainbow Dash was in the seat of it with Rarity and Pinkie Pie near her. "Darling, you sure you want to do this?" the fashionista asked.
"Yeah! I got to beat my high score!" the athlete replied.
Leila walked over to it to see what it was all about and Pinkie Pie looked at her, "Hey Rainbow! Leila's here to try to overtake your score!" she exclaimed.
The Maverick Hunter was confused, but the Athlete vacated her spot, letting the Reploid take the seat. She had flown in flight simulators before, but she wasn't programmed to be a pilot Reploid. This was new to her, but the instructions on screen told her that she needed to throttle forward to get the fighter off the carrier. She used her left hand to grip the stick as she held the throttle with her right. Finger resting on the trigger, while her thumb rested on the button at the top. She chose an easy mission for the first mission to fly so that she could get used to the controls and she would be able to rewrite her programming as needed.
"Shadow One, your objective is to protect the harbor from enemy fighters from the Discord Allegiance. Engage!" said a voice in the game.
Fighter jets rushed towards the Reploid, but she overclocked her processors, this had the effect of heating herself up more than normal, but would allow her to make calculations much faster. This had the added bonus of slowing time from her perspective to a much more manageable rate. From the outside perspective, she reacted and moved at an inhuman rate as her processors calculated the optimal movements that she should take, she would fire at seemingly the most optimal times to fire. To Rainbow Dash, this was horrifying. No human was better at the game than she was, but she was now going up against a machine. A human-like machine that could feel emotions, feel sorrow and even go as far as to grieve, but a machine nonetheless. The Athlete started to chuckle a bit nervously.
"Do not be intimidated, Rainbow Dash, you are still the best human to play a game like this. But we machines are designed to be able to process information and react to said information faster than any human. It is only natural that we would have an edge over skill based games like this," the Maverick Hunter stated as if reading her mind.
Pinkie started to laugh, but the cyan human shrugged, "I'm not nervous, not at all!" she denied.
Leila turned her head towards her friend to read her body language, moving and firing in ways she had calculated were optimal prior to making this change and then turning back to the game she was playing to continue her run through, "I'm not programmed to be a pilot, but running rudimentary maneuvers to adjust to how the craft moves and watching the angles of which the enemy planes come on screen allows me to figure out everything that I need to know in order to gather the information required to be successful at this game. It is what allows me to rewrite my own programming enough to play the game at the skill level that I'm playing it at," she replied.
The owner of the arcade heard this and walked over to the machine, "Hey, no machines here to cheat at the games!" he yelled at them.
The Reploid turned to see a rather large and imposing man for a human. The bulk of this person reminded her of some of the stronger animal themed Reploids that she had met in the past. "So you're saying that robots aren't allowed to play the games and have fun. I assure you that I'm not playing any of the games that give out tickets, which would be in your words, cheating. On top of this, I have in my database..." her voice turned low as she leaned in so only the owner could hear her, "that several of the games that give out prizes are rigged. If you want to talk about cheating, you are the one cheating many of these people out of their own money. I know why you do this, it's to make a profit and while that isn't technically illegal, it's very scummy. So before you try to call the kettle black, why don't you look at yourself in the mirror, pot," she said.
The arcade owner placed his hand angrily on the Maverick Hunter, "I'm confiscating you!" he yelled.
Leila's voice raised back up in volume, "I would recommend that you release me, the police would not believe your tale of a super advanced sentient machine walking around the arcade and playing games. You would look crazier than I would if I were to explain my predicament to the authorities. Trust me, there is no scenario in which you act aggressively that you end up winning," she replied.
The human looked at the Reploid and considered her words, "You seem so sure of yourself. Are you so sure that you'd like to test that theory?" he asked.
The Maverick Hunter stood up from the flight sim game and looked directly into the eyes of the arcade owner. "There is a thin line between bravery and stupidity and you are walking that line like a tightrope. If you do not cease this incessant aggression towards me, I will have no choice but to report this to the authorities you wish to call. You're not just being inconsiderate, but racist as well," she replied.
This caused the dark gray human to back off a step, "You think the police would believe you, a machine, over me, a human? Don't be ridiculous, you're nothing more than wires and gears, no matter how human you seem," he stated.
The Reploid walked closer to the human, "I'm not bound to your three laws of robotics, as I'm sure you've noticed. What was the second law? A robot must obey the commands given to them by a human unless they conflict with the first law. Which is that a robot must not harm a human or through inaction allow a human to come to harm. I don't have to listen to any command that you give me, I don't have to mindlessly obey you. I am a sentient being with my own free will and my own desires and likes. All I wanted to do was spend some time with my friends and have some fun at this arcade, but if this is how you treat your non-human customers, I'll take my leave of your establishment. It is up to my friends to determine whether or not they wish to stay," she stated.
The Maverick Hunter then turned her head to the three friends, "Tell Sunset, Applejack, Twilight, and Fluttershy that I'm going to be outside. If you guys want, we can head somewhere else, it was a fun half hour while it lasted, until some brute decided to barge in and start yelling at me for being a machine," she told them.
"We'll be right behind you, darling," Rarity replied
Leila nodded and walked towards the exit of the arcade, but as she opened the door, she turned back towards the owner who was watching her intently and threw a glare at him. She walked out of the building and sighed, leaning against the wall. She couldn't stand humans that thought they were superior to Reploids, but she also couldn't stand Reploids who thought that humans should be enslaved or eliminated. Both beings needed to live in peaceful coexistence, something that she had learned from her Commander and mentor. The Reploid noticed a frozen yogurt shop across the street and a smile formed on her face, though she still couldn't taste anything, she wanted to know the texture of this dessert for a while. When her friends left the arcade, she was going to suggest it to them.
The eight friends had left the arcade and had left the frozen yogurt place with their dessert in hand. Leila couldn't taste any of the flavors, or any of the toppings, but she found the cold dessert's texture to be pleasant. "That guy was a real jerk, Leila, don't let him get you down!" called out Rainbow Dash to break Leila from her analysis of the frozen yogurt.
"Indeed, darling, he was a bit rude," Rarity chimed in.
