Catalyst 2.0: Tool

>Heavy-set stallion of otherwise neutral make, the pale, caramel colored creature stares blankly ahead.  Standing proudly, mindlessly, atop a disc of flat metal within the white floor, concentric circles emanated outward from it's center.  Deep within, your AR vision viewed the entire pad as a signal ping, and you found the pad was laced with an unseen weave precious metals.  It was a signal booster with such bandwidth it threatened to pull you inside, by sheer value of it's consistent, humming strength.
“This has got to be the most dangerous idea you've ever had, Twilight.”
>”What makes you say that?” she asks.
>You walk around him.  Encased only by a circular ring of LED light, glowing around the edge of the disc, it closes it's eyes in a blink.  It is little more than biological necessity, you realize; it can't let it's oculars dry.  How long had it been standing there, watching the world ahead of it?  Hours? Days? It's entire “life?”
>It was twice your size.  When concerning weight, your AR vision acknowledged the weight class as such.  Even that was only the meat. The cybernetics and materials that compounded into a network of perfectly organized veins, combined with armored bones, made it at least 20% heavier.
>You checked some of the walls.  Though they were thin, you knew they had a fibrous weave that allowed some pliability.  They would bend before they broke, allowing for such impacts from weapons that they would appear as if shuddering.
>Based on your initial checks, you had no problems imagining that this creature could peel the goddamn doors apart, or crumple the layered plating from the wall.  It would probably cause a painful strain, but it didn't have the annoyance or virtue of pain.  That was before it was even dressed.
>Twilight had shown you the muscle suit below the enshrouding, hex-weave coat. Those accoutrements alone would let it demolish the entire room, bare-hooved, with a smile.  All of it was based off of Rarity's designs for her own prosthetic suit, and fashionable protective wear you were told she'd started after your death.
“Twilight, just from looking at it, I can see at least a dozen different ways to accidentally kill a pony.”
>It blinks again. It draws your gaze to it's eyes.  A layer of heat resistant glaze over a matrix of hexagonal photo-sensitive cells, it's cornea and pupil being made of tiny hexagons that had the glitter of sandpaper under glass.  You covered one of it's eyes. When you exposed it to light a moment later, you saw several of the tiny hex's go from a light-absorbant black to a bright blue as it blocked out input for the sake of clarity.
>Windows to the soul, without landscape beyond.
“Why use digital cameras for the eyes?”
>”I never gave specifics to the engineers besides resistance to blinding weapons.  A nice side effect was a lot of those use intense heat.  It could probably take a faceful of napalm and still function, though it would end up a lot uglier.”
“Ugly, huh?”
>You didn't have much of a concept of that with male ponies.  You smirk a little, and although you're still nervous, make a remark to try and lighten up the scenario.
>You owed that to her, at least, considering what she was doing for you.
“So, you made him cute?”
>Twilight let out a little snerk.  “Well, it wasn't really intentional, but...”
“Was it with me?”
>She rolls her eyes.  “You're based on the old models.  Rarity gave the base designs for the aesthetics on those.”
“So yes.”
>She groans, and you snort out a little laugh. “Your personality made a few subliminal modifications when your biology had to replace dying cells. It uses you perception of yourself for reference. But for the most part...”  The thought that you were inside a piece of mare eye candy never really occurred to you, but you had always assumed yourself plain.  After that, though, you felt rather like a piece of meat.  The body suit you were wearing, also, felt very suddenly tight.
>Goddamn matriarchy.
>You turn back to it, then turn away and look to the ground. You close your eyes and shake your head.
“I still don't like this.”
>Twilight responds in kind. “You shouldn't have to like it.  With all the things that have happened to you, though, I don't think you have much of a choice.”
>You sigh.  She was looking at all those past experiences like data, for some reason.
“Alright then.  Lets get this thing started.”
–
>Rarity sighed.  Putting Sweet Heart down for the night always was the chore of the day, the one she had to plan for each night.  She didn't really need much sleep, due to her... Unique biology.  It was a matter of discovering how to distract her at night so she would remain out of trouble, while simultaneously allowing Rarity to sleep.
>It had been rough at first.  She learned so fast, though, that it had gotten exponentially better since the first few weeks. Especially after she had gotten to know the guards, whom had been forced to play babysitter at night on occasion.  Sweet Heart was a loving girl, though, and didn't want to make mommy suffer.
>Sometimes, though, Rarity wondered. Was she raising a child, or was she herself being raised by the child?  She was so bright, it was impossible to tell sometimes.
