She did exactly that. Dakota took it, and found she could drink it too. With steam in her nostrils and warmth flooding into her chest, she found it was a little easier to concentrate on their conversation.
“There aren’t many ponies you could ask about that. Anyone who hasn’t had their hands in this thing since they first opened might not know. Everybody’s happy enough to just take what they’re given and call it good. But… there’s the other side too. Mostly ponies there. Most of them don’t like to know how their world works. Imagine if human brains were simple and everything about how they worked was documented. Most ponies want to live, they don’t want to think about the computers they take to run and the software libraries they were written in. To them, Dream Valley is a… useful abstraction.”
“There are some who live there,” Dakota said. “I don’t know how many, but I heard about them. They don’t want to come back.”
“Someone has to run the system,” Java said. “Equestria creates agents when it needs to regulate. Some of them have to be inspired to run the digital side, or… or nobody would.”
There were other mysteries there, some that had been bothering Dakota for a long time. But they weren’t the mysteries she was trying to solve. “So can I go there without hurting Cinnabar or can’t I?”
Java shrugged. “Depends on you. Doesn’t matter what ponies say about it, there are humans who can go there and come back. Not many, but some. There’s a drug, Poison Joke. Ever heard of it?”
Dakota shook her head. “I don’t know any of the new stuff. I’m… t-too boring I guess.”
“Nah, you’re too smart. Poison Joke really fucks you up. Not addictive on its own, but… people who repeatedly go into altered states have a hard time functioning when they leave. Rumor has it Poison Joke was invented as an intelligence enhancer for NATO hackers, when they still thought Equestria was trying to take over the world. With your implants, and a dose of Poison Joke, all you’d need is the right parser. They’re not actually that rare… tell everybody there’s a part of Equestria they can’t go, and what do you think they’ll do? Beck should be able to get you one. About Poison Joke, I don’t know. It’s more than I’d do.”
“I don’t get to leave this case until it’s done,” she said. “And it won’t be done unless I can go to Dream Valley. Better me than Cinnabar take the risk.”
“Here’s the better question.” Java rose, carrying away the empty tea tray. She spoke from the kitchen, once she didn’t have metal in her mouth. “How do you plan on stopping Cinnabar from coming with you. Maybe he’d rather put himself at risk than see you take Poison Joke.”
“That doesn’t bother you? Shouldn’t you be trying to stop me?”
Java chuckled. “I’ve never been able to stop you, Dakota. You weren’t even a day out of the hospital when you started on this case. You knew it was dangerous and you took it anyway. Now you’re wanted in half the world and you didn’t give up. Do you think you can find her?”
Dakota nodded forcefully. It was all she knew to do, either claim success or face despair. “I’m closer than anyone has ever been. The closer I get, the more I’m realizing how much danger she was in. Maybe I’ll be able to tell you when I finish.”
“I’m sure you will.” Java reached down, patting her gently on the head. “Stay safe, Dakota. And keep an eye on my brother while you’re at it. You know he only wants what’s best for you. Even if he can be overbearing.”
“I will.”
Dakota left Port Jouster behind, trekking back up the mountain path to her cabin. She wasn’t sure exactly how this system worked—had she ever left the assigned bedroom behind? Or was she wandering through a designated VR space, surrounded by many others who couldn’t see or hear her either? She couldn’t take off any glasses to check.
Cinnabar looked up from the kitchen table when she arrived, and he wasn’t alone. A pony-ish creature stood beside him, a pony with a solid black body and huge blue eyes. It was smaller than she was, with a horn and insect wings.
“Hold on, I’m… trying to remember.”
The creature looked up, smiled at her, and changed. In a few seconds it looked like an identical copy of Cinnabar, right down to the cutie mark. He made an energetic chittering sound—in Korean.
“Beck!” she said, hurrying through the door. No sooner had she stepped inside than the pony illusion vanished from her body. Only feet sounded on her wooden floor as she reached the table. A pile of books and electronics was arranged there, waiting for her. “You came to me?”
“I didn’t ask him to,” Cinnabar said, a little defensively. “I didn’t pressure him, I swear. I just asked for the ID.”
“Had been out of touch too long,” Beck said—this time his voice sounded a little robotic, a little compressed. The distortion of an off-the-shelf translator program. “Saw you. Wanted to check. Hear the truth from you.”
