Node's: Use the truth. 84%
Spike raised a claw to knock, but the door swung open on its own. He retreated a step—but it was only Apple Bloom on the other side. She was wearing one of those strange harness-things, making her stand vertically like he was. She was also entirely biological, just like he was. Just like Node.
“I was wonderin’ when you would show up,” she said. “After Pinkie found her way here… she said you’d finally found yer way in to bust us all out of this place.”
“I have,” Spike said, voice cautious. “Are you… against it, like your sister?”
Is she? No.
“Buck no!” she kicked the door out of the way with one of her hooves. The strange mechanism retracted and contorted, springs humming quietly. But it was entirely mechanical—Spike couldn’t even see anything powering it. It was just superbly perfect engineering. Just like the Signalers. They designed these. Node did say the Contingency was waiting for us.
The house smelled wonderfully of homely foods, enough that Spike felt himself relaxing as he stepped in. Yes, this confrontation was about to wear him out, but at least he could do so with a full stomach. He would have to carry these memories with him, since he’d never eat again. Unless I want to come back here. Once I know the time dilation factor, I could pop up and down without anypony else even noticing.
Spike had never seen their old homestead for himself, way out in the belt. But he guessed it looked like this—old farming equipment hung up on the walls, pictures of landscapes crudely painted, a huge chunk of iron banded with gold fixed to the wall like a trophy.
Then there was the food. The kitchen was full of it, smelling exactly like home. No more powdered protein additives, but actual steaming vegetables. True, he often found pony food a little lacking. But compared to what he’d been eating for the last forty years…
“Mhmmm,” he closed his eyes, letting the odors wash over him. “That’s real apple pie, isn’t it?”
“Sure is,” Applejack answered, removing the pan from the oven with one clawed gripper and settling it on the counter. It was too high, like everything—but too high for a pony was perfect for these bipedal skeletons. “We both worked on it. Figured you’d be here eventually, and food don’t actually go bad around here, so…”
“You know why we’re here,” Rainbow said. It wasn’t a question. Their eyes met. “We have a mission to complete. Spike says you’ve been… expressing some doubts about doing your part.”
Begin social combat. Rolls are reflected in the Equinox channel.
“It ain’t up for discussion,” Applejack said. “I’ve told him how I feel, and I assume he’s told you.” She glanced to see his face, then nodded. “Alright then. I’ve said this is the place for me. We’re dead, and that’s just a right shame. But it ain’t a half bad place to live. I figure… if we wait long enough, our families will find us.”
“They will not,” Node said. Applejack stared as she crossed the room, then pulled out a chair and tipped it back, putting up her strange shoes on the table next to some country cobbler. “Because you are not dead. Your minds are currently being simulated on the hardware of the Contingency—an immensely powerful computer, one meant to be hidden inside a large comet and launched into space. There it could hide from the Hunger for a timeless eternity, one of a billion billion similar objects. Undetectable, unknowable, unseen. A coward’s solution… my own civilization’s solution.”
“You aren’t dead,” Spike added helpfully. “None of you are, Twilight and Fluttershy have kept your bodies alive. I think there’s a way in this system here to… reverse whatever harvested your minds, put them back. We can do something like that, can’t we Node?”
“You, Apple Bloom, and me—simple. The others—tricky, but yes. I believe the process can be reversed if the transfer was recent enough.”
Applejack glanced between each of them. “You all… agree with this? Going back?”
They nodded one after another. Even her sister, which seemed to hurt her the most. It was Rarity who finally spoke, though. “Applejack, we’ve all left family behind. I’m as eager to see mine as you are to find yours, I have no doubt. But we will not find them by fleeing into the machine. We must rise up and complete the mission we came to complete.”
Applejack sighed, slumping into one of the chairs. She held out one claw, flexing the mechanical fingers. “I knew… I knew it would come down to somethin’ like this,” she said. “But before we go… I want a promise. One day—maybe a month from now, maybe a year. If we’ve done all we can, if we’re done with the Equinox and on our way home… I don’t want to go into the ice. This place is for me. I want to feel the gravity of a planet again. Grow apples again. Promise you’ll be on my side.”
