Nighthaze: Manehattan

Rekindling my shaky relationship with consciousness I found my surprisingly not-dead self submerged in a vat of warm translucent blue liquid suspended by my own buoyancy. Plastic tubes invaded every orifice, braided wires coiled around my body, terminating at mechanical nodes embedded in my spine. A spine that now appeared as if an armored black robotic millipede had crawled onto my back and dug itself surface deep into my coat.

I twisted in my tank, hooves flailing sluggishly through the thick fluid. Then I saw it, Her. Mom.

Just beyond the curved surface of the fish tank stood my mother, wearing the same long-suffering smile she always had, like the accident had never happened. I could see that matted azure coat, her black mane tinged with the charcoal grey of her years, those worn but loving emerald eyes. No broken bones, no twisted body, no pools of blood, no listless gaze into the abyss...

"Retrieve the projects, escape the lab, save sister," her voice was as clear as if she were sitting next to me in my bedroom.

I blinked and she was gone.

I reached out for her, placing my hoof on the glass, but she didn't come back. Instead the darkness beyond faded at the onrush of light that illuminated the remains of a laboratory. Banks of scrolling monitors, row upon row of old model terminals and arcane input matrices, racks of indiscernible digital equipment swamped in a rat's nest of faded multicolored cabling.

Muffled klaxons blared like speakers stuffed under a pillow as spinning lights swept the the room. A vibration filled the tank accompanied by a sound like a great big storm drain being unclogged and a sewage pump running full tilt as the liquid was quickly evacuated in mere seconds. I struggled to find purchase with my hooves, half because of the slippery resin and half because my limbs were responding like sugar-addled toddlers. Resigning myself I flopped onto the shiny metal deck. Oof, that hurt in all the wrong places.

With a horrible creaking sound the walls of the tank sank into the floor as stale air filled my intubated nostrils with the smell of a sanitized hospital.

In a distinctly undignified and unsightly fashion I extricated every intubation from my body and face, coughing up great gobs of green water. The dull whine of the alarms was quickly sharpened as fluid drained from my ears, the piercing sound now dominating my poor eardrums. A sequence of hissing noises and the bundles of cables popped out of my spine and flopped onto the wet metal grate I was laying on.

The mind numbing pain from before was supplanted by a throbbing ache; something akin to an army of fillies with rubber hammers treating my body like a game of whack-a-mole. My head was swimming, felt like my brain was strung up by butcher's hooks. Intestines were squirming too, insides felt wrong. Out of place and cramped, like a full grown stallion in a colt's playhouse.

After a few pitiful minutes of squirming around on the ground like a newborn whelp I managed to stand up, leaning heavily on a partially shattered tank.

A cyber demon's stare cut into me, a toxic green eye paired with an icy blue twin set into a mask of black metal and sopping wet dark blue fur.

My heart stopped, fear freezing my lungs. I blinked.

They blinked.

The figure moved as I did, its sharp, angular muzzle twisting to match mine. It wasn’t a demon. It was my reflection.

I sat down and pulled at the remaining fleshy bits of my face with a hoof. My coat stretched and the artificial plates extended and shrunk in response, a perfect simulacra of organic movement.

An almost invisible seam of raw tissue delineated what was left of my head and the entire right side of my face and whole lower muzzle which had been replaced with matte-black composite plating. The angular bits moved independently, each like a tiny scale jittering back and forth as it adjusted itself. A wave of motion washed over the array as it reshaped itself along new lines to resemble my old face.

I opened and closed my jaw several times, feelings of musculature gone—replaced with sounds of whirring and clicking not dissimilar from an old antique pocket watch.

The icy blue of my right eye shifted to match the poison green of my left, it was a cybernetic.

I wanted to scream, to tear the metal from my face, to rip the invasive black carapace from my spine, to slam my head into the steel decking until I was pulp, to desperately chase sweet death, an escape from the madness that had become my reality—

—at least, that would have been the expected response. Some modicum of shock, of fear, of an objectively rational heart-rending terror.

But there was nothing.

I had been shot in the face with my own gun, flushed down the sewers to who knows how deep beneath the city, jabbed with a needle by a robot more rust than metal, cut up and augmented in an abandoned lab, and given a cryptic message by my dead mother.

And yet I felt... blank. It was all just a collection of facts, detached bits of knowledge recounted with the same level of emotion as remembering a shopping list. I could rationalize the stringent extremity of my situation but it never sank deeper than surface level. I wasn't afraid, or angry, or sad, instead I only felt the slick steel beneath my hooves.

