#42

Chapters

Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter One

Chapter Two

42

Chapter Two

“Are you crazy!?”

Yes, the answer to that question is yes. I am absolutely crazy. At least I think so. Heh. Well you maybe wondering, “Boo, who is this Byte you were talking about last chapter?” and I would reply, “Well that is really complicated. LIKE REALLY COMPLICATED!”
Okay, so Byte is like this mechanical person who used to be a pony and sometime in the wasteland went full robot and he was a failed scientist that his experiments went too far.
Byte, though I don’t know his full story at this point in the story yet, he was a cruel scientist is what I’m getting at. He did some really bad shit. Like war crime levels of bad shit. Needless to say he was a VERY bad, uh, I was going to say Pony, but I, uh… Robot? Yeah, that feels right!
My husband Flutterstay stopped him a few times and as a result for his interference was captured and tortured by him for a hundred years. Yes, you read that right. A HUNDRED YEARS! You see, my husband was a cyberpony. He is a scientist too. He experimented on himself instead of others and made some enhancements once Project Steelpony was unlocked. But until then he wasn’t what I’d call a Hero of the Wasteland like Momma, Pippy, or that little filly ghoul. He was just trying to live his life and stay out of the way mostly. He did do some cool shit though don’t get me wrong. But it was the time that Byte kept him locked up and the experiments he performed on him that caught my attention.
At the time I wasn’t an all powerful Draconequus yet. I was just a VERY lucky Earth Pony when I met my future husband for the second time.

Oh, I was supposed to tell you the tale of meeting him for the second time? HA as if!

No, I think you came here to read the how and why I brought him back. That seems more like the story you came here for.

So, I had to go see Celestia. No, not the one in the SPP Hub. No, we are years in the past here. Short of the long of it:

500 years in the future Momma was having problems with her blank body. Not like bowel problems, come on I’m not going to sit here and describe in endless words her bowel movements like certain other ponies do. It actually turns out that a certain perk was being activated after her body absorbed enough Draconequus blood. She needed to maintain her blank body over the years. What you would call Flux. Is actually Discord’s blood. That bright rainbow sludge is the blood of all Draconequus and released from our bodies causes unpredictable mutations in other lifeforms. So you gotta be really freaking careful if you encounter a bleeding Draconequus.

So, this perk you may be familiar with:
Kissed by Discord: “Do you really want to know?”
Was activated and started to change her. Which gave her the ability to time travel, so while Momma thought she was dying she was going to do another paragon thing and go back and stop the war from happening. Discord once told her that something changed in the script which started this whole mess of the Wasteland and well, she figured it out. I don’t exactly know how Blackjack figured it out, but she did and she enlisted my help to fix it. So, we came back in time and stopped the event that would create the wasteland and then this version of Discord had to have a laugh. You see, what you all would call the “SHOW CANNON” timeline did happen after we changed everything, but thanks to some fuckery by Discord, and with Momma’s new “Queen Draconequus” status, they were able to fix the timeline so that the future we came from was maintained by a separate powersource as if the events happened as they were supposed to. Hey I’m just a Princess Draconequus that's well above my paygrade to explain the how and why of the temporal bullshit and fuckery they did to keep the wasteland available and viable for travel so everything they did wouldn’t unravel.
Okay, that was more long than short I guess. But you get the idea, so we live primarily in the cannon timeline, but have jaunts back to the Wasteland timeline. Then introduce a place called the Floating Vagabond bar and things get even crazier.

Um, are you still here? Listen I KNOW this is a lot to try and suspend your disbelief to. Hell, I lived it and I’m still not certain on things and I’m an all powerful being of Chaos! I would advise like all things Chaos related you just roll with it. Like they say about Pinkie Pie, “That’s just Pinkie being Pinkie.”

Maybe I should add a time frame heading to the Chapter titles… Yeah that would probably be a great idea! Heh I’m so smart!

So anyways here it is:

Ponyville
Twilight’s Rule
(15 years after the fall of Tirek, Chrysalis, and Cozy Glow)

Simple, right? RIGHT?! Gosh all this time travel stuff is a headache.

Where was I? Oh, yes. So I have to go to the castle in canterlot where former Princess Celestia is chillin’ so she can be all Principal Celestia like for her School of Magic. Okay, well I could just you know, teleport there but I’m going to be honest with you dear reader. Sometimes to get your thoughts in order its nice to take a train. And, so I did.

The train pulled up to the station in Canterlot. What, did you really think I was going to spend time telling you about the train ride? Nope, that was for me not you. Get used to it, I’m a bit selfish.

So, I made my way up to the castle and just visited a few shops here and there cause I am a lady, and I do like to shop. I even picked up this cute red dress from Canterlot Boutiqe that I can’t wait to wear for Sweetie, um, Flutterstay. I will get him back matter of fact you already know I do at this point and this is about the journey of how I do it. But I wanted to brag about the dress cause yeah. It is adorable.

So, I approached the castle entrance and there was a rather nice looking unicorn stallion wearing the solar guard armor. He looked at me in surprise as I came trotting up to the door. “Oh, Sword Strike, its nice to see you on the beautiful day! How are you?” I asked him politely.
He smiled and looked me over, “I am doing well Miss Boo what brings you to the Castle all the way from Ponyville?”
“I need to see Celetia, is she in?” I knew she was already I could feel her magic inside the castle, but one must observe the niceties when dealing with the general population. It is considered polite from what I’ve been told.
“Yes, she is in her study, one moment and I can send a guard to…” He stated and I raised a hoof to him. “It is fine Strike, I will see myself up I need the exercise all this floating around is adding pounds to me anyways.” He put his hoof down and nodded then used his magic and opened the door. “Very well Miss Boo. You have a wonderful visit.”
I entered the door looking around then made my way up to Celetia’s tower passing the royal throne room I saw Twilight Sparkle looking slightly bored and upset at a Canterlot Noble talking long winded in front of her to which I sent a small bolt of Chaos at and turned his top hat in to a propeller beanie. Twilight’s eyes wided and she put a hoof in front of her mouth as she spotted me and and gave me a nod the amusement written in her eyes.
I mouthed to her, “You’re welcome.” and continued on my way to Celestia’s tower.

Now, I know your going, "This story is so bullshit! You know the Princesses! You're not explaining the details of events you're supposed to so we can know everything you know! What kind of writer are you Boo?!" Fair questions to ask. My answer is, "Do you want a whole chapter of exposition? Go back in time and tell you from point A to Z in order with colorful pictures and fancy words?" Well if you came here for all that stuff then I'm sorry you will be disappointed. I'm a Draconequus and we do the whole, what you humans call, ADHD thing. Oh shit… look talking to you all has me all confused…
Where was I?

Oh yeah!

Now that I have Byte…

Wait that's too far forward.

I guess you need the details otherwise why would you read this?

I approached the door to Celestia's study and a black cat sat on a table next to a vase of flowers that was shattered on the floor.
"Hello Byte." I say looking at the cat.
It's black fur seemed to absorb the afternoon light coming through the window, his yellow eyes slitted as he stared at me. The eyes narrow as the door to Celestia's study opens.
"Of course Princess I will get those documents from the library for you." The red earth pony mare bows and just as she is about to close the door turns and looks at me. "Oh, hello." She was a little surprised but smiled at me.
"What can I do for you?"
I returned the smile, "I'm here to see Celestia." I state simply.
She frowned, "I don't have any visitors on her schedule for today."
"I'm just dropping by to see an old friend." I said letting my body shift into Draconequus form and the assistant's widen. "Oh… um… go on in." She steps aside knowing that there wasn't much she could do to stop me if I wanted to make it an issue which I didn't.
Did I use an intimidation tactic?
That's not very heroic!
Eh, it gets the job done.
Besides, I'll make it up to her on her way home. There's this filly she's been simping for and tonight she will get the chance to have a conversation with her.
That's still not very heroic!
I know it will all work out in the end. Trust me!
I entered the chamber and noticed the light in here was softer than outside and Celestia sat on a pillow in the corner of the room surrounded by a pile of scrolls and books. She was so absorbed in what she was doing she didn't even notice as I sat on the pillow next to her and summoned up some tea for us.
I poured the tea and sent the cup to start booping into her horn gently.
She continued to mutter to herself about some spell work or another as the teacup continued its gentle assault on her long horn.
"Ahem." I cleared my throat politely trying to get her attention.
She continued to pour over a book.
"So this is where Twilight gets it from?" I asked sipping my tea. Celestia looked up in surprise and blushed.
"Oh Boo. I didn't know you came in. My apologies. I was researching some obscure magic." She then noticed the tea cup bumping her horn and reached out with her magic and took the cup taking a sip from it politely.
"Must be some world ending magic you're looking up there. Is there anything I can do to help?" I offer.

She looked over to a box on her desk and looked back at me. "Can you banish a talking toaster?" She pleaded with me.
I look at the box.
"Wait it's not…"
She nodded.
"How about I send it somewhere it will bother the least people?" I ask.
"That would be much appreciated."
I looked at the box and snapped my claw. The box disappeared in a bright flash.
Celestia sighs and seems to relax.
"Thank you Boo. I was getting tired of Twilight's enchanted talking toaster. It literally wanted everyone to eat toast all the time. I swear if it could, it would rule all ponykind by making us eat nothing but toasted products."

Wait, I thought you said this wasn't the story of how you saved Equestria from a toaster hellbent on taking over all of Ponykind? I hear you ask.

Uh, whoops. Yeah I suppose that story was a short one.

"That sounds boring eating the same toasted stuff everyday for every meal. Ugh I could get sick just thinking about!" I look sick. Then looks fine immediately.

Celestia laughed then set her teacup on a stool next to her with many other cups and mugs.
"So what can I do for you?" She asked diplomatically.
I looked her directly in the eye as the cat that was Byte jumped into her hooves.
"I need your cat." I said simply.
She blinked.
"My cat? What do you want with Sir Whiskers?"
She asked concerned.
I smiled, "Well Sir Whiskers is actually a robotic pony cursed to live as a cat."
Celestia looked to the car then looked to me, and back at the cat.
"You know what. Discord has told me crazier things that turned out to be true. But, my sweet little murder machine is a big bad robot?" She petted said murder machine that grabbed her hoof with his front claws and bit on it.
I looked at Sir Whiskers, I mean Byte and meow at him. He got into a sitting position and meowed back.

So, we had a conversation in Cat back and fourth line that for a time before Celestia raising an eyebrow interrupted.

"Interesting conversation?" She asked.

I frowned. "He was telling me he doesn't want to come with me as he is enjoying his life in the castle. A redeeming arc for him seems to be keeping him happy. However, I need his help. So I will have to sweeten the pot." I say to Celestia as I switch back to the cat.

I made him a simple offer.

I will send him to a dimension and place that has no deities or higher beings to plague him and he would be free to live among the native species as he sees fit.

He asked me in cat, what he had to do.

I replied to him, save Flutterstay with me.

The cat rolled around and seemed to be laughing.

If you have ever seen cat amused or pleased seeing one trying to laugh like a pony was another thing. It ended up being a snorting gasping sound. After he had finished laughing he asked me if I was serious.
I nodded.

"Oh this is ridiculous." I said then snapped my lion paw at him.