Leila lightly punched the athlete in the arm with a smirk on her face, "Thanks for being considerate of my feelings, but I was analyzing the frozen yogurt that we got. We don't have anything like this in the world that I came from. It's kind of a fascinating food," she stated.
"Oh yeah, because you come from a world that's already gone through an apocalypse and is currently going through another one," Twilight Sparkle stated.
The Reploid heard this and started to laugh, while it was true that the Eurasia Incident had happened and the Elf Wars were underway by the time she had vanished. But that wasn't the reason that frozen yogurt didn't exist anymore at all, "Frozen treats in general where I came from fell out of favor in the year twenty-one fifteen. Which would be around the time that Commander X was activated. Just the world wasn't as into them as it was before that time, eventually it and Ice Cream just vanished," she told them.
This left Pinkie Pie curious, "So if there aren't any sweets, what do people eat to feel happier?" she asked.
The Maverick Hunter smiled and shook her head, "I never said that there weren't any sweets. Warm desserts made a large resurgence, even though none of us machines can taste them, ever. I was upgraded with the ability to cry, but taste is something foreign to me still. It's funny, really. We have the ability to eat and convert the food into microfusion fuel, but we don't have the ability to taste. Though to be fair, we Reploids are capable of eating substances that humans would find poisonous. Such as we can eat all the parts of a pufferfish without any ill effects, mainly because we don't have any biological systems to be attacked by any toxins," she stated.
"That sure must come in handy at times, are ya able to know what is poisonous to humans?" Applejack asked.
Leila placed her hand to her chin, "Yeah, I can tell what's poisonous to humans. So how about this beach, you girls wanna spend some time there? We've got eight hours before I go back," she said to her friends.
The seven others nodded and agreed with this plan, "Let's all get ready for the beach and head on over there in our vehicles. It'll be just like old times!" Sunset exclaimed.
"Um, are you going to wait with one of us, Leila?" Fluttershy asked.
"Nah, I think I'll meet you there, there's something really cool I wish to show you about Reploids," the Maverick Hunter told them.
"Wait, so how are you going to get there?" Twilight asked.
"Emergency Acceleration System and Global Positioning Satellites," the Reploid replied with a smirk.
"But, I thought that didn't work for long periods of time?" the scientist asked, confused.
Leila got into a lowered crouching position and she started to dash, then planted her feet onto the ground to leap into the air, carrying her momentum through and into another dash. Surprising everyone, the Maverick Hunter continued this movement all the way to the beach. Though it took her about half an hour to reach the beach, she still go there ahead of the others. She walked towards the water, taking her armor off as she did and placing it on the sand to give the others a marker. With just her body suit, the red haired Reploid walked into the water, sinking into it as she did. Her sensors told her that there was life in this water, it was a pleasant experience.
She fully submerged herself and being a machine, no bubbles exited her being. Her frame was watertight, none of her components could get wet and this pleased her as sea water was corrosive to mechanical components. However, a lifeguard quickly dove into the water after her, afraid that she was drowning. The man swam under the waves, looking at the machine before him. He was wearing an expression of shock that the being before him wasn't distressed at all, she seemed comfortable instead. The two of them looked at each other and Leila threw up a thumbs up, causing the human to surface and start swimming away. Since she wasn't drowning , a lifeguard wasn't needed. Though to be fair, as a machine, she couldn't drown.
The Reploid waited til her sensors told her that her friends had arrived at the beach, she could hear them worried that they found her armor, but not her. She changed her left hand into a buster and configured it to a harmless stream of light. Her systems adjusted for the refraction difference and she aimed in a position where the beam would exit the water above her exact location. With a single command, the buster fired. The beam of light harmlessly passed through the water and exited, telling everyone where she was.
Much to her surprise, it wasn't one of her friends that found her first. Principal Celestia and Vice-Principal Luna dove under the waves to find the Maverick Hunter standing on the bottom of the sea, fully submerged. The Reploid gave a sheepish grin and a thumbs up and then signed out that she can't swim, but also doesn't need to breathe. The two humans nodded, a bit confused as to what this meant, but swam up for air. The first one to find her ended up being Fluttershy, who came down with a snorkel. She surfaced and waited for her friends, then all seven of them came swimming down to the Maverick Hunter.
They were all confused by this, but Leila activated an emergency flotation system and rose to the surface. She floated on the top of the water as everyone swam and she chuckled a little, "I'm more dense than water, despite the fact that I'm kind of average weight for an adult human, I only weigh around one hundred and fifty pounds. But because metals are so heavily used within my construction, I can't float without some sort of emergency flotation device. Though I suppose it is helpful for the fact that I can walk along the ocean floor. Though I'm not really rated for extreme pressures like submarines are. If I were to fall into a deep enough trench, it'll crush me like a tin can," she told them.
"So ya can't swim and wanted to come ta the beach anyhow? Yer a bit funny, Leila," Applejack said to her.
The Reploid rested on her back, looking up at the sky, she could feel the waves move along her synthetic flesh. A gentle laugh came from her vocal synthesizer, and she closed her eyes with a smile on her face. "I never got to enjoy the beaches during my time as a Maverick Hunter, usually I was sent to fight Mavericks underneath the waves. I've always wanted to just... admire the ocean life and float among the waves. It seemed so relaxing to the humans who did so. It made me envious of them. I'm going back under, I saw some interesting fish down there," she stated.
The Maverick Hunter disengaged her flotation device and sank back under the waves, righting herself as she opened up her eyes and took in the sights of all the different aquatic creatures. All sorts of colorful fish swam past her as she stood perfectly still, almost like a statue. She knew that the slightest movement would scare them off. The entire scene was absolutely serene and she would have loved to just lose herself in all of this, but the sad fact of life was that she couldn't. She was on a time limit and she had to make the most of it. She started to walk along the floor of the ocean, watching as her friends swam around her. Like most Reploids, she was semi-aquatic, having no issues with movement under the waves.
She found a ledge and knew that with their current equipment, her friends couldn't exactly join her at the depth it would take her, but she also knew of a rocky outcropping she could use to her advantage to wall kick up so that she could get back to the surface. She looked to her friends, who all nodded towards her and she took a step off the ledge. Without the gem on her forehead to provide light, everything darkened, but Twilight Sparkle came through with a waterproof flashlight, illuminating where the Maverick Hunter stood.