“I promise,” Spike said. The others agreed, or else didn’t say anything. It was enough.
Spike ate along with the others, relishing what might be his last chance to enjoy so many familiar foods. He didn’t know these recipes, and there was no chance in Tartarus he was going to tell Applejack about brief trips into this thing, if he planned on taking them at all. They all had stories to share—what they’d accomplished while alone, the things they’d seen.
Only Node remained separate, tinkering with a nearby console. Finally Spike wandered over to see what she had accomplished.
She lowered her voice. “This is… this shouldn’t be my choice to make,” she said. “They’re your crew, not mine.”
“Tell me,” he said, matching her whisper.
“Well… like I said, a digital mind can go in and out of whatever system we want. But there are organics in here. Pulling them out is… going to be tricky.”
“Explain.”
“Well… the hard part is saving anything that happened in here. Think of it like… a buffer. They weren’t ever meant to go back. Effecting changes on an organic brain isn’t easy. The simplest way to bring everyone out, we just restore them to who they were right when they went in. That’s safe. Or…”
“She gestured, showing him another plan. “We could disable these safeties here, boost the gain, and try to send them back anyway. It’s been over a year of subjective time for everyone here—it would be wrong to take that away. Good thing you have to decide, and not me.”
1. Send them back without their memories. [Rainbow’s stats revert, and anything else learned by the organic crewmen is forgotten]
2. Transfer out with everything [dangerous]
(Certainty 200 required)
I'd say sacrificing the memories is an acceptable price to pay. It's arguably a benefit in some cases. Pinkie's prolonged isolation did her sanity no favors, and even Dash's improved skills seem like gilding the lily.
If the memories are reversed...AJ wouldn’t remember why she wanted to stay. Those stat bonuses could sure be useful though...tough choice
oh man, that hidden option. I'll have to come back to see that one.
Cruel as it may be to erase a year's worth of memories, I choose to believe that the Signalers knew what they were doing when they placed those safety measures in place. Bypassing them would pose an unacceptable risk to the crew and losing any one of them will be catastrophic for team morale and further hinder chance of mission success down the line.
The pragmatist in me first thought this was an easy one. You lose some skill gains but it’s safer and AJ won’t remember she wants to go back in.
Then I remembered Bloom will remember. What happens if Bloom says something about it? There is nothing worse for trust than memory manipulation. There’s also no reason to ask them or inform them cause they will either want to stay more or forget they consented anyway. I haven’t voted yet cause I still need to think in it. I’m leaning toward running the risk to have them remember.
There are too many organic ponies here to risk rolling for each of them. As bad as it may be, leave the memories behind. Just make sure Applebloom knows about it first.
Opption 4:
Let each one of them chose.
9717187
Fair enough, offer them choice while knowing the risks. Realistically the only one that would actually benefit from the memories is RD anyway.
I don't like any of these choices. Something this important needs to be decided by the individuals themselves, yet none of the options even hints at asking them about this.
But if we MUST decide on our own, I'd go with... the risky one. A year of experience for each is likely too vital a tool against The Hunger to dismiss due to "increased risk", at least in most cases.
Remove everyone without their memories. After that have Spike, Bloom, and Node share their memories with each person who was affected.
Send them back minus the memories. Its safer and it doesnt pose the risk of an even more unstable pinkie pie.
Edit: also AB node and spike can just re administer the training to RD during their trip to get the bonus back. And it can be up to AB wether they wanna tell AJ about the promise that shed be forgetting
My big question is if its a matter of buffering, why not have as many of the now data based individuals remove themselves from the system to regain memory space to ease the transference of the organic minds?
I mean Node alone has a lifetime from her previous life that was saved on this thing and is running now. Couldn't she safely do all this monitoring it from the outside to safe on processing power?
Anyway, we've probably been taking to many chances as is. The gains don't look to great to out-way the potential risks. I'm voting to send the organic crew back to the moment before they entered. Rainbow might have intel, but at this point so does Node and Applebloom.