The sweet little black cat changed into a giant murder robot with red glowing eyes and it looked at its body.

"Well, this is not something I expected." He said his voice a robotic buzz but was clearly understandable.

"Well talking cat with you was getting tiring. But my offer stands. I get you away from us hated Draconequus and other meddlesome higher beings and you get a fresh start on a world that has no magic and is purely based on science. All you have to do is help me save Flutterstay."
I restated the offer in plain Equestrian.

The robot's eyes glittered and glowed as he processed the thought. "All I have to do is save him?" He considered.

"Well he has to be alive and aware when he comes back." I stated.

"I… I will help you." He said.

My eyebrows shot up. "Really?"

He nodded, "You know the whole reason I kept fighting you two was to wipe you both from existence and leave me alone. But this offer… I can't pass it up. I have learned a lot about life being a cat. Things I never considered before. Before I was focused on destroying your kind Draconequus. But a world where I don't have to suffer your magic and can be free to start again. That sounds worth it."

I stuck a claw out. "Then we have a deal?" I confirmed and to my surprise he actually shook my claw with his.

"So where do we begin?" He asked.

"I don't know yet I have to consult my Pipbuck. Flutterstay had a computer load all the details into it." I looked at the device and read the list.

The Pipbuck beeped.

QUEST UPDATED

Obtain Byte COMPLETE
Get him to work with you COMPLETE
Go to Tenpony Tower in the Wasteland

"Looks like we're going home to the Wasteland next."

Chapter Three

42

Chapter Three

"I like trains!"

Canterlot, Equestria
Canterlot Castle
15 Twilights Rule (TR)(15 years after the fall of Tirek, Chrysalis, and Cozy Glow)

So as you may have read already my dear I got Byte. Yay! Now I hope his robotic ass doesn't stab me in the back. I'm expecting a double cross at some point don't think I'm naive enough to think otherwise I do have a plan for that eventuality.
Oh, what's the big plan you ask?
You will find out when it happens.
Or not.
It's my life so, you know. Expect fuckery.
As we made our way out of the castle Byte asked, "So, how exactly are we getting to the Wasteland?" We continued trotting out the door when I replied, "Well we can just hop a train to Manehattan and take one of the pre:arranged portals used for quick travel between the time periods. Or we can do this the hard way and go to my apartment building at the outskirts of Ponyville go through the portal there and walk to Manehattan."
Byte considered this for a moment, "So it's not going to be some Draconequus time travel snap your stupid claw kind of deal? It is literally an independent portal we can go to? How did you correct for variance of time unraveling when Blackjack changed the past to allow this timeline to exist? It would take massive amounts of power to sustain another timeline like that without the waveforms collapsing."
I turned my head to look at him in the red sensors, "No, yes, ask Momma." I replied smoothly.
His cat like robotic head turned back to watch were he was going as we exited the castle grounds to the shopping district of Canterlot where ponies, griffons, hippogriffs, and other beings watched us as we made our way through the district.
"I hate it when people stare." Byte said as we got closer to the train station. His robotic ears lay back. "That happens when you look different from everypony." I reply. "Isn't that why you made your body like that? So you could stand out and be feared?" I asked.
He took a few moments to reply as he noticed several colts shrink under his robotic gaze and run back into a house near the edge of the housing district on the way to the train station.
"Being a cat taught me something's that I miss about being flesh and blood. Breathing, a heart beat, eating. I do miss those things now that I got to experience them again. I think while I was this thing I forgot what life was like and how to enjoy it. It was just nothing but data to me. Ones and zeros. Quickest means to an end. I never thought about the things I'd given up when I went full synthetic after cyberization. Being back in this body feels, cold now." He analyzed it.
This surprised me and made me wonder if Sweetie ever felt the same way about his cybernetics. "No Boo, that's silly, he still had an organic brain and his senses. It's completely different than being a full robot. But it must be damn close." A voice said in the back of my mind. "Huh?" I thought back at the voice, "Hello?" The thought echoed in my skull. I got no reply to this. Before I could puzzle it out what that voice was I bumped into someone at the train station.
"Oh, I'm terribly sorry!" I said automatically letting a smile bloom on my face as my eyes connected with the cyan blue familiar orbs of an orange bat pony Alicorn.
"Phoenix!" I say a smile growing across my face. His features darkened.
"Oh, it's you." He said with an edge of anger to his voice.
My ears laid back, "I suppose, I deserve that." I thought.
"No that bitch Boo Prime does." The voice in the back of head said with anger, and my face screwed up in pain as something felt like it was pulsing at the back of my head and the voice was quiet again.
I shake my head and reply, "Pheonix I'm not the Boo you know. I'm…"
"Boo Clone number 42." Another voice in my head says and I say that out loud to him.
He looked a little skeptical. "What are you doing here and who is this robot cat thing?"
"You don't recognize Byte?" I asked confused.
"Should I?" He asked raising an eyebrow.
"Uh… yeah." I nod.
I looked to Byte, "You remember him right?" Byte looks at him. "He is the one I pulled his wings off in the Wasteland just to examine how they were attached to a bat pony differently than a pegasus since they are rare. His genetic deformity of being an Alicorn is natural mistake rather than mystical in nature. From the file of Subject P-469259-BPA first encountered 2 years after the fall of the Grand Pegasus Enclave."
Phoenix leaned away from the robot.
"I do recall the pain of that but not what caused it. And I still have the scars." He said looking disturbed at the robot.
Wait, wait, wait! I hear you again. Who wouldn't remember the person who injured them like that? I hear you ask. Well, that's the mystery. Why doesn't he remember Byte. He fought him with me and Flutterstay a lot.
How does he still have his wings? This was one of those incidents that Flutterstay was there for. He damaged Byte enough to make him retreat and was able to administer a hydra and a healing potion to Phoenix just in time to regenerate the damage to his flesh.
Oh, a hydra? It's made of that Flux stuff I told you about last chapter and goo from a hydra, the creature. It has a regenerative ability but it's effect works less and less the more of it you use. It can also cause you to become "tainted" with biological flux contamination.
Remember what I said about Draconequus blood being extracted to make something called Flux. Yeah, it is that stuff.
So hydra is a powerful magical healing item with diminishing returns the more you use it the less able your body is to recover even from small wounds.
"Well let's add this mystery to the list of what happened to Flutterstay." I said sighing.
"Flutterstay? You mean Fluttershy right?" He asked.
I looked at him.
"My husband… Flutterstay?" I ask looking at him.
"You two were best friends? He saved you from Byte here." I stated.
I didn't think it was possible for his frown to deepen but he somehow pulled it off.
"Boo, I don't have time for your horse apples. I'm going to see my sister in Appleloosa." He said annoyed now.
"Byte here's some bits can you buy our tickets? I need to speak with Luc… I mean Phoenix alone for a moment." I say making a stack of bits appear in mid air floating.
"Yes I will do that. This conversation is making my processor hurt." He grabbed the bits out of the air with his mouth and walked over to the counter.
As Byte walked away I turned to Phoenix, "Listen dude. You know the wacky shit I get up to. Is it so hard to believe there is something missing from your memories and how some memories don't make sense now?" I asked with my serious face on. He looked skeptical at me and thought for a moment then his accented voice said, "There are some things that I question now. Like how did you get pregnant with no stallion? Or how did we end up winning that dance off against those space things on Benar VII after you totally blew that contest. Or, how about the time you got us all stuck in a trap room with starmetal that was slowly sucking the life out of us but got us out while you were passed out?"
All very good questions. It was Flutterstay who saved our bacon all three times, I said as much to him.
He seemed to consider this then said, "So how much do you trust that machine?"
I looked back at Byte who was still talking with the Ticket Griffon. "On a scale of 1 to 10, negative 10 billion." I said flatly.
He sighed. "I guess my sister will have to wait a few more days."
"I promise I'll send you directly there once all is said and done. Cross my heart, hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye!" Pinkie promised him, making the movements with my pony arms.
Byte returned with the tickets.
"I have procured the required tickets the train leaves in a few minutes. I assumed we were going to Manehattan." He said holding three tickets in his robot mouth.
"Yes, good job Byte. Shall we boys?" I asked as I pulled my ticket from Byte's mouth gently with magic. I approached the ticket pony wearing the conductor's hat and he looked a little alarmed when he saw me floating the ticket in the air like a unicorn. Then he saw Byte, blinked and rubbed his eyes. He seemed to be nearly having a stroke when he saw the orange Alicorn bat pony. He used his magic and took out tickets, ripping the stub off and floating them back to each of us.
"Welcome aboard." Was all he said as we entered the train and found our seats in a relatively empty train car.
"Should be about 5 hours to Manehattan." I said looking over a sign on the wall about travel times from canterlot to various destinations across Equestria.
"Well, did you bring a deck of cards?" Byte asked Phoenix. This caused my mouth to turn up on a grin.
"Byte, did you just make a joke?" I asked.
His photoreceptors looked at me.
"I was merely curious if we could play a card game. It has been ages since I played one and I can't exactly experiment on anyone here without you getting upset. So, cards seemed like a logical choice of activities as I would beat you at chess hooves down." He stated.
"No." Phoenix said flatly.
I smiled.

***

Several hours later.

"I can't believe I lost to a tin can!" Phoenix stated angrily as the train departed Appleloosa on its way to Manehattan next. He looked at the now gigantic pile of chips on Byte's side of the table. Phoenix looked at me, "He has to be cheating!" He stated. I looked at my own meager pile of chips, "No, I think he's just good at cards." I said shuffling the deck. I dealt him two cards and myself two cards. I got an Ace and Queen of Spades. I nearly burst out laughing at that. "Blackjacks cutie mark." I thought. "Too bad this isn't blackjack I would win with the unbeatable pair." I thought.
I felt brave at that moment and looked at my chips. "100 left…" I thought then pushed 50 into the pot with the blinds.
"Bet." I said simply. Byte looked at the pile then called my bet.
I flipped over three cards from the deck and came up with:

Queen of Hearts
Jack of Spades
2 of Spades

It went to Byte. He looked at his chips and mine and bet 50. "Well shit." I thought, then gave a moment to act like I was considering the bet.
"You're move meat bag." Byte said.
"I'm thinking don't rush me tin can." I bit back.
"Ah what the hell you only live once." I said as I pushed the last of my chips in. "All in."
I flipped the last two cards out of the deck.

King of Spades
10 of Spades

"Show 'em meat sack." Byte said flipping his cards.

Ace of Hearts
Jack of Hearts

I laughed. Byte cocked his head questioningly at me as I placed down the cards in my hooves.