This didn't satisfy her and she concentrated on her equipment, aside from her Buster Shot and her Beam Saber, it all materialized on her. The azure gem in her helmet lit up, allowing her to see better, but also giving her access to her abilities. She briefly considered using a Lightning Web, but remembered that sea water conducted electricity and that it would harm if not kill anything close to her and with being surrounded by water, the Speed Burner was off limits. She knew from physics that ice floated to the surface of the water, so she swapped to the ice chip and engaged the Ice Burst, firing it from her buster and double jumping onto the surface of the block of ice.
The Reploid rose to the surface of the water, her friends following her as she did so. She sat on the block of ice with a smile, "I have a way to rise back up out of the water," she informed them.
"Wow, so you're able to create blocks of ice by supercooling the water or even the air so that you can generate platforms for you to use at will!" Twilight excitedly stated.
"Uh, yeah. It was one of Commander X's weapons from the Nightmare Incident. For him, it was a weapon to be used against Mavericks, but for me, it's a tool to be used to reach places I couldn't normally reach," she stated.
"Wow, so you have new tools to help you explore, that's... awesome !" Rainbow Dash chimed in.
Leila nodded and her scanners told her that there was an underwater cave down near the rocky outcropping. She slid off her ice block and quickly sank to the bottom of the water. Her gem once more lit up to illuminate her surroundings and she walked towards the cave. Upon entering, she noticed that the cave walls were different from the exterior of the outcropping. It was a very elaborate stone design and her sensors told her that there were crystalline lattices contained within them. The Reploid continued to walk further into the cave, noticing a crystal geode. Bringing some gems from it would be a wonderful gift for her friends, so she adjusted the power of her buster and cut off seven chunks, grabbing them into her hand. She walked back outside of the cave and started to wallkick up the rocky outcropping until she reached the top and did a dash jump towards the shallower part of the ocean.
She landed with a splash and walked to the beach, where she found her friends waiting for you. "I found this beautiful gemstone down there and got a chunk for each of you," she stated. Handing the crystals over to her friends.
"Darling, you didn't get one for yourself?" Rarity pointed out.
"I know where it is, I can return to that spot in my time and retrieve a crystal piece," Leila replied.
"Thank you," everyone said in unison to her and the Reploid smiled, she was a bit bashful. "Say, the sun's starting to go down, why don't we all find some place to hang out for a bit longer before we go home?" she offered.
Everyone agreed to this and they figured they were going to go see a movie. This made the Maverick Hunter happy and she smiled once more.
The movie had ended and everyone found themselves on Applejack's farm, looking up at the stars. The eight friends couldn't stay up the entire night as seven of them had work in the morning, but they were going to spend as much time as they could with their friend. Big Mac walked over to the group and noticed even through the armor who was laying on the ground near his sister, "What's she doin here!?" he yelled.
Applejack started to sit up, but Leila placed her hand on her friend and shook her head. The Reploid stood up and looked the tan human in the eyes, "If you don't want me on your property, I can leave. But in only a few hours, you'll never see me again anyhow. I'm leaving for good and there's nothing I can do about it, but there's something I can do about this. I know that two years ago, I went Maverick and I attacked the farm. You tried to stop me, which was admirable," she started to speak before being interrupted.
"He ain't the only one who tried to stop you. Mom and Dad told me you had returned, Leila and I don't feel comfortable with you hanging near Twily," Shining Armor's voice said from behind her.
The Maverick Hunter did a half turn so that she could keep both her eyes on the potential attackers. "I'm unarmed. Armored, but unarmed, I won't hurt any of you and if you'd like, I can take off my armor," she stated.
This did little to placate the two of them. They both stood at their distance away from the Reploid, but her friends started to get up to protest. However, she wasn't going to have any of it, "This is my problem, it's my duty to make amends," she stated to them, loud enough for the two men to hear her.
She stepped away from her friends and placed her hands on her helmet, removing it from her body and placing it on the ground. She grabbed her arm armor and unlocked it, removing it from her body in the process. She repeated this with her chest armor and her boots, leaving her armored "clothes" underneath. She then removed those to reveal the soft green bodysuit that remained. "I have nothing protecting me, no armor. No weapons. I'm just like any non-combat model Reploid now in that regard," she stated.
Big Mac cracked his knuckles and walked forth, causing Leila to turn her focus onto him. He glared at her and she didn't respond in any aggressive way, merely placing her hands behind her back, where she knew Shining Armor would see them. "You have the advantage, Big Mac, you can feel free to return the favor from two years ago. I know that I hurt you and Shining Armor. I hurt Cadance, Luna, and Celestia as well as some police officer I don't know. I threatened Applebloom and I tried to kill my own friends. Do you believe for a moment that I look back at that experience fondly? Can you honestly say to yourself that you believe that I want to ever go back to that, and don't think I won't be able to detect you if you try to move close to me, Shining Armor," she told the two of them.
Big Mac got within arm's reach of the Reploid and she decided to give a warning, "If you throw that punch, you will never hit me. By the time you move your arm, I will have calculated hundreds of different possibilities and will be ready to move my body accordingly," she told him.
The farmer didn't exactly believe what the Maverick Hunter was saying and decided to test it. Just as Leila said, she moved out of the way, her entire upper body moving as she did. True to her word though, she didn't react back in aggression. She stood there as Big Mac looked confused as to how he could have missed. He moved his arm back and the Reploid returned to her normal standing position. "You had an opening and you didn't take it, why?" Shining Armor asked.
"Because I'm not here to fight you or anyone. I don't want to fight anyone. I'm here to see my friends, I'm only here for a total of twelve hours and then I can't ever come back. You won't ever have to deal with me ever again, you won't ever have to see me ever again, outside of my capsule that is. I just want to spend some time with them and record some last memories with them, that's all," the Reploid responded.
"She's tellin the truth, Big Mac. She just wants ta spend the last hours she's ever gonna get to see us. Jus give her some time ta be with us, alright?" Applejack said in her defense.
