Year 5 Month 4 Day 14

"Its finished, I'm normal, I am complete, I have working legs, a working horn, my cutie mark, a career, a home. I am, happy."

Proto sets the pen down next to her journal pages. The white aura surrounding her new horn dims. Her face is still stained with blood, her legs splattered red. She walked over to her work table and looks at the synthesizer motherboard. She picks up her soldering iron with her magic and takes a metal lead and completes a circuit across the board. She then picks it up and places in a box to be mailed back to its owner in Ponyville. She walks over to a mirror hanging in her bathroom and looks at herself in the mirror. The white and red of her new horn, the streams of blood stained in her coat.

Proto, "Now all I have to do is look the part."

The inside of the Castles main chambers are vast and silent. Jim stands front and center in front of a disappointed Celestia. Captain Seize stands a bit behind Jim and spaces out looking at the large stained glass murals around the hall.

Celestia, "Well?"

Jim, "huh?"

Seize, "what?"

Celestia, "you went out to look for Proto, then you just came back in here expecting me to know what happened, something happened right? This isn't one of your pranks is it Seize, I hate those."

Seize, "Something, yes. Prank, no."

Celestia, "well then what's the something that happened?"

Jim, "Well, heh, ya see the funny thing is…"

Seize, "shut up Jim, before you get us both killed, I'm gonna make the assumption that you had nothing to do with, that."

Jim, "I swear I had no idea that was going to happen" Jim turns to Celestia, "I didn't, I promise"

Celestia, "I don't even know what happened, What Happened?"

Seize, "Subject #19 acquired herself some advanced tech and 'manufactured' herself a new horn, she then used that horn to teleport away, I have agents scanning the streets of Canterlot as we speak"

Celestia, "Mmm, and what made you think you telling me would make your punishment any less severe?"

Jim and Seize's faces go flat in terror, posted royal guard move away from their posts along the walls of the hall and move in towards them. Celestia holds up her hoof and the guards stop their advance towards Seize and Jim.

Celestia, "find her, suppress her, and bring her here. Jim you go with him."

Seize, "aww c'mot tia"

Celestia, "AH AH, nobody tia's tia, now go before I change my mind"

Jim and seize turn around and leave the hall as quick as they could.

Outside of the castle, Jim and Seize stop to catch their breath after navigating the castle.

Jim, " *pant* *wheez* Jeez, that place is a freaking maze"

Seize, " *pant* *pant* I know *wheeze* I hate trying to find the bathroom in there, its virtually impossible. *pant* *pant* I found it one time, I got lost for 2 hours trying to get out."

Jim, " *pant* what out of the castle?"

Seize, "No *wheez* out of the bathroom. Whhhhhhhoooo, okay, so. where to first?"

Jim, "wha, I DUNNO! Don't you have agents looking around Canterlot?"

Seize, "no *pant* do you have any *pant* idea how hard it is to organize a search party with my organization, *pant* *pant* Too freaking, thats how hard."

Jim, "so you just straight up lied to Celestia"

Seize, "If god was your boss, you'd want to make her feel safe too, trust me, you don't want to see Tia when she's pissed"

Jim, "well okay then, locations…I dunno, her apartment?"

Seize, "no thats too obvious, she wouldn't go there"

Jim, "then I don't know"

Seize, "what we need is a place to think"

They start walking down the street towards the center of town, Seize then leads Jim to a small corner side store.

Jim, "Canterlot Cakes? aren't we supposed to be doing something, I don't know, productive"

Seize, "this is productive, I give them money, they produce cake, thats how this works. now sit down, you've been through a lot recently"

Jim and Seize sit down at a table inside the store, a waitress comes over to them.

Waitress, "can I get you gents anything?"

Seize, "yeah, I'll have the vanilla hay cheesecake, and my friend here will take a tray of blueberry sapphire cupcakes.

Jim's eyes go wide at the thought of the cupcakes.

Jim, "ehh, I suppose Proto can wait."

Waitress, "Alright i'll be right back with those for you."

Seize, "so, whats your deal man?"

Jim, "my deal?" he rolls his eyes "I moved here from Mainhattan about 6 months ago, I've been working as an independent analyst getting money from grants on my research. I still need to find a long term accommodation in Cloudsdale if I am to complete my research."

Seize, "Lame, what I meant was, whats your 'deal', man?"

