The 'Pal' in 'Palimpsest'

by Somewhat Lexible

Rating: mature
Tags: Fluttershy, Science Fiction, Suicide / Self Harm, Dark, Alternate Universe, Human, Anthro, Original Character, Porn, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Fetish
Length: 2572

When a donor organ becomes available, a researcher's back-burner project gets bumped up in priority.

Justin's passing was tragic and unexpected.

It was also an unexpected boon to someone he knew.

There's this project, you see, that he'd been working on. Progress was stalled, due to lack of parts.
Sure, there was some damage to the donor tissue. That'll buff right out.

A one-off, self-contained, short fic originally written as a comment on Derpibooru.
Content warning: it mentions suicide taking place before the story began. TG/Frankenstein stuff.
All characters are over the age of 18.

Published 2024-03-04 19:30:00 UTC
Last updated 2024-03-04 19:30:00 UTC

Lab Notes

Author's Note

Based on this image generated by Horselover Fat on Derpibooru, and the artist's description.
https://derpibooru.org/images/3286351 (Safe)

Lab Notes

Day 2
subject’s genetic structure successfully reconfigured

The tissue damage is already reversing, which means the compatibility genes have been integrated and activated with the kick-starter metabolism regimen. My housekeeping nanobots are restoring what was lost due to oxygen deprivation and protein denaturing. I can hardly believe it myself but it's all working, despite a week passing, with an autopsy and an embalming! The tissue has been successfully revived and is rebuilding as I write this. This is more progress than I'd hoped.

I'm sure Justin wouldn't have minded. After all, he threw his own life away. Can't consent more than that, at least under the current legal regime. The funeral was empty other than me; no next of kin, not even his roommate showed up to pay respect. No sense letting good scaffolding go to waste.

This project has been stalled for so long due to a lack of natural donor tissue. Whatever the circumstances, this opportunity to advance my work can't be passed up.

Day 4

Subject's donor tissue is almost fully repaired and is responding to stimulating impulses. Autonomic functions are firing, a little irregularly, but with increasing vigor. The bridge cells I designed are starting to attach, and some areas of the synthesized body are registering neural activity. It's working! Justin's central nervous system is healing after 8 days' cessation and the ensuing embalming. I reversed it all. What's more, my synthetic biology construct is interfacing with the new growth and showing no signs of rejection. Time to start the endocrine therapy at the lowest doses to avoid shock to the natural neurons.

Day 6

I had to check my instruments, but it's unmistakable. REM patterns. There's something going on in there already, even though the corpus callosum is only at 85% regenerated connection density.

They say a fetus spends most of its time in a dream-like state. Perhaps reanimation recapitulations development? Or maybe she's not a blank slate. Maybe there's something left of Justin kicking around in there. Fascinating if true. I'll increase the nutrient ratio a bit as the repair and integration are going into overtime, and we can't have her starved for growing can we?

Day 8

Brief power outage today, but the backups kicked in without so much as a flicker on the displays. Power was restored with time to spare. Annoying, but ultimately of no consequence.

I don't know how to describe it other than "she's kicking." Her limbs are contracting in waves as the connections to the natural axons form completed pathways. I've still got autonomic functions running externally, but that might not be necessary for long.

More REM activity, but now also full cycles with alpha and theta waves. It looks within parameters for a healthy individual, aside from the lack of wakefulness. The hippocampus is going crazy at times, lighting up like a floodlight. That was an area of extensive reconstruction.

When it settles down a little, I'll try some stimulation patterns. Knew those functional MRI data would come in handy, just wish I'd grabbed more than the prurient stuff. Oh well, this was always a back-burner project until priorities changed once Justin became a factor. Since my reconstruction technique is statistical rather than strictly faithful, I doubt there's going to be anything of the old showing through. Still, it would be interesting...

Day 10

Yesterday I did a full suite of fMRI playback stimulation. The motor basics got heavy use, pre-training her body to walk and sit and even some data from a concert pianist for manual dexterity. But I had precious little to work with. Still, she responded well. It wasn't long before input and read-outs aligned. If she doesn't come out strutting, at least it won't take long for her to learn. Moving should feel natural and familiar to her.