>Always something to ask, always something to learn.  Rarity was, by proxy, learning more and more by the day, alongside her.  Tonight, it had been the intricacies of EverFree Quest's agility system and how it affected critical rate.  She swore, she'd be an expert at the game by the end of the month, though she hadn't even played it.
>The elevator doors opened.  It had soothed her rattled nerves to see her daughter again; she reflected so much of what he had been.  It was a reminder she was thankful for, after the display in Twilight's office.
>He was back, she kept telling herself.  He could be that happier stallion again.  But she was going to need a very, very curt talk with him- and then, with Applejack.
>They did NOT deserve to do that to one another, she kept thinking.
>Rarity had lost the repetition of visiting the labs over the past year.  She would have been able to recite where she was, what deck, what section. It was only polite, after all, to be timely and accurate with everything one worked upon.
>This place, however, was barely familiar.
>To either side of the long metal hall, was something she'd assumed she'd forgotten.  Depressions held horizontal containment tubes.  All but one contained floating, comatose pseudo-stallion figures in foggy blue nutrient fluid, lit from below and with bio-monitor screens hovering above each one.  She recalled having sketched out something of that make, contracted for use in the forsaken Ebon Pegasi drone program.
>She had never seen the functioning program in the flesh.  Knowing what it spawned, though, and what it had subsequently done to her friends... What it had done to *him*.
>Even after two years, the very thought always made her softly ill of mind. Though the blame for her old friends actions could rest solely upon that dead creature in the crater, she had always felt she'd enabled the entire bloody fiasco.
>She hurried past the tubes to avoid feeling watched, through the double-door, and into the control room.  Twilight was there, having asked her to the deck.  As she approached, Twilight regarded her with a glance.  To the side, within a deprivation tank, was that green colt she'd come to admire.  The violet pony was too focused on what was happening below to even greet her.
>”You need to see this.” she said.
>Rarity kept her eyes on him, taking a place between the tank and her friend.  He seemed as if dreaming, his eyes moving below the lids at lightning speed.  He was breathing slowly, as if meditating.  It made her smile, just a little, seeing him at peace in such a way.
>When she looked down into the lab, she saw one of her sketches in motion.  The full, flowing violet coat, tightly strapped to the form of a stallion she'd also put to paper.  It stood in the center of the room, looking around rather aimlessly.
>The floor was comprised of hexagonal plates.  Twilight's horn glowed slightly, and an acknowledgment blipped on one of her screens.  A single one of the plates rose to show that it was a tall, heavy column.  She pinged a few more, and they formed a set of off-center steps to the top of it.
>”Alright,” Twilight said. “hop to the top.”
>The stallion, whom Rarity assumed was far from being so athletic by the look of his weight, bounded effortlessly.  He was restricted only by his own agility, which seemed to be a weak point.  It was as if he were rather clumsy, truth be told.
>How would one of Twilight's programs be so inaccurate?
>Still, he was fast.  He judged each jump quickly enough that Rarity herself realized she never would have been able to move so quickly.  He just looked uncouth doing it.
>When he was atop the tallest column, he peered back and forth over the edges.  He turned around, looking down over the steps, and then looked upward.  He put a hoof to his chin, then turned back. “No, wait-” Twilight said. He crouched at the edge, and threw himself off.
>When he met the ground, the loud slam of his impact tapped the observation window.  Twilight grunted.  His body had been so heavy, it had crumpled the armored plating on the hex in which he'd landed.  Bent until shattering, the  plate had kicked up impact dust.  It cleared to show he was utterly unharmed, despite at least a fifty meter drop, and had his eyes closed. He was slightly hunched over, and opened one eye to peer about the room.  When he looked down, he stood straight, and then gave a whistle.
>He turned back to the window and gave a smile. “Didn't even feel it.” he said, in an impossibly deep, gravely voice.  He bobbed up and down on his legs, laughing a little.  Twilight, raising a brow, watched him crouch like a pouncing feline.  His flank waggled a moment, and he flew upwards in a leap.
>Rarity went wide eyed with Twilight, as he curled his legs up over the ledge.  He scuffed gently back atop the tallest column, and rolled his shoulders.  “By Celestia, the output was never supposed to...”  Twilight took to reading the monitors, and put a hoof to her head.
>”I'm gonna try something.” he said.  He jumped again, aiming for a clean hex.  To Rarity's bewilderment, he very purposely turned in mid-fall, landing on his back.
>He rose much like he did the first time.  In the middle of crumbled, broken pieces of white ablative plating.  He rolled to a sitting position, then rose to his hooves.  He looked back to the window again. “Didn't feel that either! Hah!”
