Red !!joXmgi1P6PI >Ponybots were an instant hit. >Adorable, reliable, living pet replacement with enhanced emotional support and integrated helping capabilities, better than a well trained dog! >For a lonely man like you, getting one is the dream. >You are Anon, stuck in a job that leaves you with basically no free time - a day of yours only consist of waking up, getting ready, going to work, work all day, get back home, eat dinner, get ready for bed and sleep, then repeat. >Although you can take the pressure physically, you are getting more and more exhausted on the mental side of things. >Since having a pet is out of the question, a ponybot became the obvious choice. >However, your funds are not exactly allowing you to order a brand new model, no. >After some meticulous research (while on toilet breaks at work) you find a site offering cheap, custom made ponybots! >Finding the one that fits your desires and funds makes you rather disappointed, but beggars can’t be choosers, so… >A week later, on a thankful Friday, you come home to a big box waiting for you in front of your front door. >It must be your new companion, you realize, and with joy, quickly bring the box inside. >You ordered a not-exactly-pony bot, one that can change its appearance - not because you wanted that, but because that one was the cheapest without a warning sticker of ‘might burst into flames’. >As you open the large box, you are met with a mishmash of parts basically thrown around, wrapped in Christmas gift wrapping. “What the f…” you mumble and start to unpack the box. >It takes you a while to find the instructions, the little booklet was tucked under one of the wrappers so well, you didn’t even notice it! >From there it’s rather easy to put your very own ponybot together. >Except… you start to understand why was it so cheap. >Well, /her/, you bought Queen Chrysalis of the changelings, whatever that might entail. >With all of her parts unwrapped, you can get a good look. >First of all, she is smaller than she should be, based on the pictures you have seen of her on that site. >Then, there is the obvious thing, she’s a normal ponybot with some ugly black plastic most likely glued on her fur, making removal unlikely without damaging said fur, not speaking about the black paint that’s on the rest of her body where the plastic pieces didn’t go. >To make it worse, there are holes peppering her legs, mane and tail, made in the most messy way you have ever seen holes drilled. >Her horn is making you actually cringe, someone had a go at it with a file it seems, because the horn was of a unicorn’s originally. >Reading the manual you figure that she can change the color of her mane and tail, but that’s only because those are made of some cheap looking plastic foil, like her wings. >Her best feature? Glowing eyes. >Under all the filed off, drilled and badly glued/painted over parts you can actually see a soft pink shaded fur, reminding you of a different ponybot model you have found. >You feel cheated on. >But… for the money you paid, you actually expected something like this to arrive. >With a sad sigh you get up and leave the parts on the floor, tossing the instructions book aside. >... >As Saturday arrives, you find out that you are unable to sleep in. >Your body is too used to getting up at an early hour, so instead of lying around in your bed, you decide to do something better. >As you get to your day, you pass by the parts of the knock-off/bootleg not-Chrysalis bot multiple times. >Each time you feel a pang of guilt deep inside you, growing stronger and stronger. >By noon you are unable to even look at the parts. “Fuck it…” you mutter under your breath and sit down on the floor, grabbing the booklet and start to build your ponybot. >Putting together the parts is easy, takes less time than building a Lego set, you feel like. >Before long, your pitiful looking companion is standing on her hooves in front of you, waiting for the little lever to be flipped under the almost invisible little panel in the back of her head. >With a sigh, you switch her on and close the panel. >For a few moments nothing happens, but then you start to hear the whirr of servos and see her eyes open. >Her eyes are very obviously custom made and cat-like, colored with shades of green and teal, not matching. >As her eyelids slowly flutter open, she gingerly looks up at you... and starts shaking. >You hear her servos whirr up before you see her trying to scuttle away; the laminated wooden floor underneath does not agree with that though. >With a little yelp, she falls on the floor, legs spread out in all four direction. “I don’t know what I was expecting,” you tell to nobody in particular, but since you are looking at her, she thinks you are talking to her. >She lets out a cricket like chirp as her eyes, in obvious panic, focus on you before she closes them and hides her face behind her forehooves. >The messily drilled hooves can not hide her well enough, you can still see her eyes behind them. >With a sigh of defeat and heartbreak, you stand up and leave her be. >You just wasted a lot of money. >... >For the rest of the day you are just lying on your