Then it was on to behavioral conditioning. Most of my data came from studies of women and focused on arousal and orgasm. Initial runs showed the amygdala reaction was faint, typical of male patterns. But with subsequent iterations it increased strongly until it matched the upper end of female responses present in the real-world data. Seems neuroplasticity is enhanced when you're bringing a brain back from the dead.

I took advantage of this success today by attempting to 'imprint' the salient fMRI for arousal peaks and orgasm against live, physical stimulation of various regions on the construct body. After a while I was able to reliably correlate stimulation and neurological behavior. Later stages were so consistent it was almost what you'd see in neuro-motor stereotype studies. Am I literally programming her with some reflexive reactions to erogenous contact? That's the aim, at least.

Still, I should try and steal some fMRI data of more everyday activities like reading, math, etc. to play back. Hopefully that will prime those pathways for accelerated reinforcement. No sense growing your own gynoid if you have to give it 18 years of education right out of the vat.

Day 13

Spent the first half of day 11 retreading the sexy-brain ground, but it seems to already be firmly implanted. There was no ramp-up between playback runs and the maximum response. So, hey, mission accomplished there. I did swipe some fMRI recordings from studies about literacy, numeracy, etc. and incorporated them into the playback subroutine. Day 12 was dedicated to priming her pathways to read and do math with minimal review. The brain took to those stimuli much faster than the female sexual response ones. I wonder if that's because Justin had already gone through college and left a blazed trail of in-place neurons in those regards.

Speaking of development, there is a definite convergence of her brain patterns towards typical sleep. She's starting to experience brief moments of neurological wakefulness, though I doubt she's coming fully awake before being subsumed by sleep and dreams again. Spent the last half of today prepping the lab and her living quarters. I'm upping the glucose gradually and enriching the oxygen ratio of her support fluid. Emergence is tomorrow, all things allowing.

Day 14

She knew my name. First thing out of the vat, after coughing up all the oxy-fluid, she looks up and locks eyes on me. After a couple of false starts, she mumbled out my first name. I gave her a sedative, put her in a gown, and strapped her down to the bed with an IV drip until I could stop freaking out (pardon my technical jargon). She stayed down for twelve hours, but I didn't dare attach any instruments to get readings.

Her voice sounded just like Fluttershy's.

Day 15

Today she woke up again and started testing the restraints. I left the observation booth and she locked eyes on me again as I changed her drip and sat down across from her. I asked if she knew my name and she replied without hesitation. I asked if she knew hers. She couldn't quite recall. When she noticed the two large lumps on her chest under the covers, she became distressed. Somehow she felt they shouldn't be there. I tried to calm her down, told her there had been a bad car accident and she was lucky to pull through. She asked who saved her, and I told her it was me. She was quiet for a moment, then asked why she couldn't remember much. I lied; told her she was comatose for a few months, grogginess was natural, it would all come back in time. She seemed to accept this, but asked about her bust again. I said there's be time to sort everything out and it would all come together, but she would need to rest some more.

She didn't get much rest. After I left she laid there under the straps that restrained her limbs, watching her chest rise and fall with each breath. She tested the restraints again and started contorting her back. I realized she wasn't trying to escape. She was trying to map the contours of her new body to some lingering impression that didn't match it.

A palimpsest. Death scraped away the detailed story of Justin's life, but impressions shaped like the letters were still there. Lots of basic functions like talking and comprehending speech, but also things specific to Justin. To Justin's identity. Not all of it, but at least enough to give the impression of misalignment between her new body and the other one. Is this coming from the original neurons? Were the reconstructed substitutions a close match for the lost originals? How much of Justin is in there? Is any more going to emerge?

Day 16

A lot of talking. We ate. She cleaned out my fridge here in the lab, actually, then I ordered delivery. Her first solid foods.

She seemed distracted when we spoke, but she stayed present and engaged the whole time. She remembers a lot. Far more than I guessed possible. Even as we spent the day talking she seemed to uncover old memories, described experiences. I don't think her recovery has stopped.

Then she told me why she was distracted. Ah yes, the conditioning was a success. We sort of experimented with that after the talking died down. She was nervous, but quite insistent and enthusiastic. She'd spent the previous night exploring herself so she was quite familiar with "the score." I am happy to report that, physically, there is nothing amiss with the synthetic body housing the regenerated brain, and its stimulation causes no negative mental incongruities. Quite the opposite; her mood improved significantly by the end of it all. I can hear her rhythmic breathing from the sofa as I log this entry; resting peacefully and untroubled. Need to turn in myself; completely exhausted. What a roller coaster.