"Read 'em and weep bot brains." I said smirking.
He looked at the cards and nodded. "That was definitely a good move. Your mother would be proud." Byte said as he reached for the cards and began to shuffle them. I pulled back the 245 chips I won that hand but byte still had the majority of chips in front of him.
I tossed a hundred to Phoenix and we played again, Phoenix went in and cleaned me out this time I raised a hoof to the pony at the bar I had materialized here for our poker game and got him to float me over a root beer float. I wrapped my lips around the straw as I watched the boys go back and fourth with them finally declaring a tie as the train approached Manehattan's Grand Central Station. I made the table and the train car go back to normal after the train stopped moving. The other passengers looked confused as they appeared in the train car like they couldn't believe that three people appeared out of thin air, and they had already arrived in Manehattan.
I looked to the guys and we got up heading to the door, ponies stayed out of our way seeing the weird mix of us.
We took in the majestic train station and Byte asked, "Where is the portal to the Wasteland?"
I smiled, "it's this way." I led the way toward the front doors out on to the night time streets of Manehattan and we made our way toward Tenpony Tower. As we got closer I smiled at them both. "Get ready boys the portal is right…here." I stopped in front of a fire hydrant.
"That is the portal?" Phoenix asked, looking skeptical at the fire safety device. I smirked. "What did you expect it to be a big archway with a sign that said 'mystical portal to a future time that shouldn't exist anymore!'"
"I did expect something to that effect knowing you Boo." Phoenix said dryly.
I rolled my eyes and transformed into my Draconequus form and with a flourish snapped a claw at the fire hydrant and it stretched into an archway.
"Is that better?" I asked.
He nodded and we entered the portal, it shifted back into a normal fire hydrant after we went through.

Chapter Four

42

Chapter Four

"Life's a journey, shame about the destination."

Equestrian Wasteland
Manehattan, Equestria
21 Years after the battle of Hoofington

The Wasteland. The brutal result of a war that should never have happened. Over 200 years ago the war with Zebra kind ended in balefire. The result was Equestria being burnt in an apocalyptic fire. As if Celestia herself had kissed the lands with the sun. Leaving magical radiation poisoning the land. Ponykind was able to survive the last day of the war by hiding in underground bunkers called Stables.
200 years after that fateful day the long thought over war with the Zebras reared it's head again as a fanatically group of Zebra purists decided to start the shit all over again led by the Zebra Legate. It took all of Equestria's heros to band together in the western most city called Hoofington to wage that final battle. The Light bringer used the Single Pony Project to wield the powers of nature in the last war, her friends fought on the front line while Blackjack and her crew, except me, went to the moon to stop a pre-equestria project Horizons from launching and destroying the world from the Moon. Only they kinda failed successfully. Instead of stopping the projectile Tom from Project Horizons from launching Blackjack changed it's impact point and used the city of Hoofingtons energy shield projectors to plunge the mile long chunk of moonstone into the heart of an evil thing called the Eater of Souls which was was made of starmetal. The reaction powered up the hidden shield systems under the Hoof and contained most of the energy from the blast and used it to dissipate the uncontrolled reaction harmlessly letting it burn itself out. All of Blackjack's friends died, except me, Scotch Tape, and Rampage. Rampage got trapped in the moon for 500 years until Momma and Littlepip rescued her.
Momma, Blackjack, became an immortal pony due to a cloned blank body her soul was attached to. She got to live as an immortal unicorn until her Perk "Kissed by Discord: Do you really want to know?" Kicked in. The result was that the blank clone body of Blackjacks started to change into a Draconequus rapidly. Though at the time she didn't know that. She thought it was breaking down and she was going to die. As a result of this she discovered new powers in the early stages of her transformation and enlisted my help to go back in time to stop the war from happening. Once she succeeded and she thought it was her final moments the Discord of the past told her the truth about herself and what was happening. We also found out that not only was Blackjack my adopted mother, but also my biological mother. Her genetic samples were used with Discord's blood to create the blank bodies used by Project Chimera.
Wow. That is a lot of time fuckery in the end there. Not really needed for you to know that at this point but exposition in detail can be nice, yes?

So, the dilapidated fire hydrant in the wasteland popped up and became an archway that admitted us into the wasteland. We looked around our surroundings and saw the efforts of hundreds of ponies to clean up the wasteland city of Manehattan with DJ Pon3 leading the efforts via the EBS Hub atop of Tenpony Tower. Our destination according to my Pipbuck.
“Looks like they have spruced up the place a little.” Phoenix said observing the somewhat cleaned streets of Manehattan.
“It appears so.” Byte said observing.
“Focus stallions.” I said transforming into my pony form and started to walk toward the walled gates of Tenpony Tower. As we approached the automated turrets on the wall tracked toward us. I kept a wary eye on them as we rounded the corner to the front gate.
“Halt, what is your business here?” Asked a gray coated stallion standing behind a fortification outside the gate.
“We’re here to see the DJ.” I stated.
He looked us over and gave a hard look at Byte.
“I can let you in, but your bot… Will have to stay out here for the time being.” He said looking at Byte.
Byte looked at the pony and said, “You can let me in. I'm sentient, not a toaster.”
My memory triggered. Kaleb, a tall human male wearing a black tee shirt and blue jeans turning to Flutterstay and calling him a Toaster.
I shook my head to clear the memory.
“Be that as it may, Robot, you are most definitely a combat machine of some kind.” He looked over Byte with a gaze fixed on his large claws and sharp metal fangs.
“How about this, Byte waits down here while we go and deal with the DJ and do whatever we need to here?” Phoenix reasoned.
I looked at Byte and the robot gave a shrug. “I can find something to entertain myself down here for a while.”
“Are you sure?” I asked him with concern.
The cat-like head nodded. “Sure I can move some stones around or examine some foliage or some shit.” His robotic voice replied, but I sensed the unhappiness from him.
“Okay… We will be back as quickly as we can. Try not to get into trouble out here.” I said.
“I’ll try to be on my best behavior.” The bot droned out and began looking around for something to keep his attention.
“Let’s go, Phoenix.” I started to trot toward the gate as it parted open for us.

***

Boo and Phoenix enter the lobby of the former hotel now turned settlement. The shops beyond the security desk were just opening for the day. Ponies and other creatures were walking about. Most were wearing fancy clothes and looking snooty. Phoenix looked at me, “You ever get the feeling you're underdressed when you come in here?” I looked at a pair of ponies who were giving me a disapproving look as they rounded the corner from the grand staircase. “Most of these ponies have lived their whole lives insulated from the Wasteland. They wouldn’t know the danger if it bit their faces off.” I replied making my way to the stairs to the elevator banks. We walked up the stairs and my Pipbuck beeped.

“Finally!” I say as I bring up the device.

QUEST UPDATED

Obtain Byte COMPLETE
Get him to work with you COMPLETE
Go to Tenpony Tower in the Wasteland COMPLETE
Obtain the water talisman gemstone.
- (Optional) Replace Talisman with a new/used Talisman

“We have to swap out the water talisman for a new one. We need the jewel from it.” I told Phoenix. He looked at me. “So how are we going to get that? Are we going to steal it?” He raised an eyebrow. I cringed as that caught the attention of two security ponies who made their way toward us. I shook my head, “No, we will just ask the Twilight Society for help. I’m sure they will be willing to work with us.” I said with a laugh. This didn’t seem to deter the Security Ponies so I wiggled my nose and the both of us popped out of the elevator lobby and appeared in the vestible.

“Phoenix, next time you have a question about stealing stuff. Make sure that there are no security ponies nearby.” I am a bit annoyed. He blinked disorientated at first then looked around, “Oh, hah, my bad Boo.”

I shook my head and yelled, “Yo, Homage you home?” My voice seemed to echo around the lobby and then a door was heard opening as the older DJ appeared out of a door. Her blue hair had a touch of gray at the base as she looked down at us from the upper floor. “Oh, hey Boo, Phoenix.” She made her way down the stairs and stopped in front of us. “What are you two doing here?” She asked.

“We need a favor.” Phoenix started.

“A big one.” I nodded.

“That being?” She raised an eyebrow.

I went on about the quest we were on and she also had no idea I was married. Whatever happened to Flutterstay seemed to have affected the memories of other ponies, including Lu… I mean, Phoenix. I gotta stop getting the two confused seriously.

“So, you got a water talisman to swap it with already?” Homage asked.

I looked at Phoenix and he looked back at me. “Uh…” He said and I smiled. “Fear not, I have one gently used water talisman certified to be free from defects by the Draconequus money back guarantee!” I wiggled my nose and one popped out in the air above me and floated there. The gem gave off a cool glow.

“Well that looks in order.” Homage said, looking at the gemstone closely floating in the air. “Well come with me and we can get it changed out. The primary water talisman is on the roof next to the rainwater collection system.” She said starting to trot back up the stairs. “On the roof? I figured it would be in the basement.” I said following her.

“It used to be until the ghoul incident so the back up water processing system up on the roof became the primary system. The old primary system got damaged by a group of talon company griffons who cleared out more feral ghouls who took up shop down there a few years ago.” She explained as she opened the door to the studio and led us through the equipment-filled room to a set of stairs leading up to a sign that read “Roof Access.”

“Sounds like you need a certain Toaster Repair Filly to come and service the system. Among others.” I said with a lewd grin. Homage took this in stride. “I already asked if she can’t do anything about the water system. The other task, well I will be visiting her in a few days for a little us time.” She said with a wink as she opened the door to the roof. The cool morning sun shone down upon the roof as a flight of strange mutated birds were startled by the sudden opening of the door, they took flight off the edge of the building and as I turned my attention back to Homage I noticed a pair of red eyes looking at me from the corner of the roof.

There was a lot of different kinds of equipment including the massive antenna array of the Equestrian Broadcast System. On the far side of the roof sat a massive water tower and what looked like pumping machinery going into another stone stairway entrance on the other side of the roof. “This used to be another access way down to the main lobby but the stairs collapsed about a hundred years ago, so I had the bright idea to use it as a rainwater collection and distribution system. It happens to be on the same side of the water mains pipe up to all the floors so it was a good place to seal off and turn into a secure storage for the water talisman.” Homage said pulling out a bobby pin and a screwdriver. “Now for a little breaking and entering.” She smirked as she went to insert the bobby pin in the lock and I just wiggled my nose making the whole thing unlatch and drop to the ground with the door springing inwards.

She looked at it in shock for a second then looked back at me and Phoenix. “What?” I asked with a smile as she closed her mouth and shrugged putting the bobby pin and screwdriver back in her hair. I walked on into the room which went down a flight of stairs pipes on either side of me making it a tight fit. I saw several valves and a tank with the water talisman glowing gently in the center of the clear housing for the tank.

“Close these valves and open the one at the bottom right side of the tank to drain it.” Homage said as she started turning a valve with her magic. Between the three of us we had the valves closed and the water drained low enough to get at the water talisman. I shifted form and gently grabbed the water talisman off of its sustainment bracket, twisting it counter clockwise and then twisted the new one clockwise. The new talisman glowed brightly. We reopened the valves and the water system flowed freely again.

“So not to be like a downer or anything.” Homage said as she closed the door behind us and I made the lock reappear. “What makes that particular Talisman special? Why couldn’t you use the one that you had with you?” She asked as she turned back toward me as my Pipbuck dinged.

QUEST UPDATED

Obtain Byte COMPLETE
Get him to work with you COMPLETE
Go to Tenpony Tower in the Wasteland COMPLETE
Obtain the water talisman gemstone. COMPLETE
- (Optional) Replace Talisman with a new/used Talisman COMPLETE
Go to Shattered Hoof Ridge and use the Gemstone on the Black Wall.

I raised my Pipbuck. “Cause this thing told me to?” I said with a smile. She looked at the screen. “Oh, yeah. I could never wrap my head around these quest log things. Like how does it know? Ya, know?” She asked, smirking. Just then we heard the clops of something climbing over the edge of the roof and we looked to see Byte pulling himself up the sides of the building.

