“What were you thinking?!” demanded Five, angrily shouting across the dimly-lit room. “Were you even thinking? Or do you really hate me that much?”

Gell leaned back on the couch booth at the edge of the room, spreading her forelegs over the top of it. She looked at Five, relatively expressionless. “He asked for a gun. So I gave him one.”

“You gave an unstable computer virus a singularity cannon!” shouted Five. “And worse- -he actually used it!”

“I tried offering him smaller ones, but he insisted on the biggest. Can’t say I blame him. And you can’t say it didn’t work.”

“Didn’t- -didn’t work?” Five turned to Proctor. “You blew a ten-mile hole in 616. Do you have any idea how many ponies you just killed?”

Proctor was sitting at the bar, a pile of components from an LCD monitor laid out in front of him. He and turned toward Five, almost seeming confused. “Zero,” he said, innocently.

“No,” said Five. “Or are you actually insane? Can a computer even be insane?”

“No,” said Proctor_Rarity. “Dearie, I don’t think you understand.”

“It is a singularity. Cannon. It fires a hyper-dense core of mass, a collapsed artificial star. It makes things very dead.”

“Um,” said Twilight_Proctor. “Actually, no.”

“No?”

“No. Unfortunately, due to the nature of the personality core, it seems I also am bound by the Mane Six’s morality. I am not able to kill.”

“By the Soth- -I saw you kill! Back in the museum!”

“Wait,” said Rainbow Dash, sitting up from a chair on the other side of one of the concrete posts that ran though the center of the bar. “You were at the museum?”

“Quiet, you,” said Five. She turned her attention back to Proctor.

“I eliminated those ponies before I acquired the core,” explained Twilight_Proctor. “After I was interfaced with it, I lost the ability to kill. Which is strange. As a machine, I feel no remorse, guilt, or fear of the law- -and yet I cannot murder. I wonder why that is…”

“Then the singularity?”

“I tuned it,” he said, as though it were obvious.

“Tuned it? What does that even mean?”

“Well, when I generated the singularity, I put constraints on its growth and quasi-locations. I linked it to an artificial seventh-dimensional toroid projection to create an outer-universal jump arc and a wormhole.”

“I don’t know what that means,” said Rainbow Dash.

“Yeah,” said Gell. “Neither do I.”

Philomena squacked in agreement.

“It doesn’t matter if you do,” said Five. “I do. But that’s impossible.”

“If you understand the theory, you know that it is quite feasible.”

“No, it isn’t. Yes, it is realistic, but- -”

“It means,” said Proctor_Jack, “that nopony had tah dah. I simply teleported them to YakYakistan.”

“But you couldn’t,” maintained Five, beginning to add annoyance to her anger. “The processing power required for that would be- -”

Proctor_Twilight jumped down from his stool and extended a false-light projection. It resolved from an amorphous, crystalline hologram into a solid shape, and dropped into proctor’s hoofs. It was, Five realized, a representation of an extremely thick book.

“Proctor user manual, volume seven hundred forty three,” said Twilight_Proctor with some pride. Pinkie_Proctor added. “Written for the Proctor, by the Proctor, about the Proctor.” He handed it to Five.

Five took it and opened it, flipping through the pages. As she did, her eyes suddenly widened to the point where they nearly bugged out of their sockets.

“What the actual- -” She looked up at Proctor. “Is this- -is this true?

“One sixth of me is the Element of Honesty.”

“What is it?” asked Rainbow Dash.

“This…this processor. Assuming this is true…this is a military grade tactical server! You could power an entire city of AIs with this, and still have room for Gell’s porn collection!”

“Hey!” said Gell.

“Where did you- -there is no way you could get this,” said Five.

“The Proctor Virus was originally intended to harvest financial information and launder the resulting funds,” said Twilight_Proctor. “Since becoming functionally independent, it has grown into the fourth largest economy in all of Equestria. I simply allocated several hundred billion bits.”

“Billion bits?” cried Rainbow Dash, falling out of her chair.

“The singularity cannon costs six hundred million bits per shot,” noted Five. “I’m assuming you can pay for the wasted ammo?”

“Hey!” said Proctor_Dash. “It was hardly wasted! I saved Rainbow’s life!”