The image and voice of my mother had to either have been either a hallucination or a ghost. Given the circumstance, I couldn't rule out either but leaned towards the former. I didn't know what she had meant by the projects, escape was an obvious goal, but saving my sister was impossible. She had died alongside my mother. I could've saved her then, but that was many years ago. Years that I had spent trying to bury that night.

I had to focus. If I was alive then so might the others be too. before anything I had to discover if Zamora or the others wound up in the same facility, maybe it wasn't likely but all of this was untrodden territory so anything was possible.

Getting up I trotted over to a nearby terminal with a sickly green glow and blipping lines of blocky text.

FDOS v5.0.6.2

Build No. 227594001

Project Exarchi active...

Primary Subject Status:
Name: RADIANT STAR
Age: 24 AT RECONST.
Species: UNICORN
Sex: FEMALE
Arcane Affinity: HIGH
Cybernetic Affinity: EXCEPTIONAL
Vitals: ERROR-NODATA
Neurolink Status: ERROR-NODATA
CMASM Status: NOT UPLOADED
AH Compatibility: 87% AT RECONST.
Engram Status: 100% - UPLOAD COMPLETE
Engram Integration: PHASE 4 AT RECONST.
Engram Stability: ERROR-NODATA
Augment Integration: ERROR-NODATA
Post-Reconst. Runtime: 999:99:99:99:999

Secondary Subject Status:
Name: UNKNOWN
Age: APPROX. 35
Species: UNICORN
Sex: MALE
Arcane Affinity: LOW-MODERATE
Cybernetic Affinity: LOW
Vitals: STABLE
Neurolink Status: ACTIVE - 100% SIGNAL INTEGRITY
CMASM Status: ERROR-FILENOTFOUND
AH Compatibility: 22% AT RECONST.
Engram Status: 100% UPLOAD COMPLETE
Engram Integration: PHASE 1
Engram Stability: STABLE - LOW ACTIVITY
Augment Integration:
+BML HF-9 Neuro-Spinal Cybernetic Framework - SUCCESS
+BML Trojan AB790 Augmented Cogitation Unit - SUCCESS
+BML Hydra KB110 Biochemical Regulator - SUCCESS
+BML UY-3 Arcano-Neural Interjector - SUCCESS
+BML SQ180 Explorer-Grade Cybernetic Eye Replacement w/ BAS Integration - SUCCESS
+BML RE324 Explorer-Grade Cybernetic Hearing Implant w/ BAS Integration (Right, Left) - SUCCESS
+BML Dragonscale SK360 Adaptive Composite Transdermal Reinforcement (Head) - SUCCESS
+BML SPAR-10 Combat Exoskeleton - FAILURE, AFFINITY BELOW THRESHOLD
+BML TGK-6 Aerospace-Grade Composite Torso Replacement - FAILURE, AFFINITY BELOW THRESHOLD
+BML Icarus WI71 Aerospace-Grade Powered Folding Monowings - FAILURE, AFFINITY BELOW THRESHOLD
+BML Dragonheart D10 Bio-Reactor - FAILURE, AFFINITY BELOW THRESHOLD
+BML Blue Dog FP240 Aerospace-Grade Cybernetic Limb Replacement (Left Foreleg, Right Foreleg, Left Backleg, Right Backleg) - FAILURE, AFFINITY BELOW THRESHOLD
Post-Reconst. Runtime: 001:17:05:45:789

Multiple faults detected
Network firewall compromised
Active neural compute nodes: 2/10
Stored engrams at risk of degradation, recommend full backup

Please contact system administrator

My eyes cycled through the list of failed augmentations, I had avoided getting hardware in the past. Heliodryl would've been just another bill and it's not like I was an athlete or a competitive spellcaster. Low affinity. Probably couldn't handle a glucose monitor now without my nervous system shutting down.

And what was an engram? What did 'Low Activity' mean? These were questions that I put onto a mental shelf to be dealt with later.

According to the runtime clock it'd been almost two days, might as well have been a lifetime. Suddenly a scan line ran down over my sight.

Green text scrolled down the sides of my vision, status bars and vitals trackers appeared on the bottom left and right of my sight. Lines of text zipped by too fast to read, a compass popped up near the top of my vision. It was a HUD, just like a video game. When I closed my eyes the HUD expanded to show all kinds of stats about my new parts but one caught my attention. Heliodryl supply. The little meter said I had a week's supply dripping through my veins courtesy of the biochem regulator. That was one less thing I had to worry about at least.

