//------------------------------// // Chapter 13 // Story: Where no mare has gone before. // by Tobbzn //------------------------------// Rainbow Dash sat on the kitchen floor next to the sink, confused. Were they really planning to eat her? Mental images of herself being ground up felt too real to ignore. But... they had been so kind thus far. They had fed her and kept her warm when they could have chosen not to. She felt like the uncertainty weakened her more than the fact that she had just thrown up. Where would she go if she ran? Unable to fly, she wouldn't be able to get that far away from these creatures anyway. She cast her gaze through the nearest window, seeing a few scattered clouds over the mountains on the horizon. She stared at them with longing. Up there, she would've been safe no matter what happened on the ground. Up there was where she belonged - where she was in control. Stuck on the ground, she wasn't. Here, she was subject to the whims of the doctors. Subject to the whims of predators. Even so, she didn't want to flee. They didn't really look that scary, and if Fluttershy could handle carnivores on a regular basis, then Rainbow Dash wasn't about to be one-upped in bravery - she, too, had stood up to far more dangerous creatures than these! Had she just been in proper health, she would easily have taken any of them on! She ground her teeth. If they try to mess with me, I'll show them who the best pony is! With that, she pushed herself to stand up again. She doubted she would ever not find meat-eating disgusting, but she could try to ignore it as long as it was kept out of sight. To make sure of that, she slammed the white metal door shut before proceeding to fetch herself a cup of water to cleanse the taste of vomit from her mouth. Daniel had to pace himself to keep a good grip on his laptop, as the harness wasn't exactly designed for sprinting, not even for short distances. Tarry had run off as soon as Daniel informed him about seeing it outside, saying to follow suit to see to the "pegasus". Assuming he hadn't somehow stolen one of NASA's Pegasus rockets, that would imply they had decided to classify the alien that way. Not exactly what Daniel had thought of when he saw it, but he was far too excited to relax and think deeply about it - he was about to see an actual alien close-up! Since he had lost track of Tarry's movement once he disappeared through the entrance of a nearby building, he followed the slightly slower woman to whom he had been briefly introduced. She seemed to know the way as well, and they caught up after ascending to the second floor. There, Tarry stood in the doorway, silent and staring. Not one to ask before entering, Daniel rushed past him and was greeted by a clearly suspicious scowl. Not from Tarry, but from the alien sitting on the floor. Apart from the initial surprise, he didn't think much of it - after all, it'd be arrogant to assume human facial expressions were universal, so it could mean anything from despair to arousal. Just in case, though, he quickly knelt and bowed his head. Hopefully, putting himself in a vulnerable position by focusing his eyesight on the floor and making himself seem smaller would convey that he didn't intend harm, as it would be very practical if they were able to trust one-another. Tarry and Flora stood back and quietly talked among themselves, but Daniel was far more interested in getting a reaction out of the alien. He could obviously use mathematics, but that wouldn't answer anything without a mutually agreed-upon contextualization. He unpacked his laptop once more. "Have you established a means of communication yet?" It took a moment for anyone to speak. Finally Tarry, looking uncomfortable and perhaps a little embarrassed, took it upon himself to respond. "No, we actually didn't think it was intelligent until earlier today. In fact, I didn't really believe it until I saw it drinking directly from that cup just now." He took a deep breath. "Tool use... actually raises more questions than it answers." Somehow, Daniel was sure it wasn't limited to simple tool use. After all, if it had come to the Earth, it must have both means and reasons for being there, and considering the problems humankind faced just jumping to the next planet in the solar system, he had no reason to believe the trip was anything short of daunting. Turning back around with the intent of conducting his own investigation, he calmed himself and started observing. He took note of the cup that stood next to the 'pegasus', as well as the fact that it did not have any fingers at the end of its limbs. If it was a pegasus, he supposed he should call them hooves, but the tips of its legs didn't look that much like hooves at all, at least not from a distance. The rest fit, though - it did seem to be a winged quadruped. He figured he should leave biological nomenclature to the biologists - to him, the important part was that it lacked a practical way to grip objects and didn't wield any technological accessories, not even ones that would assist in such a simple task, yet somehow it had managed. He thought of his own deferring position, and came to a natural realization. Perhaps it intentionally beamed down defenseless and without any technology in order to not intimidate us primitive humans, he thought. Then... maybe it's also intentional that it interrupted a great scientific experiment, making sure that it was noticed, allowing the pegasi to observe how we treat it... That seemed like a rather cruel and potentially dangerous thing to do, especially for a highly-advanced civilization capable of exploring space. Then again, interstellar travel would likely require generational ships, meaning it might not even be visiting of its own volition - it just happened to be born on a spaceship which was on route to Earth. That could mean there were more pegasi beamed down other places on Earth as well. He should probably pay closer attention to international news from now on - there might be more than war for once. Staring intensely, he tried to catch on to any piece of information the pegasus' visuals might offer, eventually concluding that it wasn't at all what he had expected to make first contact with. Granted, cheap science fiction had colored his expectations somewhat, but a small, winged horse without feathers or hair was rather far down on his list. Not only was it bared of technology, it was completely naked, though it didn't appear ashamed about it since it didn't try to cover itself. Even at a distance he could see the mammalian traits on her - assuming sexual reproduction, he was now relatively sure it was a 'her' - which also was somewhat unexpected, though it did raise the hope that some aspects of their society were structured similarly to humankind's. He was sure there was more information to be harvested, but he was unable to induce anything more specific than he already had, so he finally blinked, breaking his stare. For some reason, the pegasus seemed to smile at his doing so. It was a little strange, but not very pressing, so he thought nothing more of it and instead continued along his old train of thought. No doubt the pegasi already gathered information on humans before making contact, he thought. He wondered how long they had been watching for - if the Greeks were right, they could have been investigating Earth for thousands of years. The thought induced a little shame on humanity's behalf - the pegasi would have observed millenia of meaningless bloodshed. Only during the last couple of centuries had any progress truly been made, and humans were still murdering one-another. He wondered if the history of the pegasi was equally violent, and why they finally had decided to make contact now. "I would like access to all the information you've gathered about her so far," the synthetic voice demanded, perhaps a bit more bluntly than intended.