Jim, "I… What?"

Seize, "Y'know man, is there a Mrs. Jim?"

Jim's eyes go half mast and he cringes to the thought of the question, he face palms in pure disgust.

Jim, "please tell me you're kidding"

Seize, "I am 100% serious man."

Jim, "no…. just, no. My turn"

Seize, "aww c'mon dude really? freaking Tia you're such a buzzkill, alright go ahead."

The waitress comes over to the table with the cakes.

Jim picks up a cupcake, "What did Proto do?" He takes a bite of the cupcake and his eyes go wide, "sweet Celestia"

Seize, "sorry thats classified, literally anything else go right ahead"

Jim, "nope" He takes another bite, (muffled) "thats my question, now answer it"

Seize, "I'm gonna go with, no"

Jim, "Do it or i'm telling Tia you lied to her"

Seize, "you slippery reptile" he pauses and reviews his possible options, "I think your bluffing"

Jim looks around the store and sees a delivery pony about to leave the store with some cakes.

Jim, "excuse me, where are you headed with those cakes"

Delivery pony, "these fine beauties are going straight to Canterlot Castle"

Jim, "what a coincidence" He gives Seize a wide evil grin. he then takes a napkin and writes a letter on it.

Jim, "do you think you could give this to some pony who can take it to the Princess, Tell them its from Captain Seize."

Seize, "he's not Captain Seize, I am."

Jim, "see, now be quick about it this is urgent"

Seize's face goes flat and he grits his teeth.

Delivery pony, "You got it Mr. Seize"

He outstretches his hoof to receive the letter.

Seize, "WAIT WAIT!, Uhh, Jim, lets talk about this."

Jim, "oh pony feathers , this letter doesn't have a seal, sorry sir, maybe some other time."

Delivery pony, "ehhh, okay then." he then leaves the store to deliver the cakes.

Seize, "I hate you"

Jim, "yeah yeah that great, now tell me what she did."

Seize lets out a sigh, "fine, BUT IF YOU TELL ANYPONY, I WILL PERSONALLY…"

Jim, "blah blah I'm a traitor blah blah you'll kill me blah, hurry up already"

Seize, "You ever find it weird that she wanted new limbs Extremely Badly?"

Jim, "I feel like this has a point, could we just get to that?"

Seize, "your lucky enough i'm giving you this information in the first place, the least you could do is go along with the story"

Jim, "fine… Well, actually, now that you mention it… No, I don't find it weird whatsoever that a quadriplegic from birth would want to walk"

Seize, "But she could walk, she had her wooden prosthetics and used her magic to walk."

Jim, "yeah but doing so impaired her from using her magic while simply standing up because if she did she would lose focus on her limbs."

Seize, "Then how does she keep a steady job?"

Jim, "I… well" Jim ponders this for a moment, "with assistants, she hired me as an assistant, her pay was pretty terrible so I can see why she may have had to go through a lot."

Seize, "oh she went through a lot all right, you're the lucky one"

Jim, "what do you mean?"

Seize, "an electrical engineer, here in Canterlot, the city of unicorns, look around, do you see one electrical appliance?"

Jim looked around the store, he was right, the oven in the back was fueled by fire and sparked by unicorn magic, the light posts outside were lanterns, and now that he thinks about it, he had to go through a lot of hassle in order to set up electricity in his house.

Seize, "the last thing Canterlot needs is an electrical engineer. So you tell me, why is she here?"

Jim ponders the question, "I was going to be a test subject?, no, NO, that doesn't make sense, I'm a dragon, my nervous system is completely different from a ponies."

Seize, "you're right."

Jim, "What?"

Seize, "you weren't going to be a test subject, you were just going to be her assistant. I should know, I wiped her memory of her previous 'assistants'."

Jim, "wh- why?"

Seize, "to see if she would choose a different path, its blatantly clear now that its not the case, instead of finding other ponies, she just used herself, but pretty soon, she's going to want to expand, she's going to want more, she'll want to try things that to another pony might prove fatal if done improperly."

Jim, "her, her previous assistants were, were…"

Seize, "experiments, yes, they were tests of her early models, she quite literally would do anything to walk, including kill, multiple times."