Leila turned around and walked over to the blue haired human, giving him a hug, "You're my big brother, Shining. I'm sorry for suplexing you two years ago. I didn't have any real control of my actions, my equivalent to a brain was damaged and I registered all humans as enemies. At the end of the day, despite how advanced I am, despite how lifelike I seem, I'm nothing more than a machine and I follow what my coding tells me. Even though under normal circumstances I can rewrite my own programming, if my cognitive systems are damaged, I'm stuck with what it tells me," she told him.
She leaned her head against his chest, "You were always kind and friendly when I got to see you two years prior. You loved to joke around and make me feel like I really did belong. So I ask you, big brother, please let me spend my last hours here with my friends. I'm going to be returning to the time I came from soon and I won't ever be able to come back," she stated.
Shining Armor thought about this and then looked at Twilight who nodded, "Alright, Leila. I'll let you spend time with your friends. But Mom wants to see you one more time before you vanish off to your own time," he said.
Leila smiled and broke the hug, "Thank you, brother," she said as she looked into the eyes of the man who stood before her.
The two of them shared a handshake and the two men left the women to themselves. "Wow, I didn't know that you felt that way about Shiny," the scientist pointed out.
A gentle breeze blew through the farm, causing the Reploid's hair to flow in the wind, "I had brothers when I was back in my world. None of them were like me though and none of us really shared anything in common, other than our shared admiration and love for our father." She sat down and looked up at the stars, "Though we loved each other and felt like a family, we weren't really as close as I was to you and Shining Armor," she said.
"I have a feeling this has a tragic ending, Leila," Rarity pointed out.
The Maverick Hunter nodded, "You are perceptive. I've told you all how Mavericks reached my father and how I was too late to save him. My brothers blamed me for that, except for one. He was part of the force that attacked the facility. I don't know where or how he got the weapon he had that day, he attacked me and I was forced to retire him. This being after Commander X had used the Mother Elf to rid the world of the Maverick Virus caused great worry. It turns out that the entire attack was to cover up a theft. What had been stolen was classified, even I didn't have the clearance to know about it," she revealed.
Fluttershy gasped, "That's horrible!"
"Being forced to put down your own brother like that, I can't imagine what that had to have been like for you," Sunset stated.
Leila shrugged, much to the shock of everyone, "Like I said, at the end of the day, I'm just a machine despite how human I seem. My DNA Soul has my personality and physical appearance saved within it. It hurt a bit knowing that it was one of my father's creations, but I'm a Maverick Hunter and he had already attacked and killed over a dozen human researchers. It was in my personality if you will to put the well being of humans over anything else, even my own self-preservation," she stated calmly.
"So you don't feel sad about it at all?" Pinkie asked.
"Didn't have the time to. With Maverick attacks popping up all over the world almost immediately thereafter, I had enough time to go into sleep mode and get a minor repair job before I was sent back out onto the front lines. But I digress, Twilight, you and your family are the first time I ever felt like I had a true family. Like I felt like I had belonged somewhere. Because of Flim and Flam..." The Maverick Hunter sighed and looked down at the ground, "That got all taken away from me. I can never really get it back, all I can do is keep going forward," she said somberly.
Twilight Sparkle moved closer and wrapped her arms around the Reploid, "You'll always be part of our family, our descendants will know this, that much I can promise you. Even if I don't have kids of my own, I know Shining Armor has a daughter, I'll be sure to tell her about you," she told the machine.
"Yeah, and we'll always be friends, no matter if we are separated by space or time!" Sunset pointed out with a confident smile on her face.
The eight of them realized the time and they all looked at each other. This was going to be their final chance to say goodbye to the Reploid. But none of them were sad. Leila walked over to Fluttershy first and drew her into a hug, "Fluttershy, I'm glad to have gotten to meet you and the animals that you showed me. There were so many different kinds of animals that I didn't get to see when I was younger. I hope you'll be able to ensure those animals have long lineages that last into the far future," she stated.
The soft yellow woman smiled and returned the hug, "Thank you, Leila. I hope that your time in the future is spent happy, surrounded by many wonderful animals," she said.
The two of them broke the hug and the Reploid walked over to Applejack, giving her a hug and she gave her a tight hug back. "Ah know ya ain't gonna be able to see us again, but Ah sure do hope that where yer goin, y'all will have Apples runnin around and tendin to the farms there," the farmgirl told her.
The Maverick Hunter smiled and patted her friend on the back, "I hope your orchards are nice and strong when I go visit them in over a hundred years from now. You were always one of the best farmers and one of the strongest people I've known, thank you for being my friend, AJ," she stated.
The two of them broke the hug and smiled at each other. Then Leila walked over to Rainbow Dash, who she hugged tightly. The cyan human was hesitant at first and then hugged the robot after a few moments. "Your loyalty to your friends is strong, but never give up your dreams. I know you want to be a pilot and join the Wonderbolts team. If you work hard at it, you will achieve that dream," the Maverick Hunter told her friend.
Rainbow Dash was taken aback by this, she had never been told this by the Reploid before. "Thanks, that means a lot to me. I hope that I'll go down in history so that the world never forgets me or my friends!" the athlete stated.
Leila started to laugh as they broke the hug, "So long as I live, the world won't forget any of you, my friends, that much I promise," she said with a smirk.
The red-haired machine walked over to Pinkie Pie and gave her a hug, "I know that you're sad that I had to take down my own brother, but don't be. I can also tell you're sad that you're never going to see me again, but if it helps, you can go to Twilight's lab and talk to me in my capsule. Heck, ask Twilight to keep recordings of you guys talking to me, I won't be able to see any of them until I wake up and then come here and then go back to my time, but I promise you that I'll see them. Keep a smile on your face, stay happy and spread your joy everywhere. You'll make a better world that way," she stated.
Pinkie returned the hug, "You pinkie promise?"
The Maverick Hunter nodded, "Cross my heart and hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye," she promised.
