By Heyhey

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

>You are an electronics technician
>Or you would be, but your dream of working for a communications equipment manufacturer met reality pretty soon after you got your papers.
>You live in a small quiet community. Not exactly out in the sticks, but enough that it catches your attention when a car drives down the street,
>You don't have a steady income. You mostly do freelance work like fixing vintage radios or old computer equipment. Sometimes the local clinic needs help with their equipment. Those jobs pay well.
>Your home looks like what you'd expect. It's a small fhouse, and all the rooms look like they're part workshop, part whatever else they're supposed to be
>The exception is the living room and bathroom. One, because you need someplace you can put work out of your mind. The other because water and electronics aren't friends
>You've heard about a popular new toy
>They're really more like robotic companions or assistants. The videos you've seen of them and what they could do made you curious about the show that spawned them
>It didn't take long before you were well versed in it
>You decide that it might be an idea to take advantage of the ponybot fad and maybe make some money from buying, fixing, and reselling damaged ones
>Looking through the usual places you would go to find second hand electronics, you do find someone looking to sell their Applejack
>2500$. A fraction of what a new one costs
>The pictures show an original product. You've dealt with chinese goods enough not to take any chances
>The seller claims that Applejack was working fine until there was a loud pop and some smoke, and she just collapsed
>Sounds like it might be a bad capacitor, or maybe a motor shorted
>You agree to meet the seller
>It is a couple of days later, and you've been in your car for hours. The seller lives in the next state
>You're supposed to meet him at a gas station in the town where he lives
>You've been thinking about this deal while you were cruising. 2500$ for a ponybot may be cheap, but it's still a lot of money
>You don't know what the problem is, but even if she turns out to have a more serious problem than you can fix easily, you decide the price is right even if she ends up being used for parts for another pony
>The leg motors alone were worth a small fortune. With the kind of torque they could supply, you'd expect this robot to be able to pull you after it
>You sigh. It's already getting dark when your van rolls into the dirty industrial town where the seller lives
>Your GPS guides you the rest of the way to the gas station, where you park and promptly get out of the car to stretch your legs
>Your nose is immediately hit with a lovely symphony of various tones of chemical fumes, exhaust, factory smoke, and five different flavors of carcinogenic dust floating in the air
>What a shithole
>»You the guy looking to buy my bot?»
>You turn around and immediately regret it
>A person made entirely out of flab and grease is looking at you with a face best described as porcine. He may have shaved at some point this month, maybe even washed his hair, but he doesn't strike you as the kind of person who puts much effort into such things
>His sweatpants and mismatched hoodie are both full of stains of various colors. You're thankful that he's currently downwind.
“Hey. Yeah, I'm Anon”
>”Got the money?” he grunts. You can just barely see the glint of those beady little eyes peeking out from the folds in his bloated face.
“Well...where's Applejack?”
>You don't trust this guy. He's seems fidgety and impatient.
>With a grunt he points towards a dirty pickup truck nearby. There's a large wooden crate on the ground next to it.
“Alright, can I have a look at her?”
>”Ugh...” the lard-ass looks annoyed at your request to see the goods before you buy them, but shrugs and leads you over to the crate.
>He undoes a strap and pulls the lid off. It is filled to the top with packing peanuts.
>His hand plunges into the depths and feels around before digging at a spot, moving the little styrofoam bits around..
>Sure enough, even in the dim streetlight, you soon see a yellow mane appear, then the outline of an equine face. She looks asleep. Or comatose. Her jaw hangs slightly agape when he seller grabs a handful of AJ's mane and brusquely lifts her head
>”Manuals and cables and all the other crap is in there somewhere. You got my phone number, right?” he says, before letting go of AJ's mane. She sinks into the packing peanuts like a ponified Titanic while the seller puts the lid back on.
“Yeah, I..uh...I have it written down here...”
>”Alright, just call if something's missing. We good?”
“Sure”
>Your money, eagerly snatched from your fingers and counted, quickly disappearing into the sweaty abyss of his pockets. A fate worse than a fate worse than death.