Day 17

She remembers enough to know. The dots connected. She understands what happened. She understands what Justin did, and guessed what I did after that. There are still gaps in her recall, especially towards the end, but the bigger picture is clear enough to her. I didn't try to deceive her this time.

She seems to be taking it in stride. I broached the subject of her old life, but there was no getting around it. She told me as much; as far as the world was concerned, Justin died almost a month ago. No sense trying to get all that back. Everyone would have to move on; it would be far less distressing to all involved.

There was some remorse(? regret? guilt?) in her voice when she insisted there had to be a clean break, but I think her mind (Justin's?) was already made up by the time she pulled me in for the conversation. I keep trying to think of her as a recent 'creation' but it's clear she's so much more than that at this point; the kind of emotional maturity on display can only come from an adult amount of lived experience, hazy as the details might have been.

So it's to be a new life from here, then. But she doesn't want a new name. Says that as much as things have changed, 'Justin' is the only thing that still fits. I think she means it. So we're trying to figure out what happens from here.

One month later:

"How are you so good at this? You said you've never played this game before," the researcher whined.

"It's the sequel to one I played all the time in high school! I know all the combos! Prepare to lay down your life, wimp!" she jeered with a disconcerting, smug tone in her otherwise soft voice. She was well on her way to a sixth Flawless victory.

The researcher sighed in frustration and leaned over to blow on her neck. Her beautiful face giggled adorably in surprise.

"Hey, no fair!" she gasped out between breaths. Her eyes were dilating rapidly and a flush was spreading from the tips of her pointy ears down to her bare shoulders. Her character took several hits that she was unable to counter, so she resorted to blocking.

"Gotta give me a handicap, I'm dying over here!" he replied.

"I gave you one, I'm not even playing with my main!" she insisted, regaining her advantage and finishing the round with a less than perfect victory. Her composure was returning, so her opponent decided to press the issue. A hand squeezed her thigh just as she commanded her character to leap into an attack in the opening seconds of the match. "Ack! Cheating!" she choked out with more giggles, her hands unsteady on the controller. Two dull points began tenting the fabric that was stretched tight over her enormous bust.

"It's not my fault you're such a naughty girl, getting distracted so easily," he said with a wicked smirk. Now he was stroking her leg up and down its long, slender curvature.

"It literally is your fault!" she argued despite a broad smile cracking on her face. "I still can't believe you put my brain in a sex-bot body!" Her controller fell to the floor and both game characters stood in idle animations. Her opponent had definitely outmatched her in the meta. She hid her reddening face behind her free hands, her partly-obscured lips showing an excited grin.

"Hey, plans changed pretty quick. I had to improvise." They sat quietly for a moment, but he didn't remove his hand. "Hey, Justin?" he asked, shifting his seat to turn to his companion.

"What?" she answered, peeking through her fingers and unable to suppress the smile as his hand slid back and forth over her smooth, yellow thigh.

"Let's put it on Story Mode, Normal difficulty. I want to see how you do playing against the CPU while sitting on my lap. In the interest of science, of course."

"Science, right," she chuckled. "Easy difficulty only," she stipulated. "And no Trigger phrases or putting me in Doll Mode while I'm playing! Otherwise I'm going to get clobbered. Deal?"

"You know, you're right. I'd say 'easy difficulty' has you written all over it," he smirked. Releasing her thigh from the tyranny of his affectionate touch, he was rewarded with a brief lap dance as she lifted the leg over his own and scooched deliberately onto him to assume the requested position, tail draped over to the side of the couch she'd just abandoned.

"Again, your fault," she pointed out as she straddled his lap and adjusted her seat before bending down to pick up the dropped controller. "All your fault," she said with a smile. He brushed her mass of pink hair aside, noting how her diminutive wings were trembling slightly, dancing to the flurry of signals racing between all corners of her synthesized body and the rescued, reconditioned mind it housed.

"I admit no wrongdoing," he replied, letting his hands come to rest on the small of her back and enjoying the sound she made as he did so.

"Who said anything about wrongdoing?" she said, biting her lip and attempting to concentrate on the game menu. Justin could already tell this was going to be more challenging than she'd assumed. "Feels pretty right to me. After all, it's the way I was built."