couch, staring at the screen of your TV without actually seeing anything, your mind is just too tired. >It gets dark outside before you notice it, however… a noise takes your attention then. >Coming from your bedroom you hear… cricket noises? >Blinking your mental block away, you yawn, stretch, then get up and go to investigate. >The closer you get to your room the louder the chirping is. >The door is slightly open, just enough for you to peek in. >In there you see your bootleg pony, sitting under the slightly opened window, chirping at the actual crickets outside. >She didn’t notice you just yet, and you really don’t want to listen to these sounds, so you enter the room and loudly lock the door behind you. “Stop that,” you tell her in a commanding tone. >Chrysalis practically jumps, scaredly scuttling away and under your bed. >She is just small enough to hide there. “Oh for…” you mutter and turn on the lights, then kneel down to look under the bed. >She’s right there, now covered in dust bunnies, staring at you with that same panicked expression she wore when she first saw you. >You feel drained, mentally and emotionally, and let’s not speak about your bank account. >Without saying a word, you reach out for her, successfully grab her right foreleg, and pull her out, holding her up. >She’s rather light for her size, you realize, but she still has some weight. >Holding her by her torso makes her try to escape, her hind legs dangling down as she tries to ineffectively find a surface of traction, while her forelegs push against your arms. >Now you really feel bad. >With a sigh, you turn her around, switch your grip so you can hold her with only your left arm, then you find the little hidden panel on the back of her head. >A few moments later her struggling ceases, her legs going limp. >For a minute you just stand there, holding your wasted money in your arms. >With a sad sigh you sit down on your bed, staring off into empty space. >The ponybots are meant to make their owners happy. >Yet the only emotions you are feeling are of loneliness and sorrow. “What am I doing with my life?...” ~~~~~ >You haven’t felt this bothered, disturbed in many years. >The feeling didn’t subside over time either, leading to you getting yourself in front of your computer, trying to find information. >Browsing the site you ordered your very much home-modified and most likely broken ponybot, you come across a different model that /kinda/ looks like her, but has many different attributes. “Teenage Cadence,” you mutter to yourself, reading her description, “Ideal for small children, good babysitting abilities, can sing a variety of songs…” >You lean back and take a look at your bootleg pony as she’s lying on your bed, eyes emptily staring forward, her face expressionless. >A gut wrenching feeling passes through you but you quickly look away to avoid it. >It is clear now, you’ve been ripped off, badly, and if not for the obvious faults in the looks, then it’s the fact that your bootleg Chrysalis’ personality… or rather, whole AI is most likely based on a cricket’s. >With a heavy sigh you decide to disassemble her. >You finish with it around midnight, the next day will be long and you are not looking forward to it. >... >Your Sunday starts with you waking up unrested, angry at both the site that fooled you, and yourself for allowing yourself being fooled. >With the parts packed back into the same box they arrived in, you get in your car, angrily driving to the place that was marked as the reselling company’s location. >For over an hour you drive, glad the traffic is low, however, upon arriving to the place you realize. >It’s an empty warehouse. >And not just empty, it looks abandoned. >There is no return address on the box either, you can’t follow that back. >Even more angry, you just drive home. >Once there, you unpack the parts and assemble not-Chrysalis again. >It takes even less time, and as soon as you are finished, you turn her on. >With anger in your voice, you start talking to her, keeping her safe in your hands.. “Can you understand me? Respond! And don’t try to flee!” >Chrysalis’ eyes immediately go wide open and she stares deep into your eyes. >The fact that she starts squirming and not responding to what you have said, seals the deal, she is not sapient. >Whatever has been done to her, it either completely short circuited her ‘brain’ or just flatout replaced her original programming. “Come on Chrysalis, please just say something!...” you almost beg, your anger quickly turning into despair. >She continues trying to get free of your grip, like a cat would. >For a few moments you stare at her. Then you just lower your head, letting go of her. >No point in doing anything, it seems. >At least you won’t be so alone, despite clearly not being able to communicate with her. >When her batteries are drained, you won’t recharge them. >... >The next week is spent with little variety. >You quickly learnt that unless the windows are open, Chrysalis won’t start chirping, >When you arrive home after work, you often find her in the darkest places of the house, behind a couch, under a table, in a cupboard, always in dark and