The Great Multiverse Theory: Repairs and Recordings

I wiggled my jaw at the static that is now the video feed of my robot. And this was several years before the crazy starts happening. If the change of days is enough to short out the camera, when the main course begins, the entire thing will go up in a small fireball. I gave a slight sigh. The words of a powerful wizard and a few forgotten personal experiences come up to mind. Paraphrased, its pretty much how magic interferes quite a bit with technology. In small experiments I have conducted, I had found out that in some cases they act similarly to electricity, and though it was a type of energy, it acted more like an EMP pulse to things that run off of electricity. I could convert A/VER-E to run of a magical power source, such as a gem battery or crystal powder based hydraulics, but despite its size, A/VER-E actually uses enough energy to run a factory. Using magic stored in crystals was just way too inefficient when I have Energy/Matter (E/M) Rods at my disposal. Basically, they were solid rods of matter than can be melted in a way to release the energy, and resembles a black hole in density, though with a bit of manipulation, I managed to make them comparatively light and portable.

So, in order to use this power source instead, I needed to call out someone who I left as an emergency, someone who could do the necessary modifications to A/VER-E. I flipped out my rusty phone. “Janitor, get Erma.”

A hummingbird sat on a tree, napping besides a sweet, yellow pegasus’s cottage. Life is goood she thought to herself, lightly ruffling her feathers. Several centuries of just enjoying the life made one content bird. Hmm. A buzzing noise. Oh, so he needs me now? Guess I’ll go check it out. The small bird shook its head in a brief bout of confusion before understanding the message. She took off and flew to a specific set of coordinates in the Everfree Forest and landed about ten minutes later in a barely visible clearing. She fluttered around a bit and found an egg half buried inside a branch. A bit of pecking managed to loosen the egg, and then she rolled it to a fork in the branch. The bird gently tapped her head against the side of the egg; the egg pulsed slightly. She would miss her presence.

As the hummingbird shot away, the egg rolled off the branch and cracked onto the forest floor, spilling life juices everywhere, the fluids slowly seeping into the ground. Some of the evaporating liquid caused a few flowers of some dead looking trees directly beside the impact point to quiver. Suddenly, color rushed back into the trees, and their roots started straining against their earthly cell. A circle of grass yellowed and died. A few feet below the surface, the yolk touched the bones a certain someone left in place. A circle of runes glowed from beneath the grass, electricity jumping up the tree trunks nearby. With renewed vigor, the trees ripped completely out of the soil and stepped into the circle. Wood chunks fell off like melting butter, sinking into the soil. The peeled bark revealed a set of dry, well preserved muscles and organs, which entered a hole one of the trees have made in the unmarked grave. Soon, all that was left were a few husks of the old trees.

A moment passed before a bony hoof stabbed its way out from the dirt. With the last of their juice, the trees pulled upward, loosing a bit of the soil. The bony hoof slowly pulled the rest of its skeleton out of the ground, sitting in a pool of mud. After it was sure its internal organs were in place did it absorb all the water. Lungs reinflated, a heart was met with new blood, and a mouth took its first breath in centuries, though the mind inhabiting the body had been alive for some time. Cells replicated at a rapid pace, growing skin to hold the body together. Hair follicles grew a tannish fur and a ragged, messy grass colored mane. Eyeballs inflated, spinning a bit in their sockets.

Elma stretched her old body, yawning slightly. Grappling claws grew out of her hooves and hauled the rest of her skeleton out of its shell, shaking her rump a bit to spread out the water and a bit of tail flicking to shake out all the dirt. The claws slowly retracted back into her hooves. She looked at the bored figure leaning on a tree across from her, his grey flak jacket rather noticeable against the background of trees. “Was that really necessary?” he asked

She pointedly ignored him. “So, whatcha call me up for?” The Janitor straightened and stuck a thumb behind him.

a few hours later (in their time)

The pair walked to the edge of the forest and saw the still smoking ruin of what was a perfectly functional camera-bot. “Oh, so this happened,” Elma said. “You really should make a list of things on a planet that may cause distress to whatever plan you cook up.”

“I know, I know,” Shtik grumbled into her mind. “I was mainly worried over the god-princess here, and forgot about everything else. I’ll get to it eventually, but in the meantime, that’s why I have you here, is it not?

Elma rolled her eyes. “Fine, I’ll admit it makes life a bit more interesting. Now quiet, I’m working.” She circled the robot, examining its innards. The Janitor handed her a blueprint and an instructions manual, which she skimmed through. She summoned an ivory screwdriver out of her hoof and popped of the robot’s back cover and started pulling out half of the wires, motherboards, and cards inside. “Esh, the stuff inside is starting to melt just from the magic field.” She whacked her head a few times to change the frequencies her eyes saw to move the robot to a spot furthest away from the leylines in the area. The Janitor fell asleep, but did leave his broom beside her for her to use.

Elma took a deep breath. Here we go... Bubbles slowly formed along her hoof as she shoveled food dug from within the broom’s depths into her mouth. She also chugged a shot a hydrochloric acid to speed up the digestion process. A pink thumb like object popped out of her skin, almost looking like a tumor. Yellow fleshy wires sprouted out one end. Elma grew a hand underneath her right hoof, the one currently “holding” the growth and started the slow process of rewiring and reprogramming the robot.

