Prototype 2: Magic's evolution
Author's Note
Hello there this is a story I've been planning on doing for a few years now. I don't know how long the chapter will stay up after I publish this. If I have to edit the story to remove offending images I will create a collection of the images that are used for reference and post a link to my Discord server where you can find them.
Prototype 2: Magic's evolution
Sergeant James Heller was a broken and angry man. A year ago, he and his family had survived the first outbreak of Blacklight, or the Mercer virus as it was more commonly referred to. After the outbreak ended Heller went back on tour with the US military out in Afghanistan. It was during this tour near the end of it that. Heller returned to New York having been reassigned to the Yellow Zone of a new outbreak of the Mercer virus.
Upon reaching his home in the Yellow Zone Heller found that it was destroyed and his wife Collette was dead, her body on the ground. He also believed that his child Amaya had died in the carnage after seeing enough blood for two people. Unbeknownst to him Mercer had taken an interest in his unique DNA and kidnapped Amaya, killing Collette when she tried to stop him. The blood on the ground was a mix of Mercer's and Collette's as she got in a few good hits before succumbing. A little known but relevant fact was that Collette was a former soldier having left the military after she became pregnant to raise Amaya in her hometown. Seeing the carnage inside his home broke Heller making him demand to be reassigned.
Now all Heller dreams of is taking revenge on Mercer for killing his light and in his mind his child. After a psychological eval said that he was too unstable and revenge focused on Mercer he was denied reassignment to the Red Zone, at least for a while. That was until the situation escalated and now all hands were on deck. Being assigned to the Red Zone we find Heller on his first patrol in an ACP in the red zone right before disaster strikes.
Princess Twilight Sparkle was a happy mare having finally gotten through to her student Luster Dawn the importance of friendship. She now found that Luster Dawn had been working on a project in secret. Without knowing that her test subject was an old friend of Twilight's.
"Luster I'm surprised that you would even try to make a prosthetic horn, very few mares and stallions these days need such a thing," Twilight said as Luster showed her teacher her lab and notes. "I'm glad that you decided to and that you did it on your own not even knowing of my connection to Tempest Shadow." She praised. "I understand why you held off on telling me about this considering just how dangerous an experiment such as this could be considering Tempest's unstable magic and the fact that the minerals you've been using to try to simulate a horn are highly sensitive to any form of magic."
"It was challenging Princess. Every time I tried to use magic to complete this the experiment failed. I hadn't considered the minerals would attune to my magic field instead of Tempest's." Luster admitted sheepishly. "But now that I have some friends to help me work on it, especially those with hands, I've made so much progress!" She revealed the unicorn in question, who was standing in the circular array of Runes carved into the floor ready to levitate the golden shining cone on the table.
"She surprised me too Twilight." The deep maroon-colored unicorn said. "I may not get much more use out of my horn in my old age but even being able to try something like this has excited me!" Tempest Shadow said as she stood in a magic circle meant to stabilize her magic enough to allow her to use levitation while in it. "So if this works I won't have to use these damn spell arrays anymore?"
"Quite right Commander Tempest!" Luster said beaming "While the arrays have then a good stop-gap measure for certain spells. If the prosthetic works correctly you should be able to use all of your magic. Everything you know and have learned in your life without needing to stand in one of these circles ever again. Although they may still be useful while you're adjusting to the new sensitivity your magic has as you've had to brute force a lot of your magic through the circle just to replicate what would be easy for a foal." Luster winced upon realizing just how harsh her words were. "No offense."
"None taken. I know my limits and I know how hard it is to make a spell array that allows me to use basic levitation and make it to be strong enough for battle, let alone inscribing it into a crystal for me to use at any point with a quick flick of my hoof."
"Ok, now that Princess Twilight is here we can begin." The three powerful magic casters got into position. Twilight and Luster behind a protective shield with Tempest standing ready to levitate the crystal material. "Whenever you're ready Tempest levitate the apparatus towards your head. It should automatically attune to your magic and affix itself to your stump."
The older unicorn nodded before letting her magic flow into the circle pouring as much into it as she could without overloading the array. Sparks flew out of her horn as the prosthetic slowly floated over to the mare. Once the piece was affixed to her horn a whirring was heard as the prosthetic clamped down while simultaneously making connections to the remaining nerves in the stump upon Tempest's head. The process only took a few seconds but Tempest had not noticed. She was still pouring magic into the array causing the now functioning prosthetic to begin glowing brightly.