The pink human started squeezing tightly and Leila had to stop herself from projecting the Rolling Shield as she started to notice pressure readouts on her HUD. She wondered how a human could hug this tightly, but she managed to break free from the hug, "I know I can't breathe, but you don't need to damage my systems, Pinkie," she stated, surprised that a human could squeeze that hard outside of Applejack.
Pinkie Pie started giggling as the Reploid walked over to Rarity and gave her a hug, "Your generosity is an amazing thing. I would love to take some clothes with me to my time, but I have a feeling they won't follow me as I go back. Please spread and teach generosity to all the peoples of the world, help the others make this world a better place," she stated.
Rarity returned the hug tightly and smiled, "I will Darling. I have a fashion line inspired by you so that no one will truly forget about you and I'll be sure to leave some clothing in a safe spot where they won't get damaged so that in the future, you'll have a Rarity original to wear in your time, sweetie," the fashionista stated.
The two broke the hug, "Thank you," Leila said with a smile.
She then walked over to Sunset Shimmer, the two hugging each other and Sunset ending up using her Empathy power to see the future that she came from. "Wonderful world you'll be going back to, but it's empty without us. I'll try to ensure that we leave some mementos for you to never forget us by. If we were immortal, then you wouldn't have to be able to be alone forever. But are you sure that you're really okay with living on in a world without us?" she asked.
The Reploid nodded, "Yeah." She broke the hug and placed her hands on Sunset's shoulders, looking into the orange woman's eyes, "I'm a Reploid, a machine. I have no upper limit to how long I can live in theory. I was going to outlive you guys anyhow. Even so, getting to know all of you, even for such a short time as a month and a half and then twelve more hours. It'll be something that I look back on fondly for as long as I continue to function," she said truthfully.
Everyone turned to Applejack who shrugged, "She ain't lyin," she pointed out.
Leila sighed and smiled, "Thank you, Sunset. Well, this is the last time I'll see any of you alive, except for Twilight, I'm going back home with her. It's been great seeing you all again and I hope that you'll never forget me and remember to record lots of messages for me in your future. I'll be sure to watch them all and treasure them," she stated.
There was a somber silence among the group, but everyone said their goodbyes to the Reploid. They all separated to their vehicles and both Twilight and the Maverick Hunter climbed into her car. Neither of them said a word until they were halfway home. "So why didn't you say anything to me back there," the scientist finally asked.
Leila looked out the window, "Because I already know what you're going to do. All of your research, all of your experimenting. Everything, it all finally succeeds to bring me back to a functioning state. But you'll never get to see it happen. If my chronometer wasn't incorrect, I wake up one hundred and sixty years from now. One of your successors ends up being the one to oversee the project during the years you are gone. Hell, I don't even know if I should tell you this, because of the ramifications it could have on my future," she stated.
A hand was placed on the Reploid's shoulder as the vehicle came to a stop at a red light, she turned to see her sister looking her in the eye, "Leila, you don't have to worry. I was going into this with uncertainty if it could ever be done, but knowing that you'll get to walk the Earth once more, even if you're not with us, then that makes it all worth it. I care about you, sister, I love you. You're family and knowing that there's a member of my family still around in the future makes me happy. I want you to go to your world and be the hero that you appear to be now. Be the hero that I know you've looked up to. This world doesn't have an X or an Axl, but it has you. You can be the hero that everyone looks up to, that everyone turns to when there's trouble in the world. Just like we are to this world," Twilight reassured her sister.
"Thank you, Twi," the Maverick Hunter said to her sister.
"I'm going to head to bed when I get back. I'm sure Mom and Dad are waiting for you to return if they're not asleep. Before you go, would you like to say goodbye to them?" the scientist asked as she placed her hand back on the wheel, turned her attention to the road and started driving again.
"Yeah, I would." Leila replied calmly.
Neither of them said anything as they returned home. Nor did they say anything when they pulled into the driveway. The two of them climbed out of the car and walked to the front door. "Good night, Twilight. I hope your future is bright," the Reploid told her sister.
The purple woman smiled and opened the door, "Good-bye Leila. I hope you'll become the hero that the future needs," she stated.
The two of them went their separate ways, and the Maverick Hunter found her parents asleep on the couch. She shook them both awake, "Mom? Dad?" she said to them.
Twilight Velvet and Night Light both woke up, they looked tired, but the gray skinned human smiled weakly, "Hi, Leila, how was your day with the girls?" she asked.
"It was good, but before I carry you both to bed because you're out here on the couch, there's one thing I want to say to the both of you. Individually," the Reploid said to them.
The blue skinned human yawned and rubbed his eyes, "What is it, honey?" he asked.
Leila hugged her adoptive mother, "I want to thank you for taking me into your family and calling me your daughter. Being part of this family meant more to me than anything else has before. I never had a mother before you and I never had the chance to get to know what it felt like to be a part of a real family. I'm glad to have met you and I promise that for as long as I live, I'll never forget you," she said.
Twilight Velvet hugged her adoptive daughter, placing a hand on the back of her head, "Leila, you are a truly wonderful daughter. Not many children would travel back in time to see their parents again," she told her.
The two of them broke the hug and the Maverick Hunter hugged her adoptive father, "Dad, I know we didn't get to talk a whole lot, but I'm glad to have met you. You're like the father that I've wanted in my life since I lost my own. I'm going to miss you... both of you when I'm gone, but knowing that you were part of my life, makes it all worth it. Watch over Twilight and Shining for me, lest they get into trouble," she told him.
Night Light returned the hug, he patted his adoptive daughter on the head with a smile, "You're a great kid, Leila. I'm sure that in the future, you'll be a wonderful leader. I know that you'll never forget us, you'll never forget any of us. But never forget that your mother and I love you. We always will, even when we're not here anymore, we'll be watching you from the other side. If you ever feel like you're alone, just know that we're there with you," he told her.
The two of them broke the hug and the Reploid helped them both to their feet, carrying them to their bedroom and placing them in the bed. She started to walk out of the room when they pulled the covers over themselves and she stopped at the doorway, "Twilight will have a project to make video messages for me when I get back to the future. I would like the two of you to record a few, please. Oh and ask Shining and Cadance to do so, along with any kids they might have," she told them.
Twilight Velvet smiled, "We will, honey. I wish you a wonderful life in the future. I love you," she said.
