The Invincible Iron Manon (Part 11)

>Like a butterfly leaving the safe chrysalis, you depart from the warm grasp of sleep.

>A pleasant yawn escapes your lips as you stretch. What a nice—OW!

>Sharp pain resonates in your left shoulder.

>Forced to open your eyes, you look at your arm. It is bandaged up. The white ribbons trail along your chest and bicep.

>Out of the corner of your eye, you spot a whiteboard with a name on it.

Doc…Doctor Doctorton?

>Under the strange title is your own name. It’s…a patient chart. You’re in a hospital.

>The tacky blue and yellow zig-zag wallpaper should have been a dead giveaway but hey, you’re tired.

Man Jahvise, what did you do while I was sleeping?

>No sound answers you. No sound of gears, no metal scraping on the floor, no resonating power cores, no nothing.

Jahvise stop messing with me.

>As you lean over one side of the bed, you see a table with a note on it.

>”Dear Lightning Gallop,

I regret to inform you that you will never use your left arm again.

Sincerely, Nurse Blueheart”

>The doctors here are so good at their job.

>You lean over the other edge of the bed and are met with a horrid sight.

>A mess of gold, light blue, and grey sits on the floor against the wall.

>In the shoulder is a huge hole. The area of the gap seems to correlate with your pain so that must be that. You also see huge claw marks along the chest.

>The feet are completely gone as well. Luckily yours are right under the covers.

>Beep. Beep. Beep beep. Beep beep. BEEP BEEP BEEP! BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP!!

>Your armor!

>Jahvise!

>ALL YOU DID WAS SLEEP!

>Through the door rushes doctors and a certain purple pony.

>Well, she tries to enter. Large ponies in nurse uniforms attempt to hold her back.

>”Anon! Are you awake?”

Twilight! What the hell happened to my armor?!

>”Well you see, funny story about tha—“

Twilight.

>”Yes?”

>You give her a deadpan stare.

Kill yourself.

>”Well Anon! It’s nice to see you awake finally!”

Finally? What do you mean? Who in the name of Einstein are you?

>The dark brown pony taps on your chest and chuckles, shaking the white hair on his face.

>”You gave us quite the scare there, young man. Lucky for you Dr. Doctorton was here to doctor you back to health!”

How did I scare you? What isn’t anyone answering my questions?

>The clickity-clack of Twilight’s hooves comes for you. Turning, you see the guards are gone.

>Funny, you didn’t see them leave.

>”Anon, it’s a long story. You might want to wait until you’re at least out of bed to hear it.”

>The lifeless suit sits beside you, offering no support.

>You never programmed something for Jahvise to do when he “slept”.

>You wonder if he dreams anyway. Can machines even do that? Dream?

>The human brain is a bunch of electrical impulses like a computer, so why not?

>Then again, the human brain also has chemicals and little spark of life.

>Maybe one day, you can give that to Jahvise too.

>One day he’ll be able to dream with you.

Tell me now.

>She looks at you worriedly.

>With a flash of magic from her horn, a chair pulls up to the bed.

>As she sits, she looks to the ceiling like she’s about to tell a really dramatic flashback.

~~

>You run outside to see what the commotion is about. One minute you were experimenting then the next your lab begins to quake!

>The sky is a blaze of pink and green with beams of light and magic.

What in Celestia’s name is going on out here?

>Through the blinding light, you see one golden object fly from the fray.

>Following it is a black cloud that sounds like a bunch of flies.

>The golden object dives for the ground, shooting pink beams of energy at the cloud.

>Little black…bug things fall from it.

>Right before crashing into the dirt, the gold turns parallel to the earth and flies straight through a house.

>Flies right by you.

>That’s no ordinary object, that’s Anon!

Anon! ANON!

>You call for him, but he does not answer.

>He seems focused on doing aerial tricks and shooting at bugs.

>Just then, one of the insects flies out of the mist and flies right for Anon.

>It slams into his shoulder, causing the left rocket to malfunction and putter out.

>He hits the bug away and sends it reeling for you.

>Once it stops skidding along the ground, you run to look at it.

>It seems to be missing a horn by the broken base of where one would be.

>It also has…fangs.

>The sound of the fight fades away.

>Skies darken and the warm dirt turns to cold nothingness.

>That is no bug.

>That is no simple thing.

>That’s a changeling.

>Your heart gets caught in your throat. What are the changelings doing here?

>Turning your eyes to the sky, you see a trail of white smoke following Anon as he weaves through the sky, blasting and hitting the changelings out of existence.

>He can’t do this alone! You’re going to help!

>Maybe he’ll thank you later too.

>Ma…maybe he’ll scratch you behind you ear.

>Focus girl!

>Snapping out of your trance, you envelope the cloud in a purple shield.

>Your fields will never be as strong as Shining’s, but you think it will do for now.

>Anon tries to shoot at the shield, but it only bounces back at him, hitting him square in the face.

>Anon turns to you.

Glad to help, Anon!

>He raises his hand to say thanks.

>Funny, why is the repulser glowing if he’s saying thanks?

>And why’s there an energy beam heading towards you now?

>Anon…this is a funny way to say thank you.

>Instinctively, you let go of the changelings and create another shield in front yourself.

>The beam fires back at Anon again, this time hitting him in the chest and sending him on a date with the ground.

>They make sweet love as a puff of dust and dirt fly up into the air, making everything hard to see.

>Buzzing becomes harder to hear as the changelings fly away.

>Good, one less thing to worry about.

>Rushing over to Anon, you clear the dust cloud around him.

>He lay on the ground, unmoving.

>If he’s breathing remains unclear as there is a huge metal plate in the way.

>What IS visible though is a big fat horn lodged in his shoulder as well as a cracked power core leaking energy, missing feet, scratches all over the armor, and millions of other issues.

Anon? Anon wake up!

>He elicits no response.

Anon! Somepony call a doctor!

~~

>She’s pulling your leg.

>You escaped the changelings. There’s no way they could have followed a giant hunk of metal back to its home.

>Hold on, that’s exactly what they did.

>”Anon, why were the changelings chasing you? Why did you attack me?”

>Twilight’s words rip you from your thoughts.

Huh? I didn’t attack you. Jahvise must have assumed—

>”Jahvise was running the suit?”

Well yeah. I was busy sleeping.

>”While changelings were chasing you? Anon, really?”

They weren’t at the time.

>You motion her to move to the side as you begin to remove yourself from your bed prison.

>”Now hold on there Mr. Anon. Dr’s orders say you stay in bed!” Dr. Doctorton told you, putting a hoof on your shoulder.

>With a push of your arm, you shove him away.

With all due respect, I have better things to do than sit around and listen to some old coot babble on about what it was like back in the old days when all medicine amounted to was rubbing moldy bread over a cut.

>Jesus, Anon.

>You could have at least said you just had to fix your suit.

>Again.

>It seems to be a trend that you get a day of fun out of every suit before it is inevitably destroyed.