“He’s right,” said Gell.

“Don’t take his side!” snapped Five.

“And,” added Proctor_Shy, cowering behind one of the tables. “I- -can’t pay you back.”

“What?”

“Well- -I- -since I’m a rogue node, I don’t have access to Proctor’s funds anymore. I…um…don’t have any money.”

“Well that’s just great!” shouted Five, causing Proctor_Shy to squeal and hide under the table.

“Hey!” said the real Rainbow Dash. “You can’t talk to him like that!”

“Yeah,” said Gell. “You already had the ammo. No money wasted. You didn’t even pay for it yourself. If I recall, you stole that gun.”

“That’s not the point!” cried Five, exasperated. “Even if nopony died- -which I still do not believe completely- -Proctor just took out a huge section of the city! Including part of the upper levels. As in, we’re now all wanted criminals. Are we even safe here?”

“Of course,” said Gell. “This is Pretty Lady’s place. She and I go way back. Isn’t that right?”

“Sure is,” said the bartender, who was leaning against the back of the bar. Despite her heavy makeup, her voice was deep and her size and proportions stallionlike.

“Great,” said Five, sarcastically. “So we have the support of your favorite madam- -this clearly brings great reassurance!”

“Hey,” snapped Pretty Lady. “Nopony is gonna come looking for you guys this far down in the lower levels. Especially to my bar. And just so you know, I don’t like you very much. If Bluntforce wasn’t vouching for you, I’d throw you out on your plot.”

“And trust me, my dear,” said Gell. “I will give you quite a thanking when this is through.”

“Save it, Blutforce. You have until the cleaning cycle is done.” She motioned toward the small and run-down, graffiti-covered robots that were humming across the floor, cleaning up the vomit and alcohol that covered the floor from the night’s customers, several of whom were still passed out just outside the door.

“And you,” said Five, turning toward Rainbow Dash. “You really messed up thoroughly.”

“Me?” said Rainbow Dash, defensively, taking flight. “How is this my fault?”

“They were after you!”

“Yeah, I can tell- -but why?”

Five paused. She actually knew why. It was just as Proctor had said- -external entities had likely realized that she was attempting to use the Elements of Harmony, and that this Rainbow Dash was the real one, or at the very least some kind of clone. They intended to terminate Rainbow Dash to prevent Five from activating the device.

“Irrelevent,” said Five. “Just tell me again, how many where there?”

“I already told you,” said Rainbow Dash. “There were four flying, and maybe five more on the ground. I didn’t see those too well, but the ones flying were some earth-pony with a jet pack, a black unicorn, a Pegasus, and a griffon.”

“A griffon?” said Five.

“Yeah. Oh, speaking of him, it was pretty awesome: somepony tried to snipe me, but I hit it with my wing- -” She slashed her wing outward, cutting a deep gouge in the greasy concrete support column.

“Hey!” cried Pretty Lady. “That thing’s holding up half the city! Careful!”

“Yeah,” said Pinkie_Proctor. “We wouldn’t want the whole place coming down on us…oh wait. It already is.”

“But yeah,” said Rainbow Dash. “I knocked it back, and it hit the griffon right in the wing!”

“The wing?” said Five, pausing suddenly. “Please inform me you did not injure a griffon’s wing.”

“Yeah! Well…actually, I think I kind of knocked it off.”

“Well,” said Five, collapsing into a plastic lawn chair. “This just keeps getting better, doesn’t it? Do you want to make my life difficult? Does such please you?”

“Hey!” said Rainbow Dash. “That was some epic flying! And besides, I saw you take off a pony’s wing!”

“I took a Pegasus wing,” corrected Five harshly. “Pegasi get all weepy and depressed when you take one, and usually self-terminate. Griffons swear life-long vengeance. We kill griffons. Now this one shall be pursuing you until one of you die.”

“Yeah,” said Gell, “but it will take time. If Proctor is right, all the mercs got sent to YakYakistan. And that place isn’t exactly close.”

“Along with three percent of the city,” said Five. “Yes, I know. But they will be back. Especially a griffon mercenary with ponies- -that means he was too much a loose cannon to play nicely with official griffon mercenaries.” Five sighed. “This is bad. This is very bad.”