confined spots. >After the third day you stop even noticing her. >On the next Saturday though, you wake up to a strange noise. >It is coming from your room, from the dress mirror on the other side. >After wiping your eyes from the sleep, you focus on the noise and realize, it’s Chrysalis, doing some sort of… dance in front of the mirror. >It’s a series of quick sideways movements, the fluttering of her otherwise dysfunctional wings, and firefly-like flashing of her eyes. “The heck?..” you mumble in your tired stupor, wiping your eyes again. >Hearing you talking and moving, Chrysalis jumps and tries to quickly scuttle away. >With a series of panicked chirps, she slides under your bed. “I… I don’t need this.” >Robbed of your sleep, you get out of bed and start with your day, leaving the slightly trembling, occasionally chirping ponybot behind. >... >On the tenth day you start to notice her slowing down. >Her steps are definitely not as springy as before, and her reaction time is greatly extended. >As expected, when you arrive home the next day, you don’t find her in the usual spots. >After some searching you catch a glimpse of her badly painted exterior sticking out from behind the couch. >With a sad sigh you pull her out from there: she is unmoving, not responding to anything you do. >Her batteries lost their charge completely. >With it, you lose your emotions, only apathy remains. >For the next ten minutes you unceremoniously disassemble her and put the parts back in the box she arrived in. >As you grab the box to put it on the bottom of your wardrobe, you remember something you read in a book, a quote which, sadly, applies to you now. >You recite it with, but not before a heavy sigh escapes your lips. “The moral of this story is that no matter how much we try, no matter how much we want it… some stories just don’t have a happy ending.” >With a ‘thud’ the box is placed in the wardrobe, never to be opened again. ~~~~~~ ~~~~~~ >You wake up with a start, drenched in your own sweat. >Reading off the red numbers from your alarm clock on the nightstand, you realize with a sigh, it’s 3 in the morning. >You still have some hours left to sleep, but you most definitely feel like shit. >It’s been like that for the past few days… was it a week already? >Apparently it’s also showing on you, your colleagues began to comment on how sickly you look. >After several days of listening to their comments, sometimes behind your back, sometimes said to your face, you feel like losing it. >With a tired, almost pained groan you get out of your bed, going for the bathroom. >Perhaps splashing some water on your face will make you better, right? >The awful feeling in your gut tells otherwise. >Regardless, you wash your face, then return in your room, eyes involuntarily locked on your wardrobe. “God fucking dammit…” you swear, a low growl resounding from your throat. >Your failure with your ponybot hasn’t left you for a moment since you put her box in there. >It is clawing at you, so much so, you feel like you are actually getting sick. >With another, this time rather animalistic growl, you turn heels and head straight into your garage, you know you have all the tools and materials to /fix this./ >In five minutes you have them all prepared and laid out on the kitchen table, only one thing misses. >Your wardrobe opens with a slight creak, the box sitting in the same place you placed it. >Without a second thought you grab it and leave the room. “Okay... just gotta remove the plastic covers and fur, fix up the holes, paint it all over, get a new set of mane and tail and… that’s it, I guess?” you list it to yourself as you put the box next to the kitchen table, opening it up. >The disassembled parts tell you of something you already know but don’t want to accept just yet. >If you do this, you need to go all out. “I need better stuff...” >... >Nighttime driving is rather relaxing, you realize. >Finding a hardware store that is open at this early hour is infuriating, though. >They make a good balance in keeping you awake and aware. >Thankfully, you find a store by daybreak, and soon enough you are richer with most of the things you need. >However, finding a replacement mane and tail, as well as that skin like material that covers the ponybots under the fur, you are almost 100% certain you can only find those on the internet. >What’s that called anyway, ‘synthflesh’? >You have no idea. >By the time you arrive home you already have a plan hatched, and it will only eat up the rest of your savings, no more, no less! >Despite this fact, you feel a springiness in your steps as you get out of your car and head inside, ‘crafting supplies’ in your hands. >That sickly feeling is starting to leave your gut, too! “Wait, shit, work,” you realize. >For once in your life you are thanking your coworkers, as soon as your boss picks up the call, you are asked if it’s about being sick. >The short conversation ends with you taking a relieved seat, the rest of the week - six days, since it’s Tuesday today - is your well earned sick leave. >Spirits restored and higher than in the previous months, you quickly make your way to your computer, typing