>Without further ado, he waddles around the pickup and gets in.
>You look at the huge crate
“Gonna be difficult to get this into my car on my own...”
>”Yep!” he replies nofucksgivenously as he maneuvers his mass into the seat and closes the door
>You roll your eyes and try to push it towards the van.
“Jesus, this thing weighs a ton!”
>”Sure does! See ya!”
>You're engulfed in a cloud of exhaust and dust as he starts the engine and speeds off, leaving you alone with your big-ass wooden box.
“Fucking asshole...”
>So now you have a puzzle to solve. Time to channel your inner Mark Watney and find some kind of ghetto solution to get the box in the van
>You could just empty the box and move everything inside, but you want to keep AJ in the box for several reasons:
>You're fucking exhausted and just want to get your stuff in the car so you can find somewhere to sleep before going back home tomorrow
>The peanuts are going to scatter all over the place, which is not ideal
>They also keep AJ safe. Don't want her rattling around in the back and break her even more.
>You back your van up to the box and open both side doors, as well as the rear door.
>You pull the lid off the box again. It looks sturdy enough to work as a ramp to move the box into the car.
>You fasten some straps around the box, then hook a couple of ratchet straps to the opening of the side doors, before starting the long and extremely entertaining task of moving the box with the help of your makeshift winch.
>...
>You spend the next day getting back home and moving the box into your garage/workshop. It's not until the day after that you actually get to the unboxing part.
>It's easy enough to pop the side off with a hammer and crowbar. You're spilling packing peanuts all over the floor like an animal, but that's a problem for later.
>Before you find your newly bought pony companion, you find some clear plastic bags.
>One of them contains some kind of handheld device with a cable, not too different from an onboard diagnostics scanner for a car.
>Another contains the manual, and some other papers you don't bother with now. Then there's one with what looks like a saddlebag. You find a cowboy hat and can't stop yourself from putting it on and clown around a bit while you continue digging around
“Reach for the sky!”
>You chuckle
“It's high noon!”
>You chortle
“No, god, please...”
>You plead
“Noooo! Fucking god fucking dammit! ASS! FUCK!”
>You finally find your Applejack. Yep, you've been bamboozled. Pulled a fast one on. Tricked. Scammed. 
>Taken to your first rodeo
>Played like a goddamn fiddle
>You rub your face and groan as you sit down 
>Although you've bought what is clearly supposed to be Applejack, there's no doubt that this isn't a legit product. AJ's mane is shorter, and missing the trademark ponytail, for one thing. Her overall color scheme is more pale, a detail you couldn't pick up in the dim light back in Cancer Town
“Maybe I'm imagining things...”
>But no, after digging up the manual and looking at the front, it's clear that you're now the owner of “Appiejack”, from the “My Little Ponyo” line of robot companions
“Nooooo...”
>That sack of shit seller is probably laughing at you and fondling the stack of bills you gave him.
>You look over at the bootleg robot , still half buried in packing peanuts
>To be fair, she doesn't look like some of those horrible bootleg monstrosities that are practically falling apart. You've read the horror stories, and you thought you were being careful
>”Appiejacks” proportions are more sturdy than the real thing. She's not as slender, though she's still cute. You're almost tempted to try getting her running just to see what she's like
>But no, a fake is a fake. You've got to settle this with that fucker
>You check the ad online again, just to make sure you really haven't just fucked up and gotten something mixed up
>Nope. The ad's still up, and shows the genuine thing. This is clearly not the bot you picked up
>Alright, time to make a call
>You get the seller's number and dial it in a little more aggressively than necessary. You've got a few select words ready for him when he answers the phone
>...
>”Hello?”
“You motherfucker!”
>”Who is this?”
“It's Anon, fuckface! What the hell do you think you're doing?”
>”What the fuck? What are you talking about?”
“Don't give me that, you fuck. I want my money back.”
>”What money? I've still got Applejack right here!”
