The Maretian

by Kris Overstreet


Sol 338

AMICITAS FLIGHT THREE – MISSION DAY 343
ARES III SOL 338

Despite having spent the morning harvesting potatoes in the Hab and the early afternoon harvesting or replanting the surviving potatoes in the cave farm, everyone rushed to bring out the computers for the book reports. The confused, faltering efforts to tell stories about the current heroes of Equestria had proven one thing: storytelling was hard.

“All right,” Starlight said once everyone was gathered. “Dragonfly, why don’t you go first?”

“Fine by me,” Dragonfly said, looking “I didn’t make it all the way through Foundation, and I’m in no hurry to finish it. When I read the description I was expecting empires, space ships, huge battles, big darn heroes. And what did I actually get?” She tapped the top of her computer. “Math. Math and books and talk, talk, talk. Hardly anything really happens at all! Or if it does happen, it happens way over there somewhere so that it won’t bother anybody. If this is what Isaac Asimov is like, I hope he didn’t write very many books.”

“Only about four or five hundred,” Mark muttered.

“All right,” Starlight shrugged. “So we won’t go there. Fireball, what did you think of The Golden Spiders?”

“It was fun,” Fireball said. “But a little confusing. Had to look up what ‘displaced person’ meant. Then looked up immigration. Did you know humans don’t want to let other humans move from one place to another? Make it hard to do so? Dragons not put up with that for long. Stupid idea.”

“Preach it, brother!” Dragonfly cheered.

“Be quiet, you,” Spitfire said. “Your queen number one argument for, wossword, in-meague-ray-shun.”

“Spitfire, leave Dragonfly alone,” Cherry Berry said quietly.

“Anyway,” Fireball continued, “I figure out blackmail just fine. Know some dragons who do it. Nice roof you got, fresh straw, burn nice, too bad if someone sneeze, and not getting lots of gold make snout itch. So I got the idea. But what made it a good book was two main characters. Character who tells story is funny, smart. I like him. And his boss, the fat human, I think I like too. I want to know what makes his head run. I like the book lots. Is there more?”

“NASA sent over forty books by Rex Stout,” Starlight said. “I think they were looking for long series or prolific authors or something.” She turned to Cherry Berry. “Now for Ringworld. Cherry?”

Cherry had been blushing deeper and deeper as her turn approached. “Mark,” she said quietly, “are all humans this obsessed with sex?”

“Um…” Mark shifted a little uncomfortably. “I didn’t think Ringworld was all that-“

“A device that triggers sexual bliss on command?” Cherry asked. “A world where sex is used to seal every bargain? What kind of imagination comes up with that?”

“An imagination that wants to sell a fuckload of books?” Mark suggested.

Cherry blushed even more deeply. She reminded Starlight a bit of Big MacIntosh for a moment.

Mark apparently got the hint. “Oops. That was unintentional. My bad.”

Cherry Berry coughed and moved on. “Most of the book is really interesting. Radically different aliens- like us- gathered together to explore a bizarre new world. Crash-landing on that world. Relying on each other to find a way home. It had action. It had big thoughts about luck and design and stuff. It had emotion. But it also…”

Starlight wondered why Twilight Sparkle wasn’t here now to rescue them. Cherry’s blush had to be visible across at least a few dimensions…

“Look, the ri-ri-the sex stuff is really distracting, that’s all I’m saying!” the commander finished. “And there’s no way I could read this book aloud without thinking about what’s in it!”

“How about we trade books?” Dragonfly asked. “And maybe I could translate that one for my queen when we get back. You know she loves the racy books.”

“I did not need to know that,” Starlight said. “Moving on. Spitfire, how did you make out with Equal Rites?”

Spitfire tapped her computer. “This story,” she said, “is home.”

“Home?” Starlight leaned closer. “How do you mean?”

“More like, it home if we had humans run things instead of princess,” Spitfire continued. “Some stupid stuff. Why can’t boy or girl be wizard? Or witch? But then I think. Back home I know unicorns built in Cloud Valley, earth pony in capital. I think of pegasus want to teach magic. I think of earth pony who want to fly.” She looked straight at Cherry Berry as she said this. “So girl want be wizard, is, um, like earth pony want fly. Thing.”

“Metaphor,” Starlight said.

“Whatever. So I understand that part. But the rest of it is… not like Hogwarts. Not like Middle Earth. Real people. Magic that breaks sometimes. Weird things happen just because. Monsters. Laundry. And pr-eye-vee. Had to look it up too. Means outhouse. Harry Potter only go bathroom to talk to Myrtle. No outhouse in Middle Earth at all.” Spitfire smirked, saying the next sentence with great care and even greater amusement: “No one in Middle Earth ever goes to the bathroom.”

“Or on the starship Enterprise either,” Mark muttered.

“Huh?”

“Nothing, go on.”

“Anyway, big adventure, big thought, and it feels like home.” She paused a moment then added, “If home were flat and on giant turtle.”

“I’m glad you liked it,” Starlight said. “So we have two books left to choose from. Rex Stout’s Golden Spiders, and Terry Pratchett’s Equal Rites. And since I’m getting enough magic from working on the final enchantment for the new Sparkle Drive and the new repulsor system, my vote is for the murder mystery.”

“Me too,” Fireball said.

“I don’t want to hear more about how mean people can be,” Cherry said. “I definitely don’t want a story with blackmail in it. I vote for the other one.”

Spitfire tapped her chin. “You sure no Ringworld?”

Cherry the Red Faced Earth Pony made a return appearance. “Affirmative.”

“Then yeah, I stick with mine,” Spitfire said nodding. “I like mystery, but I like feeling home more.”

Everyone looked at Dragonfly, who tapped her chin with a hoof. “Promise to stop bopping me on the head?” she asked Spitfire.

“No promise,” Spitfire replied flatly.

“Spitfire, I told you to cut it out!”

Dragonfly shrugged. “Plenty of action in both books, right?”

“Gunfight,” Fireball said.

“Magic duel,” Spitfire added.

The changeling shrugged. “Then I’m good either way,” she said. “Sorry, but I abstain. Let Mark break the tie. It’s his books, after all.”

Mark, feeling every gaze turn to him, shrugged. “Actually I’ve never read The Golden Spiders before,” he said. “I was never much into mysteries. But there’s a book a little later in the Discworld series which has tons of action, a bit of magic, and a murder mystery. Plus politics, heroism, and romance.”

“And blackmail?”

Mark shrugged. “Well, yeah, a little bit,” he said. “But if it helps, it’s not exactly a person doing the blackmailing.”

Cherry Berry’s eyes made an attempt to imitate those of a certain mailmare. “How?”

Mark grinned, pulling the computer from Spitfire and scrolling through the library for a different title. “They may be called the Palace Guard, the City Guard, or the Patrol. Whatever the name, their purpose in any work of heroic fantasy is identical: it is, round about Chapter Three (or ten minutes into the film) to rush into the room, attack the hero one at a time, and be slaughtered. No one ever asks them if they wanted to.”

The others drew closer as Mark began to read of dragons (“No dragons ever be that close together without a fight,” Fireball complained), of a drunk watchman in a gutter, and of the effect of books on spacetime (“That’s right! Twilight’s told me about that many times!” Starlight said). The aliens listened, and commented now and then, and laughed at the silliness of the cultists and the lantern-jawed innocence of the six-foot-tall dwarf boy sent to the big city alone.

All in all, it was a good beginning- and a lot better than bickering about what it was like being around Equestria’s greatest heroes.