a few keywords into the search engine. “Ponybot… replacement… skin, mane, tail… custom parts…” you mutter along. >The sites you find do seem to offer these things thankfully, although you feel a little sting of pain looking at the price of said parts. >Before doing anything, you start to look up how Chrysalis is /supposed/ to look like. >It takes a while, but soon enough you have a strong understanding of the looks of her character. >Sadly, there is a reason for why only this bootleg version exists, no official Chrysalis bot has been released up to date. >Regardless, you are committed to do this so you return to the site you found offering replacement parts and type in what you think you need. >Ten minutes later you are done ordering the parts - for the ‘Teenage Cadence’ model. >Custom, furless black skin with a thick, teal band around the torso, teal recolor of the back, hyper realistic mane and tail in custom color and shape, replacement eyes in custom colors and shape, replacement custom horn. >Everything should arrive by Friday, you mentally state to yourself, and with that done, you let out a sigh. >It’s time to do the difficult part. >Returning to the kitchen table, you grab your brand new tools and start to meticulously remove all the painted over fur and badly glued plastic covers from the various parts. >It takes a while… a long while, in fact, but it does not bother you. >Removing the ‘skin’ from around the head is the most difficult, you find out. >Still not as difficult as removing the eyes… >... >The clock reads 10:27 when you finally finish with this little project of yours. >Chrysalis is just a bunch of metallic parts, servos and cables very much visible everywhere. >You haven’t touched them, thankfully none of them is damaged as far as you know, and you want to keep it that way. >However, there is another thing you have to fix. >Her persona. >After eating some food, you plant yourself in front of your computer again, looking for some sort of explanation about how the ponybots work, what drives them. >The official site gives you no proper idea about how to fix her without bringing her in an expensive service, so you turn to the help of the fellow ponybot owners, discussing the problems they have, on various forums. >Finding a solution on the internet has been always difficult to you. >Your line of work never actually required you to learn how to search for things efficiently, so you never did that. >But that’s not going to stop you, you are fully committed now to see this through. >Some time later you find instructions about how to access the hardware inside the ponybot’s head, and with a handy diagnostic tool you found along the way, you can actually see what’s going on in there. >Now you are glad you removed the old skin of Chrysalis, access to the insides wouldn’t be possible without that. >Above the power switch, under the future hairline, you find the access port. >It is an USB port, and without anything to obscure it, you connect it to your computer. >As soon as your machine registers the ponybot as another device, you run the diagnostics tool. >A minute later the tool brings up a window that tells you the name of the current OS the bot runs. >Apparently the people putting her together thought it would be funny to give her an actual damned cricket simulation for personality. >No wonder she wasn’t sapient. “But how am I gonna find a replacement? Fuck!” you swear, grumbling to yourself. >The solution offers itself in a different forum, which apparently has a good few people like you, trying to fix the damaged goods they received. >The more tech savvy realized that with some tweaking, they can completely reconfigure a base ponybot persona, to whatever parameters they desire. >To your luck, the instructions are also right there. >... >Programming is hell. >For two days and three nights you’ve been leaning over your desk, trying to set up the parameters the newly downloaded and installed persona would use. >Thankfully, by Friday morning you are, by some miracle, done. >She should act like Chrysalis. >Kinda. >While researching her you realized that you would much more like a cute, nerdy companion you could play tabletop games with. >Just as you are about to go to bed to catch some well deserved sleep, you hear the bell ringing at the front door. >The parts! >With as much energy as you can muste, you get to the front door, where a delivery man is waiting for you. >”Delivery for a Mr. Anonymous, am I in the right place?” the man asks, looking at a sheet of documents. “Yes, that’s me,” you nod, looking behind the man. >Several, various sized boxes are getting unloaded from the truck he arrived in. >”Please sign it here, here and… here,” the delivery man asks you and you do so, getting more excited than you thought you should be, “Thank you sir, have a nice day.” “No, thank you! Goodbye!” you respond and quickly grab the boxes, hurriedly bringing them inside your home. >A couple minutes later you are doing the assembly: with the provided parts, tools and materials, you quickly put on the new, surprisingly lifelike skin on the limbs and body, replace the old horn and eyes, switch