>Rarity watched the massive male shake off the grunge. He was seeming to take great care in the appearance of the coat; he dusted of crumbs from the slick, undamaged cloth.  Even with how bad the fall had looked, she had to respect the fact he was at least keeping tidy.
>”Twilight,” Rarity began. “How exactly did you modify this stallion?”  She couldn't take her eyes off him, watching as he moved from the shattered floor.
>Twilight looked back at Rarity, looking very pleased with something.  “I didn't.  I made him from some schematics Applejack had.”
>The violet pony blipped something else on her screen.  Another column rose, about head height.  A hologram appeared on each of the six sides- a target silhouette.
>”Alright, hit it.” Twilight said.
>”With what? The guns aren't online.”
>”If you can't figure that out, you're not doing it right.”
>He turned to the hologram.  Rarity watched as he turned and bucked.  A single strike from both back hooves left him off balance, as the force behind it seemed to make the column evaporate in an eruption of noise and broken material.  He fell to his stomach, having expected the column to at least still be there, and when he got back to his hooves and turned around, he held up a forehoof.
>”This is at least double the expected collateral output.” Twilight whispered to herself. “The combat suite must be modifying underlying redlines.”
>”Gimme another.” he said. “Taller, this time.”
>The column rose to double height next to it's shattered brother.  He crouched.
>He yelled out some kind of jibberish as he struck: “SHORYUKEN!” He used a single forehoof, slinging it upward and using the weight of his rear hooves. It carried him from the ground, and the column exploded vertically, leaving a jagged wedge. The force carried him forward and over it, and he landed a good three meters beyond. The bits of it moved with such force they bounced off the ceiling of the atrium.
>Quite happy with himself, he shook his black mane clean of the dusty shards as they rained down upon the area. He looked at a hoof. “Damn, I feel awesome.”
>”You actually MADE this monster?” Rarity asked.  “Twilight, how could you possibly think that anyp0ny wouldn't see this as some kind of war armament? What could we ever need him for?”
>Twilight looked back to her, seeming surprised.
>”Look at him.  He's enjoying himself in this!  What would those hits have done to a normal pony?!”
>Twilight tilted her head. “Rarity, it's-”
>He looked to the window.  “Rarity, you saw that right?”
>She looked back at him with a gasp.  He knew her name?  Had Twilight put some VIP library into the drone program?
>”You won't have to worry about me getting hurt again when I'm in this thing!”
>Words melted, and trickled away.  Her eyes went wide.  She peered at the deprivation tank, noticing the soft smile on his lips.  Her jaw fell open when she met the eyes of the stallion below, with a viciously visual, sickening combination of fear and rage.
>”Twilight,” she whimpered. “You... You didn't...”
>Twilight let her vision go between Rarity, and the beast in the atrium. “You didn't know?” she asked.  “The body schematics have been in at least five different memo's I sent... this has been on record for at least a year now, but with him here now it's-”
>”I have a CHILD to take care of Twilight! I simply don't have time to read every little...” He was looking up at the two of them, worried and befuddled.  “WE have a child to...” she shook her head.  “How could you do this to him?!”
>”Rarity, I'm not sending him away in that chassis. This is only in case something-”
>”That isn't the point!” she yelled.  “You put him in that thing, that can crush and shatter the world around him, and you're saying it's a 'just in case?!”
>”He doesn't have full control over it Rarity, he won't-”
>”Oh that's just sooooooo much better.  Nop0ny could ever need that much 'just in case.' Not only do you make it, then you put him in that thing when he doesn't even have real control over it?”
>”Rarity!”
>She looked down below, from where the voice had come.  Her eyes met his, while she reigned in angry tears.  She looked back at the tank, the familiar, humble, caring body asleep inside.
>”I'm doing to protect myself.  To protect us, if need be.  Doesn't that mean anything?”
>She grit her teeth. “You see what it's done to him already?  He's appreciative of being able to do those horrible things! Didn't you think about precedent? What if somep0ny finds out and comes after him BECAUSE of this?  What if he starts WANTING to do those things?”
>”What if they came after him because of what he could do before?  Came after you and Sweet Heart, to get to him?”
>Rarity put her head to the deprivation tank, looking over him inside it.  He had a scowl, listening to their conversation, now as if deep in an endured nightmare. She looked back at the demonic creature below.  “I'm not saying you shouldn't try to... I'm just...”  She turned to talk to the strange stallion below.  “It's not like you.  It's like you're getting used again. By my friends, no less.  Why on Equestria would either of you allow yourselves to fall into that?”
>He opened his eyes with a start. He put a hoof to the glass of the tank, looking for a way out.  Muffled, he pleaded. “Rarity, don't leave. Please, just-” The door opened with a smooth, barely audibly hydraulic hiss.  “I just didn't want you to have to worry.”