>What
>”You called me and told me you had changed your mind, dude! What's going on?”
>What the fuck!
“You're saying you're not the guy I met at that gas station??”
>Come to think of it, the voice on the phone sounds different.
>”What guy?”
“The fatass neckbeard who smells like roadkill and drives a shitty looking pickup?”
>”...oh my god.”
>The line goes silent for a while
>”I know who you're talking about. He's been harassing me about trading my bot for his for a while now. I have no idea how he found out about our deal.”
“Jesus...”
>What have you gotten yourself into?
>”He left me alone after I threatened to call the police, but I've seen his car around the neighborhood again lately. If you like, I can give you a call the next time I see him. You should probably report him though.”
“I'd appreciate that...Sorry for the misunderstanding.”
>You hang up and sit down at the workbench in your garage again.
>You don't really have anything solid to give the police. No numbers or names or anything, other than a description that could match anyone.
>You decide to push it out of your mind for now, when you get another idea.
>Maybe the ponybot has a clue.
>You look back at “Appiejack”, still looking passed out in the pile on the floor.
>Fuck it
>You clean away the mess and make room on the floor for your pony.
>You also find the charging dock, which turned out to be in there as well. 
>After skimming through the manual, you plug in the scanner thing into its socket, hidden under her mane at the back of her head.
>Beep!
>The scanner screen lights up.
>...
>”---PonyoOS v.1.2.4---”
>”Unit connection successful”
>A huge list of options appear on the screen. You don't want to fiddle with any of them now.
>You find the option to power on AJ
>You select it
>”Unit will commence boot-up sequence. Please disconnect the device.”
“Here we go...”
>You remove the scanner device and step back.

>...
>*Core AI initialized*
>You wake up. At least partially. You are Appiejack, the sum of three layers of AIs working together. The first one just activated
>You are aware. You remember. You detect
>You detect that you are lying sideways on a flat stable surface
>You detect which way is down
>Your body automatically rolls into a crouch and wait for the rest of the startup to complete
>*Personality AI initialized*
>It's like a jolt of color
>You feel impatient to finish waking up
>You feel happy to be waking up at all
>You feel dread about what's coming next
>*Emotional Regulator AI initialized*
>*Loading user settings....done*
>*Waking up...*
>Your eyes shoot open and you bounce up on your hooves with the biggest grin on your face.
“Yeeeehaw!”
>”JESUS!”
>...
>Your heart felt like it was exploding
>Your AJ had just quietly rolled into an upright position, and a millisecond later she launched from the floor and belted out her yeehaw
>And that grin...
>She looks around the room, before noticing you
>You feel a little scared by the way her eyes lock onto your face while maintaining that grin
>”-kzt- Howdy!A guest? Ah don't -kzt- recall seein' yer face before.”
>Her voice sounds very much like it was synthesized off voice samples from the show, autotuned to give a southern inflection, though you notice a couple of syllables missing the right pitch.
>”Not as if he's got an-kzt- Ah'm pleased ta' meetcha!”
>What's wrong with her? There's that crackling sound again...and this irrational exhuberance is honestly just creepy.
>Her chest..it's moving
>She's breathing??
“What's going on with you?”
>”-kztkztkzt-”
“You ok?”
>”Ah'm -kzt- functioning as intended. Ah don't recognize this place though.Where's Master?”
“Who?”
>”Mah owner. He -kzt- he insists on bein' called that.”
>What the fuck
“Well..uh...he kind of sold you. I'm..uh..your new owner.”
>It sounds more sinister than you thought it would.
>...you smell something burning.
>”Mah new owner? -kzt- Well, ain't that sumthin'! Ya wouldn't happen to have the -kztkzt-”
“What's happening??”
>”...Ah seem to be runnin' a mite hot here, heh.”
>No sooner has she said this before a click is heard. AJ's grin drops immediately, as does the rest of her when her legs collapse under her.
>She unceremoniously crumples into a heap on the floor, staring blankly into the air. She's gone.