I looked at him, my mouth agape and he looked back at me, “What?” His monotone robotic voice replied. “I got lonely.”

Chapter Five

42

Chapter Five

"404 page not found."

Equestrian Wasteland
Manehattan, Equestria
21 Years after the battle of Hoofington

I stared at the robot. "You were lonely?"
"Yeah, so?" He asked as if this was obvious. I shook my head and laughed. "Looks like we're rubbing off on you, you bag of bolts."
"I have admitted enough for one day." He said.
"Anyways…" I said sharing the data from my Pipbuck with him.
"Shattered Hoof ridge is pretty far from here, and goes through raider territory." He stated.
"Yes. I think some teleport magic is indeed called for in this." I replied waving a claw.
"Homage, it's been interesting. We must do this again soon." I said looking at her.
She raised an eyebrow with a smirk. "Yeah, this was interesting."
I grabbed both of my companions around their necks and waved another hand and snapped.

***

Equestrian Wasteland
Shattered Hoof Ridge, Equestria
21 Years after the battle of Hoofington

We appeared in the middle of a desert area with a ridge of cliffs around us. There were shattered hulks of tanks and still some sun bleached skeletons out here. I'm looking around and I'm not seeing any black walls.
"Any ideas guys?" Phoenix asked, looking around too and examining the cliff sides in front of us. "Not yet." I say trotting around to the opposite side of a tank and seeing the burned in shadows on the hulls of the broken tanks of what looked like ponies shadows had been left without their pony and only bones littered around the ground. I looked at the bones then shifted my gaze around the area.
Dirt, grass, broken war tanks, bones, and hello what's this? I started walking toward the cliff face and a bunch of frames of tents and behind the bones of the tents was a boarded up mine entrance.
"Equestrian Coal Mine #5" read a sign next to the entrance. I turned back and called for Byte and Phoenix. As they got closer I asked, "What if we're supposed to be looking for a literal wall of black. Like a coal mine?" I asked, turning back to the boarded up entrance.
"That is logical." Byte replied analyzing the coal mine entrance, then a little panel opened on his right side and three tiny mechanical parasprites buzzed their wings and took off toward a broken plank in the door. The panel closed as the little bots disappeared into the tunnel.
I looked at him raising an eyebrow. "Mechasprites?"
He nodded.
"They are great for recon. Limited distance though, we might want to follow them."
I snap my claw and the wood melts like ice cream on a hot day, the melted wood lay on the ground as we walked over it entering the mine entrance.
The mine entrance was dark and Phoenix illuminated his horn lighting the way ahead of us. Byte's eyes observed the rock around us. "Judging by the geological analysis so far it seems this mine still has plenty of coal left in here. I wonder why they abandoned it?" He said his monotone sounded thoughtful.
"That doesn't make sense if it had plenty of coal in it still they wouldn't abandon a rich resource like that, it was critical to Equestria during the war." Phoenix replied.
A little more ways in I spotted a gray carving in the stone and chaos pulled at me. "Probably because OIA had a nefarious use for it." I said pointing to the 6 interconnected symbols of the ministries cutie marks set against Luna's moon.

The OIA, Office for Interministey Affairs, was an office setup by one Golden Blood during the prewar Equestria. They were responsible for all the projects pretty much. Pulling the strings behind the scenes. The wall ahead of us was black, made of obsidian. I tapped it with my paw. "I'd say this was a black wall wouldn't you?" I asked, looking at it.
They both nodded and pulled the Water talisman out of a subspace pocket and tapped it to the wall. The wall shrank back from the gemstone and admitted us into a Stable-tech hallway. "Well this isn't ominous at all." I said and the lighting in the hallway flickered to life as somewhere deeper in the facility rumbled to life the magical power generation system.
We carefully made our way down the corridor until we reached a Stable door with the seal of the ministry of peace on it. Above the door it said Project Steelpony. "Ugh why does my life have to revovle around the same things as Momma?"
"Because you are Blackjack's daughter." Byte said going over to the control panel and looking it over and presented his leg and a Pipbuck interface cable popped out and inserted itself into the console. A few beeps later and the door ground and shrieked as it opened and rolled to the left.
"The password was: Cheesewhiz." Byte said in an amused fashion as he retracted the cable back into his leg. "Cheesewhiz?" I asked raising an eyebrow. “Cheesewhiz.” Byte confirmed.
“What a word for a password. “ Phoenix said dryly, floating out a pair of machine guns. “I’ll take point.” He said walking ahead of us. I look over to Byte and we both shrug at one another and walk behind the alicorn bat-pony.

***

We finally made it into the main room of the place. As we looked around we saw different research labs, storage, and production. “Everything the wasteland needs to get their cyberpony production up and running we should definitely tell the Colleaget about this place.” Phoenix said walking up to a Poniqune with cyber parts on it.
“Why would Flutterstay want us to come here?” Byte asked, looking around himself and starting to collect tech samples.
“I’m not too sure. Maybe this is the place he was when he woke up in the Wasteland. We never really talked about it.” I said poking a cyber eye display the eyeball rolling to the floor making a glass breaking sound but didn’t look any worse for wear.
“Well whatever it is, maybe there is a Pipbuck tag you can follow to whatever it is he wanted us to find?” Phoenix asks, looking around still and pushing a button and a door opens, he jumps back as a broom falls out at him with a pony skeleton.
I see the male enhancement cyberpony parts and go to open my mouth to make a joke and Phoenix bonks me on the head with a baseball bat that reads, “Horny Bat.”
“OW HEY!” I protest rubbing my head.
“No horny.” He says simply making the bat vanish back into his saddlebag.
“Fine, fine, no potty humor.” I said toggling my Pipbuck Eyes Forward Sparkle. I see the navigation tag in the storage area. “This way.” I say trotting into the open door.

The doorway led into an unfinished area where piles of boxes lay around labeled with different cyberized parts. We trot through the warehouse to another hallway labeled, “COLD STORAGE” we enter, “This is where the tag ends.” I say and push the button the door doesn’t open. “Hmmm.” I turn to Byte, “Hey Byte, can you open this jar of pickles for me?” He steps up and pulls the panel off and begins playing with wires. After a few moments the door slides up into the ceiling. A standard Stable-tech retracting door. I turn on my Pipbuck lamp and illuminate the room. Inside there were tubes. Each one says “PROJECT ICICLE” with a number on each panel several of them were in operation. “So this isn’t creepy at all. Stasis pods?” Phoenix looked at one and a mummified frozen pony was inside. “OH SHIT!” He jerks back from the surprise of a mummy. “Careful Phoenix. Don’t piss yourself.” Byte says in monotone going to a terminal in the room and plugging into the system. He then begins to recite data.
“Project Icicle, Stasis Pod prototype research. Head researcher True Blood. 5 active cryopods, 1 surviving test subject.” He paused, then looked at the cryopod in question, “One of these was recently activated, 195 years ago.” He said looking at the pod.
“If it's a frozen jerky pony I’m going to be pissed.” Phoenix says as he goes over to the pod and wipes away the frost on the window. “Uh… you should really see this.” He says, blinking in surprise.
“Oh?” I ask trotting up to the window. “What is…it?” I trail off looking into the pod. What I see is a cyberized Anthropomorphic wolf. Her eyes were closed and the vitals on the cryopod screen indicated cyberparts are functioning perfectly.
“How in the hell did a cyberwoflie make it here?” I ask the boys.
“No idea.” Phoenix said as he looked over the terminal and pressed a button.
“Let’s ask.” He says.
At this point I just blinked at him. “Uh, Phoenix do you really think it's a good idea to unfreeze random strangers?” I ask as the process begins.
He shrugged and readied his pistol machine guns.
The tube cracked open.

Author's Note

Short chapter today, Chapters will update ever Thursday until completion from now on. It has been a busy few days and I haven't been able to write as much as I want. Work gets in the way, life gets in the way.

Chapter Six

42

Chapter Six

"Too much of a good thing "

Equestrian Wasteland
Shattered Hoof Ridge, Equestria
21 Years after the battle of Hoofington

The pod cracked open and retracted upwards as cold air rolls out of the it. The scent of a freezer filled the room and the CyberWolfie inside the pod didn't stir.
After a couple dozen heartbeats I approach the tube. "You think she's freezer burned?" I asked the boys getting close up to the creature and poking it with a clawed finger.
"Maybe." Phoenix said simply letting his SMGs drop a bit as I examine the body. "Hey Byte how about some sensor data from this?" I say to him as he takes a few steps forward and a little sensor pod appears out of the center of his domed head wiggling back and forth scanning the creature in the tube.
"All vitals are steadily increasing. Estimated twenty minutes until the subject is able to be woken." The little sensor retracts and he turns to me.
"Suggestion: gather supplies. I will monitor the subject until it wakes." Byte said.
I looked back to the wolf then back to him.
"No experimentation. Just data collection and medical intervention." I say firmly.
Byte nods. "I will comply."
Phoenix raised an eyebrow at this. "You want to trust the bucket of bolts to this task?" His Trottingham accented voice said in its deep rich tone.
I smiled at Phoenix, "He is just as curious as we are about this. I trust his curiosity."
Byte drones, "The subject is fascinating, I would like the opportunity to study it further without damaging it. The dissection of this subject albeit fascinating as a thought exercise would go against the goal of getting out of this universe and to a new one. My curiosity must be tempered so I can achieve the goal of being rid of messy higher powers."
Phoenix replied dryly, "Right." He extended his I sound as he said that.
"So let's go shopping. Phoenix you got room in your bag for some samples we can take to the colleagete so they can assess the usefulness of 2 century old mass production cyber parts?" I ask.
He nodded. We left Byte to observe the CyberWolfie and began wandering the premisis scavving for useful stuff.

We spent the next 20 minutes collecting all sorts of parts and samples. A lot of it was familiar from Momma and Sweetie. Though we did manage to find some useful things like a few mouthgun weapons a whole stock of magical energy weapon components and the most shocking thing I found.
Flutterstay's workspace.
You see, before the war Flutterstay was a scientist for the OIA. He worked under True Blood as a cybernetics researcher. He unfortunately got some Flux contamination and had to have parts of his body amputated and replaced with preproduction run mark 3 cyberparts. The kind Momma had were the official mark 4 run of parts in her cyberized body.
I actually found photos of him and his coworkers here at the facility. It was strange it was like he was a different person. In many of the pictures I found of him and his coworkers he wasn't smiling in any of them. It wasn't until after seeing some photos of him after his cyberization did I finally see pictures of him cracking a smile. But, getting back to his workspace.
The lab wasn't very big but in the room was all sorts of cyber parts and facilities to implant. A cyberization booth sat in the middle of the room with what looked to be some prototype parts for the cyber Wolfie. I put some of those in a subspace pocket for later. I tried to turn on his terminal but it wouldn't power on. Knowing him it needed to interface with him directly to even be able to boot. I did find notes scribbled in his neat magical writing in the journal of sorts of his progress notes. They were so highly detailed my eyes spun in my sockets as I tried to make sense of the math and jargon but it was all too much for me.
Don't get me wrong. I can warp time and space with the best of them, knowing how that math works is kind of a savant chaotic ability. But these notes were very straight forward and relied on a different kind of engineering than I was used to. I worked with the fabric of reality and it's maths. Sweetie used mortal maths.
I don't even know why I'm explaining things to you on this level. It's more blah blah you really can't comprehend if I tired to explain it to you. I mean some of you could, but that's for another time. Why don't we go back and see how Byte is doing.