>She wanted to hate him for what she'd just seen him do.  Honestly, truly wanted to.  He just stood there, and swallowed hard.
>She put a hoof under his chin, and moved close to him. Eye to eye and inches apart, she moved to rub her nose with his. “I'm not saying you shouldn't try to protect me and Sweet Heart.” she whispered.  “I'm saying you should prove to everyp0ny that you can be trusted. Fear of what you're capable of isn't the way to go about it.”
>He rubbed his nose back against her, not daring to close his eyes.
>”What happened to my big-hearted hero, huh?” She asked.
>He sputtered into a little laugh. “I'm just sick of feeling helpless.”
>Rarity blinked.  “Fluttershy was the same way.” She said.  “What happened, then?”
>The serrated comment cut him clean to the bone.  She didn't have to hear him say a word.
>”Don't you think you can do better?” She asked.
>He smiled again, though his eyes appeared as if he were blinking away some kind of irritant. He sniffled.  It reminded her of doing the same, and when she did, took in that pleasant vanilla scent his body had.
>”Yeah.”  He said.  “If... If I could just ask you something?”
>”Of course, Darling.”
>”Well, I'm worried.” he said.  “I mean, I'm just... I can't do anything by myself right now.  All but the recent files are only so much garbage.  I guess, well... If we do clear things up in all the-”
>”Memories, dear. Memories.”
>”... Memories. Yeah.” He was trying desperately to keep his eyes upon her, picking his words.
>Rarity chuckled painfully.  Her heart sunk. “Try to have a little faith in yourself, darling. You're still standing, aren't you?”
>There was a quiet between them, for a time. “That's what I'm worried about. I shouldn't be, from what I can remember.  What if when everything's clear again,” He tried to smile.  Such a shame, it was so very forced. “I'm not the big-hearted hero, then?”
>He tried to figure out something to actually say, or do. Rarity wanted to believe he was glad to see her.  From his show down in the atrium, however, she was not so sure.  So, she gambled.  She kissed him.
>He closed his eyes and inhaled through his nose, pleasantly surprised.  When she pulled away several seconds later, he looked as if waking up from a happy, restful nap.
>”You don't have to change your face for us.  You know that.”
>The words made him look suddenly, and brutally ill.  “What is that supposed to...”
>”Oh... No, darling, I didn't mean-”
>”Do you think this is easy? I trying to figure out where I stand. I am NOT-”
>She put a hoof to his mouth.  He stared over it.  “No, darling.  You aren't.  And I don't ever want you to be.”
>His hoof came to hers, and he lowered it gently away from his mouth.  The way his neck muscles tensed, she realized, he was choking back words.  He turned from her, “I gotta put the chassis away.”
>”Please, don't ignore me.” She said. “Just... keep some perspective one what that thing, really is.”
>”A tool.” he replied, dry as dust.  He ran a hoof along his head, putting it to the floor. ”Yeah.  Just a tool.”  The door sealed him back inside, and moments later, the chassis below started to move.
>Rarity tried to say something more, through the glass.  He didn't respond.
>”He can't hear you now.” Twilight said.
>She quickly turned back to her old friend, trading glances between the tank containing him.  She didn't want to show it, but it was already obvious. She could feel the mascara starting to drool along one cheek. “What happened to him, Twilight? He's taking every chance he can to focus on everything so-”
>”I know, Rarity. It has to do with the memories he can't fully access.”  The violet pony watched him.  He stumbled in the chassis, swearing to himself silently.  “He did a lot of fighting.  There's a lot of ticks that seem to set him off, and he's beating himself up because he doesn't know why.”
>”You can help him, can't you?”
>Twilight sighed.  “I don't know, Rarity.  Once I start the defrag process, he's going to see it for himself.”
>As he stood upon a metal pad, he turned to face outward.  The chassis rolled it's shoulders again, and moved to close it's eyes.
>“He's going to relive every ugly moment of what made him like this. But he'll understand. We all will.  I guess the next question is, if we can handle that.”
>”But Twilight,” Rarity said. “Did he even recognize where he was?”
>”It's only a replica.”
>”How could he possibly forget it?  It's where he killed Rain-”
>The deprivation tank opened up, and he shook his head as he left it.  It took all her strength not to reply to Twilight.  She used her magic to lift the mascara from her face, and smeared the hovering droplet on the underside of the rubber body-suit's hoof cover.
>”You have a big day tomorrow, Darling.” she said to him. Her lungs begged to scream.  Remaining the lady... How much had it changed *her*? “Lets go home.”