I opened my eyes and a flashing marker appeared on the compass. Looking around the lab was empty. A thick layer of dust coating every thing. Irregardless I made a quick tour of the spacious lab. Dessicated equine skeletons were scattered around, dressed in tattered lab coats and splayed out like discarded toys.

The lab coats all had a logo embroidered onto them, worn and faded but visible was a crescent moon circle inscribed inside of a triangle set inside another of it's kind. In the border between the triangles was the text 'Blue Moon Laboratory' with each word aligned to a side.

Whatever happened here was long ago, but how was the system working?

Another one for the shelf. I turned and followed the marker on my compass, I wasn't sure if it was the exit but whatever it was, it had to be better than wandering around without direction. The marker led me through long hallways dotted with scorch marks and more skeletons. An ominously dark corridor appeared on my left.

I though about calling out for Zamora until I heard chittering, like the sound of a deep fryer slowed way down. It echoed out from the obscured end of the hallway. Whatever it was I wasn't sticking around and glued my muzzle shut.

After that I attempted to slink around like a mouse, trying not to make noise as I snuck around each corner and hugged the walls while fighting my jerking limbs. Eventually I came up to a stained steel door with a big faded radiation symbol.

Set into the frame of the industrial door was an access panel. Ones like that hadn't been used in construction for well over a decade but luckily for me they had a critical fault. The simple guts of the switch were familiar to me as I slid my magic through the unprotected seams in the panel. I found the two contacts and pinched them together, with a satisfying click of a heavy relay the hoof-thick door slid up, a chilly blast of foul air rushing over me. Beyond the double wide door frame was a barley lit room, correction: a chasm with catwalks. Deep darkness lined the bottomless pit that stretched far beyond sight. A tiny landing led to steel catwalks barely wide enough for two ponies abreast that cris-crossed the ocean of shadows connecting pillars of steel shrouded in cables, conduit, and steaming pipes.

Chitter chatter. Behind me the sound crawled up the corridors and into my ears. I slid into into the room and pinched the contacts again. The heavy door slid down and sealed causing the room to darken considerably, however only momentarily. A green night vision filter replaced my occluded sight revealing the full length of the metallic room but not it's depth. At the far end was a raised platform with a long control console and a reinforced cylinder in the center. The marker pointed right at it.

Augmented vision, I could get used to that.

I crouched and crawled forwards, every creak and groan of the walkway causing me to wince. Two equine robots sprung to life with bright amber eyes and trotted towards me. Quickly I crouch-ran to one of the nearby circular platforms of the massive steel pillars and his behind it.

The pair looked old, but not as decrepit as the one that had found me in the Downs. Mutlitools and cutting saws extended from their backs as they moved to a pillar opposite mine and started unbolting maintenance panels.

Once I was comfortable they were occupied I snuck down the ramp and crept towards the main platform. Industrial noises set the background. Slowly I rose to my full height as the marker flashed faster and faster. The jerkified corpse of a long dead pony was propped up against the silvery casing dressed in a discolored but sturdy looking hazmat garment, a fire axe embedded in it's shattered head encased in broken glass helmet

A clicking noise popped head unbidden, a little amber radiation symbol flashing in the bottom left of my HUD with the text 'Minor Radiation Exposure'.

The hazmat coveralls had a similar radiation symbol visible on the chest, most likely indicating a rating for protection from arcane radiation. Though the helmet was missing it'd be better than nothing.

Stripping the dessicated remains from the suit I slid the tail cover on first and cinched it tight before slipping into the slightly stiff heavy industrial suit. The heavy stainless steel seal ring hung about my neck like a piece of zebra jewelry, I'd discarded the useless helmet considering just about none of the glass was left.

Looking I saw the message about expose disappear as the clicking of the rad counter stopped. There was an active terminal attached to the cylindrical casing. Its screen was blank save for a login prompt with a flashing text insertion point.

A waterfall of text scrolled across my vision as the terminal glitched and new lines rolled across it's screen.

Authorized override, access granted. Welcome user X¶3£×76";d

Warning: Last exposure test 999 days ago
Warning: Field integrity compromised
Warning: Casing saturation at 100%
Warning: [1] Bio-form(s) detected with insufficient protection
Unable to continue, contact project management

ERROR BUFFER OVERFLOW
Bypassing safeties...

Unsealing PROJECT WAVEBREAKER...
Warning: Usage of device by unprotected user will result in radiological, electromagnetic, and [CLASSIFIED-PROJECT MOONSPIRE] contamination

Disengaging protective casing...

Deactivating containment field...