I walk back into the cryopod area and see the lights were on and the CyberWolfie was stirring in the pod. As I entered her eyes opened and a string of unintelligible computer jargon came out of her mouth then she looked at me. Her ice blue glowing eyes locked on to mine.
"Mistress Boo. It has been over 195 years since F12 put me in the stasis pod. Can you please verify your identity?"
I blinked, "uh. You seem to know who I am already. Why do I need to verify it… uh, what's your name?"
"I am Trisha. F12 saved me on an adventure from the place you call the Floating Vagabond. I was injured on a mission and he did what he could." She explained.
Of course, a FV adventure. This poor creature was injured in some fashion and Sweetie felt like he needed to save her.
"How badly were you injured Trisha?" I ask pulling a stool out of subspace to sit on.
"Records indicated that I had some severe brain damage and loss of most of my organic systems. F12 loaded personality data from what was left of my organic mind to try and save me. It was a partial success."
"F12 was Flutterstay's researcher number here." Byte supplied as he checked over Trisha's condition.
"I gathered as much." I replied looking back to Trisha.
"Trisha, when Flutterstay put you away in the cryopod was there a reason for it?" I asked.
She nodded once Byte finished examining her head.
"Yes. F12 was in trouble. He recorded a message for you but I am afraid that my memory file has been damaged by the cold." Trisha replied.
"Sounds like someone had freezer burn." Byte said evenly.
"Hahaha. That was a good joke." Trisha said her flat feminine sounding monotone voice replied.
Byte jerked his head back surprised.
"Thank you. One appreciates when their jokes are laughed at."
I smiled. "Trisha can you tell me what you can from the memory?" I asked.
"I can show you." She said raising an arm and letting a holo image display a broken holo file. It was Flutterstay and he looked pale and sections of him were missing. The static buzzed as he was speaking letting things trail off into unintelligible static.
"They were… blanks… so many of them. He was just trying with me as the dra… started to suck us both of our organic matter. I did what I could Trisha. I'm sorry I couldn't restore your personality fully. Those damn things. That evil son… bitch. Trying to erase us both from the universe. If Boo were here should could have stopped him I know it." He looked to the right his mismatched eyes seemed to be messing with his arm with a screwdriver and he flexed his left hand a completely robotic left hand that wasn't normal for him. A field repair.
"Trisha I know what they are doing to me know. What that damn Dis… he's trying to erase all Draconequus it's like Byte 2.0 if he had ch… I think Boo will care enough. I hope… I know she will care enough to find out. She needs to. The fate of our universe hangs in the balance. I brought you back in time here Trisha to help you and fix you. I also was able to fabricate some chaos enhanced parts for you. You have all the defensive talisman, runes, and all I could find at Canterlot castle's library on Draconequus defenses. But I know what you are going to be more useful with. Helping find my scattered…" the video winks out.
"File terminated. I will try to reconstruct the file over time. There is still minutes left in it." Trisha explained lowering her arm.
"So another threat that can disintegrate a Draconequus has arrived to play games. I might have been interested in a team up with it had I not a better offer from you." Byte said.
I looked at him warily.
"Please do what you can with the file Trisha." I said. She nodded as I heard shots rang out from back in the atrium. The roars of submachine gun fire answered the sounds of rifles and pistols firing.
"Oh what fresh hell is this?" I asked walking back down the corridor. A bullet whizzes and I catch it in my teeth.
"Well now." I say spitting the projectile to the ground as I now rush to the atrium area where all the displays were. Phoenix was on the inside of the door that led to the storage area. He popped his SMGs around the corner and blew through a spray of fire in seconds, then pulled the tube back letting them cool for a moment as the assaulting party gave their rebuttal with bullets. He ejected his mags and slapped fresh ones in with his wings. I slide to the opposite side of the door way and extend my claw out snapping causing a ponyquin with cybernetic legs display to explode in shrapnel. It didn't hurt any of them I know but it made them think for a second as Byte ran down the passage I saw him take a bullet to the chest, he staggered then got up and caught one in the head between the eyes.
My heart stopped.
"No." I whispered.
"Damn it!" Phoenix swore as he saw Byte was down.
I was shocked that a single bullet to his armored head took him down. Sparks issued from the home in his head and his eyes blinked out.

"No, no, no, no." I yelled. Then I did something stupid. I charged into the room where the fire was coming from my eyes glowing red as a furnace and I took in the room.
I selected each one of the 9 bandits in the room then with a double snap they all suddenly feel limp. Not just fell limp. I removed their bones. Each one of them was a mass of pony flesh, with no bones to hold them together they all crumpled on the floor. They weren't dead. Oh, not yet I had a special plan for these goats.

I walked up to the them letting my eyes glow angrily as a I presented my claw to the eyes of one who had the misfortune of still being able to see.

"Let's see how you like feeling a bullet enter your head shall we?" I asked in a demonic tone.
Something in the back of my head made me stop as fire erupted from the back of my skull. I bent over and roared in pain. Then I blacked out.

Chapter Seven

42

Chapter Seven

"Come on lucky 7!"

“Wake up little clone.” I hear a voice say. I opened my eyes and with blurry vision look around me and see, me. “Well look who is awake.” Prime Boo smiled down at me without mirth. She raised an eyebrow, “Someone was being naughty.” She said simply her pony face frowned as I sat up slowly feeling like my head was plugged into a light socket.
“What happened?” I asked wincing at sound of my own voice.
“You saved your friends.” She replied.
“Boo, are you alright?” Phoenix asked, standing behind Prime Boo.
“Yes.”
“Yes.”
We both say at the same time.

“So what are you doing here?” I asked Prime Boo, who turned to the deskeletoned ponies and began wiggling her nose at them sending them away.
“I got your distress signal and came as fast as I could. Can’t a mare be worried about herself?” She asked as she banished the last one away.
My mane went itchy at that, “I didn’t send out a distress signal.” I stated frowning.
She looked at me in exasperation, “Of course you did!” She stopped seeing Byte in the corridor on the ground his head still letting off a spark every now and then. “Well looks like you got the pony you were looking for then huh?” She trotted up and kicked him in the head with a front hoof.
“Finally got what you deserved eh you tin can?” She taunted the unmoving mound of robot.
I immediately felt sad at that, then rage at her.
“He was trying to save Flutterstay with me.” I growled at her. Where was this anger coming from? I asked myself.
“Oh,” she looked surprised. “Mortal enemy big bad robocat Byte wanted to save him?” She asked then looked at him again. “I don’t buy it 42, I think your broken. Maybe I should reasorb you and your memories and see what was really happening. Then decide if I’ll even go after Flutterstay. Assuming he can be saved or whatever.” She said flipping her left hoof to and fro mockingly.
I could feel the anger in me starting to boil again.
“On second thought, I’ll just absorb you then go and do some real Chaos. Change some roads to soap, mess with a few minds. Maybe, even go to the Vagabond and mess with Kaleb a little bit.” She said.
“No.” I said simply letting my anger build.
“No?” She asked raising an eyebrow and trotting toward me.
“What gives you the right to tell me now clone?” She asked dangerously.
“You did.” I said narrowing my eyes.
She looked back to me for a moment let out an annoyed breath and turned back to Byte. “So you need this pile of junk?” She changed the subject trotting back over to him.
“Yes, whatever plan Darling has to come back involves him. We…” I started explaining and she yawned at it.
“Boring!” She said simply, “You’re boring me. Why don’t you give up on him? Let him be?” She asked as she started floating in the air turning to me. “After all, Flutterstay wasn’t a good match for us, he wasn’t imaginative enough to be a Draconequus. I don’t honestly know what I was thinking turning a scientist into one.” She said flippantly. This caused my anger to boil over.
“Because we love him you idiot!” I snarled at her shifting form to my Draconequus body. She looked bored at that.
“Is that supposed to scare me 42?” She asked as I took a step toward her. She didn’t budge and I walked toward her. “No, this is.” I said taking a deep breath and focusing all my energy on Byte and pictured what I was going to do perfectly in my head. Then I snapped my claw.
A bright light filled the room as Byte’s body was engulfed in the light.
Everyone else in the room covered their eyes as the bright flash burned hot. The other Boo being so close to Byte when I snapped yelled out in surprise and popped out.
I continued to pour my attention into Byte as I maintained the spell. Cyberpony parts starting flying into the room from boxes and into the light.
Once the light faded I fell to the ground gasping for breath and as I braced my arms against the ground I noticed I was see through.
“That’s not good.” I moaned as I laid on the ground and looked up.
There standing in front of me was a flesh and blood cyberpony. He was a unicorn with dark almost charcoal blue fur. He opened his eyes and took a deep breath looking around. The green eyes slid over the room and looked at me.
"What happened?" He asked confused.
"Uh, Boo turned you in to flesh and blood pony?" Phoenix said looking Byte over.
Byte's green eyes popped wide as he examined àhimself. "I… what in Tartarus?!" He asked me, then took in my condition.
"What happened to you?" He asked.
I smiled, "I meant to fix you… looks like I went a bit too far and expended a lot of power. Also, Prime Boo made an entrance and I had to push her away."
He looked at me his jaw dropping open. "I didn't have any flesh left Boo. Where did you get the raw materials to make this body?"
Trisha walked into the room and answered the question. "The bodies that were in the cryopods are missing, I reason she got the raw materials from the bodies." She approached me leaning down and putting a hand on me.
"You have used a lot of your energy. You need rest." She said,
"Not sure this is a safe place to do so." Phoenix said, going over to Byte's side.
"You okay?"
Byte looked at Phoenix and tested his body by trotting around in a circle and doing some stretches.
"It appears this body is perfectly functional." He said, analyzing himself.
"Rest sounds good." I say as Trisha picked me up.
"Why don't you let me take her?" Phoenix asked as he trotted over to offer his back.
"That would be advisable due to her low power State you would not be able to interact with her physically. 42 has entered a Draconequus life-saving mode. Right now nothing can touch her in this physical world that is not imbued with some form of chaos energy. It is to protect her life essence." Trisha explained.
Phoenix looked at me, "I didn't know you had that."
I blinked, "yeah kinda a last resort measure. Keeps us safe until we recharge."
He raised an eyebrow in thought, "Huh, weird." He then tried to boop my snoot and it went right into my head.
"Hey it kind of tickles." Phoenix said with a chuckle.
"Can you please get your hoof out of my brain?" I asked politely with a bit of annoyance.
"Whoops sorry." Phoenix said withdrawing his hoof but then he looked closely at my head.
I started looking self-consciously at him, "what do I have a booger hanging out of my nose?"
"No but there's something weird on the back of your head that looks like a black square?" Phoenix said, examining my head closely.

"Affirmative it appears to be some kind of chip like a computer chip." Trisha said, examining the back of my head.