A tear ran down Leila's face, "Thanks Mom, I wish you the same, but for your future. And I wish the same for Dad. I love the both of you too," she said.
The Maverick Hunter closed the door gently. She was now alone with only an hour before she had to go back to Future Equestria. She walked into the living room and picked up her Buster Shot and Beam Saber, which had been placed on the table by her parents. She walked out of the house and into the Lab where she saw her damaged and inactive body in the capsule that it had been placed in. Leila placed her hand on the capsule and smiled. "Don't worry, you'll wake up someday, and you'll come back to see your friends one more time," she told the inactive Reploid.
The active Reploid sat down in a chair within the lab and activated a vocal recorder, "By the time you get this message, I've already left to my time. Twilight, I know that you sometimes feel lonely, but there is someone out there for you that you haven't quite worked up the courage to ask. I've seen the way you and Sunset look at each other and I know there's an attraction between the two of you. All one of you have to do is ask and I'm sure the other will say yes. Don't spend the rest of your life alone, my sister. Don't worry, Mom and Dad are okay with this as is our friend group. Well, this is the last message I'll be able to pass on to you, I hope you take it. Your sister, Leila," she said into it.
She stopped recording and just waited as everyone in the house slept. Everything was quiet and then the fated time for the Maverick Hunter to return came. She closed her eyes and started to fade out of existence. All that was left of evidence that she was ever there was the security footage in the lab and the recording that she had left her little sister. As far as the rest of the world was concerned, she had never left her capsule. Her friends and family however knew the truth, that she had returned one last time to see them. After a few moments, the lights in the lab turned off as there wasn't any more movement.
Chapter 8: A New Beginning
Leila found herself in Equestria, standing before the purple Alicorn who had sent her back in the first place. There was a silence between the two and the Reploid, having accepted that her time to spend in the past had come to an end, merely turned away from the pony. "Did you do everything you wanted to do, Leila?" the Alicorn asked.
The Maverick Hunter stopped herself from walking away, "Yeah, I did. I made some new memories, had some great memories added to my database," she said, a sadness in her voice.
Twilight Sparkle stepped down from her throne and walked over to stand in front of the Reploid. The two beings looked in to the eyes of each other for a brief moment. "You're sad and alone. Everyone you knew and cared about is gone, but you don't want to admit to yourself that you're upset about it," she assumed.
Leila shook her head and then walked past the Queen of Equestria, "Everyone handles grief differently, this includes Reploids. The concern is heartwarming, but I'll be fine. I've got a world to get back to and I want to learn about the lives my friends had lived. If they lived full and happy lives, I can be happy. If you want to come visit me in the human world, I won't mind, your highness," she said at the door of the throne room.
The two turned to share a brief smile, the Reploid's was sad and it became obvious to Twilight that the machine wasn't hiding her sadness, she was just dealing with it differently than she was used to seeing. The two of them waved to each other and parted ways. There wasn't much to say between the two of them and all Leila really wanted to do was get back home.
She walked through the halls of the castle and reached the portal room, entering the portal and being thrown out onto the other side. Her internal gyroscopic systems forced her body to right itself, allowing her to once again, acrobatically land on her feet. She was back in the human world, back in the year 2180. Her Ride Chaser was still sitting outside of the embassy building and she climbed aboard it. The Reploid started the ignition and started to drive along the highway. She wasn't heading back towards the lab, she was heading somewhere different. Somewhere she could think.
She pulled the ride chaser up to a graveyard and shut it down. She placed her helmet on the handlebars and walked in. The Reploid walked towards a group of people that resembled her old friends and noticed that they were standing in front of the graves of her friends. A quick glance revealed that they had indeed lived long lives. Quiet gasps and hushed whispers sounded around her as she turned away and left the graveyard to head back to the lab.
Midnight Sparkle was waiting at the lab after a quiet drive back. The other Reploid looked at Leila with a smile, "You left in such a hurry, I didn't get to tell you that your friends had left you some things for you to have when you woke up. Oh and someone named Dr. Ciel wants to talk to you," she stated.
The Maverick Hunter nodded and walked into the lab, she was going to have a meeting with this Dr. Ciel before she did anything else. She followed the signs until she reached what was known as a communications room and saw a hologram of a woman with a long ponytail standing there, "You must be Leila, I've heard so much about you from Midnight Sparkle and X," the woman said.
The Reploid nodded, "And you must be Dr. Ciel, I've heard nothing about you," she said.
The human laughed a bit, "You're as serious as he told me, but I'm here to tell you something that wasn't told to you when the decision had been made. You're no longer an A-Rank Maverick Hunter. You're a GA-Rank Hunter. You were promoted around sixty years ago, during the Weil Incident. You are also the de facto leader of the Maverick Hunters, being the last one that exists. Though I must say that you certainly do look the part. Commander Leila, congratulations on your new promotion and your new position," she reported.
The Maverick Hunter sighed and deleted the registration of being a current Maverick Hunter from her database, "I'm abolishing the Maverick Hunters. They are not needed in this world. What this world needs are Guardians to ensure that the peace will continue. I shall create such an organization to ensure the utopian world that my friends had created doesn't fall apart," she told the human.
This shocked Ciel, she hadn't expected this from the Reploid, "I created an organization known as the Guardians to ensure the peace a friend of mine had created as well. He was a great warrior and a protect of humanity until the very end. He had sacrificed himself to defeat Weil and save Area Zero from certain destruction, ensuring that nature would spread across the world. I wonder what kind of leader you'll be though. X told me that you looked up to him a lot, that you used him as a role model. If you're anything like the real deal and not the copy I made as a child, you'll be a wonderful leader," she said.
A biometal floated into the view of the hologram, "So you have chosen to retire from the Maverick Hunters to become a Guardian, Leila. Your creator would be proud of you. I regret to inform you that none of his creations had survived the Elf Wars, but your legacy wasn't forgotten. Several Neo Arcadian Reploids looked up to you and Sage Harpuia was at least partially based off of your appearance. The question is, what are you going to do now since you're going to be a Guardian rather than a Maverick Hunter?" it asked in the voice of X.
