"YAGH!" Applebloom snapped awake so suddenly that all four hooves went into the air. She lay there panting for a second, trying to get a grip on herself. After her heart slowed a bit she sank back into her pillow. Sakes alive, what a wakeup.

"Bad dream?" Applejack said, smiling at her over the rail of the hospital bed.

Applebloom yawned and rubbed her eyes. "No, actually I-" wait a minute. Hospital bed? She sat up. Yes, it was a hospital bed. There was a doctor standing there. Applejack was sitting by her side. "What the hay?" she croaked.

"Here, have some water," Applejack said, pressing a cup into her hooves. "Drink it slow now." Applebloom obeyed, sipping carefully, letting the coolth slide down her throat and cut through the dry raspies.

"Sakes you gave us a start," Applejack pulled her into a hug. "Thank heavens you're all right..." She sat back and looked Applebloom over, beaming and a little teary-eyed. "Don't do that to me ever again, y'hear?"

"Okay..." Applebloom said, confused. The doctor stepped in.

"If I may..." he quickly listened to Applebloom's heart, checked her temperature on her forehead, checked her reflexes with a hammer, looked into her ears and eyes with a little light. "Why'd you jump up like that, if I may ask?" he said.

"I... did you ever doze off in the middle of doin' something important?" Applebloom said. "An' then you wake up and go 'omigosh, I-' Omigosh, Malfunziona!" She almost jumped out of the bed.

Applejack chuckled and pushed her back down. "Now easy does it, there," she said. "That crooked rascal's taken care of. Though there's some ponies who want to ask you questions about what you did..." there was a commotion out in the hallway. "But that can wait for a minute. You got a few visitors first." The door opened, and in poured a half dozen folks, all shouting out in relief when they saw her sitting up awake. Babs was first through the door, hopping with excitement; she was wearing an enormous pair of scissors strapped across her back for some reason. Then came Lockheed; the gryphon was sporting a bandage around his head and a big smile. Growf and Grunt came in. Next, to her surprise, was Kilo Wattz. He'd actually slicked his hair down and was looking rather scholastic and respectable. Then, in a wheelchair, was-

"Red Fort!" Applebloom squealed with glee. "You're alive!"

"By the grace of the Maker, yeah," the engineer said with a half grin. It had to be half; most of his left side was covered in bandages. "Shoulda been parboiled, but pure luck- the safety valve broke off crooked. It hit me in the chest and knocked me outta the way a split second before the steam could cook me." He winced a little. "It don't feel too fun, but I'm alive. I like to think the old Thunderhead reached out and love-tapped me to save my hide. Glad to see you're feeling better."

"What happened?" Applebloom asked, rubbing her eyes. "why am I here?"

"Well you've been asleep for almost two days," Applejack said. "Ever since-"

"Two days? Hokey smokes..." Applebloom suddenly turned red. "Oh wow," she said, squirming suddenly. "That explains a few things..."

A hasty run to the little fillies room, and a quick return, set everyone chuckling. Mortified, Applebloom got a boost and climbed back into bed. "whuf, I still feel so tired..." she said.

"Not surprising, all considered." The doctor said.

"Well?" Babs said, hopping up and down on her hooftips and grinning eagerly. "Do ya feel any different?"

"Different? Why would I-" She stopped, her breath catching. She remembered that crazy tingling on her flank- She started to pull up her hospital gown to look, then stopped and clapped her hooves to her eyes. "I can't look," she whimpered. "It... it isn't a bug-catching cutie mark, is it?"

There was a long, strange pause. "Uh... no... but I think she was talking about-"

"Ah can't stand it!" Applebloom pulled her hospital gown around to look at her bare flank.

No, not bare. A cutie marked flank. An apple, overlaid by a shiny metal gear and an Erlenmeyer flask, surrounded by a golden laurel wreath.

I'm an INVENTOR. I solve practical problems...

"OMIGOSH OMIGOSH OMIGOSH YES YES YES!" Applebloom bounced up and down in the bed, her wings buzzing with excitement.

Wait. What? What? WHAT?

She flapped them again. Once. Twice. Hesitantly, she reached up with a hoof and brushed her forehead- and tapped the tip of a horn. Flabbergasted. Gobsmacked. Boggled. Croggled. She found herself wishing Sweetiebelle was there because she couldn't think of a word sufficient to describe how knocked for a loop she was. She looked up at the others, her eyes round and her jaw slack.

