Space-Time
by Avatar Titan
Chapters
The Things That Change Us
There is a certain solemnity to space - it is peaceful, tranquil, silent. It is a place for contemplation, for exploration, for study. It is the ultimate destination, the final frontier, the last obstacle that must be overcome.
But space can never be overcome. It always wins in the end.
In the end, everything that enters the cold of space is doomed to one day be like it - cold and silent, lifeless, but also full of life and ever open to new horizons.
Dash looked at the oxygen generator with disgust scrawled all over her face.
But there wasn't a choice.
She took the folding knife and cut the main tube, barely wider than her mouth. She stared at it for some time, the wiggling nozzle and the jet of cloudy oxygen that came out.
It would hurt. It would hurt and she was sure of it.
As Gilda's floatpack maneuvered her against the wall, Dash swallowed hard and held her breath.
Then, with all the force her weakened muscles could muster, she stuffed the oxygen-rich tube down her throat.
In the end, everything that goes Faster than Light is doomed to one day die.
Clouds of oxygen came out of her mouth, and she desperately tried to cough.
But there was no mouthpiece, no regulator, nothing to help her breathe. The emergency tank she had been living off was nearly empty. There was no other way.
She tried to suppress the gag reflex but it did not work - the remnants of her poor meal came flying out through every orfice it could, including her nose.
It hurt. It hurt but at least she wouldn't die.
Trying desperately to relax, Dash inhaled, feeling the cool oxygen flood her atrophied lungs.
In the end, despite our best efforts, the void of space will eventually consume all who dare set foot or hoof within it.
Dash tried to scream, but the ship, broken and scarred as it was, didn't have an atmosphere with which to scream into.
Space is a dangerous place - filled with death and destruction around every corner. It is thinly veiled behind its beauty, but is nevertheless there. Always, no matter where, space will try and kill you, either by removing your ability to breathe or by destroying everything you've ever loved.
No matter what, space will tear apart those who venture into it.
Dash was hungry. But if she removed the tube from her mouth there would be no air to breathe.
She would rather starve than suffocate. SO she left the tube in her throat, and tried to think of better things.
The only memory she could catch in her dream catcher was that of food. Food that, woefully, she could only dream about.
At the very least the tube kept her lungs filled.
Space is a beautiful monster. No matter the circumstance, it will always try to kill you.
The oxygen generator was exposed to the void.
It was so very, very cold.
Even when the system's sun illuminated the decimated room, Dash felt little more than total numbness. It hurt.
It hurt, and Dash could not stop it from hurting. It hurt.
Dash took another deep breath and tried not to think about it, but she shivered anyway.
In the distance, behind the gas planet that the Kestrel had been orbiting for months, something came to a halt.
It was rectangular, with exposed struts and pylons. It was much larger than the Kestrel.
Space is filled with danger, but there are those who know better. Space has masters- those who, after centuries of torment and torture, finally took the reins away from space.
I'm so sorry I left you behind.
I'm so, so very sorry.
You did nothing wrong. You didn't deserve this.
You didn't deserve to die.
I'm so, so very sorry.
Space, and time, bring eventual end to those born into it. But, sometimes, there will awaken one who can survive the wrath of space and the lashes of time.
The ship drew closer.
Dash was barely breathing; she was so hungry.
She had had nothing to eat for the past twelve days - or was it thirteen?
Lights came on from within the metal shell. Beacons flew across the wreckage, looking for elements of value.
It found nothing. Nothing but a few dead bodies, untouched by decomposition due to the nature of their death.
The ship prepared a few body bags - it dispatched two crewmen to clean things up.
But she was still alive.
Sometimes, when all hope is lost, there is one who still holds on.
The Wreckage
It's not often that we find a distress call these days. Especially with the hyperspace networks all set up and running. Most distress beacons come from sectors we're familiar with, not the asteroid belt of an uncharted system. Still, it's Federation policy to respond to beacons when we can, and even in deep space someone might need help.
My name is Peter Baran, Senior Warrant Officer on board the UDF Casmir, an Archangel-class repair and resupply cruiser. We were one of two Angels assigned to a flotilla currently hunting an Amber Fleet somewhere in the uncharted zones. The Crystalline Being is helping the navigational A.I navigate, but so far its been slow, and we haven't seen a single red ship anywhere. The Ospreys are getting restless. When we picked up the distress call the flotilla commander was sure it was a trap - some kind of weird Amber broadcast, no doubt. He sent us to make sure.
There was nothing in system when we first dropped out of h-space. Long-range scanners picked up a large amount of asteroids. Even our UV-band sensors, which are supposed to detect cloaked ships, received absolutely nothing in return. We were about to warp back when one of the ensigns pointed out something drifting in the asteroid field.