"Tempest the prosthetic is connected you might want to tone down your magic!" Luster shouted, inadvertently breaking the military mare's concentration.
This lapse in concentration caused Tempest to fire off a bolt of wild magic in the shape of a lightning bolt. Which bounced around the room before hitting Twilight in the chest. With a loud crack and a bright flash, the alicorn disappeared.
"Ah crapbaskets," Tempest said as she looked to Luster. "At least we know what your next project is going to be since this one is a resounding success even with what just happened."
"Commander Shadow?" Luster questioned nervously. "What exactly do you mean?"
"Twilight had a plan prepared in case she had to leave the country or this world for any emergency." Tempest explained calmly. "We can just modify that plan to include an investigation into what just happened." Tempest made a motion with her hoof to have Luster follow her outside of the lab. "You and I are both going to figure out where Twilight went and how to bring her back if she needs to be brought back. If not, we'll figure out how to assist her."
"How are you so calm about this?! You could have just killed our ruler!" Luster said, beginning to panic.
"Twilight can't be killed," Tempest explained. "Her body can be destroyed but she'll just come back. She literally is magic itself given a living form so anything I did to her would only send her to a different place whatever that place is we need to figure it out."
"Oh yeah, alicorn and element of Harmony I forgot about that," Luster said remembering what her teacher had explained when she had cut off one of Twilight's legs during an early lesson. "Okay, I think we should cordon off the lab that way nothing else can contaminate the results. I'm just glad we built it in a magic-resistant bunker here in the mountain."
"I already thought of that now let's get this investigation started."
Alex grinned happily. Glad he could save one of the soldiers from the attack Mercer had instigated. Even if that person hated his guts from the memories he gained after infecting him. Just the thought of what Mercer had done to Heller's family caused him to grimace angrily right before he got struck by a bolt of lightning appearing out of nowhere.
"Fuck!" Alex shouted as his body spasmed before instinctually taking on his armored appearance. Not realizing that in the moments he could not control his body's form a chunk of his biomass had integrated itself with the being riding the lightning down infecting them alongside Heller. 'Shit! Mercer would have heard me! I need to get out of here. Hopefully, Heller will be able to avoid Blackwatch after waking up. Thankfully I'll be able to track him it was surprisingly easy to take a small DNA sample and gain the memories that I have from him. After this, I just need to keep an eye on him.'
The original evolved looked around before jumping to the roofs nearby. "Good luck Heller, we're both going to need it."
"Fuck me." A female voice said from right next to Heller's unconscious body "I knew Tempest was strong but to know she's powerful enough to teleport me with a single bolt of wild magic is surprising." She thought out loud before stretching out her reshaped limbs "My whole body burns from that lightning. No, not just from the lightning, the forced transformation! That means I must have been thrown into another world about the safeties of the mirror."
Twilight opened her eyes to look at her new form. "It looks like I am a cross between my form from Sunset's world and my normal pony form considering I can feel my magic flowing through me and my wings," She said, examining herself in detail. She noticed how her body had the general shape of a human female breasts and all. She still had her fur muzzle and a little something extra that was usually only around when she got aroused.
"I'm not channeling Harmony to have the same effect. Otherwise, I'd feel like I was in my rainbow form again. I can see the fur on my body although this extra bit," she said, playing with her erect penis. "That never showed up in the human world so I'm not there." Her musings were cut short when she heard groans coming from next to her. Looking to her side she saw an unconscious human male.
"Oh no, I hope I didn't-!" She said as she took a step forward and a flash of memory and power, not hers flowed through her. "Heller, Mercer, Alex these names, these memories! My body, my powers?! Just what happened, how do I have these memories?!" Suddenly the sounds of gunfire caught her attention. The sounds were getting closer with every second and Twilight made a split-second decision.
"The answers will come later! Right now I've got to help Heller. If Blackwatch finds him they'll try to weaponize him or destroy him!" The decision made she grabbed the unconscious evolved in her incredibly enhanced strength. 'He's lighter than air to me,' she thought as she began running in the opposite direction of the gunfire looking for a clear place to take to the sky. 'I mean I knew I had enhanced earth pony strength for a while but my infection and evolution seems to have increased all my attributes even further than being just an alicorn did.' Finding a somewhat open area within the maze of half-destroyed buildings and growths of biomass. Twilight leaped up 300 ft in one leap before spreading her wings and flying higher with a single flap, before heading Northwest to the Yellow Zone.
