Chapter 2
The Doctor used his sonic screwdriver to seal the corridor leading to Lavender Berry's body, out of respect for the pony that he never had the privilege of meeting. Or, rather, meeting while they were both still alive.
Amethyst wiped away a tear, not able to handle the stress of her current situation whatsoever, not with her best friend dead.
Then, she heard it, the sound of perfectly timed and calculated walking. She'd lived around robots for her entire life, but she'd never heard something quite so robotic. She looked over to the Doctor, and saw his eyes grow more wide than she'd thought possible. The whole time she'd been around him, there'd been a crazy, confident look on his face. Now, there was nothing but survival, and animalistic fear, the fight or flight response freezing his body from any sort of plan he could create.
The Doctor snapped out of his stupor of amazement and horror, and whispered lightly to Amethyst, "Listen to me, Amethyst; there are only a few rules for this type of situation. First, do not run, running never helps, and you'll just trip over something if you do. Second, don't go up any stairs, you'll just box yourself into your own coffin, so to speak. Fourth, no, wait…Third, don't go into anyplace that isn't well lit, I can't guarantee that there is only the one Cyberpony. Four, don't go anywhere alone, that's just asking for trouble. Understand me?"
Amethyst broke at least 3 of the rules at the same time, having run away from the Doctor around the second rule.
The Doctor was amazed by the nearly natural response in each and every creature in the universe to not only never listen to him, but to go against his knowledge in an attempt to simultaneously go against all of their instincts for survival.
If he had time to facehoof, he would have then.
But he didn't have time; the Cyberpony was far too close behind him to do something as useless as a facehoof. He had to run, right then, or he would die. Cyberponies aren't able to convert a Time Pony to become one of the Cyber Legion, but they certainly weren't about to let their enemy get away.
Pacing himself only a small bit faster than the Cyberpony, an easy feat due to its extreme calculation of speed, he headed in the direction of Amethyst, knowing that everypony eventually breaks all the rules of being in a deadly situation with an insane killer, so he knew, also, that up the stairwell in the dark is where the surviving ponies are.
From the sounds of screaming, yet another rule that really shouldn't be have to be told, he knew he was right, and headed up the stairs calmly, knowing that emotion in these situations only makes it worse for the pony trying to make it out alive.
With the Cyberpony out of sight, the Doctor dash up the stairs, making sure to control his emotional response to being hunted by one of the most fearsome creatures he's ever dealt with, and the high likelihood that up there, with Amethyst Jewel and whoever else may have survived, was a Cyber Conversion Unit, and that only danger awaited him. He regretted not bringing his brainy specs, but something told him that looking smart was the least of his problems at the moment. Still, a bit of a boost to his sight would be a great advantage in this situation, even if, following the clichés, they would be broken by his own stupidity, crippling him at a critical moment.
The Doctor really needed to stop watching horror movies; it was affecting his ability to get away from danger. However hard he may try to convince himself, and everypony else, that it was helping him, he knew that his instincts are more powerful than anything a badly made movie designed to make ponies scream may make him think.
He heard another scream, alerting him to the other ponies' location, but also likely alerting the Cyberpony to their location, as well. He whispered a curse to himself, a very old and very filly unfriendly curse, and dashed up the remaining stairs. The staircase seemed to stretch on forever, the darkness hiding the top from the Doctor.
He reached the top of the stairs, and looked across the dark room for an exit, casting away his superstition about going up staircases while in danger. Surprising himself, he found the exit, and bolted through the doorway, to find Amethyst and another pony.
"Amethyst, we must hurry, the Cyberpony is very close," the Doctor said, his breath intensely drawn in between each phrase, building up his desperate sentence.
"We can't! I just pulled Orange Fist out of a horrible machine, and that's the only thing down that hallway thing!" Amethyst said, obviously having been the one who screamed both times.
The Doctor used all of his will to avoid mentioning that Orange Fist sounded like a terrible superhero, and barely managed to say, "We have to get out of here, now, or we're all about to end up in that machine."
He then lifted Orange Fist up, and carried him down the stairs, hoping desperately that he could get away from the Cyberpony with Orange Fist and Amethyst still alive.