It wasn't like any ship I've ever seen - it was too angular, and too boxy. It was also too small - we easily were twice its length. The captain ordered a full scan of the vessel for signs of life. Nothing. And yet there were no signs of an Amber attack. The familiar red crystals that graced our holo-screens and our interwebs weren't here. Nothing. Not even a scorch mark from cannon fire. We tried hailing it but it didn't even have a proper comm system. It was a derelict - we had orders to scrap the thing and bring the metal back for analysis.
Chuck and I went in one of the shuttles. We were fairly certain that this was either a trap or some sort of joke, so we brought our rifles with us. These things can shoot a plasma bolt capable of melting anything it touches - and can do so at seven hundred shots per minute. Crystals won't stand a chance.
I had the first go, so Chuck followed me in his engineering suit. I had a laser saw, but we quickly found out that that wouldn't be necessary - the hull was already so full of holes that we could slide right in. Our suits were meant for this kind of search-and-rescue mission: decently armored, with the flexibility of civilian clothes. I did this kind of thing often during the Great Rebellion, as did many Angels. After cutting through the ruins of a Mantis ship, it gets routine when you have bodies flying all around you.
And there were - it was clear that this wasn't a Federation ship from the uniforms they wore (or didn't). It was especially obvious because they were unlike any sentient species we'd ever seen. Miniature horses. That's the closest I could describe them as. And there were a lot of them, all different colors, all atrophied and devastated from what seemed like an eternity in space.
How long had this beacon been on for? Even Chuck couldn't find out, and he was the resident computer genius.
We did a materials analysis on the structure of the ship, but it turns out it was made of some sort of aluminum alloy - completely useless in the new age of titanium-alpha. The computers were of no help either - the most advanced thing we found was barely any more powerful than my youngest sister's toys, and she's five. It seemed to be some sort of A.I core. Must've been a dumb A.I.
Chuck eventually decided to start scrapping some of the electronics when we discovered copper wiring in the equipment. While he did so I poked around the rest of the ship, looking for valuables. I had a nasty feeling in my mind that the captain wasn't exactly happy that the ship wasn't of any worth. I radioed Chuck to hurry up and cut through a partially broken door with a scratched-out symbol on it that looked suspiciously like the Lewis structure for oxygen gas.
The oxygen room was rather clean, I should admit. There was an atmosphere in here, albeit leaking like crazy. The oxygen generator (or so I presumed) wasn't of a make I knew of. It was like the rest of the ship - square and boxy, unlike the smooth and soft machines we were so used to. There was a horse corpse attached to a pipe feeding into the generator - it was sky blue, with faded hair the color of a rainbow and small, feathered wings that looked barely able to sustain flight. I said a silent prayer for the thing and started to examine the generator.
It twitched.
I looked at it again - it was just like the dilapidated corpses we'd passed over before. My helmet lights inadvertently fell on it, and its eyes (at least, I think they were eyes) squeezed together like a teenager rudely awoken from sleep.
I stepped back from the generator with mag-boots on, approaching the half-dead lifeform with a degree of caution. What the hell was this thing?
"Chuck," I said into my comm. "You're going to wanna see this."
The horse-creature slowly twitched some more. It was definitely moving. It began to cough - clouds of unbreathed oxygen came flooding out of its mouth. A few globs of what looked like half-eaten food were floating around it - it weakly started to bat at them with its stubby legs.
The tube from the oxygen machine was poking out from inside her throat - it had stuffed it down there to breathe. The thing was dying of oxygen deprivation!
When Chuck came in the bloody nozzle was shooting around the room expelling dry oxygen and I was holding my emergency air mask over it's parched blue face. It was breathing as if it never breathed in years - which looked like the case. Its eyes had the same euphoric gleam as a mother having her first child.
Chuck sliced off the only working piece of equipment on board while I radioed the ship to prep a room in the medical bay. No doubt the ensigns were already scrambling around with nanite injections while Dr. Pomeroy quietly rubbed his mechanical metal head.
We sort of half-carried, half floated the creature and the generator back to the shuttle. With the presence of gravity the generator weighed a ton - in comparison the half-dead horse was still as weightless as she was out there. Dr. Pomeroy was going to love this one. I put a few nanites in its leg while Chuck flew back - its euphoric look still fixed on its face. The oxygen inside the shuttle must've smelled divine.
Pom was waiting for us when we landed. He took one look at the poor thing and shouted in his robotic Engi voice for an immediate full nanite transfusion. It wouldn't be leaving the med bay anytime soon.
The Medical Bay
...beep...beep...beep...
The first thing Dash felt when her brain started working again was a sharp prick in her left leg. Or was it her right? Dash couldn't tell.
...beep...beep...beep...