"There is writing on the chip it says number 42 MMOD." She said examining the chip.
Alarm bells went off in my mind. "Yeah when I was about to fry those ponies I felt something like a searing pain from the back of my head. I think it might be where it came from. Can you get it out?" I asked, trying to stay calm.

Trisha examined it closely and shook her head, "Negative. I am not a surgeon. We would need the proper healing ponies to take care of this. With you in low power mode I cannot even interact with it other than observe it visually. But from what I can tell it is directly wired into your brain."
This thought unsettled me that I had a computer chip on the back of my brain that I didn't know about. This isn't normal for clones to have that.

What exactly did Prime Boo do to me? Why do I get the idea that this is not going to be good?
"As fascinating as this all is," Byte began and then continued, "we really should find a safe place to hold up any ideas of anything close by?"
I screwed up my face in thought, “Nothing I can think of. Things around here are mostly Raider hideaways. Do you think we can just close the stable entrance here?”

Byte blinked rapidly. “Perhaps.”
He then looked thoughtful, “I… I will look into sealing the stable door. I need some time to… process this.” He looked down at his cyberhooves then back at me. With that he walked away toward the stable door.

I looked to Phoenix, "Why don't you see about getting more supplies?"
He nodded and I slumpped down exhaling.
"I'm so tired now." I said to Trisha who just petted my mane.
"Then you should rest 42." Her monotone femme voice said.
"Maybe." I said closing my eyes and started to drift off when the laughing began.
I opened my eyes and looked around. "I know that laugh." I said with a smile.
"Of course you do, my dear little chaos child." The voice said as a head popped through a wall wearing a big red head. "Hey kids wanna see a dead body?" Discord said smirking.

"Very nice Alucard. Though I think Fluttershy would be more appropriate for that role Papa." I said with a giggle.
He finished phasing through the wall and threw the hat off with a flourish. He took me in with his mismatched sized pupils and a look of surprise on his face.

"Only one of you Boos across the universe calls me Papa you know." He said thoughtfully.
I blinked, "Sorry Dad, it felt right." I shrugged still laying down in my pony form.
"No, my child, it is quite alright." He said dismissively as he examined me closely. "Looks like you could use a pick me up." He said and shook his right arm into a nozzle. He shoved it into my mouth like Applejack shoving her hoof into Rainbow Dash's mouth and I could feel chaos energy flow down my throat as his eyes started counting up bits.
After a few moments he pulled the nozzle out of my mouth spraying me with the fuild and I wiped my face with a leg.
"Gross." I noticed my body was now solid.
"Now tell me what are you doing down here?" He asked, shaking his arm back to normal.

I began to tell him the story so far. As Kansas's Carry on my wayward son started playing.

Chapter Eight

42

Chapter Eight

“That is a sticky situation.”

BYTE

I looked over the control panel of the stable door. I raised my right… hoof. To the control panel and commanded the link cable to come out. Fingers popped out instead. I looked at the appendages and gave them a wiggle. “This is so odd.” I said to no one. I commanded them to retract and they did. I put my hoof back on the ground and screwed up my eyes to my horn and tried to remember how to get magic to work.
My horn sputtered and crimson light flickered and then went out. “Hmm, maybe something more basic like levitation?” I ask myself then look at a pencil on the ground and focus my horn on it. I imagine it being gripped, trying to pick it up. My horn sputtered and a solid glow of crimson magic enveloped the writing instrument and I lifted it into the air. During this whole process I hadn’t realized I was holding my breath until a little O2 gauge popped up in my vision with a percentage remaining. I let my breath out and the gauge started to refill quickly as the pencil clattered to the ground.

“Damn it.” I swore as I caught my breath. So I am out of practice with magic. That’s to be expected I guess. I then turned my attention to the control panel and looked it over and pushed a few buttons. The warning lights came to life and the door rolled back into place being pushed by a pneumatic piston until the locking assembly pushed in to the back of the and pushed it into place making horrible screeching sounds as it whirred and locked the bolts of the cog shaped door in to place.

“Nopony is getting in here.” I say with a nod and turned back toward the door way another door caught my eye. “STORAGE” it said. I walked to it and it refused to open. I pressed the button on the wall with a hoof and it clicked and the servo refused to engage to lift the door.

"Odd." I say and then examine the door I notice the hydraulic line was crimped. I looked to my hoof and popped my fingers out and carefully unkinked the line. I then pressed the button again and after a moment the door ground as it raised in to the ceiling.

"That's better. Now what were you hiding in here?" I asked the space as I looked around. It was definitely a storage room. Only it wasn't quite just a storage room I could see boxes labeled different things that a stable might use and then on the other wall a pressure door not like a hydraulic door like the stable door I just opened. No this one was a straight-up pressure door I walked up to it and I pulled on the lever that opened the door. With a creek the door open swinging inwardly away from me. On the wall opposite me were three signs. An arrow pointing to the left side reactor, the sign in the middle pointing to the right said offices, and the final one said security office.

Definitely not just storage I thought. I proceeded towards the security offices. It was a pretty long walk it must have taken me a couple minutes to walk down that way okay it did take me a couple minutes I have a chronometer on my heads up display. I finally arrived at another pressure door. This is odd I thought why would these areas need to be pressurized?
I then tried pulling the handle to the security office it would not budge. I looked around at the door and noticed a little sign that said pressurized when this knob is out it was just a little bump with a circle. I took a finger and poked the bump it did not retract it gave tension as I tried to push on it.

"Okay why would a security office need to be pressurized?" I asked myself. The most logical answer I thought was a fire suppression system. Maybe halon gas. I checked around the wall looking for some way to release the pressure in the room. I didn't find anything on this side of the wall so whatever pressurized in the security office could probably only be unpressurized on the other side. I made my way back towards the reactor rooms.

I encountered the same problem at the reactor room doors. "Well that's odd." I said out loud to myself. Well let's try the offices I thought to myself and name my way towards the office door. This was also a pressure door but the pressure indicator was not popped out and this time I was able to pull the handle and open the door. As I walked inside I saw a movement and then Phoenix's head popped up over a desk.
"Where did you come from?" He asked his trottingham accent asking in surprise. I looked back at the door, looked into the hallway then looked back at him as I trotted in and I pushed the door slightly closed. The backside of the door was disguised as just a normal part of the wall.
"Apparently I came through a secret door. No idea why they needed that. Have you seen the security office or the reactor level yet?" I asked him.
Phoenix nodded his head as he pulled his hoof out of the desk drawing with it a can of cram. "Yeah I tried getting into the security office but it wouldn't open. It was locked with the terminal and I don't have the best skills with terminals."

"It seems like that would be a job for me then. Which way to the security office?" I asked the bat Pony alicorn. He pointed his hoof back out the doorway he had come through, "go out that door make a right head all the way down the hallway you'll come across one of them big stable tech doors in front of it is a security terminal good luck with it though." He explained to me.

"You didn't lock out the terminal did you?" I asked him giving him a pointed stare. Phoenix shook his head left and right indicating a negative. I nodded my thanks and walked out the door followed in the direction he said and came up to a terminal and I could see why the security door was closed tight and there was another one of those little pressured icons on the door.

"Time to give up your secrets to me." I said as I opened up the terminal and began hacking into it manually. It took me three tries but I finally got the password and of course it would be something so silly "bubblegum."

The terminal screen presented me with four options:

RELEASE SECURITY OFFICE LOCK
UNPRESSURIZED FIRE SUPPRESSION
OPEN DOOR
LOG OFF

I typed the number two and pressed enter. A hissing can be heard from inside the door and the little notch dropped him back into the door. The terminal screen changed; the second option was now pressurized with fire suppression. That's so odd I thought. I pressed one and then pressed enter and then pressed three and enter and then I folded the keyboard back up. When the door opened the first thing I noticed was the smell of carbon. So apparently there was a fire in there at some point. As I entered the office I noticed a dozen bodies on the ground, well charred skeletons really. Each one of them had a firearm and one of them had a flamer. Looks like the old weapons in there had been cooked. And the flavor was definitely out of fuel why would a dozen security ponies be in here and decide to cook themselves alive?
I looked around the room for anything that could have survived the blaze unfortunately everything in the room was torched including the security terminals.
Phoenix popped his head inside the door, "well looks like things got toasty in here." He said stating the obvious.

"Yeah I don't think we're getting any answers out of this room as to what happened or why." I said as I trotted it back out of the room.

"Definitely not and it doesn't seem to be anything else of value anywhere else I could find." Phoenix said sounding disappointed. He found a couple of pistols some ammo a couple of snacks pre-war of course. But nothing of interest at least to me.

"So," he began letting his so trail off.

"What?" I asked him.

Phoenix looked me up and down, "how are you dealing with the change? I was thinking we could just get you repaired but I guess Boo had other ideas." He asked me there was actually some concern to his voice.

"I am all right. Just a day ago I was a cat, this is a marked improvement from a cat halfway between fully organic and robotic, a change like this I can deal with after all I was a cyberpony before I went full robot."
Phoenix nodded, seeming to accept my answer.
What was I doing conversing with him there's no point to it. It's not like I was trying to make friends with him, he was just a means to an end just like the Draconequus. But yet… something about him made me feel like I could trust him to a certain extent. Perhaps I needed to get in the habit of trusting merely fleshy bodies again. After all I do recall boo saying something about she would have to change me.
"It honestly doesn't matter what form I am." I said finally.
"This is not as quite as easy to work with. But I will make do with it after all it is nice to be able to breathe again and to taste and see things without the color red obscuring everything." The bat Pony alicorn seem to accept this.
"Well then let's get back to Boo and see what our next step is."
Phoenix started trotting down the corridor and I followed.

Chapter Nine

42

Chapter Nine

“DUCK SEASON FIRE!”

Equestrian Wasteland
Shattered Hoof Ridge, Equestria
21 Years after the battle of Hoofington
Ministry of Peace Secret Project Steelpony Stable
42’s perspective

“And that’s how Equestria was made!” I finish with a flourish. I bow to Discord and smile. He claps then looks baffled for a moment and asks, “WHAT?”
I smiled back at him at my random joke to end my story. “What?” I say innocently.
He looks at me for a few more moments then raises his ears, “Well it seems like your friends are coming back so I must be going.” He then unzips himself and disappears in a flourish of bright light.

I still felt very tired at my core even with the recharge of chaos energy. I laid my head down. “Welcome back boys, any good finds?” I asked as they trotted in.
Byte looked at me, “Not really just your usual fare of Wasteland goodies.” He said floating a bunch of stuff out of his bag in the air in front of me in his green magic. Odds and ends a pistol and some ammo. “Not too bad of a haul for a small place like this.” I said as he put it back in his bag. I gave a yawn.
“I think I need some rest.” I said my eyes half lidded. Phoenix gave a yawn as well. “I think thats a good idea it's still daylight outside might be safer to travel at night.” He said as he laid down on the ground next to me and Trisha. Byte looked at us both and nodded, “I will keep watch as you two get some rest.” He moved off his synthetic red eyes giving a slight glow as he walked away.
“Trisha will you keep an eye on us?” I asked as I began to drift off.
“Most assuredly.” She said then I was out.

My eyes opened to the most beautiful sight I have ever seen! Fields upon miles of ice cream and sweets of all kinds! With a squeal of joy I jump into a giant mound of chocolate and begin eating the delicious delights. After making a long trench of ice cream I stood up and laughed long and hard then I spot a lot sized piece of dark chocolate and start licking and munching on it.