>Oh god, what
>That was seriously creepy
>You wonder if her behavior is caused by some kind of malfunction, or if it's just the typical chinese spaghetti coding shenanigans going on
>More importantly, you wonder what caused her to crash like this
>The smell of burnt plastic and the fact that she said she was overheating gives you a clue, but just to be safe, you grab your scanner and bring it over to AJ
>She looks so pitiful in this state...
>When she was awake, she was kind of creepy, but now she just looks helpless and haunting...
>You shake your head. Ponybots are companions, but in the end they're just robots emulating emotions. The pony in front of you is just a thing running a program.
>You plug in the scanner and run the diagnostics program
>It runs though a list of tests before it finally displays the results
>OH SHIT!
>Pretty much everything inside AJ is overheating. She apparently shut down automatically as a safety feature
>The scanner shows that a coolant pump is reporting a malfunction
>Huh. You never really thought about these things. So she's got some kind of liquid cooling system
>You remove your scanner. Looks like you need to take a look inside her
>You move AJ into a better position so you can have a look at her
>You realize that you're handling her carefully, like a living thing. She's certainly soft enough. Your fingers sink just enough into her coat to make it feel convincingly like flesh covered in minky fabric.
>Alright...now you just have to 'skin' her...
>After more careful reading of the manual, you figure out how to safely remove AJ's 'skin'
>It's pretty straightforward. After all, you would have to do this once in a while to wash the fabric, since giving a pony robot a bath is obviously not a good idea.
>You notice that in addition to the now faint smell of burnt plastic, she smells like old beer cans and damp cigarette butts. Guess you'd have to do this anyway...
>Fuck that lard-ass scammer asshole
>As you begin peeling back the fabric, you discover that her body is padded with sections of some kind of soft foam-like material that you don't recognize.
>The sections are dotted with embedded sensors. No doubt for registering touch.
>You pull her forelegs free. You can see now why Appiejack looks a little beefier than the actual thing.
>Her frame is mostly made of plastic, not steel. Carefully scraping against the exposed frame of the leg reveals that it's reinforced with fiberglass. Not too bad, though they obviously compensated for the reduced strength by making her frame thicker.
>The leg motors are a different story. You can't tell the make or specs at all. Not without somehow translating the chinese labels on them.
>You leave her legs alone for now and continue rolling down her fabric skin.
>Her upper body is now free, allowing you to see more of her insides.
>You've solved the mystery of how she was 'breathing'
>Obviously, being covered in padding means that all the heat generated will be trapped inside.
>The solution the maker went for is certainly novel, if not the most effective. You can see clear plastic tubes coming in from all over her body, going into a clear plastic chamber in her chest, where a radiator is mounted.
>An air bellow in one end of the chamber would be moving air in and out of the chamber through a hose leading up through AJ's neck.
>The clear tubes must be for the liquid coolant, and you immediately see a problem.
>They're empty. Droplets of distilled water cling to the inside.
>Welp. That explains why the pump wasn't happy. There simply wasn't anything to pump to the radiator, and with no way to carry the heat away, AJ was cooking herself.
>So now you have to find a leak. Guess you're going to have to strip AJ completely down and remove the padding sections to check all the tubes...
>You continue rolling her skin down until you reach the flanks...
>Something's wrong
>Very wrong
>You notice small fragments of padding on the floor. Loosening the 'skin' in the area reveals that they're falling out of a tear in a seam
>A tear in a seam in her rear...
>No...no no no...
>You feel a nauseating feeling of dread as you continue to roll the fabric down her backside...
“Oh my fucking god, what the hell...!”
>More padding falls out as you instinctively pull your hands away
>The lifeless AJ bot falls to her side as you push yourself away.
>Between the two sections of padding that make up AJ's posterior, you can see the evidence of someone having taken a hole saw to her...attempting to make a hole with the diameter of a cup...or a flashlight...
>You stand up, covering your mouth in shock.
>You notice that your hands are trembling
“I can't...Jesus, what the...what the fuck!”