Slowly, her nerves came online, sending weak pulses of electricity to her brain. She felt soft sheets covering her body, wrapped tightly around her. Or were they simply draped on her? Dash couldn't tell.
...beep...beep...beep...
There was an uncomfortable sensation on her chest, as if something mechanical was rhythmically pumping along with her heart. Or was that just her heart, heavy with sadness? Dash couldn't tell.
...beep...beep...beep...
And then, finally, her eyes opened. At first, they were barely more than slits. But, as she woke up, safe in her bed, safe in her cloud house in Ponyville, her eyelids made way for a pair of magenta eyes, criss-crossed with crimson veins. And nothing made sense anymore.
She was, indeed, lying in a bed, but it was hard and uncomfortable, instead of soft and foamy. Blinking, she struggled to adjust to the darkness around her, lit only by the green lights coming from a nearby contraption. A green line jumped sharply on a pitch-black screen, flailing erratically with no distinct pattern. A large tank with glowing green liquid was attached to it, a line filled with the substance crawling underneath her sheets. A hodgepodge of displays and viewscreens completed the trashy look. To Dash, it seemed as if somepony had stacked a ton of boxes on top of each other, tied everything up with a rat's nest of wires and tubing, and hoped that it would stay together.
Her throat hurt badly, almost as if somepony had stuffed a tube down it. Why would anypony do that? It didn't make any sense. She tried to get out of the bed but her legs wouldn't move, and she couldn't feel her wings. There was a faint pricking sensation in her left leg that twitched every once in a while, and her body felt uncomfortable, as if something was moving inside her veins.
Was she hurt? Was this Ponyville Hospital? Must be. Dr. Cardiac Arrest would come in through the door any moment now and ask her how she was doing. It was daytime, right? There was light - brighter than any Dash had seen, flooding through the seam of the door.
She collapsed back on the pillow, still unsure of what was going on.
Then, the door hissed open, and she only had more questions.
Two... things walked in. One was some sort of hairless ape, standing upright and wearing what looked like an armored chestpiece and loose blue pants. The other was some sort of machine - completely made out of metal with a glowing green monitor where its face should be displaying a crude rendition of one out of pixels. The only thing similar was that the chestpiece, tan with two symmetrical red vertical lines, was replicated on the metal ape's own hunched-over chest.
The machine went over to the monitors next to Dash. She watched as its rightmost appendage - with two graspers - disappeared in a flurry of action and was replaced with some sort of probe, which he stuck into a port in one of the displays. The hairless one went to her bedside and looked her straight in the eye.
"We're going to get you out of here," it said.
Immediately the hospital shook. The armored ape fell onto Dash's leg. Something moving within her and she had the desire to scream as loudly as she could, but her throat would not make a sound.
"Observation - Subject is injured," said the machine. "Do not further injure subject."
"Heh, sorry Doc." It turned back to Dash. "Don't worry, I won't let that happen again."
The hospital shook, much stronger than before. The ape braced itself against the bed this time. There was no pain, only a mild discomfort as a few pinches registered all over her body.
"Request - please cover me."
"Roger that," said the ape. It was now that Dash realized that it also was carrying something on its back - it looked like a weapon, and was glowing the same bright green as the liquid being pumped into her. He (it was a he, right?) grabbed the weapon with his graspers (they were called graspers, right?) and ran out the door. Sounds like warped gunshots echoed in from the hallway.
"Statement - you will be fine," said the machine, pulling off the covers.
She wasn't in a bed. This wasn't a bed - this was a dissection table. She was lying in a vaguely pony-shaped groove in what else would be a table. Small plates pressed against her legs, and restraints mounted on the side of the groove walls kept her in place. She was wearing some sort of paper-thin garment - it was like nothing she'd ever worn before. Dash had liked some... weird stuff back on Equestria but this was the greatest extent she'd seen her friends go out to please her.
If only her throat would stop hurting.
The machine fumbled around some more with its probe, and the restraints came loose. Dash felt her legs come back to her, but she still couldn't move them.
Then, the machine reached into the table with its steely appendages and picked her clean off. Hoisting her firepony style over its broad shoulders, it started running towards the door. The sound of gunfire and explosions still echoed off in the distance.
The instant Dash took a proper look outside, she completely removed any notion of her friends pranking her.
She was in some sort of hospital - it was clean and utilitarian, lacking any creature comforts whatsoever. Two massive windows flanked the open room, with an asteroid field in plain view. The hairless ape was standing behind a large pillar, the same color as his chestpiece, with a large amount of the same vicious green liquid inside. It was holding its weapon in its graspers, firing a stream of what looked like green balls at...
Nopony would ever dare to look that thing in the eye - it seemed to radiate fear.