Leila thought about it for a while, "Construct a floating vessel, see the world and how much it changed in the last one hundred and sixty-two years. Help some people and Reploids on the way. You know, do some good in the world like my family would want to on the way. You know, that sort of thing," she replied with a smile.
"X was right, you do have a good heart in your chest. Your world will be in good hands with you at the helm," another voice said.
A second biometal, this one looking different from X floated into the hologram. "You seem confused, I am Model Z. Created from the DNA Soul of Zero, a legendary hero from the past," he introduced himself.
"Nice to meet you, finally, Zero. I've heard many legends about you, but I fear that our first meeting may be where we part ways for now. It was good meeting you again, Commander, but I have some messages from my friends and family to go through," the female Reploid stated.
The hologram shut off after the three on the other side said their goodbyes and Leila walked back to the room with her capsule in it. The room was completely empty. None of the researchers were there anymore. A hologram appeared behind her and this triggered some of her sensors. The Guardian turned around and looked at it. It was Twilight Sparkle, but she was old. "To the future world, I know that you have heard that the Reploid in this Capsule had gone Maverick at one time, but the research that I have done on her systems have led to a new era of peace and prosperity for my world. The lives of humans however are short and time waits for no one, so I will not be able to live to see my project out to its completion. Do not fear Leila, do not worry about her going berserk. I had fixed those issues during my life time, but instead when you finally bring her into the world, welcome her with open arms. She is my sister and will be the oldest member of this family upon her revival. She comes from a world that is different from our own and despite all of this, had chosen to try to fit in here. She befriended us and joined my family. She will be the progenitor to a new race of mechanical beings for our world, a race that her world has seen go through multiple iterations. Reploids have great potential for the future of our world. Leila, if you're watching this, all of the recordings we have made were compiled and added to your memory unit, you'll be able to upload them to any machine and watch them as you please. Or you could just watch them in your own head," she stated.
This caused the Reploid to smile and she shut off the hologram, "You won't ever be forgotten, Twilight Sparkle."
Five years had passed, Leila had redesigned her armor and now wore a blue coat over it in honor and memory of Megaman X. She was now the founder and leader of the Guardians, traveling in their airship above the clouds. She sat on her chair with a smile on her face, her violet eyes staring forward through the viewport. They had left the drydock for their maiden voyage only hours ago and everything had been running smoothly. "Commander Leila, everything so far has been in the green!" an engineer Reploid stated to her.
The Guardian Commander smiled, she stood up and turned on the intercom to the entire ship, "Guardians, as you know, I am your Commander, Leila. But do not dissuade you from just calling me by my first name. I have assembled you all here, because you are the finest Reploids and humans in your field who volunteered. Our task will not be an easy one, but we'll get to travel all around the planet and get to see exciting places and meet new people. Hopefully, some day, we will expand our operations to other worlds. We are not a military or paramilitary organization, despite some elements of those being among you. Our primary job is the defense and rescue of the innocent peoples down there. We are a law enforcement group, nothing more. I hope you all will enjoy your time on our mobile airship and remember to work together, we are friends, family, and a crew. Thank you for your time," she said.
The red haired Reploid turned off the intercom and looked towards the helmsman, "Let's go to Prance first, Rarity told me about that place and I would like to see it with my own eyes first," she told her.
The helmsman, a Reploid based off Apple Bloom nodded and turned her attention back towards the navigation console as the Commander sat down in her chair. This was the end of an era for Leila. She started to accept that this world was a second home to her and she was going to do her best to protect it. As she thought back on her friends and the messages that they had left to her, she swore that she was going to do everything in her power to defend the world that they left behind.
Leila found herself being tossed to the ground from the mirror, but being a Reploid instead of a human gave her increased reaction speeds. She was able to catch herself and from there, easily stand back up. She looked up and noticed that she was on the grounds of Canterlot High School. It seems that she had made a mistake in assuming that she'd be placed somewhere away from this building. However, much to her relief, no one was on the outside of the building. She swapped to infrared vision, causing her eyes to turn red, which was a new addition to her systems to let humans know what spectrum she was looking into. A file within her mind told her that it was added while she was offline by Twilight Sparkle so that future humans would be able to more effectively work alongside the Maverick Hunter. There were hundreds, if not thousands of heat signatures in the building which was not the optimal scenario she had hoped for. She had to be careful to not be caught on the grounds of the school, lest Vice-Principal Luna try to have her arrested.
Much to her surprise though, it wasn't Vice-Principal Luna who walked out the doors. It was Principal Celestia. "Excuse me, but are you lost?" she asked.
The Reploid switched back to her normal vision, returning her eyes to the violet that they were normally. "I'm not lost, I just arrived here through the portal and I'll be leaving now, if you don't mind," she explained.
The principal smiled, "I understand what you mean," she said.
A memory flooded into Leila's mind and she grabbed her head in agony as pain seemed to rip through it. She remembered that day on the farm, when Celestia had tried to stop her. The Reploid's eyes softened and she sighed, pulling the hood tighter around her face. "Are Luna and Cadance okay?" she asked.
Principal Celestia nodded, albeit confused as to the question, "They're okay, but why would you ask such a thing?" she asked.
The Maverick Hunter didn't give a response, just a soft smile knowing that at least three of the people she attacked years ago had made a full recovery. This put her mind at ease and she turned around to leave. "Wait, you... Leila?", the principal stated, her tone showing shock at this revelation.
The Reploid turned her head and placed her finger to her mouth. "Don't tell anyone that I'm here. I want to surprise my friends with my presence. But if you can, tell your sister and Principal Cadance that I'm sorry for attacking them the last time we met," she said just loud enough for Celestia to hear.
The principal nodded, "I will, that I can promise," she stated to the Reploid.
Leila silently left and navigated with her own built-in GPS. People gave her strange looks, but it was preferable to the looks they would give her if they saw her fully armored. She had a single destination in mind, the place she had called home for the month and a half she was here until she was taken offline. Fear rose up within the Maverick Hunter because of her having gone Maverick the last time she was around this world. She didn't know how anyone would react to seeing her, especially the ones that she had fought.