The beautiful sky fizzles and darkens as a voice issues, dark, deep, and full of promises of utter terror.
"My isn't this a lovely sight?" I stop eating and stand up looking around my hooves slipping in the ice cream.
"What?" I asked smartly.

The voice chuckle darkly, "A being such as you and your power having a dream of eating delicious sugary sweets in a dream, I never would have guessed knowing what I know of you 42."

My mane began to get really itchy. "Who or what are you?" I asked as I continue to look around for the source of the voice. Then out of the corner of my eye I see a dark form coalesce with bright red eyes. It was a draconequus body tall and proud but the body was completely black as if no light could escape it except for those eyes.

"Such a dramatic entrance!" I say evenly. "So what do I call you?" I ask then that voice sent my main itching again, "oh dear 42 you don't get to know what my name is; suffice it to say even though I am a great fan of yours. I can't have you interfering like that husband of yours in this universe. I simply cannot let you revive him."

He stretched out his dark appendages and gave us loud slap of his paws. And all around me other Draconequus appeared pure white with red eyes each one of them held out their paws and then they started sucking out of me what felt like pure chaos like energy.I wiggled my nose flipped around and then started to run as I pushed one of them out of my way with a shield. As my shield collapsed into him it wrapped him up and turned into gum then stuck into the sticky ground of the ice cream.

I ran and ran and ran what felt like an eternity every time I slowed down one of those creatures popped up and started sucking the essence out of me. Just as I banked around the corner of a cinnamon stick sticking out of an ice cream something impacted my side and threw me off my hooves.
I screamed out and then woke up.

I yelled out and Trisha jerked back from me in surprise. "Fuck!" I yelled zipping away from her up to the ceiling and sticking my self there with my magic.
"Miss 42 are you okay?" The stunted robotic voice asked from Trisha.

The entire I continued to breathe hard as I was shocked awake. "I, uh, huh?" I looked around as Byte came sprinting into the room his eyes look to me and Phoenix sits up groggily and looks down at his leg. "Why does my stomach hurt and my front leg all wet?" He asks as he frowns.

"That was 42's doing, she began making joyous noises then her body scooted toward you and she began to swallow your leg like a snake, until she started to run in her sleep. She was able to land numerous blows on your stomach as she 'ran' in her dream before I could separate her from you." Trisha stated as I floated down to the ground my heart pounding in my chest.

Phoenix looked disgusted at this news and frowned at me. "Boo, will you please keep your mouth to yourself?". This causes me to blush a little. "Sorry Phoenix."

"How long were we out?" I ask shaking my head to clear away the rest of my tiredness. Trisha replied helpfully, "You slept for 6 hours, 56 minutes, and 44 seconds. Night fall will be in the next 35 minutes."

I looked to Byte, "Well I suppose it's time to get moving." He nodded and made his way back towards the door as Phoenix stretched getting to his hooves.
My Pipbuck beeps:

NEW OBJECTIVE ADDED:

GET PARTS FROM ROBRONCO FACILITY

"We have our heading. Looks like we're going to a Robronco Facility about 3 hours trot from here." I said to Phoenix and Trisha.

We met up with Byte in the entrance way. He opened the door we left and he closed it behind us. As we exited the coal mine we noticed that the sun had already set over the horizon. The night was somewhat clear with a bright half moon in the sky stars twinkled brightly. All in all it was a very beautiful sight. A cool wind blew in and we started to make our way to the Robronco facility.

Chapter Ten

42

Chapter Ten

"DEATH FROM ABOVE!"

Equestrian Wasteland
Brighton Hoof Highway, Equestria
21 Years after the battle of Hoofington

Boo's Perspective

The cool night air was only disturbed by the crunching of our hooves on the cracked sun worn asphalt. We made our way east toward the Robronco sattleilte facility. The only light out tonight was that of a sliver of the moon, hanging in the cloudy sky like crescent shaped sickle. We had our heads on a swivel looking for night time raiders, but we met nothing in the long hours trek. Byte finally broke the silence as he sucked on a ruby.
"Why the hell are these things so spicy?" He asked using his magic and putting the half melted ruby back into his saddle bag and pulling out a mint green emerald and popping it into his mouth sucking on it.
"Mmm, Mint!" He commented happily.

"No idea." Phoenix said tersely as he looked around us for trouble.
I smiled, "Something to do with dragons and not wanting to be bored with life giving gems they magically flavored all the gems in equestria to taste like different things." I said.
Byte's red eyes widened. "That would have been a powerful magical spell how did they pull that off?"
I snorted. "They didn't. I was jokin' Byte." I replied as the top of a building came over the horizon and the first thing I noticed were the lights.

He frowned, "Ah, I see. Something to do with Discord then."
"Uh, you boys see that?" I asked stopping and pointing at the light at the top of the building.
They both turned their eyes and ears toward the building's roof top over the horizon.
"Lights." Phoenix said simply.
"You think somepony is home?" I asked.
"One way to find out." Byte said as he started to trot toward the building.
We had made it about half way down the road when something pinged off the asphalt spitting rocks and dirt up at us. It took my brain a second to realize what just happened as Phoenix and Byte jumped behind old dilapidated Motorwagen on the road side.
"Is... somepony shooting at us?" I asked stupidly standing in the middle of the road a bit peeved.
Phoenix's magic reached out and yanked me to him as another ping followed by a crack is heard, from where I was standing.
"Boo do you want a hole in your head?!" Phoenix asked as he floated out a long rifle from his bag. Another ping followed by a crack and little chunks of rock pepper the two of us from the road way.
Byte blinked and then scurried into the busted out window of the motorwagon and I could hear him crawling around in there.
A bright light suddenly shines on the motorwagon casting is in shadows from the building. "Well this isn't a way to make friends." I said simply pushing a mini Boo out of my hoof. The little pegasus copy of me looks around meets my eyes and salutes as she flapped her tiny wings and took off toward the sky. A second later a shot was heard and the mini me exploded into a cloud of rainbow blood. I cover Phoenix with an umbrella out of nowhere with a wiggle of my earth pony nose. Just as quickly I dismiss the umbrella.
Phoenix observed, "Must be a pegasus, griffon, hippogriff, or thesteral to make that shot that quickly."
I looked over to him. "Are you saying unicorns and earth ponies don't have that good of shots?"
A reply to that was an explosion going off 100 feet to our right. "Well shit." I said simply looking around for a place to run for better cover. I banged the wagon, "Byte gotta move dear. They are lobbing missiles now."
The reply I got was a sudden explosion of a missile into the front of the motor wagon pushing the long dead machine into both of us and shoving us a good two feet back. I shook my head to clear the ringing in my ears as something hard dropped on my skull followed by the cyber unicorn. Strangely he didn't have a scratch on him. What lay on the ground was an old energy pistol that had seen better days but hummed to life as Byte levitated in his magic to him and checking it over.
"It's got two maybe 3 shots in it." He said with a smirk.
"Uh where did that come from?" I asked looking at the weapon.
"A skeleton in the wagon was a pegasus and had it strapped to their front leg. I detected a fain energy..."
BOOM
Another missile exploded against the wagon pushing it into my back.
"Less talking more fleeing!" Phoenix said darting back the way we had come. I shrugged at Byte and we made a tactical retreat.

Once we had gotten a sufficient distance away from the explosion. What's down in the middle of the road and I asked, "Anypony hurt?"
Both the boys shook their head in the negative. I looked back towards the way we came, "Well we are definitely going to need a new strategy. Any ideas?" I asked looking back to them.
They looked to each other than back at me and they both had a smile on their faces.
"I'm not going to like this am I?"

Chapter One

42

Chapter One
“Wacky? How wacky can it possibly be?”

Somewhere in the multiverse:

I suppose it all started one cool and surprisingly not rainy day in Hoofington. Momma was walking in the lead as P21 and Glory flanked her. Lacunae was walking, letting Scotch Tape ride on her back and Rampage was… well she was trying to get me to say curse words… any words really she was trying to get me to talk at all. Back then Discord was riding shotgun in my noodle and he was teaching me other things. So my body was just a body moving through the world wanting to be with its herd. But Discord was teaching me.
"And that's how Equestria was made." He said with a flourish.
I clapped my mental hooves and looked out the windows of my eyes and saw something that caught my attention. I smiled then ran up Blackjack and dug into her pack.
"Hey, Boo what the hell?" I heard her ask in confusion and my face retracted from her bag, a can of cram, a canteen, and a cyberpony cake in my mouth. I then ran away and went to a blue and green lump in the dirt. I approached the lump of pony and bright eyes rolled up at me.
I set the things down and nuzzled the can of Cram toward the pony. He, yes a he, looked at the can of Cram and quickly took a bite out of the whole can. He looked at me wearily and said, "Thank you, miss” in a broken voice. I smiled widely.

I guess it was at that moment I decided I liked the pony. Cause I nuzzled him before Momma came to me with a snack cake and my primitive mind said. "OH FOOD!"
But as Glory checked over the Pony he was beginning to fix himself with the can of Cram.
"I will be okay." The Blue unicorn said. "Thanks to your friend showing a little Kindness in this hell hole."
Glory smiled, "of course! I would go to the Fluttershy Medical center and get some of those gashes looked at though. I'd give you a healing potion but we hit some strong E fields yesterday and ruined most of them."
The pony took a deep breath and I missed the rest of what was said. But I did catch his name, "Flutterstay." And that stuck with me to this very day where his name was in my heart.

***

600 years later, then 800 years back, then 10 years forward again then a stint in a universe where the natural laws are out to lunch.

I snapped my eagle claw, and sent a burst of pure chaos at two guards, the guards flashed and turned into a bowl of petunias, and one very surprised looking whale. A snap of my lion claw and another pair of guards disappear in a flash of light. To this day I don't know where they ended up but that's neither here nor there. See what I did there! Hah!
A gun shot rang out and suddenly I had a hole in my head and both my eyes rolled up as I fell over.
"SNAP!"
Flutterstay snapped his claw in anger and the offending sniper exploded in a cloud of glitter and became a pinata.
"Come on honey, no laying down on the job." He said with a smirk.
"You're no fun love." I floated up in the air as a group of soldier humans wearing black uniforms with swastikas on their armbands looked terrified as my 'brain' came out of the hole in my head.
"I have such a headache." I said to them, smirking.
One of them actually pissed his pants.
Hahahaha!
They turned to run and then a human wearing jeans and a black tee shirt came from off screen and 'Falcon-Punched' all three of them. One guy's head actually let off the sound of a gunshot as his head spun around and looked at me in surprise, his lips moving in a silent statement.
"Yes sweetie. You backed the wrong side." I said sadly, as the body fell to the ground letting the fading life get one last view of the sky.
I want to say that I haven't killed anyone to this point. Even the ones I teleported away and I don't know where they are, I know they aren't dead. I don't do that with my magic. After all there is nothing more boring than a corpse. That's what Discord told me anyways and it is something I took to heart.
I dismissed the hole in my head resisting the urge to make a holy joke.
"Ah, you looked better with a hole in your head." Kaleb quipped as he punched another soldier who tried to rush him, knocking him out in one blow.
Hey, I said I didn't make the holy joke. I never said others didn't.
The ground shook violently as a gigantic black dragon landed near me, snatching up a SpaceNazi and crunching him down his gullet. Then the dragon burped holding his stomach and said, "Ugh these SpaceNazis are giving me an upset stomach!"
I smiled then snapped my lion paw and a 55 gallon drum of Pepto Bismol appeared next to him. He looked at the drum, read it and a smile spread across his gigantic lips as he picked up the barrel, sunk a fang into it and then downed the entire drum.
One more chalky smelling burp later and he said, "Thanks Boo, that helped."
I smiled up at him, "You're welcome Lucas."
Gun fire erupted from a window on the building and ricocheted off his scaly armored hide a few rounds zinging past Flutterstay, Kaleb, and me.
Then distinct clicks of an empty weapon and an annoyed Lucas looked into the window of the building and he took a shallow breath and blew a blowtorch like flame into the room.
I winced as Kaleb said, "The only good Nazi is a dead Nazi."
I snorted at that.
"Anyways… I think it's time we find out why they decided to attack us now." Flutterstay said as he snapped a claw and the front of the building dematerialized letting us walk into the skyscrapers lobby. Except for Lucas who swore and transformed himself into an anthropomorphic wolf. He burped again. "Ah, that's better." He said, rubbing his stomach.
I shook my head with a smile as I shifted to my earth pony form and we made our way into the lobby.