Only after several blobs of fleshy matter have been grown and sealed within small silicon boxes and springs did Elma relax. There were still some motors within, but Elma had stuck on tiny spiral cone-shaped bones to act like magical lightning rods. Even if A/VER-E was hit with a magic blast, it will only be knocked out of commission for a few minutes to stabilize and reboot. That’s what Janitor and she were here for: to protect the robot from receiving too much damage and to repair what damages it may pick up.

Elma grabbed the back cover and screwed it back on. She spun a black rod recovered from the electronic innards she tore out earlier. “Here goes nothing.” She dropped the rod into a tube that looked suspiciously like an exhaust port. A tiny fan twitched in response to the energy that coursed through it and began to spin. Elma flipped open a tiny cover on A/VER-E’s “chest" and stuck the plug of a small view screen in to check its biologically based computer. For the moment, it seemed like all clear:

A/VER-E (2.0) searching …

A/VER-E (2.0) not found, running A/VER-E (1.0)

(1.0) is updating, please wait a moment …

Bioware successfully installed, now running version (1.0/B)

Total run time: 0 hours.

Damage: 4% (Note: Contains Passive repairs, est. time to 0%, 1 hour)

Power Levels: 88%, est. runtime, 1.5 years (Damn, this doesn’t sound really efficient. Probably why he doesn’t use bioware for simple projects)

System Diagnosis: Running …

All systems online, no errors detected.

A tiny, old looking camera popped out of the top of the cube shaped robot. It was the prototype camera, a cheap one slapped on just as a proof of concept. It wasn’t of the best quality, but it would work for now. Plus, it wasn’t as susceptible to the background magic, though there will be upgrades soon. I refuse to use this old thing forever.

The robot snapped its head up. “A/VER-E (1.0/B) ready for service.”

Elma smiled. She turned and prodded Janitor’s foot with a foot. “Wake up, sleepyhead. What’s our next destination?”

A hologram suddenly materialized beside her; it was a green tinted version of Shtik. “We’ll be going … back to the FUTURE!” He posed dramatically, pointing at the sky.

“Actually, back to the past, but whatever,” Janitor grumbled, hauling himself up. Shtik gave him a glare, but Janitor ignored him. Shtik looked like he was about to give a snappy retort when something appeared to have disturbed him. He held out a hand and summoned a revolver from Janitor’s broom. Shtik grabbed the handle, spun around, and fired into the darkness of the forest. Shtik then stuck his hand into a portal and pulled out a small gooey mess. Despite its ruined remains, a piece of a claw and wingtip was still distinguishable. “Oh dear...” he muttered.

Elma raised an eyebrow. “Something wrong?”

Shtik burned up the corpse. “I hope not, but you two, I mean three, go on without me. I’m going to need to do some research and find this world’s auditor. If what I fear is true, then there will be an even bigger reason I can't stay.” He tossed the revolver back into the broom and faded away. Elma and Janitor just stared at each other and shrugged. With nothing else to say, Janitor pulled out a rusty alarm clock, set the timer to several thousand years earlier and activated the alarm. A swirl of spiraling energy surrounded the trio. The light slowly grew brighter and brighter before a small boom went off as a section of air was disturbed rather violently. In moments, only a few sparkling traces were left behind.

I lowered my hand, the  reaper’s blood still tingling the palm of my hand. I clenched my stomach, wincing slightly from his furious kinsman clawing inside me. “Gah!” I fell to my knees, colors distorting. I saw a small young child standing to the side, staring at me. Boy or girl, human or alien, I would never know, because one second later there was only a bloody stain where I hacked my sword through it in blind fury, my forest green bathrobe flapping behind me. I closed my eyes and sheathed my blade, shakily exhaling. When I opened my eyes again, there was only a small pile of shattered stones. I have massive respect for those who must fight their conscience, it’s not easy, especially when it conflicts with your own moral path. I gave in once … never again.

I spun around and started packing my stuff: my monitor, the cannon, a few office supplies, etc. I tore a hole in space-time and jumped out of the universe and into the deck of my warship, The Loggerhead, which basically resembled a massive mechanical turtle with an equally massive array of concealed weapons. It was parked right next to the universe, so I quickly began scanning the number of citations that the universe had. As the scan ran, I was mildly amused that the universe had started budding already.

This amusement was cut short by the beeping that started emanating from the scanning device. The auditors...most were unique, separate entities. I looked down at my attire. A bathrobe is not what someone brings to battle. I flung it off behind me and summoned a glowing blue outline around me as I stood up. Liquid matter poured in, covering me briefly like a cocoon. Soon, the colors came back. I was dressed in my stealth suit. A grey fishing hat covered my face. A large, dark brown cloak fell to around my ankles. Old runes flared, opening portals within my pockets. I checked two trailing bandages from the back of my head. One fifty centimeters. That’s about 79%, good enough. I stuck my hands into my pockets, gripping the handle of a custom made sniper rifle and an oversized, large caliber, plasma boosted eight shot belt feld revolver. It was an old design, and my favored side arm for a good several centuries.

“Let’s go.” C-6 dutifully stuck his massive gripping claws out of my back and grabbed the controls of my ship and steered us along a glowing line to a world as we slowly but steadily floated closer. I pulled my rifle out, watching the pulsing wire, tracing its path as it split into a few pieces. “And there comes the first one. Soon, more will follow. And so will the unsavory ones.” C-6 walked me to the abandoned world as more wires started sprouting out, including a couple of other nearby worlds. We silently walked out of our ship through the main cannon and hopped into the void without a word.