With a horrendous metallic creaking the rust-free shroud split, the upper half crawling up while the lower dropped down. A painfully white energy field held aloft an artifact. A weapon. It's shape was unmistakable, a long bulky prototype rifle suffused with tightly wound wires and embedded with luminescent baleful green engraved gemstones. A shroud protected what appeared to be the barrel and the grip was designed for unicorn or combat harness use while the stock held several strange humming power cells.

The clicking returned and sped up as the casing retracted. This time the message read 'Minor Radiation Exposure', the weapon was eminating unsafe levels of ambient decaying arcane energies. It was most assuredly unsafe to handle, yet I couldn't find it in myself to so easily discard such a potential tool.

The glowing field died down and the rifle gently floated until it was level with me. I reached out with my magic and carefully lifted it from the field and brought it closer.

A series of amber lights lit up on the top of the weapon as a name appeared in the bottom right of my HUD.

'DE-71c Wavegun'

Just above it the number twenty appeared with a little radiation symbol next to it. That had to be an ammo counter. Another radiation roundel popped up on the bottom left with the word SAFE next to it. I wasn't sure how reassured I was by that.

A blaring noise cut through my focus. The two maintenance bots were rushing towards me, saw blades spinning furiously.

The rifle came up in my magic, a pull of the trigger. A warbling ripple tore through the air and was absorbed by the first raging bot and the grating beneath. Instantly it's plating crumpled like tinfoil and it's lighting bulbs shattered while the deck rattled. Like a puppet whose strings had been cut its momentum carried it forward to slam into the console behind me as I threw myself aside.

Killer bot number two adjusted it's vector and slammed into me like a car. The wavegun dropped to the decking as I was pinned. A flurry of sparks showered me as I ripped my head aside to dodge the killing blow and the saw grazed the shaking steel grate. Another swing, stopped using my magic to hold the blade fast. It's multitool arm grabbed my throat and squeezed. White and black spots formed on the edge of my vision and slowly crept in as warning messages flashed across my HUD.

With as much force as I could magically muster I ripped the saw blade to the side. A burst of sparks blinded me as it's multitool was severed. The black crept in, it was locked on my throat. Still pinned I released the saw and freed my neck from the constricting pliers, blood rushing up and oxygen down.

A horrifying screech of tortured metal. The jagged blade tore through synthetic muscle and composite scale alike, sending a surge of molten pain through my face as sparks and blood sprayed across the deck—I pulled the trigger. The wavegun hovered in my glowing levitation against the bot's sensor head, gemstones glowing, but nothing happens when I pull the trigger. Red lights flashed on the top, it was still charging.

I dropped it and used every bit of faltering magic to yank the saw from my muzzle. It bore down on me and struggled against my magic. As it put all it's weight into forcing the blade down on me I released it and curled my body to kick it away. The saw bit into the steel deck and stopped abruptly, it was jammed. Grabbing the only other weapon available I jerked the axe up and brought it down on its sensor head with every last ounce of self-preservation.

The petrified pony head was wedged in the blade as it connected with the rusticated metal housing. It split into chunks as I buried the axe as deep as possible, relishing the metallic crunch. With a waterfall of sparks and sheared shrapnel the murderous drone hung limply, it's pressure on my limbs gone.

With a heave I shoved the hulking bot off of me. It was when then I noticed the driblets of blood leaking from my muzzle. I sat down and held my broken jaw with both forehooves, sharp pain lancing through my face. Red text flashed informing me pain suppressants and coagulants were being injected. Another told me auto repair systems has been activated.

As I got to my hooves a few droplets of blood fell before the flow was staunched, the cutting pain dropping to a throbbing ache. I took some time to scan the room for more bots as I hefted up the wavegun, the ammo counter reading nineteen now and the charge indicator was amber, still not ready. Looking back I stared at the fire axe, I was going to need as many weapons as I could get my hooves on so I wrenched it free and floated it and the rifle alongside me.

A giant millipede with a pair of mandibles the size of kitchen knives slithered along the unsteady catwalk. It's lurching body crawling out of the now open door until it's full length was visible, all twenty feet of it. It reared up towards me and made a rapid clicking noise as hundreds of mandibles on it's belly revealed a mouth stippling with sizzling acids that ran the entire length of it's underside.

Glancing I saw the amber lights on the wavegun, too late. The millipede skittered towards me in a flash and was lunging for my head. Jerking back I forced the handle of the fore axe into it's primary mandibles and tried to hold it back. I had to release the wavegun and brace myself, it chomped and shook with hungry rage trying to twist the axe or bite it in two.