It looked like an ape made entirely out of ruby crystals. It was so red that Dash saw everything with a green tint for a few seconds after. The green balls that the hairless thing was shooting at it didn't seem to do anything at all - merely making the monster bob up and down as if he was laughing.
It then fired a crystal straight at the pillar, causing green fluid to slosh all over the floor. But then the machine rounded the corner, and the ape followed soon after, with two more crystal shards embedding in the window.
As the machine carried her along Dash began to see other things in the breaks between the door-filled walls. Red crystals spreading a creature's brain over the machinery; green insect-like creatures spitting some sort of acid at more crystals; a figure shaped like the crystals but made of rock beating down yet another set of crystals. And everywhere, Dash saw the blood-red shards floating in space, shooting more shards at the ship she was in.
Celestia must've hated her. This was a banishment. Dash closed her eyes and tried not to look.
The sound was unmistakable - heavy footsteps. Heavy, heavy footsteps. And the noise of gunfire. Green flashes crept in under Dash's eyelids.
She tried to look.
It was another crystalline being. As red as blood, with tiny white dots that looked like eyes. Wing-like protrusions of crystal jutted out from its wide back. The floor and walls bent as it ran closer, unhindered by the endless surge of green energy the ape fired at it. It was making a sound like laughter, but deeper and crueller. Dash heard a vaguely feminine touch in its voice.
"Out of energy!" shouted the ape.
"Suggestion - continue running"
The green weapon, which wasn't glow so green anymore, was tossed to the side just before the machine ducked down and leapt into the air. Dash saw the cramped medbay corridor disappear behind them as the machine sailed over a huge flight of stairs. There were red crystals everywhere - wrapped in and around the steps and railings, and covering the floor of what appeared to be a massive hangar building.
The ape burst out of the same corridor they'd been running though and began to sprint down the stairs, somehow not slipping on the crystal. Suddenly Dash felt a sinking feeling in her stomach as the machine began to fall - the floor approaching faster and faster with every passing second.
Just before they were to crash through it, the machine's legs shot green clouds at the floor. Dash and the machine hit the floor running without so much as a dent - the ape right behind them.
"Pom! Find a shuttle and get her out of here!"
"Objection - not leaving organic behind."
There were hundreds, if not thousands of small, vaguely ship-shaped objects sitting around the hangar. Most of them were smoking - several completely swallowed by crystal. A few were charred wrecks, with shards of Sombra's favorite plaything scattered loosely around them, scorched and devastated. Apes, insects, and machines mixed in with the ships, in the exact same states - some with crystals embedded in their armor, some with bloody holes where there used to be crystal, and some desperately firing their weapons at an enemy who was more than happy to take the damage.
"Pom!"
The machine stopped. It's mechanical head looked back.
The hairless ape was pointing a pistol - Dash was sure that was a pistol - at the crystal monster. Barely. It barely got two shots off before the blunt crystal arm slammed into him and sent him flying into a spacecraft. The machine immediately began running towards the ship - it was in only one out of the lot that wasn't smoking or burning in any way.
Dash saw the ape spit blood out of its mouth - she was sure that was blood - and pull itself to its feet. The pistol was still in its hand. The mass of crystals laughed its ugly laugh and began charging towards the injured ape. Dash reached out with her hoof and tried to shout out.
The crystal fist found the ship, tearing the machine out from under her and sending her sailing across the room. Paralyzed and barely able to breathe, Dash could not help but stare up at another crystalline being as it stared back at her.
In the edge of her vision she saw the ape point its gun at the misshapen mass, only for the gun and half his grasper to be taken off by a crystal. His scream of pain was only dulled out by the ringing in Dash's ears.
A crystal mass walked by, carrying the machine in its hands.
"Good run," said the winged mass. "Take 'em back to the ship."
The normal mass nodded his "head" and began walking towards the massive exposed section of space on either side of Dash. As she watched, it re-formed itself, becoming a living projectile as it flew out of the hangar and into the asteroid field.
She then felt boring eyes gaze into her soul. The winged mass was standing over her, along with another, smaller one. She pointed at the ape, now lying in a puddle of blood, and the crystal man picked him up and carried him away.
Dash's uncomfortable paper robe squeezed tightly around her neck as she was picked up by the thing. It had no face - merely two glowing dots. Swirls of energy zipped around inside its crystal form, bouncing off the edges and concentrating in a single ball near the middle. It looked at her menacingly. Dash tried stand her ground but what little energy she had left failed her. She was nothing more than a ragdoll in the hands of an angry child.
"Well now, I haven't seen anything like you before," said the thing, its voice so loud that Dash thought it was being projected into her mind. "Maybe you'll have information like them. Maybe you'll make good eating. We'll take you along."