And they were staring back at her, just as flummoxed. Babs was the first to crack. The Manehattan filly started cackling. Then HOWLING. "She- she noticed the Cutie Mark FIRST?" She rocked back and forth in her seat, laughing so hard she could barely breathe and clutching her sides.

Applejack joined in, laughing till tears rolled down her face. "Horn? Nah. Wings? Nah. But my oh my, she gets her cutie mark and she... oh hoo hahahahahahah!" She leaned helplessly against the rail of the hospital bed and laughed her lungs out. Pretty soon the rest of the ponies and others there were chuckling too, if not laughing out loud. Applebloom just sat there with her lower lip pooched out and glared at them all. That only made them laugh harder.

Eventually the laughter faded back to good-natured chuckling. Applejack reached over and tousled Applebloom's mane. "Oh don't be like that, Sugarcube," she said. "We're all just happy for you, is all. Besides-" she gave her baby sister a nose boop. "It is kinda funny."

Applebloom tried to keep sulking, but finally gave in and gave her a grin. "Sorry, Babs," she said. "Guess I sorta stepped all over your cuteceneara, huh?"

Babs pretended to huff. "Oh, well I NEVER!" She said in her snottiest imitation of an upper crust Manehattan accent. "Going and ASCENDING on MY cuteceneara day?" she gave a haughty sniff. "SOME ponies simply have NO class a-TALL..." She tossed her mane, then grinned when Applebloom giggle-snorted. "Ahh, c'mon, geddoudahea. It's great! Now it's a double-cutieceneara! And an- Ascendencineara? Is that a thing?"

"Guess it's gonna be," Applebloom said. "But... why me? Why'd I ascend?"

"I think that would be obvious," a familiar voice said. Applebloom turned and found herself face to face with Celestia's smiling image.

"Oh, Princess Celestia, you're here!" Then she sat back and realized the image was framed by a mirror. They had apparently wheeled Applejack's magic mirror-wardrobe into the hospital room. "Oh... um... I guess you're not here. But... why would it be obvious?"

Celestia smiled warmly. "Honestly, are all Apples so self-effacing?"

"Not me, I'm fulla beans," Babs said, smirking.

Celestia cocked an eyebrow. "True enough," she teased. "But Applebloom, think about what you did the other day. You pushed yourself further than ponies twice your age, with ten times your power and training would manage. You not only earned your Cutie Mark with your talent, you used it to defeat and imprison a Draconequus- something even Luna and I only managed with the Elements of Harmony."

Discord's face appeared briefly in the mirror behind her. "In other words, she cheated. Nyeah." He stuck his tongue out at Celestia while Applebloom stifled her giggles.

"Discord-!" Celestia said, annoyed. Discord gave everyone a "who me?" look and vanished. "As I was saying," Celestia continued with a roll of her eyes, "You ascended, because you transcended. Those who witnessed it are already calling you 'the Alicorn of Invention.' " She dimpled, her eyes twinkling in amusement. "Already you've demonstrated a knack for inspiring others. Ponies are already halfway to making you and your friends into folk heroes. Stories of the Brave little Barber-"

Babs grinned and Applebloom cocked an eyebrow. "That I gotta hear," Applebloom said.

"The Thunderhead Engineer, who risked death to save a Princess..."

At this, Red Fort coughed into his hoof and looked off at nothing in particular. While Applejack... dimpled at him? "Okay, that's another I gotta hear..." Applebloom giggled, giving her sister a look that promised all SORTS of embarrassing questions later.

"And... well suffice it to say that a surprising number of legends were born just the other day," Celestia concluded.

"Forgive me for interrupting, your Highness," Kilo Wattz said. "But there is one mystery that I would like to clarify- to satisfy my curiosity as a scientist... that... cage that Princess Applebloom built..."

"I have to concur," Red Fort said. "I must confess that my own engineering inclined bump of curiosity was aroused. If the young filly wouldn't mind explaining?"

"Oh indeed, I did want to ask about that myself," Celestia said. "Babs, dear, would you open another leaf of the mirror so I- oh good. Thank you." The portion of the mirror Babs unfolded clouded, then cleared to show the interior of the rather badly damaged Glass Palace. Standing in the middle of the floor was a giant construction of metal. It was a bare tubular framework of an isocahedron, inside of which was a dodecahedron made of interlocking gears. Every now and then the object shook slightly, as if something inside was struggling mightily. Sulfurous swearing in Neightalian emanated from within.