“But we beat them,” said Rainbow Dash. “I mean, we won- -and I believe Proctor, even if he is weird. So nopony got hurt.”

“I don’t care if ponies get hurt!” said Five. “What I care is that we are now being hunted, one, and two, that that was surely only the first wave of mercenaries. More will come.”

“They were smart, too,” said Proctor_Jack. “Knew exactly how tah take yah out, lahke an old dog to behahnd the barn.”

“I am aware. Side note: head shots are not fun.”

“At least you got a nap,” said Gell.

“That still creates a problem,” said Five, opening a hologram and multitasking. “This means that Rainbow Dash is now in danger.”

“Me?” said Rainbow Dash. “Why me?”

“That does not matter,” sighed Five. “What matters is the recourse. The fundamental issue is that I have stuff to do. I can’t be guarding you all the time.”

“Especially since you’re not actually a soldier,” noted Gell.

“Correct,” admitted Five, begrudgingly. Although she was able to shoot and fight, she did not have the formal training necessary to serve as a bodyguard. “So I guess you can look after her.”

“Not likely,” said Gell. “You aren’t getting out of the contract that easily.”

“Can’t Proctor do it?” asked Rainbow Dash.

“That would work,” said Five, “at least until he randomly switches back to Proctor_Shy and hides in a pool of his own tears.” Five turned to Proctor. “And don’t think I haven’t noticed. You can only make wings as Proctor_Shy or Proctor_Dash, and you can only use pseudo-magic as Twilight_Proctor or Proctor_Rarity.”

“But…Twilight had wings,” said Rainbow Dash. “Real nice ones…” she suddenly looked very sad. Five supposed that she had seen the Twilight Sparkle exhibit’s most beloved artifact.

“Apparently, the programmers believed ponies would prefer interacting with ‘Twilight Classic’ rather than the alicorn version.”

“Add to that the fact,” said Five, turning to Proctor, “that I don’t trust you.”

“You don’t trust me?” squeaked Proctor_Shy.

“I trust the mercenaries more than I trust you,” said Five. “At least I am aware of their motive. You, I do not know. For all I know, you called them in yourself.” Five looked at the holograms and swore. “Except now I have to deal with this.”

“What?” asked Rainbow Dash, leaning over the hologram even though she was functionally illiterate, especially since Five was reading in Draconian.

“Corpolite,” said Five. “The mercenaries have frozen my accounts. All that I have left is the Assyrian off-shores.”

“You know what they say about a banker ass and his tightness,” smiled Gell.

“This is not funny,” snapped Five. As she paced, her gauntlet suddenly came in proximity toward the metal rim of the bar, and started to magnetically pull her toward it. “I have probably two thousand bits left.”

“Plus mine,” said Gell. “I only spent…well, half of it.”

“And mine,” said Rainbow Dash.

“And I may be able to help get some of the funds back,” said Twilight_Proctor. “I may not have access to the Network, but my core is still powerful enough for some thorough hacking.”

“How long with that take?”

“Um…what was a pony’s lifespan again?”

“Great,” said Five, her gauntlet sticking to the bar. Magnetizing things was easy, but removing magnetism was almost impossible. It was just another feature that made her day severely terrible. “Just great.”

“What do you even need money for anyway?” said Rainbow Dash.

“To buy you a bodyguard,” said Five. “Not that doing so would be easy at this point. Probably can’t take a legal route because of somepony’s vandalism and or mass murder. I would say I could get you a griffon, but they’re only loyal to the highest bidder. Too easy to buy out.”

“You could get an equidroid,” said Proctor_Dash, both exited about that prospect and disappointed that she would not get to play with a griffon.

“So you can hack it and knife her behind my back? I’m not just trying to protect her from them, but also you in addition. Be sure to know that.”

“Oh,” said Proctor_Shy. “I’m sorry…”

“You should be,” said Five. “Not that I even have enough money for even a marginal shlub of a guardian.”

“Well,” whispered Proctor_Shy, “I might…” she trailed off in an inaudible string of syllables.

“Speak up,” demanded Five.

“Ah said,” said Proctor_Jack. “Ah think ah might know a guy.”