"I didn't know your family had a workshop."
Scootaloo looked around her, seeing all the instruments displayed on the walls and the few workbenches with hammers, nails, screws, wires lying around. They were in a small barn, behind Sweet Apple Acres' orchard, pretty far from Ponyville. But the little pegasus' attention was quickly drawn back to her two friends. Apple Bloom, wearing a welding mask, brandishing a blue-flamed torch, directed at Sweetie Belle's opened foreleg. The little unicorn seemed unbothered, simply staring at the work her friend was doing.
"'t was a gif' from Flim an' Flam, like an apology. Ah know, weird, right?"
"Yeah, I'm impressed everything hasn't imploded yet," Sweetie Belle said.
"So, ah learned a few things," Apple Bloom followed, before shutting off the torch. "There you go, your leg should be fine now."
Sweetie Belle's skin suddenly shut close, like a pair of doors, leaving on her leg no traces that it was opened just a moment ago. She moved her hoof around, commenting:
"Woaw, this works so well!"
"Ah know, ah know," Apple Bloom said with utmost non-modesty.
"Rarity doesn't do it that well, and she's a unicorn."
"What can ah say, it's a gift."
"Try no to break your leg again next time," Scootaloo added with a little smile.
"That wouldn't have happened with reinforcement," Sweetie Belle muttered.
"Ya want some?" Apple Bloom suddenly said. "Ah'm sure Ah could put a few plates on your skeleton parts."
"Wouldn't that make me too heavy...?"
"Not if Ah increase the strength of your legs."
Sweetie Belle was suddenly surprised and amazed by the proposition.
"Go on, then!"
"Are you sure about that...?" Scootaloo worried. "The manual advised to not tamper too much with her body, you know? You might hit a nerve or something."
"Nah, it'll be fine!" Apple Bloom said, waving a hoof.
"I'm sure she knows what she's doing," Sweetie Belle added.
Scootaloo looked at her unicorn friend, who was staring at her with her usual curiosity. She saw her round and green iris rotate around her pupil, like they sometimes did when she was thinking.
"Okay..." Scootaloo accepted, still unsure about all this. "Do you mind if I leave then? It just feels wrong to see your body getting opened like that and all."
"Sure," Sweetie Belle said.
"We'll be at the clubhouse when we're done," Apple Bloom added.
They didn't go to the clubhouse. Not that day, at least. When Scootaloo went there, it was already dusk.
"They probably went home," she said to herself, before heading to her house.
The clubhouse was still empty in the morning. More worryingly, Rarity and Applejack had come, looking for their respective sister, saying they hadn't seen them since yesterday. While Scootaloo didn't snitch on them, she internally sighed, knowing perfectly where they probably were.
"I'll go look for them," she said to the two worried mares.
Something felt wrong, when she arrived in view of the workshop. It didn't have a roof anymore, and weird things were poking out of the windows, clamps made out of wood holding onto the frames. Scootaloo wasn't sure at first, but she heard sounds coming from the inside. Weird metallic noises.
It was dark inside, because it was the morning, but also because of those things standing in the way of the windows. And despite having no roof, no light was raining down in the workshop. Scootaloo couldn't see a thing, yet she still walked inside.
"Apple Bloom...? Sweetie Belle...?"
The noises stopped and the little pegasus heard her friend's voice:
"Scootaloo?"
It sounded like Sweetie Belle. The sounds came back almost immediately, strident squeaking of metallic pieces sliding against one another, getting closer to Scootaloo. Two green lights pierced the shadows, in front of the pegasus, but about a meter higher than they should have been.
Sweetie Belle's face went into the light, but what followed behind almost made Scootaloo faint. There wasn't any skin, it was just a long black piece of metal supposed to be a neck, holding her head in the air. The body it was attached to stepped into the light as well, and it looked grotesque. A huge chunk of wood and nails welded together, from which elongated and thin articulated rods came out of, supposed to be legs, sharp enough to sink into the ground. The rest of her body was still hidden in the shadows. She looked like a giant spider with a way too long and articulated neck. Also she had blue wings?
"How do you like my new body?" Sweetie Belle joyfully asked, although there was something unsettling in her tone, as if she wasn't really talking to someone.
"What did you do...?" Scootaloo said, horrified. "Where's Apple Bloom?"
"Oh, she's back there, working. She's been at it the whole night, since I upgraded her. She doesn't need to sleep anymore, so she can work on me."
Sweetie Belle moved forward, bringing her smiling face right in front of Scootaloo, staring at her. Her legs moved around the small pegasus, but they weren't the only ones she had, more massive stomps came from the darkness.
"I feel so much stronger now. She was so right when we repurposed my morality chip into a relay for my legs."
"That's, huh... great," Scootaloo said, taking a few steps back. "But Rarity and Applejack are looking for you."
The pegasus's back stopped against one of Sweetie Belle's wooden legs.
"Oh, they're going to come?" the robotic filly said with a joy that echoed through her spine and joints. "That's great, I need new materials, we're running out of metal."
Scootaloo nervously giggled, feeling oppressed by Sweetie Belle's rotating eyes staring at her. She tried to go around the leg.
"Yeah, I... should go and look for them."
She went for the door. But she was grabbed almost instantly by one of those wooden clamps the size of her body.
"Say, Scootaloo..." Sweetie Belle slowly said. "I really need skin and flesh."