Snapping its body like a whip it tore the axe from my grasp and shot towards my throat. I leapt into the air and angled my hooves as I came down hard onto it's back carapace. There wasn't even a crack.

With another whip I was tossed way into the air head over hoof, the creature positioning its waiting mandibles beneath me. A green light stood against the darkness, it was all that I needed.

I whisked the charged wavegun to my side as I reached my apogee, feeling the absence of gravity for a split-second before plummeting back down. A pony's length above the millilede's head I sent a thunderous wave through its insectoid body. Chitin cracked and imploded, green blooded spurting from every hole, its death rattle almost harmonizing with the screech of the catwalk crumpling and giving way.

Before I could land on the broken insect it and the catwalk fell away beneath me faster than I was falling. The steel decking sheared into bits as it slammed and bounced off the steel pillars, faring not much different the millipede was cut to pieces by a network of pipes and beams.

Before I could count my luck at not hitting anything I registered the sounds of splashing water seconds before I was plunged into a dank pool of murky black water. As soon as I figured out which way was up I swam to the surface and coughed up the acrid water.

Chittering from above snatched my attention. Looking above with my augmented vision I could see more millilede's crawling down the walls towards me, there was so many I could scarcely see the walls beneath them.

Time to move. Taking a deep breath I dove down searching for a way out. There was a submerged door but its control panel was dead, beside it was a big acrylic viewing window.

Looking around I spotted the axe and pulled it over to me through the water. With all my might I swung the axe, with magic then with my teeth at the window causing a few small chips. My lungs burned forcing me topside, I packed my lungs and dove again to hack away at the acrylic, each swing reduced to a slow whoosh by the thick waters. A spider web fracture shot across it's surface, crisply cracking as more and more cracks splintered off the main web, covering the entire surface.

With a bang and a torrent of water the acrylic finally shattered. Tiny bits of safety glass exploded outwards away from me like a grenade blast as the currents ripped me forwards. I was slammed into the wall of the adjacent corridor and pinned by the rushing waters. Seeing the axe and wavegun rush by I managed to scoop them up in my magic.

When the water finally died down and released me from the wall I dropped to my hooves only to see millipedes zipping my way. An armored shutter hung over the empty window frame, secured by a single hefty pin. I yanked it free.

The shutter creaked then roared down as a millipede darted through the quickly closing gap. Turning to run I felt two knives spitroast my back left leg, a blistering nanosecond later the shutter crashed closed with a meaty chonk and crunch. I collapsed and rolled over to see the squirming front half of the insect that had been chopped by the closing shutter. Millipedes on the other sides banged against the steel but it held fast.

The bug's mandibles were deep in my leg, having cut through the thick hazmat suit like paper. Another moment and I'd have been amputated at the hip. Fire shot through me, burning its way through me as hot needles of pain crawled up my spine. I grit my teeth and slammed my hoof on the floor repeatedly. After it stopped squirming I managed to get ahold of my breathing and tried to staunch the bleeding with my magic.

Blood soon filled the legging of the suit. I undid the cargo belt and tied it just above the wound and cinched it tight. I bit my lip hard enough to bleed, well it would've bled if it was still flesh. The tourniquet held though, the flow of blood stopping completely.

Now came the shitty part. Taking several quick breaths I grasped both mandibles in my magic and ripped them free in a spurt of blood. I rolled over and threw my head back, biting my forehooves to keep from screaming. My leg felt like it had a thousand razor cuts, had been soaked it lemon juice, then gasoline, and set on fire.

I don't know how long I lay there, trying to drown out the pain and failing miserably. However eventually more pain suppressants kicked in and I was able to form coherent thoughts once more. Doped up on Nopane I was able to stand and limp around on three hooves.

Still leaking life force I scanned the corridor I was in, there were colored lines along the wall with labels. There were several but all I could see was the peeling red text that said 'Aid Station'.

I limped for what felt like two hoofball fields until I finally arrived at the aid station. Stumbling in I saw a row of cots, empty wide open cabinets, overturned instrument carts, and a pile of long dead equine corpses in threadbare gowns piled in a corner.

Desperately I pilfered drawers, cabinets, and shelves but found nothing but empty bottles and used syringes. When I rifled through the office desk I found a half bottle of Apple Family hard cider, it's have to do. I brushed the dust off a cot and managed to roll onto it and sit upright.

Tearing strips of cloth from the mattress I scraped as much dust and dirt from them as I could. Then, taking a wad I bit down hard as I poured the cider on the puncture wounds. The burn was distant but poignant nonetheless. I wrapped the leg in several layers of the thin material to form a bandage, it'd be hell to remove but it was better than bleeding out.