Suddenly, Dash was enveloped by a shell of crystal. There was barely enough room to move around, much less fight back. Dash couldn't do both. The sudden change in velocity thrust her against the rear wall of the cavity as, through the semi-transparent crystal body, Dash saw the ruins of the rectangular ship, covered in a sheath of red, like it was bleeding.
The Amber Ship
Fuck the Ambers. Fuck them. They have to come along and ruin us, every time. It's not like we weren't prepared or anything. But the plasma weapons barely did anything against them. These Ambers are upgraded. I saw it in their crystals. Energy - beyond anything we'd ever seen. Hateful and angry energy, the kind you get when someone annoys you to the point of wishing their death. Spite, given a material form and injected into their very forms.
Everyone on board is either dead or captured. I'm one of the lucky ones - I got out with a half-missing hand. The others... well, someone was taken as a torso, nothing more, with his arms and legs completely severed. Gives me shivers just thinking about it.
I don't know where they've taken the horse. Last time I saw her I was half-dead on the floor of the hangar. Kinda like her.
I've seen a Crystal brig before. The ones whose crystals are a nice, solid blue. It's a very innovative thing they do. First, they inject you with nanites that remove the need for food, drink, or the bathroom. Next, they throw you into a regenerating crystal ice cream cone that traps you in like a teepee without a door. The only view outside is on top - there's a small porthole where you can see the stars. Reminds you that the Crystal now controls you - you don't control the Crystal.
They did unspeakable things, these Ambers. They made their ships so that the screams of the tortured can be heard in the cells. And not only that, it echoes around endlessly, the pain reverbing in your ears. It's mind-numbing. It's impossible to think. For some, it gets to be too much. I've only heard rumors up to now - survivors who endured the torture in the crystal ships, who were finally rescued by Federation. I had to receive them once on board - I was, to say the least, uncomfortable by their presence. Now, I'd like to see the face of the person who receives me, if I get out of here alive.
If. If is the question, not when. This is deep space. The prisoners we cared for were all from explored space. Patrol craft found them eventually.
Us? A prayer before mealtime is more likely to happen than a rescue.
The crystal bandage that formed around my severed hand kept the blood from leaking out, but the headaches and torment it brought along was torture in itself. Add that to the deliciously painful methods they use to extort information from you, the endless isolation, and the unanimous red decor. The whole place is a living hell.
These Crystalline aren't like the regular ones - those are shades of blue. They started popping up in small fleets soon after the Rebellion was shut down. Dr. Pom always said that the color of a Crystal is dependent on the emotions they evoke - Crystalline color changes rapidly as a child, but by adolescence Crystal society has usually caused the specimen to maintain their most-expressed color. However - in the case of the Amber, the Rebel invasion of their home systems caused a certain anger reflex within the Crystal matrix - their "brain". This extreme anger corrupts the functions of the Crystalline, making them both infertile but capable of self-replication. The Amber ship is little more than a collection of dead Amber Crystallines, fused together in both mind and matter.
They remind us that we are unlike them - that we are mortal, unlike them, who can live for generations "in proxy" of themselves.
But, no matter how depraved the rumors are, there have never been rumors about Crystals becoming invulnerable to weapons. It just simply cannot be true.
Heavy footsteps. Through the semi-transparent crystals I can make out a Crystalline. It stands at seven foot two, just shorter than the average Rockman. The shape is contorted by pockmarks, most likely made using Manis spit. It's holding something in its blunt hand - cyan blue, with a faded rainbow mane and a pair of defeated blue eyes.
It looks around for awhile but does nothing. It then approaches my pod and touches it. His faceless face is as red as everything else. I scowl angrily at him, but he says nothing, merely tossing the pony into my pod and closing it.
His crystals looked solid, as opposed to the transparent nature of the red crystal covering the ship. Perhaps it was a temporary effect? Whatever the case, I had a new occupant in my cell - one that I wasn't keen on letting die.
She wasn't injured - at least, not any more than the last time I saw her. Dr. Pom had said it was a female, due to the similarities between it and mares of the species Equus ferus caballus, but other than that even his advanced processors couldn't come to a stable conclusion on what it was.
Whatever she was, I was responsible for her life.
Then, she looked at me with her magenta eyes, and I felt my heart jump into my throat. Fucking Ambers.
They replaced her left eye with a solid piece of crystal. Could she even see out of that? Did they actually torture her to try and figure out who she was? Amber torture methods are famous for not leaving any marks - she could've been...
The soft cyan fur collapsed into my arms. I felt obligated to hug it.
I had an extra nanite injection stored in the lapel of the armored Federation uniform. It was supposed to be for emergencies - I supposed this was emergency enough. There weren't enough nanites for a complete healing - merely a broken bone or something - but at least it would give her comfort.