***

So you know those scenes in the movies where they just appear in front of the bad guy after entering an elevator? Yeah I know life isn't a movie after a really long and boring elevator ride up. Though that music was kinda catchy and familiar.
We finally made it to the office of the big bad. Yeah know all this action and imagine our surprise when we were greeted by a big lobby and a secretary sitting at a desk. Her name plate read Karen.
"Excuse me Karen." Flutterstay ever the diplomat started before Kaleb grabbed the woman from behind the desk and launched her toward the elevator.
"You better leave if you know what's good for you." He said. She got up and looked terrified and instead of running and opening the door to the stairs or pushing the button to the elevator she literally smacked into a wall and knocked herself out. Really! I can't make this shit up!
We all strode to the door then everything went white.

Confusion, blood, a gunshot.
Star metal.
Death…

***

I wake up, opening my eyes in my home. I look around and see me standing there looking annoyed.
"Oh good of you to join me. Are you fully aware yet?"
Who was I?
What was I?
Why was I?
Oh, yeah. I'm The Great and Powerful Boo, clone #42.
"Yes I'm aware." I replied with a smile.
"Excellent." The Boo in front of me, Prime Boo, looked tired, her Draconequus body sagged and there were dark circles under her eyes.
"Are you clear on everything up to this point?" She asked wearily.
I thought and with a sad epiphany nodded.
So A LOT has happened since the point above. Let's give you the cliff notes version to catch you up.
I'm Boo, Princess Draconequus, all powerful, clone #42. I'm… well, a lady doesn't tell you her age. Let's just say I'm old enough and don't look a day over 25 years old. No, for real immortality has its perks!
Let's see…
After I was sent back in time with Flutterstay and I fell in love, I made him a Draconequus, lots of shenanigans ensued. I got knocked up, got stabbed, had twins, a wonderful life, met some crazy characters when to a place called the Floating Vagabond, more universe expanding shenanigans, went to a world where humans got turned into ponies to save them from being killed by thalamic radiation, and then I died.
Well, I got better, kind of.
Ruled Hell for a while, that changed me. But I don't feel changed.
Mostly just icky, which is why I was made. To restore me back to before I went to Hell. Well, I don't remember the memories. Something to do with a tainted soul and what not. So I was split off to be a pure soul. Not sure if that's how it works though. I'd have to ask someone from Hell. Who do I even know from Hell?
"Yes." I replied to Prime Boo. I have one question, "Where is Sweetie?" I asked.
"Swe…sweetie? You mean Flutterstay, I don't know where his dumbass went. After I broke up with him, you know 'til death do us part.' Blah blah blah. He went somewhere. I don't really care if he has his own life and I have mine." She replied.
My brain stopped.
WHAT?
THE!
FUCK?!
I frowned at the Prime Boo, "He risked his life to save you from Hell and you just, fucked off?!" I ejaculated loudly.
She nodded then floated on to her bed and laid down. "Yeah. Whatever. If you want to fix it, go after him. I need rest." With a yawn Prime Boo started snoring like a diesel motor with a faulty piston.
I blinked.
Fine. I thought then I saw a flower, I don't know what type of flowers they were but they were red and I floated them into my hair. They were cute to me. I hope Sweetie likes them. I hope I can fix this. I hope he can forgive me.
Wait, forgive me?
No, I don't need forgiveness that bitch does.
Growl.
I left the room behind me and looked into my living room. I noticed the picture on the mantle above the fireplace that glowed with a cool blue light of a fish tank that put out the warmth of a fire.
I looked at the picture and realized something was very wrong with it. It was me and the kids, but the kids were sitting in mid-air. I remember this picture. 'Stay was supposed to be in it. The kids are sitting on his lap.
Okay… that's not very mocchi. I thought about seeing the same things in other pictures.
He was gone in all of them.

‘Alright, first things first.’ I thought, looking around for the lab door. There it was beside the couch but barely visible. I approach it and put my hoof on the door. It appeared with the sound of confetti.
I open the door, as I step in I’m transported to another dimensional space where the lab slowly builds itself in a decayed state. I see wires hanging loosely from the ceiling and sparking every so often.
“Hello?” I call out looking around for the computer interface, my hooves giving echoes of clops with every step in the nearly silent lab. It was eerie. Usually this place would be filled with the sounds of humming computer fans and pumps cooling the components.
I walk up to the console and push a few buttons and nothing happens. I then frown and kick it and it comes online.

“System failure operating at 12 percent.” Comes a distorted AI Voice.
“Well now we’re getting somewhere.” I say. “Run diagnostics and repair guidance.”
The computer makes computery sounds like you know beeps and the like and I stand there as it seems to go on forever.
Oh, it is forever so there is this thing, which is why we Draconequus seem to know what happens in the future. It's called Draconequus time. So, imagine you’re having a conversation right but it's like the other person is talking so slowly right? Okay well we have a sense that can make us perceive time in a faster dimension a bit like a read ahead like a fast forward. It's not completely accurate as time is always in flux. But the big things like an arrow or bullet coming at you we can dodge because of this state. Problem is we have to remember to exist in two frames of time at once and that takes a little concentration.
But when there is a lot of BLAH BLAH BLAH! That is when it gets really boring.
“...system restoration requires rewire of the main console, power supply realignment, and reboot.”
Oh, shit I almost missed that.
See?
“The power fault is in grid 7. Please proceed to the repair station to retrieve tools.” The AI instructed.
“Maybe I should just call a certain Asshole Beer-can I know, to do this…” I mutter as I get the tools from the locker. I pull out a soldering iron and some wire and resistors and walk back to the panel and pop out my draconequus arms and begin rewiring the console. There was a beep and the computer said, “System Restoration at 59 percent.”
“Well that is nice. What’s next ‘Puter?” I ask putting the tools back in the tool box.
“Please proceed to grid 4 for next repair.” The computer said, its voice sounding a bit better.
“Okay.” I pick up the tool box and float toward the next section to repair.
Alright this is kinda the boring part. Are you sure you want to read this? You do? Okay…
I approach the Chaos conversion generator and look at it. It looks kinda like the hacking terminal from BioShock, but was massive. Lots of tiles for chaos energy to flow through.
Less said about this part the better but lets just say I was never very good at this. So I set off the automated defenses a few times.
Nothing a few snaps of my claw couldn’t solve.
WHAT?
You want details?
You know what. Go ask Flutterstay about his contraptions. I barely understand this stuff.
…

OH ALRIGHT I ADMIT IT I ELECTROCUTED MYSELF A FEW TIMES ARE YOU FLIPPING HAPPY!?!

Ahem.

The last bit of repairs to be done is to fix the polarity of the gemstone power recombobulator.

I DON’T KNOW I’M NOT A SCIENTIST! I throw my appendages up in the air getting all frustrated.
Okay, so the computer just told me to flip the gem inside the matrix upside down… I never claimed to be a smart draconequus.

A voice is heard, “Actually you need to roll a 4 or lower on a 1d12 to do it correctly.”

I look up, “OKAY! BY CELESTIA’S TEATS!” I roll the dice and get a 6.

“FAIL.” said the narrator.

HOLD UP I SPEND A LUCK POINT AND REROLL!

I reroll and get a…

“DAMN IT!”

I look at the die angrily and then spend another luck point and roll it again.

I growl at the dice and then eat it.

“I, uh, what?” The narrator asked confusedly as I continued to chew on a plastic dice.

“One more time!” I say to it and roll again. The new dice afraid I will eat it too just gives it up and gives me a 1!

“YEAH!” I say out loud!

“Power restored to 100%!” The AI reported.

“But, Boo…” I hear you ask. Yes I am the narrator of the story technically, but there is another voice I have to contend with that made the idea for these events the being who pulled all the strings for this merry adventure. That wasn’t me, I just muck with them alot.

“Sounds like there are two narrators in this story!” Says the other narrator. I push them away with an angry look and to make my point I make the dice in my mouth make a sharp crack as I continue to chew on it like bubblegum.

“Please come back to the control room. I have a message from master Flutterstay.” ‘Puter says over the PA system. “Okay.” I say putting the tools away and floating the box behind me and put it away upon entering the control room.

“Playing message.”

“Boo, I knew you would be concerned enough at some point to know why I disappeared.” The hologram Flutterstay says.
“Of course I would be! I’m your wife, dum dum!” I reply to the hologram.

“Well… yeah.” It replies.

WAIT WAIT WAIT!? The narrator says confused.

“WHAT NOW?!” I ask.

HOW IS HE REPLYING TO YOU!?

“DRA-CON-E-QUUS!” I reply in all capital letters sounding it out syllable by syllable.

“Narrator voice?” The hologram asks.

“Yes.” I reply annoyed now blowing bubbles with the plastic die.

“Anyways. Ahem. So I have a list of things to do for you to get me back, but you’re not going to like it.” The hologram says plainly.

“I love you, I am willing to do anything to get you back!” I said to the hologram as my Pipbuck beeps.

“I just sent it to your pipbuck, and I love you too.” Holo-stay said.

I looked at my Pipbuck and saw the new quest list.

*Obtain Byte
*Get him to work with you.
*Go to Tenpony Tower in the Wasteland

My brain crashes like a car wreck. “Byte!? Our sworn enemy banished to be a feline in Celestia's castle Byte? The bane of our existence Byte?!” I yell at the hologram.

“Well, heh heh, yeah.” The hologram replies.

“I’m tempted to leave you dead, my love.” I say looking back at the list again.

“I…”

I sigh, “Of course I want to see you again. I will do it.” I am not happy about it.

“I love you Boo. I will see you soon, yeah?” The hologram holds out a claw for me to fist bump as we really couldn’t hug.

“I love you too.” I bump the hologram's fist and it disappears in a shower of light.

Well, shit. Looks like its time to go visit the former ruler of Equestria Celestia.

I transform back into my earth pony form and trot out of the lab.