It was about this time I looked up and saw my sister

"Retrieve the projects, escape the lab, save sister," she said, clear as day.

I blinked and she disappeared. A new marker appeared on my compass.

"Okay. Empirically, this is fucked," I said.

Whatever was giving me these visions had at least partial control over my compass, sensory augs, possibly other systems too. How in Celestia's golden arse did they know what my dead family looked like? That list of implants had included a cogitation unit, but that was beyond anything we had today. Especially if it was accessing my memories, directly interfacing with my brain. Just what had they stuck in me?

I checked the wavegun, the reassuring green charge light bringing a smile to my face.

"Sure, let's go dig up some old lost tech and fight lethal monstrosities for an unknown benefactor pulling my strings with ghosts of my dead family," I chuckled.

My mind was cradled in a frayed net, a little more weight can't hurt. Just bury it, shove it aside, push through and don't think about it. I wasn't afraid, I wasn't scared, I wasn't lonely, I wasn't broken.

I shook my head vigorously, focusing on the throbbing pain it brought to distract me. There wasn't time for useless thoughts. I had to get out of here, to find Zamora. Those projects, I'd have to get them before I'd be able to leave. Yes. Retrieve the projects then escape the lab.

I stuffed the quarter bottle of cider and more torn rags into a satchel. A belt from a corpse that wasn't using it anymore became a makeshift sling for the wavegun. The fire axe I alternated between holding in my teeth or floating it beside me.

My magic felt strange, like it wasn't mine. I couldn't perform any of my light spells or any magic beyond basic levitation. Was the deadhorn daiquiri wearing off? Maybe the arcane interjector implant had something I do with it? Valuable questions. I was beginning to amass a fortune of them, though I had increasing doubts as to whether I'd ever be able to cash in on it.

The hallways down here were devoid of the noises of crawling insects, however the hollow silence that remained instead was far more eerie. Cool damp air was circulated by struggling recyclers. Pre-fab metal walls sweat and icy LED lights turned on and off at random intervals. Rust was just beginning to creep from the cracks and crevices while the painted navigation lines peeled.

It wasn't long before I arrived at another double wide reinforced door. This one lacked any glaring warning labels, instead just having alphanumerical markers. Same make and model as the last though. A few moments and the heavy groan of another two ton security door being coerced open.

There was a sally port that led to a massive octagonal control room full of blinking consoles and tables stacked high with folders and books. In the center was a raised octagonal platform with a slanted plexiglass window on each side.

Just above each frame was a petrified equine corpse sat in an arcane looking articulating chair with a harness of wires and connectors slotted into ports along their spines.

Limping closer to on of the windows I saw the decaying body of a changeling in a room, no more than a four by four meter box with nothing but a toilet/ sink combo, a steel bunk, and a plastic mattress. A heavy security door was opposite the window, shit tight. The bright orange jumpsuit hung limply to the deflated remains, life long gone from their eyes.

Food pellets were piled in a small hill under a dispenser next to an inverted water dripper mounted in the wall, like the kind you found in small pet cages.

The next was the same cell, except the changeling had torn strips of plastic from their mattress and braided them together to make a noose. The same that they had tied to the light fixture and hung themselves by. I went to the next,

Head smashed against wall,

Drowned in toilet,

Leg chewed off,

Mouth and nose stuffed with synthetic fiber,

Artery cut with zipper,

Every body a changeling, each death self-inflicted. Except, when I moved to the eigth window they weren't.

"Shaky wouldn't dare! I'd promised Miss Chartreuse a splendid night out and now he's swoops in to steal her from me?" said the puce stallion trotting back and forth in the cell.

A sickly green flame engulfed them and in a flash an old bright green unicorn mare stood in their place.

"Dear Mortimer, I do wish you'd refrain from voicing your delusions. Just because I actually said 'Goodnight' for once, Celestia knows why, does not mean I agreed to whatever hair-brained mockery of a date you've envisioned for yourself," she said, whipping her head dismissively only to look directly into my eyes.

"Hey," I said.

"What... You can't be real—" another wash of green flames, the old mare replaced by a grey younger mare "—Look! He's got the Wavebreaker on his back—" more green fire, this time a chestnut stallion "—Listen to me, you've got to shut project Vicar down—" whoosh, orange stallion "—Get us back into our bodies—" yellow mare "—The reset period is soon we don't have much time—" wavy-striped zebra "Don't listen to them, kill us. Kill us now before they esca—" a violent baleful green immolation shook the floor, leaving a hard-bitten sapphire stallion with a short jagged pearly mane.