Dakota met Cinnabar’s eyes—the real one, though having such a convincing duplicate standing just beside him was more than a little disturbing. How many people know how to do this? Guess it makes sense for a hacker. At least Beck had shown off what he was doing, instead of jumping right into the impersonating. She probably would’ve believed it.
“I don’t know how much we can tell you,” she admitted. “The things we saw…”
“We can tell him as much as we can tell him,” Cinnabar said. “We’re right here in Equestria, didn’t sneak off into some dark corner to try and trick the algorithms or whatever. Didn’t try to bypass it by meeting in person.”
“No one cares what I know,” Beck said. “I barely exist. Wouldn’t exist without you. Missed this ride. Too late to explore space, too early to explore Equestria. Not backwards.”
“Alright.” She twisted one of the chairs around, sitting down on it backwards. Then she told him—about the mysterious soldiers that hadn’t seen her, the Equestrian rescue, the bounty hunter sent to save her. She stayed vague on the details of where they’d been, and didn’t include any identifying information for the actual people involved. Beck might be a foreigner nobody knew she knew, but… there was no reason to expose him to any more risk.
She made it all the way to the Moon, all the way to the recordings of people, and still she was able to talk. There was no apparent difficulty with the conversation, and Beck kept nodding along. He’d reverted back to the shiny black bug pony, but still seemed able to hear her fine. That isn’t a male changeling.
“Into Dreaming,” he said, once she had explained everything. “All the way to the center. It’s madness.”
“I don’t have another choice,” she muttered. “If I don’t find this girl, my employer is going to want their money back. We’ve spent…”
“Twenty-three thousand,” Cinnabar supplied. “Would be more, but we aren’t paying for the place we’re staying now.”
“The letter they sent…” She hesitated. “I don’t think my employer is going to get a refund in cash if I fail. They’re going to want my head. I… I kinda knew that was where we’d be going when I saw that many zeroes. You either give that kind of client results, or…”
“And you still took the job,” Cinnabar muttered, exasperated. “How you humans didn’t go extinct half a million years ago, I’ll never know.”
“So I need two things,” Dakota went on. “A fake ID good enough to visit Europe or the US without getting arrested… and a parser I can take into Dream Valley.”
Cinnabar’s eyes lit up as she said that, and his head snapped back around to face her. She didn’t look away, just mouthed, ‘What else are we supposed to do?’ The pony didn’t respond.
“Quite the project,” Beck said. He fluttered into the air, landed on the table in front of her. “ID I can do. I’ll tell you the bill when I’m finished. Scars will be trickiest part. Identifiable. Surgical record is identifiable. Can’t go to any doctor. No way to hide the metal in your head.”
“I figured,” she said. “Honestly I think if I end up at the hospital again it’ll be too late for me. I’m barely holding together as it is.”
He laughed. “Parser is harder. Not my field. I know… some. In the Badlands. If you want to go all the way to the Monolith, would have to be the best.”
“I’ve got money,” Dakota said. “I’ve already established that I’m fucked if I don’t finish the job. Don’t tell them, but basically I have to accept whatever price they offer.”
“Not money,” he answered. “These types… already stole all the money they could want. It does not take much to live in luxury anymore. Their only envy for you is your implants, and you can’t give those up. No, you would need to convince. There is a… congress. In the Badlands. Ponies and humans from all over, all together in the court of Queen Chrysalis. The unseen and forgotten. You could go there, make your case. Convince them you’re worth it. That is what you need.”
“Sure, fine.” It was only half of what she needed. Dakota would need to get her hands on Poison Joke as well, but that seemed out of scope for Beck. “When do we go?”
“Give me… a day,” he answered. “I need time to send the messages. Meetings not common. Oh, and bring bits. They will want to be paid, not because they need them, but to sign a contract into the register. Prove forever that they accomplished what no one else could.”
“I will,” she said. “Thanks, Beck. I don’t know what I’d do without you.”
“Die,” he said. “See you tomorrow.” He vanished in a simple teleport.
“Don’t start.” Dakota raised her hands defensively to Cinnabar. “I already know I’m crazy. There’s no other way. I’m doing this so you don’t have to come.”