'I'm certainly able to fly faster and higher now. So much so that I might even be able to match Rainbow Dash, maybe even go beyond her old top speed of Mach 10 with the rainboom.' While flying Twilight shifted Heller to a more comfortable carrying position while also trolling through the memories Alex had inadvertently imparted upon her. 'It surprises me that none of the Evolved have tried to use their powers of shapeshifting to grow wings. The infected can fly with the infected birds. If they absorbed one of them they should be able to gain wings. I'm also surprised that none of them have tried just experimenting with their shapeshifting. Alex is a scientist priding himself in his creativity but he's limited all of his abilities to combat and utility without actually figuring out how to fly on his own. All evolved can glide meaning they can reduce their physical weight enough to float a decent distance doing so along with creating wings would make locomotion far easier.' Twilight was rapidly approaching the remains of the bridge between the red and yellow zone as that thought passed through her head.
'Then again I should count it a blessing that the evolved have yet to realize just how far they can take their shapeshifting abilities. Flying combatants are a lot harder to fight than ones that can simply glide a short distance.' Twilight noticed the bridge beneath her and began following it towards the Yellow Zone. 'Oh, we're close! I should probably at least disguise myself in a more normal manner for this world. Thankfully I can keep what's between my legs since that is something that does exist here. Even if I have to change the shape of it. I'll just shift my extra biomass so that I'm thicc as it's called.'
The anthro alicorn landed on the pier by the bridge and gently put down Heller before shapeshifting to a more human appearance including minimal clothing, while also chuckling at her joke. 'I should be able to blend in a bit better now with my extra features hidden and once I get my body covered. Examining everything she was wearing, a thought came to her head. 'I'm glad that black light shapeshifting works in such a ridiculously precise way considering that even though it was my flesh just a few seconds ago my clothing is now 100% clothing down to the molecule, down to the atom!'
'This will do for underclothing but it's a bit cold. Maybe I should go with something a bit warmer.' She thought for a moment before realizing that she didn't feel cold just and was recognizing the ambient temperature. She shrugged. 'Still, I think I'd be too eye-catching like this. I'll switch it out for something a bit more inconspicuous.' She quickly formed some more clothing around her while also shifting her heels a bit to cover her feet more. 
'That should do, for now, The next step is getting Heller and me to a safe place away from others. She quickly filtered through the memories she had received once more looking for any place that might be remotely safe in the area. 'Thanks to what I got from Alex, I now know the location of one of his safe houses that he rarely uses here in the Yellow Zone. It's a good spot too since it's right by the area we landed.' With that in mind, Twilight grabbed Heller and started walking towards the abandoned Brownstone she had gotten from Alex's memories.
She was careful to avoid any Blackwatch in the area, not sure if they could detect her or Heller at this point but she didn't want to even risk it. After 10 minutes of basically dragging Heller along she reached the apartment building.
"If you can hear me, big guy, we're almost to a safe area. I'll explain a bit more once you're awake but you're going to be in for a doozy." She said to her companion as she pushed open the cleverly disguised front entrance. Once inside the building she found what she had gotten from Alex was still accurate; the bottom floor had been completely opened up allowing for a large area to train ranged and close up abilities in. "I still can't believe Alex decided to just live in the evacuation zone after reforming. I mean it did give him time to build all this. But nowadays he rarely uses it since it was his first safe house after getting back to shore." She muttered while navigating the open layout of the first floor to get to the stairway. "His negligence is our gain though, and once Heller wakes up we can both train in the abilities we gained from Alex. I can even probably give Heller some of my DNA to help him access magic."
Once up the stairs, she found another mostly open area with a small room that held two beds. "Even as a living virus Alex still likes to sleep as a human. It's admirable although I don't know how Mercer sleeps if he even does the insane piece of shit."
Twilight lay Heller on one of the beds before going to lay down on the other. "A nap will be good and since I have complete control over my body, I can set an alarm in my head that will wake me up in about 4 hours." With just a thought Twilight did as she said and laid down rapidly falling asleep thanks to that complete control. 'Hopefully, Heller won't wake up until after I do. It would be a pain in the ass to be woken up by him being confused as to where we are, who I am, and all that crap.' She thought before completely drifting off.