"Enough," he said, biting down hard on his forehoof leaving a bloody bite mark.

"Whoever you are you must access the remote tethering terminal behind you and disconnect all the tethers, login with the username Dr. Withering Hail. Password is 'Over my dead body 33, all lowercase, no spaces" he said.

The compass marker was pointing directly at him.

"Don't you want out of that cell?" I asked.

He facehooved and sighed, "If I wanted that, I would've asked for such. Just do what I told you."

I backed up and turned around to see the ancient computer he had been referring too. Using his credentials I logged in as I wiped the film of dust from the screen. There were several options listed:

Reset all tethers
Disconnect specific tether
Disconnect all tethers
Terminate reciever subject(s)
Purge all tethered engrams
Purge specific engram

There was so much not right with this. I spun and nearly fell over myself before I went back to the window only to find the stallion gone. In his stead there was a charcoal changeling, shaking and curled up on the worn cot.

"Wha– Who are you?" I asked.

"N-nobody..." they said.

"Those other ponies, were they you?" I said.

They just curled up tighter. Their eyes clenched shut as soft sobs barely escaped the room through the thick armored glass.

"What is project Vicar?" I said.

No response.

"What are the tethers? What happens if I disconnect them?" I said.

No response.

"I'm trying to help you," I said.

They shot up, wings buzzing as they slammed both their hooves into the glass. I was thrown into my ass out of shock as the changeling's visage twisted into a vicious mask of malice.

"Fuck you!" they hissed, "You're a glorified zookeeper. You think I don't already know that I'm worthless, nothing but a piece of clothing to be worn?" They hissed.

I was taken aback, finding purchase beneath my hooves as I levelled a blank stare at them.

"I don't know what you're referring too," I said.

Their hooves dropped from the glass as they hovered back down to slump on the floor. Head hung they spoke softly, barley audible through the window.

"I know. It's been a while hasn't it? The others haven't noticed but I count the days, I see the cobwebs and rust," they said dejectedly.

I nodded but raised an eyebrow, "Others?"

"The scientists tethered to me," they turned around and gestured to the black metal crest embedded in the back of their skull. Pointing a hoof at the implant they sighed.

"You asked what project Vicar was, well this is it," running from the base of the their horn to the top of their spine it had quick disconnect ports and precise chamfered angles.

"Take a changeling, rip out half their brain, shove a computer and a network uplink in, and out comes me. Want to sneak into enemy territory? Attend a meeting with a dangerous warlord? Cheat on your wife with someone on the other side of the continent? Just plug in..." their voice trailed off.

"So those ponies, they were using your body? Remotely control you and live through you using that implant?" I said.

A nod.

"Why so many?" I said.

"Zhalia had said that when the oher recievers... when they were gone that the scientists were dead and the system had no where else to put their engram, so eventually," they tapped the side of their head "all wound up here,"

"What's an engram?" I said.

"Full of questions aren't you? Zhalia was like that, always poking at the world around her. From what I understand engrams are like a copy of a pony's mind, beyond that I'm not sure, sorry," they said.

"No, that's okay. Thanks," I said.

"If you disconnect their tethers I don't know what'll happen. Their engrams have nowhere to go," they said.

"It also gave the option to 'Purge tethered engrams' too, either all or specific ones," I said.

Their expression lifted to look up af me, eyes awash in a mixture of hate, anger, hope, regret, pain.

"They'd be gone. Erased," they said, gaze staring off behind me.

"Where are they now? They seemed to be jumping over each other earlier to get a word in," I said.

"Dr. Hail told us that there was instability in the implant. A pony couldn't spend so much time an artificial brain stuff inside a changeling forever without errors occuring. For a few minutes every twenty four hours the system resets and all the engrams are... Asleep I guess. When they come back I'll be stuffed back down until the next reset," they said.

I sat down again. Nine minds, one body. What was the best solution here? Disconnecting the tethers would likely just kill them or not even work considering the original ponies and zebra were dead. I could try and find a way to rig it to constantly reset so the engrams would be suppressed but I wasn't familiar with the technology, not to mention the issue of finding them new hosts. Tech like this wasn't even supposed to exist, it was an age beyond anything we had today.

"Bas Typhoon, the zebra. Purge the others, he should have my body. He's the only one ever spoke to me like I was real," they said.

Purge seven of the engrams, keep one, and let them have the changelings body? Hmm.