"I'll keep the question simple," Celestia said. "How is this cage of gears possibly holding him?"

"Oh, it's simple," Applebloom said. "It's holding him because it's built right- but still doesn't work right."

Celestia paused, her brow furrowed. "Pardon?"

"See, I kinda wondered how Proud Lion managed to hold him in a bronze tube. Till Malfunziona told me the secret himself.

"He's a chaos critter, a Draconequus-"

"Lesser," came the echo of Discord's voice from the mirror.

"-And, like he told me: he can't use mechanical stuff. And he really can't repair anything. It's totally backward to what he is. All he can do is break stuff. Can you show a picture of the canister, Princess Celestia?" Celestia nodded and the imaged changed to that of the canister sitting on a workman's table. "Now I didn't get a long look at the canister Malfunziona broke out of, but I did notice one thing: It's got a trick lid. If you try and unscrew the lid, it tightens in the other direction. Sorta like a Chinese hoof puzzle. No matter which way y' turned it, you were still tightening it. So, like, breaking the seal made it seal more. And the rules of his own power wouldn't let him open it."

"So how'd he escape?" Applejack asked.

Applebloom shrugged. "The canister musta got damaged from the outside," she said. "See that dent on that side? That there must've done it.. bend the seal so that turning it one way stripped it. " Applebloom shrugged again. "I decided to make something a li'l sturdier." she sketched out three gears in the air with her hoof- and yeeped in surprise when pale yellow lines of magic formed the actual image in the air. Crossing her eyes she saw that her horn was lit. "Whups." She decided to roll with it. "see these three gears? What's wrong with 'em?"

Red Fort chuckled. "you put three gears like that, they won't turn," he said. "They're locked together- oh, I see." He glanced at the mirror, which had returned to an image of the cog-wheel prison. "Slick trick there, pint-size."

"Yup. The big ball o' gears is the same way, all around. The whole thing is a machine that can't work." Applebloom nodded. "I spaced 'em a li'l off, so if you break any one gear, all the gears will turn free. But Malfunziona can't break any of them, because his power won't let him."

"AhahaHAAAA!" Kilo Wattz. "Because the whole thing is a machine that, if he breaks it, he fixes it." He clapped his hooves. "Brilliant!"

"I wonder what happens to him if he does," Babs wondered.

Discord reappeared in the mirror behind Celestia, sticking his head around a corner in the background. "Something unpleasant, I assure you," he called out. "Using your magic against its nature is really, REALLY bad for us D-qs..."

"Discord..." Celestia said, annoyed. He popped in closer. In FRONT of Celestia this time.

"I'm more of a big shot than him so I have less restraints," he went on, "Mine is that my magic has to have... something random in it. But even I don't try to run contrary to my nature." He shuddered. "I did it once. Distinctly unpleasant."

"Ack! Discord, get out of my-" Celestia said. He disappeared, then reappeared back out in the hallway behind her.

"Had cramps for three weeks after!"

"DISCORD! OUT!"

"Couldn't he just... use his muscles and whack it, 'r somethin'?" Applejack pointed out.

Applebloom shook her head. "Remember how puny he was? I think all his muscle is magic." She thought about it. "You prob'ly better tell them mages to seal all that in somethin' more airtight, in case he gets clever, lets all his power fizzle out, and slips out through the cracks."

"I will," Celestia said. "They'll be able to incorporate your trap into his final prison, now that we understand the logic behind it."

"Logic? Bleeeaaaahh..."

"Discord, so help me-!"

Applebloom giggled fit to bust. "Well, gosh, now what?"

"Now..." Applejack said. "You rest up a bit..."

"Awww..."

"And we plan you and Bab's Cuteceneara," Applejack said. Applebloom and Babs cheered. "-er, Ascensioneara. Coronation. Thing."

"Big party," Red Fort proffered.

"That'll do."

"This is so... crazy," Applebloom yawned and grinned. A faint worried expression crossed her face. "But, I don't wanna sound whiny or nuthin but... why didn't Sweetiebelle or Scootaloo call?"

Celestia chuckled. "As it turns out..."