"YOU. SHALL. BE. CONVERTED," the Cyberpony said in a monotone voice, each word spoken or, better described, projected, as an individual statement, with a long pause between each. Its voice was asexual, too deep to be female, but too soft to be male.
The Doctor picked up in speed considerably after hearing that, before noticing, in pure and utter shock, that Amethyst Jewel was no longer behind him.
"Orange Fist, don't let yourself be caught, okay? I'll be right back, need to save Amethyst," the Doctor said, dropping Orange to the ground, and running back up the stairs, back to where he knew the Cyber Conversion Unit was. Then, he heard it. Or, rather, didn't hear it. There was no loud sound of the Cyberpony walking, no pounding on the industrial floor of the building. It was either at the converter, or too far away to be heard, both of which were very, very bad.
The Doctor ran as quickly as he could, forgetting his rule about never running with emotion in that situation. He painfully fell to the floor, and rolled down the staircase in agony, beginning to hear the screams of Amethyst Jewel as she was being turned into a Cyberpony.
Breathing hard, and concentrating on his mission, he ran back up the stairs, through the pain of what could be called an epic fail, and galloped across the room, looking for the Cyber Conversion Unit.
He gasped in equal parts fear and sadness as he saw that he was too late, and Amethyst Jewel was a pony no longer.
She was a Cyberpony, stripped of emotions, and turned into a killing machine, bent on conquering the universe, one living creature at a time.
Only, she was incomplete, the conversion still occurring. He had to choose between two horrible options: Use his sonic screwdriver to deactivate the machine, which would buy him some time to rescue the remaining ponies, but kill Amethyst, or let it finish, leaving him stuck with 2 Cyberponies and less of a chance to win, but allowing Amethyst to, in a way, survive. The completed Cyberpony stomping in his direction didn't help his indecision, either.
The Doctor felt worse than he did when he had sent away all of the Time Ponies, a sort time ago, but knew what he had to do.
He tearfully lifted up his sonic screwdriver, and with a high-pitched sound, deactivated the Cyber Conversion Unit. If he was only a bit faster, Amethyst would have been alive.
"Sorry, Cyberpony, but there's no mercy to anypony that messes with my friends," the Doctor bitterly said, as he used his sonic screwdriver to temporarily deactivate the Cyberpony, giving him even more time to get Orange Fist to safety, and to find the other ponies.
On the way out, he locked the door behind him, thanking the universe for not making the door be wooden.
Sadly clopping down the stairs, he considered if he had even helped with his interference, or if he only made things worse. He threw away the thought, deciding that only a few ponies safe were better than no ponies safe, and picked up Orange Fist.
"What happened to Amethyst?" Orange asked as he regained consciousness.
"Same thing that happened to you, only she wasn't as lucky," the Doctor sadly informed him.
"Oh…" Orange said. If he was able to move his front legs to wipe away his tears, he would have. He was too crushed to tell the Doctor that Amethyst had, before her untimely demise, been his fiancé. Orange wondered just how lucky he was to have survived that terrible machine alive, but not to have done so with her.
"I'm sorry to ask, Orange, but do you have any idea where all the other ponies might be?" the Doctor asked.
"You might try going down those stairs, the ones with the bright lights, in the right corridor," Orange said, badly masking his broken heart.
"Of course that's where they'd be," the Doctor said. He then asked, "Can you walk? I'm sorry to ask, but, I'm recently regenerated, and…You're not the lightest pony."
"Oh, yeah, I think I can," Orange said, climbing off of the Doctor's back, and wobbly stood up.
"Thank you."
"Can I ask you something? Well, before I can ask, I 'll also have to ask: what's your name?"
"I'm the Doctor."
"Doctor, do you have any family here?"
"No."
"Do you have any family at all?"
"Not anymore."
Orange Fist stared tearfully at the ground, and said, "Me, too."
The Doctor wanted desperately to say he was sorry, but he knew that it would have been completely useless.
"I'm sorry," he said anyway.
"Thank you, Doctor."
They walked down the stairs to the oddly well-lit room as they heard the pounding of the now awoken Cyberpony pounding on the locked doors. They had little time before they were completely doomed.
The Doctor just had to remember how to get back to the TARDIS, and luckily for him, the Silence had not been following him that day. He needed something to be lucky for.