out the old mane and tail to the new ones, put the old wings back (no replacement for that, sadly, then as the final step, you put the skin on the head as well, spending extra time on making sure it’s all set up well. >Before long, Chrysalis 2.0 is standing in front of you, completely recharged, remade to be the perfect companion for you. >Her mane and tail is a bit messy, but that can be fixed later. >With a beaming expression, you reach to her nape and switch her on. >You hear the whirr of her servos before you see her moving. >Chrysalis’ eyes slowly flutter open, gaining focus on you. >”O-oh! Hello!” She says in a sweet voice, then blinks and tilts her head, “Who are you?” “I… I’m Anon. Nice to meet you,” you reply, feeling like as if a boulder fell from your chest. >”Nice to meet you too, Anon! I’m Chrysalis, but you can call me Chryssie!” she replies, adorably smiling, then goes in for a hug. >Her elevated position allows her to hug you without a problem, and so she does that, her messy mane hanging in front of your face. >You wrap your arms around her smooth but warm body, letting out a long, relieved sigh. >”Anon, you look tired, do you want to snuggle with me?” she asks, leaning back from the hug. “Yes, some sleep would be great,” you agree, nodding, “Come, let me help.” >With your basically self made companion in your arms, you head to your bedroom. >She is not perfect, she is not the real deal, certainly won’t behave as such, but she is yours. >A happy warmness fills you, knowing that now you won’t be so alone anymore. ~Fin~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >Anon brings a crown from Burger King for bootleg Chrysalis "Hold still, will you." >You gingerly place the paper crown on top of the mare’s head, slightly nudging it this way and that until it sits right. >It’s just a tiny bit too big for her, slipping down to right above her eye level. >Glowering up at you, her ominously glinting irises just barely visible below the rim, Chrysalis chirps. "I know, I know," you hold up your hands in a placating gesture, "you deserve better." >She chirps again. "But it’ll do for now, right?" >You can’t suppress your smile. >Chirping yet again, the mare keeps staring, angrily leering from under her new headwear. >God, she’s cute. "Hear ye, hear ye," you try to affect your best impression of a sophisticated accent, "Queen Chrysalis, First of her Name, Protector of the Realms, Home of the Whopper, Guardian of the Secret Sauce, Paladin of-" >You’re cut off by more angry buzzing, accompanied by the freshly-coronated mare wildly pointing and flailing with her hooves. >Her crown keeps slipping down over her eyes, forcing her to readjust and push it back up while maintaining her furious chirping. "Alright, alright!" >You hold out your hand, grinning down on the mare "If you don’t want it, give it back." >Chrysalis stops dead in her tracks, her venomous glare creeping from below the paper rim. >With a last, dismissive buzz, she turns around sharply, skittering off with the crown on her head. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Reminds me of this old image. >she'll eat just about anything heart-shaped since her "consume love" feature is that half-assed and poorly programmed >items shaped like a heart she'll try to eat as a whole >if the hearts are painted on or otherwise a part of something else, she'll try to extract it and then eat it >mostly by scrubbing it with her hoof or trying to gnaw on it and just sticking her muzzle against the thing and making chewing motions while chirping >somehow all the things she eats she can actually process, you wonder if there's some kind of nuclear reactor inside of her if she eats basically anything >she doesn't even need it, really, you still have to charge her >but you learn that she's programmed to feel things like hunger, as well as satisfaction from eating something she likes - which are hearts ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >FagAnon is disappointed with bootlegChryssie. >Waits until she shuts down under the bed from low battery. >Throws her into the closet. >*one year later* >FagAnon moves out, garage-sales everything he isn't taking with him. >BarginHunterAnon comes by. >Spots Chryssie. "Oh, hey, is that a ponybot?" >"Yeah, a shitty bootleg one. Pretty much brand new, only used it for a few days, should still work. I'll give it to you with all chargers and whatnot for, lets say, $30? "Deal!" >Anon takes Chryssie home. >Same skittish behavior happens. >Anon finds it cute. >Over time Chryssie gets used to him being around. >Explores the house. >Cricket-chirps in the night by the window. >Tries to get love from heart-shaped objects. >Other bootlegpone shenanigans. >Good times and comfy feels ensue. >Anon is sitting in the armchair with Chryssie chirping quietly in her sleep on his lap. "Damn, that guy at the garage-sale really had to be an entitled faggot to throw away such sweetheart just because shes a bootleg!" >she seems very happy when you feed her >just when you're running out of those heart things an idea crosses your mind >draw hearts on a paper >she eats it >you might be onto something here