It took only twenty minutes, but she arrived at the house and noticed the lab. Curiosity overtook her and she instead of knocking on the door of the place she once saw as her home, went to the place where Twilight Sparkle was usually found. However, there wasn't any Twilight Sparkle, just a pod standing up against the wall. Inside the pod was her past self, which was enough to cause her to have a minor existential crisis. She had died back then and this was the coffin she had been set up with. Yet now the Reploid was standing only a few feet away from it, looking at her offline frame.
She couldn't help but to reach out to her pod when a voice spoke up, "Who are you!? Where did you come from!? How did you get in here!?"
Leila recognized that voice as belonging to Night Light. She turned around and placed her hands on her hood, lowering it so that her adoptive father and her could see each other face to face. When that did nothing to help with the confusion of the man, she placed her hands on her helmet and removed it, holding it under her left arm. The look of the blue human turned from fear to confusion. "I'm sure you have a lot of questions, but I can explain," the Reploid started.
Unfortunately for her, it was too much for her adoptive father to handle and he just fainted. She quickly moved to catch him and lifted him into her arms, being sure to gently place her helmet on his midsection so she could carry both. The Maverick Hunter walked to the house and then realized that it would be a difficult endeavor to open the door without a free hand, much less knock. She looked around for some alternate entrance and just gave up, lightly kicking the door with her foot.
Twilight Velvet opened the door and gasped, "What did you do to my husband!?" she asked.
"He fainted, Mom. I'm not a Maverick anymore, that's been fixed and my head has been reinforced so that a blow like that won't make me go Maverick again. It's hard to explain and I only have a limited amount of time to be able to explain, but would you be able to call Twilight Sparkle and her friends and have them come here?" Leila explained, making a request as she did so.
The gray skinned woman nodded, "Of course. Just set him down on the couch," she stated.
The Reploid walked in and placed her adoptive father on the couch. She sat down in a chair and looked to her adoptive mother, "You know, it's a bit strange that you didn't question how a Reploid that's currently in a pod of some sort is up and walking around," she stated with a mix of curiosity and amusement.
Twilight Velvet walked into the kitchen and brought out a plate of snacks for the Reploid, "Take off your cloak, you don't need it in this household," she said sternly.
Leila grabbed her cloak and removed it from her person revealing the armor underneath. The gray skinned woman walked over to the Reploid in awe, "You look different than when I last saw you. You look a bit more mature than you did when you first arrived," she told her adoptive daughter.
The Maverick Hunter took off her armor, placing it on the floor next to the couch, revealing the full soft green bodysuit that she wore underneath. "Oh, you can put that back on, I just didn't want you trying to hide your identity is all, honey," the purple and gray haired woman stated with a smile on her face.
The Reploid shrugged and placed her armor on, including her helmet and Twilight Velvet couldn't help but smile, "You look so much like a hero instead of some soldier trying to fit in with the rest of us. You've really come into your own, Leila. Tell me, when do you come from?" she said to her adoptive child.
The GA-Class Hunter didn't know if she could be honest with this woman, but something inside of her told her that she had to be, "I'm from over one hundred years in the future. It's a very peaceful world, a utopian dream that my commander, X, would be proud of. Seeing a world like that gives me hope that my world can attain the same peace. Hopefully the conflict known as the Elf Wars had ended before too many other people or Reploids got hurt or lost their lives and the world had a long period of peace and prosperity. Thing is, I'll probably never know if that did happen or not," she stated.
Twilight Velvet walked over to the machine and drew her into a hug. Said machine returned the gesture and smiled, "I missed you, Mom," Leila said to her.
"I missed you too, you've always been so friendly to me and the others," the human woman replied.
The two held their hug and Night Light started to stir, causing them to break up the hug. Twilight Velvet walked to another room to start making phone calls, but the Reploid sat down in a chair, "Dad, I know it's a lot to take in. But I am Leila, I'm the same one that's in the pod in the lab. I'm just from a different time and speaking of time, I don't have a lot of that to spend with you and my friends. In a little over eleven hours, I'm going to be returning from when I came from and I'll never get to see any of you again. I won't be able to come back and in the time I came from, all of you are long gone..." she explained, tears streaming down her face.
The blue skinned man sat up and nodded, "Well, if that's going to be the case, then I guess we'll have to make the best of the time that we've got together. When Twilight told me that you were some kind of robot, I always knew that you'd outlive all of us. But it's not the short time that we'll have together that you should concern yourself with. You will always be our daughter, whether or not you have us in your life and we will always be your adoptive parents. You will never have to worry about that, just enjoy the time you have with us and never forget that time. It'll make your long life worth living, I promise you," he said.
This shocked the Maverick Hunter, she had never thought of anything like this. She hadn't even considered how wise Night Light could be. She reached towards one of the snacks and placed it in her mouth. Like all other food, it was flavorless. She wondered why she couldn't have been modified with the ability to taste things. "How's the food taste?", the man across from her asked.
"Flavorless, everything has no taste to me. They were able to modify me to have the ability to cry, but they weren't able to give me the ability to taste anything," the Reploid stated, annoyed.
"Don't you say that in front of my wife, she's very proud of her cooking. Though I'm sure she'd understand if you told her that you're physically incapable of tasting anything. I wonder what that's like, being unable to taste anything," Night Light wondered.
Leila shrugged, "Well, I can hear sounds that you humans can't, see in spectra that you humans can't, I'm faster, stronger, and more durable. I can think faster than you can, react faster than you can, I have the ability to manipulate energy. On top of all of this, this armor increases my own already heightened physical attributes, but I'd trade it all away just so I can taste food for the first time," she stated to him.
Twilight Velvet walked back into the room, "They'll be here in around two hours. They all have to get off work first. Do you want to do anything?" she said to the Maverick Hunter.
The Reploid shrugged, "Let's just all spend some time together, watch some television,"
The blue skinned man laughed and turned on the TV as his wife sat down next to their adoptive robot daughter who genuinely smiled. She felt great being with the two that had taken her in over a century ago when she had nowhere else to go. She would only have nine hours to spend time with her friends and her sister, but she was determined to make those hours count.