//------------------------------// // Chapter 29 // Story: Voyage of the Equinox // by Starscribe //------------------------------// Pinkie Pie 66% Twilight knew something was wrong from the moment Pinkie emerged from the ice. She wasn’t in the room then—the slurry of chemicals and refrigerants that would be in the air during a pony’s decanting were not something she wanted to ingest. But through the glass, she could see Pinkie Pie emerge, with a plain jumpsuit uniform still clinging to her frozen body. Bits of it broke apart in little chunks as she emerged, taking coat or skin with them on their way down. Sweet Celestia. The painful reality of it hit her then, as surely as any other reality in her confusing world. You weren’t supposed to go into cryo wearing anything, other than medical implants. That was a basic fact that even entry-level students to the space program would’ve known. Pinkie Pie certainly did. More importantly, Twilight had been there when her crew went under, and they’d all be properly naked. You woke up, Pinkie Pie. But when? Most of the next few hours for her friend would not require her intervention, though she did call Fluttershy over coms immediately. “It’s Pinkie Pie,” she said, before her friend could so much as squeak. “Something happened on the voyage. She went in wearing her jumpsuit. Looks hurt. There’s blood in here.” Fluttershy wasn’t in cryo—according to the system, she was speaking from medical. Probably getting it ready for the routine procedure of regeneration and immune-boosting drugs. “Horesefeathers,” Fluttershy swore, louder than Twilight had ever heard her. “You said she was wearing her… we can’t grow grafts out here, uh… I’ll be there right away.” Twilight remained in the background for the next few hours, just far enough to be out of the way as her friend worked. There were more than a few close calls, with Twilight terrified she might be able to watch Pinkie bleed to death under Fluttershy’s knife. But the Pegasus’s skilled hoof prevailed. At times it seemed that Twilight could feel the magic in the room, with Fluttershy’s kindness manifested as a physical force. But then it was done. Pinkie Pie, still under dozens of different medications, was finally resting. Fluttershy emerged from medical to an anxious crowd—even Spike had come to wait, watching through the glass beside them. “She’ll make it,” Fluttershy finally said. “It’s going to be… rough. I had to take some tissue…” at their expressions, she quickly trailed off. “She’ll have scars. But she should be able to heal otherwise. Earth ponies are tough. That would’ve killed a pegasus or a unicorn.” For a few seconds, there was silence—silence except for the Harmony’s distant engines. The air recyclers kicked in, rattling a little in their housing. Finally Twilight spoke. “Did she ever wake up?” “No!” Fluttershy seemed horrified. “I’m keeping her in a medical coma for at least another month. There are grafts healing, and I don’t know what kind of infections there might be… do you know what it feels like to be missing some of your skin?” Applejack clutched at her stomach, stumbling a few steps away. She didn’t actually puke, though Twilight could’ve sworn her coat went a little greener. “Yes.” “Do we…” Twilight hesitated. After something so sensitive, asking about the practical side could make ponies think you were callus. But this was her friend’s life they were talking about. “Do we have enough supplies for you to keep treating her that way? Enough medicine…” “Yes,” Fluttershy answered. “But… we’re going to be real low on… everything when we’re done. I guess that’s something for Applejack to keep in mind.” “I could switch back to geneseed,” Applejack muttered. “Would cut into our food supply, but… if something else happens.” “No.” Twilight shook her head. “We have enough, food is more important right now. We just… we won’t wake up anypony else until we’ve got more. And we can be sure that they aren’t going to… Celestia, how did it happen? Could you get anything out of the computer, Spike?” Spike nodded. “Not… as much as you’d like. Her pod showed her going into the ice about… twenty years ago.” “You don’t remember that?” She had to ask the question delicately, but it was hard to restrain her frustration. Spike hadn’t been frozen during the whole trip, yet more and more terrible things had happened without him sounding an alarm. Spike winced, looking away from them both. “Dragons hibernate, Twilight. That would’ve been right after we started decelerating. A few intense weeks, then… I slept. For almost a year. There was nothing going on when I went in, I remember. And when I woke up, everything seemed normal.” And here we thought that having a dragon would mean we had a perfect watchpony for the trip. But Spike was right, she’d known about dragon hibernations for years. In older creatures, they could last for centuries. But a dragon as young as Spike wouldn’t need to sleep nearly as long. When we got here, the computer was scrambled. Spike didn’t know how to destroy records. Either he learned during the trip, or it was somepony else. How much had happened during the trip over? Forty years was a long time. I have scars on my brain. Pinkie Pie was woken up and put back under with her clothes still on. Someone either didn’t know or didn’t care what happened to her. “We have one more question to answer,” Fluttershy said. “I know it’s… not gonna be a nice one. But we should. Pinkie Pie… ordinarily you don’t put someone back under the ice after waking them up. But her body is damaged enough that the risks are… about the same as leaving her awake. Another freeze is more damage, but… if we leave her in until we’re back in Equestria, we can treat her in a real hospital. She can get real grafts, and real organ replacements if anything failed I haven’t noticed yet. Keeping her here stops from doing more damage, but… leaves her with me to care for her.” She lowered her voice to a faint, nervous squeak. “I can’t be sure if it was only her body that was damaged. For all I know, she might not ever wake up. Or maybe she went through something similar to you, Twilight. It might be kinder just to put her back.” “Freeze her again, after all that?” Applejack shook her head. “I don’t like it, cap.” “If it’s really best for her…” Spike didn’t sound convinced. “I trust Fluttershy.” “I think it would be,” Fluttershy said. “But the odds are close. If it wasn’t, I would just decide. But this is Twilight’s ship. She gets to make the call.” A. Put Pinkie Pie back on ice, permanently. As much as it hurts, she has a better chance back in Equestria. B. Let her heal here. Fluttershy has already done medical miracles. Pinkie Pie is barely holding on as it is. She can’t survive being frozen again. (Certainty 170 required)