The flat, disk-like needle went into her leg without so much as a sniffle. I rubbed her mane with my free hand while the nanites worked their magic, numbing pain systemically and promoting cellular growth in damaged areas. She slowly came to life in front of me, and only squeezed harder into the hexweave of my chestplate.
I hugged her too, trying my best to dull out the desperate screams of the tortured as they echoed around the vessel.
Briefing Report on Amber Fleet Intercept Mission
To be stored on board the UFS Nesasio until mission expiration.
Initiation date: 21/07/2107
BRIEFING - The following information is confidential to all except those for whom this briefing is intended.
UFS Nesasio,
We have received reports of increased Amber activity in the outer regions - specifically grid 10726, 130; 10738, 130; and 10748, 130. While initial readings show no difference from standard Amber fleet composition, field sources report that these ships are becoming increasingly resistant to plasma weapons and are exhibiting more brutal tactics, including boarding actions and hostage capture.
PRIMARY OBJECTIVE: Secure an Amber or an Amber vessel for interrogation and/or analysis.
IF PRIMARY OBJECTIVE CANNOT BE COMPLETED: Secure Amber wreckage (including corpses) for autopsy and salvage analysis.
SECONDARY OBJECTIVE: Respond to and resolve distress reports that may involve Amber vessels, the nature of which is either violent an/or abductive.
TERTIARY OBJECTIVE: Recover personnel and/or civilians that have been captured by Amber vessels.
They hadn't come. Both the Federation and the Amber. After they threw her into the pod it hasn't been opened since. My wounds are actually beginning to heal. She's actually beginning to look around and move on her own now. She still can't talk (if she can talk) - her throat is extremely damaged by the tube she stuck down, but at the very least she accepts mane rubs. I've tried my best to communicate with her - to an extent, it's working. Mom always said I was great with kids - this pony, she's just like a kid.
From what I could tell she has the same personality as my youngest sister - adventurous and thrill-seeking. Not afraid of anything. She's not fearful of the pod or screams, more likely just curious. She's been scratching at the crystal for days now - it's almost a form of entertainment to her. It makes me happy just looking at it.
The world changes, I suppose. Wherever they're taking us, at least I have her.
The ship shook slightly as the hyperspace fluctuator activated. Outside the tiny porthole, the blanket of tiny white dots blurred out into an unintelligible sequence of lines until the blackness of space was gone and there was nothing but light.
The Stealth
Dash woke up inside another medical bay. This time, the lights were on, and she was lying on an actual bed. It looked remarkably similar to the gurneys Ponyville Hospital used to transport around sick ponies to the scanners and whatnot. The familiar green glow mixed in with the white light. There were needles, although not as many, sticking out all over her, and Dash couldn't help but think that something out there was using her as a pincushion.
She looked down at herself next - woah. Whatever had happened to her on the way here, it was completely gone. Her skin and coat were a lively shade of blue. Her wings, which lay folded up beneath her, seemed completely feathered. The sensation of something sucking everything out of her was gone, with only the familiar feeling of nothing all over her body. She was fine.
The room was like the previous one she'd been in, but much more sparse. The machines weren't there anymore, replaced by a singular bottle of the viscous green liquid, with tubes flowing out to the needles on her legs.
The last thing she remembered before her memories were but blurs was the deafening howl of explosions and the shaking of the crystals that surrounded her and the ape. Something had happened between then and now, but even Dash didn't know what. Maybe the ape's friends had come to save them?
The door suddenly hissed open, and there in the doorway stood the metal machine, wearing what seemed to be a shirt. A faint memory in her mind recalled the machine being named something that began with P. The ape had called it that. What was it? Princess? Pom-pom? Somthing spelled p-o-m, because she wasn't stupid, and had learned her Equestrian well.
It was also a doctor, apparently. Seems like robots could go to school here. Did they get cutie marks too?
"Um..." she began. "Doctor..."
"Strange, it comes from another world, and yet it speaks our language."
Every hair in Dash's body suddenly prickled up. The machine sounded a lot like something she knew. She didn't remember what though. A few blurs revealed a white blob in the faint shape of a pony with striking purple hair.
"Tell me, what other words can you speak?"
It was definitely feminine. Dash could give it that.
"Uh... hello?"
"Fascinating... Oh, please do continue."
"Hi. Um, are you, uh, Doctor-"
"Doctor Pomeroy? He is fine. Although I am not him. "
Its voice changed. Suddenly it was overtly masculine in nature and quite low. Dash was reminded of a time when one of her friends had a really deep voice.
"Uh, okay, could you tell me who you are?"
"My name is Kayos." The conversation ended there.
"Kayos, huh? Well, I'm-"
"I suppose my name is not enough. I am a prototype Engi diplomatic unit, with advanced vocal projectors capable of mimicking other species' speech patterns. You may have confused Doctor Pomeroy for me, although I can ensure you that he is not me, because even though Engi units are similar in appearance, each is unique in its own way."