"What if I purged all of them? Wouldn't you be yourself again?" I said.

"Self? There's no self, not in me. I'm just a shell, may as well let one decent person get a life out of it," they said.

"But surely—"

"I was born here, as a hatchling. Never given a name. Never seen the sun, stars, or moon. Never met anyone that wasn't wearing a labcoat or a jumpsuit. Conditioning, obedience, order, structure, routine. If they could've used a machine they would have Instead they spent years making me no different than one," they said.

I got up and limped over to the terminal, leaving them to their sorrows. Tearing yourself apart was a horrible thing, but wasn't it okay if it was to save somepony? Sacrifice is counted as a noble virtue, so why did this feel so different?

The choice wasn't as easy as I'd liked it to have been. Tapping the keys I selected the best option and pressed it, confirming the selection.

There wasn't a massive bang or charming alert to signal something had happened. I limped over to the window and looked down.

They were laying in a twitching heap on the ground, drool pooling around their mouth. I scanned the lab around me and found a stairwell leading down. Half limping, half running, I rushed downstairs through the short corridor to a room made of eight doors with a terminal protruding from the center floor.

Using the doctor's credentials I logged in and opened every door. With a hiss they slid down into their frames as I clumsily ran to the changeling.

Their eyes were staring ahead, I gently shook them. For endless minutes I rolled them onto their other side and prodded them and heaved their body onto the mattress. I sat their for Luna knows how long before their mouth moved and their eyes blinked.

"...please tell me you didn't do what I think you did," they said weakly.

"Those ponies had a chance to live their lives already, you've never even had a foalhood," I said, placing a hoof on their shoulder.

"You killed Bas!" they shouted in my face.

"He died years ago when his corpse rotted in that chair," I said defensively.

"He was alive, his mind, his memories. Bas had a good heart. If he was here instead of me he'd be able to help more ponies, share some of his love with the world. You've robbed him of his future," the said.

"No, I gave you yours!" I said, shaking them with both my hooves on their shoulders.

"It wasn't your fucking choice!" they yelled.

"It was best for you," I said, realeaing them.

"Like you know what I need. If Bas lived then my life would have at least had some meaning. I'd have saved someone, done something worthwhile. Now I'm just an empty shell, a nothing," they said.

"No one is ever nothing," I said softly.

"Shut up, you don't know me," they said, getting off the cot and shoving past me.

I limped behind them and they shot me a venomous glare back.

"There is a whole city above your head, a city full of ponies doing their best and getting crushed by a system meant to farm them for every second of their time, every bit of their paystub, every pound of flesh. I've seen ponies with nothing, discarded at birth, grown in the streets, torn apart by the system, and killed several blocks from the same gutter they were thrown in as a foal. You have something they don't," I said.

They stopped and shoved a hoof into my chest, "and just what is that?"

"Someone you cared about, you were willing to give up your life for Bas. He's gone but your memory of him isn't. You want to share Bas' love with the world? You still can. Through you his light can shine," I said, wrapping my hoof around theirs.

Their eyes softened as a tear formed and traced their cheek.

"I can't do what Bas could, I'm not a good pony," they said.

"We don't live for what we are, we live for who we can be. Besides, only good ponies try and sacrifice themselves for other good ponies so I wouldn't sell yourself too short," I said.

"Who I can be... I don't know what's possible. I've never been anything more than a test subject," they said.

"Most of us don't really know either, we just try through each day and each moment to do better than the last. You can do that can't you? For Bas?" I said.

Tears hit the ground as they made the slightest nod, "For B-Bas."

We went back upstairs as they spent time sitting Infront of each of the other seven windows staring at the bodies, the last one they sat Infront of was their own cell, now empty.

"You should have a name," I said.

They looked up at me puzzled, "Why?"

"Well, if I wanted to ask you something what would I say?" I said.

"You'd just say 'test subject K4Z3, what is my favorite color?' or something like that," they said.

"K4Z3, like Kaze?" I said.

"Kace?" they said.

"No, Kaze. Kazzze. Four and three are often used are substitutes for A and E in lingo, figured it works here too," I said.

"Kaze. I think I hate it," they said.

"We could pick something el—"

"I'll keep the name Kaze. My designation is the only thing that belongs to me, choosing an arbitrary name would be meaningless," they said.

"Well, ok then. It is yours after all," I said.

"It is, isn't it." They said, smiling slightly.

We sat there staring at their empty cell for another ten minutes before the rose their head.

"What now?" They said.

My compass marker was gone and after a few seconds was replaced by another slowly blinking cursor.

"Now we live."