Jim, "Then why the heck is she still alive, its obvious she's dangerous"

Seize, "Because even though her methods are incredibly unorthodox, her intentions would be quite helpful across Equestria. Working autonomous prosthetics, do you know how many lives we could better with that kind of technology. And now a working prosthetic horn, the medical applications aside, imagine what that could do to our military."

Jim, "so that's what she is, a walking militia!"

Seize, "don't go on her side, do you have any ideas the kind of horrid things she did to ponies in the past."

Jim, "but those are gone right, you wiped her memory of all that, so what makes you think she'll want more?"

At that moment a bright flash of white light can be seen in the distance outside the shop, followed by a massive explosion. the mushroom cloud extended far into the sky, screams could then be heard in the distance. Jim turns slowly away from the scene outside the shop, He reaches out and grabs another cupcake off the table and begins eating it slowly. He swallows then puts it back down.

Jim, "is that the direction of the Canterlot library?"

Seize, "yep"

Jim, "her apartment is right next to it, could be a coincidence."

Another large explosion is seen in the distance followed by more horrifying screams. Jim reaches out and takes another bite of his cupcake, chews, swallows, then sets it down again.

Jim, "we should go"

Seize, "agreed"

Jim and Seize leave a pile of bits on the table and run out of the store towards Canterlot library.

Proto stands in front of a mirror looking at the machined work of her legs and horn, she turns away and looks at her work table. On it sits a chunk of pure crystal, using her magic, she cuts it up into a 2 foot long cone with a very pony tip. She then hollowed out the inside of the cone and separated it into sections. Next to the crystal laid a metal and an extender mechanism in the center, she organizes the sections of crystal on top of one another over the metal base. the extender mechanism reaches out and grabs onto each individual section. Proto then uses her magic to break each section into vertical thirds around the base. Each third is grabbed by the extender mechanism and organizes them into a compact cone about the height of a normal unicorn horn, at the top sat the sharp vertex of the original cone. the metal base was hooked up to a switch, she flicks it on and the extender made the structure grow to its original 2 foot length in a matter of seconds, flicking it off, it shrinks back to its compact size. She walked over to the wall and places her current horn into a vice, she twists her head and the horn detaches from its hub in her skull. she then walked over to the table and grabbed the new horn with her hooves and clicked it into place. The metal base of her new horn outstretched extra grips to the hub to make a more firm grasp on her head. The new horn glows a bright white like her other one, with a quick thought, she extends the horn and it snaps into its 2 foot long length in a matter of seconds. She extends and contracts it a few times to make sure it was working properly, with it fully extended, she walked over to the vice holding her old horn

Proto, "theres no need for this old thing anymore"

Her aura lights up around her horn and around her old horn, it levitates in front of her, then in a quick instant, the old horn collapses in on itself, Proto continues to compress it until it was the size of a marble. she lets it go and it clacks on her floor. She retracts her horn again and uses her magic to pull out a jar from her chest in the corner of the room. The jar contains a thick cloud of some kind, its labeled 'Nanites'. She uncaps the jar and a large cloud envelopes the room, in the center of the cloud a white light shines from Proto's horn, the cloud grew thinner and thinner as they grouped around her prosthetics. Once the cloud complete dissipated, Proto walked to her bathroom mirror, her horn and legs looked, like the rest of her body, they looked like a normal ponies legs and horn, her legs had muscle tone and veins, her horn had curves and a spiral curling up to its vertex. Proto sees her reflection and begins to cry, she notices this and puts her hoof up to her eye, even water ran over her hoof as if it were real skin and fur. She grins with happiness and chuckles at the beauty of it all.

Proto, "Time to go out on the town"

She walked over to her door and put a hat and scarf on, she then steps outside and takes a deep breath of fresh air. Out of the corner of her eye she sees a pair of white unicorn stallions, she looks over and sees that they are royal guard accompanying Princess Celestia to the Canterlot library. As they walked towards the entrance one of the guards caught Proto staring.

Royal Guard, "is there a problem miss?"

Celectia hears the guard and looks over

Celestia, "Hmm?"

She then looks at Proto and instantly recognizes her.

Celestia, "YOU!"

Proto, "huh?"

Celestia's horn began to grow a bright yellow. Proto stepped back slowly in fear.

Celestia, "YOU'RE COMING WITH ME!"