9717236
Yes. This has been my complaint about this story all along. The poll options are selected, and the results are interpreted by Starscribe, in ways that give very little actual choice or agency to the participants. Starscribe also chooses not to answer questions about the poll to clarify the choices. Other interactive stories have chosen different methods that have been far more collaborative. For example, picking the most popular reader suggestion(s) or picking one suggestion from the comments using random selection.
Don't underestimate the last factor!
Sorry if I missed something, but was it stated why they didn't launch?
Of course, leave the hard decisons to us.
Speaking of which, I voted to Send them back without their memories, for the same reasons 9717137 had already stated.
We're so close. Let's not trip at the finish line and have to limp across.
That's an interesting idea.
Silly earth pony, you aren't actually dead.
Transfer out with everything, we're well past not living dangerously.
Hmmm, considering how well Signaler tech has performed so far, the risk seems fairly low in actuality, but would it be worth it? Disappointing it's an everyone or no-one choice....
Yikes. This is some pretty morally gray area.
Unfortunately, the Hunger is still out there, and I don't think Rainbow's new kicking skills are gonna do much against it. Danger is unacceptable when not needed.
Wipe their memories. We can beg for forgiveness later.
9717405
It's not a space problem. It's a problem of writing the new memories back to fully organic brains. Node, AB and Spike have computer brains, so it's easy to copy the data to them, but not the others.
Scanning the brain to make a digital copy of the mind is easier then putting some new memories into the brain.
I vote to wipe them, but inform them first - they won't remember it anyway. Also, Applejack won't be so eager to go back in. There is enough risk out there without adding some more.
Yeah, really doesn't make sense that Spike wouldn't give each of them a choice. I'd bet Rainbow would take the chance, even if no one else did.
Rolling for insanity....
...2...
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Hmmm, the options this time are both tempting. Having AJ forget all this may be for the best, but we'd lose RDs boosts. What they've learned over the year-ish time seems... not actually all that great. Rarity created like she do, RD got those stats, AJ just got homey, and Pinkie almost went NUTS. I guess if Rarity was doing some science while making dresses we'd have knowledge to lose. AB, Node, and Spike would retain everything from their experiences at least.
Also the corrupt option this time around is really good honestly. Definitely something you could see a malcontent A.I. doing at a time like that. A lot of the time the corrupt thing just sounds like an extreme lash out of irrationality, this time it's cold machine logic.
As much as I'd like to keep those stat gains, I'm always going to advocate for safety. And that's sadly to simply revert them. Just gotta tell Apple Bloom about it and discuss what to do about it after. Too many rolls, too many chances for something to go wrong.
I dont think enough people want to play devils advocate. To many people wanting to play it safe or a little dangerous.
And again the most obvious choice is thrown out...
What is it that gets you in a tiffy about ASKING THE DAMN PEOPLE what they want?
Yeah, why don't ask each of them if they want to risk it or not? and how is "dangerous" exactly? Headache? malus to stats? headexplode?
and even if they forget spike and applebloom wouldn't. They could leave message for themselves if they want. For example Applejack could explain how it was and why she would come back to it if nothing else is possible.
Also, there is not a way to make a copy? Node said that a copy of her is in one of these simulations somewhere (or she is a copy, whatever) there is no way to bring them out AND leave them in? as a kind of backup?
...in what universe would Spike ever make this decision affecting his friends so deeply without even asking them?
Can we try and send everyone back with memories intact except Pinkie? She did NOT have a good year and I dont think her stability needs the extra cracking
If it was me, I’d want to keep my memories.
Voted for the dangerous option.
Oh crap, I think I just gave a tiebreaker vote. I wasn't ready for this kind of post-vote pressure!
... And "Ask them which they'd prefer" is not an option..... why?
9719661
If you had a deep-seated fear of abandonment and you had to endure a year's worth of time alone wondering when and even if your friends were coming back, all while completely isolated from contact with any other intelligent being, you would want to remember that?
9721626
Yes.
Because then I (Pinkie) would know that, no matter how much I was afraid of being abandoned, no matter how long I had to wait, eventually my friends would come for me.
I (she) was never truly alone. This memory is important for her.