Dash sheepishly smiled at the machine, crawling back from it.
"I am sorry if I frightened you. Most aliens are indeed likely to be frightened by contact with extraterrestrial life."
Did it... did it just call her an alien? In its now neutral, toneless voice?
"No," she said. "I'm not scared. Definitely not scared. You... um, you all just look the same."
"True. However, I assure you that we mean no harm."
There was something about the metallic voice that made her feel comfortable. A faint memory in her head triggered a picture of a purple alicorn, although Dash couldn't remember who.
"I came to wake you before your nanite injection."
Huh? What?
"Nanite injection?"
The machine walked into her room and sat down on the thing that looked vaguely like a chair. It was red, with a shine like plastic, and the machine laid its rear end into the curvature.
"Yes. Your mind and body have been extremely damaged from extended periods of time in a zero-g, low-oxygen environment. When there is no gravity, muscles slowly begin to deteriorate due to their lack of use. Artificial gravity is present on every Federation ship, but perhaps there was none on yours. Your mind, needless to say, has been damaged from multiple head wounds and impact-related incidents, as well as psychologically broken due to a traumatic experience."
There was a flash of red over the left side of her vision. Her head and stomach suddenly wanted to leave her body as fast as they could.
"Knowing the Amber, they probably have done horrible things to you."
The thing, made of crystal, and its rock-like arm. They were just blurs, but thinking about them made Dash shiver from top to bottom.
"The nanites will allow us to reconfigure several parts of your skeletomuscular system that have been damaged, as well as restore your brain to full functionality. Your anatomy seems very similar to human innards, I'll give you that. We have devised a simplified procedure to inject the machines. "
Dash noticed that the machine's right grasper had transformed into a long needle, with a vial of the green liquid at the very bottom.
"If you'd like, we can start now, and I can tell you any story in my codex of human entertainment."
Once upon a time there was a prince. This prince became king when his father died. He had always wanted to be king, and the previous king had prepared him for the task. At his coronation, instead of allowing the steward to crown him, he took the crown from the steward and placed it atop his own head. The crowd cheered for him then.
Later, however, the people did not cheer for him. The prince had changed. Once king, power had gotten to his head. He was... affected... by a dark disease, an endless desire to immortalize his rule and become supreme.
Perhaps his mistake was the greatest ever made. He accepted the powers of the dark and became one with the shadows. Suddenly, not only did he have the means to control his own empire, but all the empires that ever existed, past, present, and future.
He hid his powers and waited for a chance to strike. His military genius was second to none - the supreme ruler of the land bequeathed upon him riches and accolades for all the achievements he made in war. But soon, a new age of harmony came about, and war was not needed anymore. The dark prince saw his pawns disappear - he saw his people break into cheer. The chaos that came about - he despised it. And so he used his power not to control the world, but instead to revile it.
A fatal mistake, this was. He was turned to shadow by two sisters, and banished to the frozen ice of the arctic north. He returned, once more, and this time he was removed from the world. The second resurrection, he was disintegrated, with his horn the only part of him remaining. It was lost in the blizzards of the north, buried under layers and layers of ice and snow.
The crystals that made him abandoned him, leaving him for the waves of dark and tides of time.
But there was another... more powerful entity that found him. Rebels, red as blood, fleeing from defeat, found his horn and his power. They found his last remnant, and in this remnant they found a voice.
"Sir!" said the dish operator.
The pony at the helm of the control station instantly acknowledged the operator.
"What is it, Bit Byte? Report."
"Sir, we've lost contact with at least twelve of our orbital satellites."
In this remnant, on this planet, they found a means of victory. They incorporated his corruption into their own crimson bodies, and in doing so became more powerful than they could ever imagine.
"Sir! I have a visual!"
"Put it on the screen, quickly!"
The dark prince saw a means to gain life for a third time, and so he took it, spreading his essence over the crystal fleets and the crystal cities. The new empire called themselves Amber. They quickly struck back against their former oppressors, tearing them apart without so much as a scratch."
"Inform Celestia immediately. We have a global crisis in our hooves."
"Sombra has returned. And this time, he's serious."
Even though she didn't feel great, at least she could move around. When she laid hoof on the floor for the first time, she discovered that she was about half the machine's height, and that she could barely walk without wobbling off-course. Kayos had said that this was normal for quadrupedal creatures and that he had summoned a wheelchair.
Her mind felt a little better. At the very least, she could recall the names of her five friends. Their pictures still looked fuzzy, but Kayos, again, said that it was normal for visuals to incompletely develop after a nanite reconfiguration.
The machine, however, knew more - much more than she did. He purposefully blurred up several memories deep within her cerebrum. They contained a lot of red. So much red, that Kayos's optics were a little green afterwards.