Celestia lets loose a massive beam of magic energy at Proto. Proto shuts her eyes in fear of the incoming beam. Then, out of a sheer force of instinct, her horn extends out of the Nanite shell that coated it. It locked into place and her magic created a shield spell in front of the beam, The two connected and a massive amount of energy exploded upwards. Proto slowly opens her eyes and sees the street charred all around her, except where she was standing. She then looked at herself to make sure she was okay, the nanite shell that coated her legs and horn formed a belt around her abdomen. Ponies that weren't in agony from burn marks stared at Proto in shock and fear of her power. Celestia stunned that her attack was blocked began to charge another attack. Proto used a teleportation spell and teleported behind Celestia. Celestia reacted quickly and turned her head aiming her horn at Proto then quickly fired. Proto used another Shield spell and successfully blocked the second attack as well. Celestia, thoroughly mad, grit her teeth and charged a third attack. but while she was charging her attack, Proto countered and boosted off the ground using her magic energized prosthetics. Her horn created a cone of magic around it and she rammed into Celestia at an incredible speed. The recoil sent Celestia flying into the air, but she quickly came to her senses and spread her great wings, creating a shadow that cast over Proto. Proto looked up at Celestia, in wonder and in awe. She looked at the size of her wings, the power of them, the power of her. Then suddenly the belt of nanites around Proto molded themselves into a pair of metallic wings. Celestia locked eyes with Proto and saw the wings. Proto extended the wings straight upwards and thrust them down with a great amount of force, sending her high into the air, eye level with Celestia. Jim and Seize arrive and see them in the air. Jim is in awe of Proto's wings.

Celestia, "You've already done enough damage, come quietly or face extended consequences"

Proto, "I've done damage? you were the one who attacked me, I merely defended myself, you see that" Proto points her hoof at the ground, Ponies scramble in the burning chaos that was Celestia's Royal Power. Ponies lie unconscious, some running with severe burns screaming in pain, a hospital cart finally arrives to aid in the devastation, fire pegasi fly overhead to put out the fires.

Proto, "This isn't my doing Princess Celestia, this is yours."

Celestia stares at the carnage, a tear is visible in her eye in realization of what she had done. She attempts to bare down and face Proto.

Celestia, "It was only because of your actions that I preformed so irrationally."

Proto, "What are you talking about, what have I done to harm you prior to this. to any pony? You tell me!"

Celestia becomes truly enraged. Proto replies calmly

Proto, "you can't can you." she shakes her head, "So much for the great and honorable Celestia, enjoy trying to explain this little fiasco to your burning subjects."

Proto's horn illuminated with its white aura, it surrounds her and she teleports away.

Celestia slumps her head in anguish and defeat, she sees Seize and Jim starring up at her with fear in their eyes. In her shame, she spreads her wings and flies back to the castle.

Year 5 Month 4 Day 15

"The past 24 hours have been something to behold, The nanites especially are strange. I programmed them to adhere to the will of my magic, but for them to create a working pair of robotic wings? it makes no sense. Why had they performed in that manner? Its as if they were mending themselves to my innermost thoughts,. For now I've ceased to use them until I can perform further tests. Onto the battle, firstly, I fought Celestia and didn't die, that right there is something to praise all in itself. But over all, it was wrong, I acted too slowly, I defended myself, but I had plenty of time to not just defend, but retaliate. What I need is a way to see actions while they are being performed and react accordingly. The fight is far from over, and if i'm to face Celestia again, I am going to need all the help I can get."

Proto set down her pen and parchment onto the ground with her magic. She had very little time to grab her things from her apartment before Celestia would see her. She grabbed all she could and put them in her saddlebag; her journal and extra parchment, her soldering iron, a hoof heard mirror, an optical video cord, a camera lens, and a small box of spare wires and a few blank silicon motherboards. She set her saddle bag on the floor of the cave she is currently call home. She walked over to a puddle and looked at her reflection and splashed the water, she stared as the ripples broke the image and moved over her face. Her eyes widened a bit, she walked over to her saddle bag and took out her hoof heard mirror. She looked at her reflection and stared at her iris.

Proto, "I need to see my targets actions and be able to react accordingly."

She took her hoof and pulled down her eyelid to look at her full eye. She then looked over in her saddlebag and saw the camera lens, the optic cord, and the box of various electrical components. A grin grew across her face.

Proto, "And I believe I know just how to do it."

END PART 3