But the removal of a memory requires a vessel to hold it in, and Kayos was forced to relive Dash's torture.
It was not a pleasant experience, even for an emotionless quasi-machine like Kayos.
But what was he to do? Peter had said to keep her happy, and he was to keep her happy. Peter was his superior officer.
The black and blue vessel slipped through the hyperspace tunnel with a speed beyond anything light had ever attempted. Its darkened armor did not reflect the hyperspace light, merely neutralizing it and rendering the ship a mere shadow amongst thousands of bright stars. It was practically invisible against the blue walls of the tunnel.
There were enemies behind it - enemies that it could destroy. But it was one ship, while the enemy was ten. So it held back its weapons and pursued them. In time, it flew past them, and was currently ahead.
A silent order rang through h-space, and the vessel began to slow. The blue walls slowly turned back as the starfield returned. The light of a nearby sun tried to catch the stealth cruiser's eye but it would have none of it. Quickly, it flared its engines, yellow flames leaping out of the exhausts. Silently, it released a silver orb into the darkness, before jetting away, and disappearing.
Mere minutes later, A fleet of red ships appeared. They looked startled, the crystals that covered them dull and worn instead of energized. They looked around and saw the sphere. Several began firing shards of crystal at it.
Suddenly, the space was alive with fire. Black ships, with cannon bristling from every angle, came in from the side. The cruiser, its job complete, released its powerful cloak.
The howl of a thousand missiles thundered over the silence of space as explosions tore apart the crystal apparitions. The cruiser weaved between the flying shards, its own anti-ship missiles deliberately aiming for control centers and weapons networks, never hitting the brigs. Blasts of plasma mixed in with the missiles but they did nothing against the crystals - while the explosions fragmented them into a million pieces.
It was over mere minutes before it began. The small fleet of missile cruisers tore open the crystal ships. They now mingled with the remains, piercing open prisoner pods and rescuing the broken, scarred, and afraid captives within.
One shuttle found a pod with a surprisingly unhurt man, and a deformed quadruped with hair all the colors of the rainbow.
Kayos had left the pony, breathing and alive, in her room. The nanite injection was, for the most part, over. The residual memories he had obtained from her had been archived and primed for deletion. Everything, as it seemed, was fine.
There was just the small thing of reporting to the captain.
Unfortunately, when the Engi stepped onto the bridge, he got much more than he was bargaining for.
The captain and two Zoltan in Federation uniform were waiting for him there. The ship Zoltan rarely ever exited the systems - these were obviously not the ship Zoltan. Kayos knew the Zoltan - all four of them were lime green. These two were a dark forest green, with serious faces etched from peaks and crevices of energy.
One of the Zoltan extended its glowing green arm, which Kayos took in his grasper.
"Medical Officer Kayos," said the captain. "These gentlemen are from a research firm in the Gas Cities of Jupiter. They wish to speak to you about the alien."
"The alien? You mean the horse?"
"Yes," said the one on the left. "The psuedo-equine that your ship found in the brig of a crystal vessel. We were hoping we could analyze it."
Zoltan were always brutally honest.
"And?"
"And see how it would react to stimuli," said the right one. "That stimuli being pain, euphoria, and various other simulated emotions."
"You obviously haven't scratched the surface yet."
"We also wish to do a surgery on it. To observe its inner workings in the flesh. And perhaps gather more data in case we ever see another member of this non-sentient species."
"Non-sentient? How could it be non-sentient? It spoke to me. Plainly. In English."
"That is impossible. The report stated that it was incapable of speech and locomotion."
"You actually haven't seen her yet, have you? I just finished her nanite infusion, she's-"
"Her... Her. When did you confirm its gender?"
Kayos never really liked talking with Zoltan.
"When I partially displaced her blood with nanite mush. I was able to conduct several inner body assessments and can conclude that she has a very similar anatomical structure as a human female, of maybe twenty years old."
"Are your findings valid?"
"Valid as I could say. I'll have Doctor Pomeroy re-check them if you wish."
"We understand that this specimen may be of some value to a specific officer on board. Perhaps this is clouding your judgement."
The Zoltan on the left leaned closer to the Engi.
"This is an alien specimen. It must be dealt with the absolute caution. We do not yet know what it is capable of. I request, most vehemently, to take it in for analysis and possible dissection."
"She may be an alien specimen but she is still a living being. And the Federation exists to preserve and protect all living beings, including this helpless little creature you refer to as "subject" and "specimen"."
The right Zoltan sighed.
"Captain, it seems you were right. We will get nowhere with our petty requests. We must make a deal with this Engi unit and the human responsible for finding her."
"We humbly request that you make a stop in the Gas City so we may discuss the matter further."