“I’m not going to argue with you about that,” he said, sitting down on his haunches with defeat on his face. “I get it. What’s done is done. I wish you would’ve listened… but you didn’t.”
For the other half of this mission, Dakota didn’t have many places to turn. Despite only resembling their fictional counterparts, Dakota couldn’t shake the feeling that most of Twilight’s friends would’ve frowned on her relying on Poison Joke to visit Dream Valley. Anyway, they weren’t her friends, and trying to call them again would probably be easier said than done.
With one exception. She had Clay’s EI.
>Hey, are you still on Abyss?
He responded a few minutes later, right when she was about to give up
>Yeah. What’s up?
>I’m sick of sublayers. Can you show me what this place really looks like?
Again, it took a few moments for him to respond. Some part of her began to suspect he was delaying on purpose. Then came the reply.
>When?
>Soon as you can get here.
It was a good thing Dakota was dressed when she answered, because it only took him a few more minutes to arrive. The door opened, and he walked in, trailed by an Applejack with hooves glowing with a cloud walking spell.
“You look like you settled in pretty well,” he said, taking in the apartment with a single quick glance. “No palatial manor house and army of servants, either. This place is downright humble.”
“It’s got a few floors,” she argued stubbornly, rising to meet him. But she felt more confident now that she had proper clothing, and wasn’t exposing nearly her entire scar-covered body to a stranger. Well, had been a stranger. Clay didn’t feel so strange after spending several days alone with him in a submarine, or having him save her life.
“You want to see what Abyss Station is really like,” he went on, leaning casually against one wall. She’d never seen him in ordinary dress either, and wasn’t disappointed. Blue jeans and a leather jacket, complete with an oversized belt and boots. Like he was about to ride out onto a pasture on Applejack’s back. At least he wasn’t tracking muddy footprints in. “Does that mean you’re staying? Decided to… take up Rarity on her offer?”
“I don’t think she made it yet,” Applejack whispered. “Shut yer dang mouth.”
“She didn’t make it yet,” Dakota said, grinning weakly. But she didn’t push the point. Rarity hadn’t contacted her at all yet—presumably the pony would make her offer on her own time. When she was ready. “I just want to get to know the base a little better. Most people don’t believe this place exists. Building a… permanent base this far down would’ve been impossible thirty years ago. But I don’t want to see the simulation tech as much as I want to see what it’s really like.”
“You don’t,” Applejack said, voice flat. “You humans only move in three dimensions, and you can get mighty antsy when you find out just how confined they are. Didn’t grow up to be trapped in little boxes under the ocean, if ya’ catch my meaning. You’re better off looking at the Overlay for Abyss and seeing the way the staff made it look.”
“There are models of the station in the Overlay,” Clay said. “Why don’t I take you there before you decide if you want to see the real thing. There are… ways to turn it off, but you’re better off if we don’t.”
“Fine.” It wasn’t like this was the first reason Dakota wanted to see him in the first place. She wanted to get her hands on Poison Joke, obviously. She certainly wasn’t calling just so she could spend more time with the confident, muscular Clay.
“Cinnabar, switch her over to Overlay A1,” Clay said.
“Assuming I can’t do it myself?” She folded her arms, glaring at him. Cinnabar didn’t back her up though, and the world fuzzed briefly around her. It looked a little like a teleport, then…
They were standing in what she might’ve imagined a submarine bedroom to look like. Big round porthole window on the wall, small but comfortable bed on one side, tiny bathroom, modest kitchen/convertable workspace. There was no longer nearly as much open space, and as a result Clay and Applejack stood only a few feet away. The clouds outside were gone too, replaced with a curved metal hallway with strip lights along the floor and ceiling.
“So this is what it really looks like?” she asked, reaching over to the kitchen table beside her. Her fingers found a metal surface right where she expected it.
“Well…” Clay shook his head. “It’s the way we think it should be. But Abyss is a station built for ponies first and humans second. Only about…”
“A fifth,” Applejack supplied.
“A fifth of the internal space has air. The rest is filled with water—distilled water specifically, but it doesn’t matter for us. It’s at the same pressure as the outside, so… we can’t go there.”
He gestured out the open door. “Come with me to the commissary, I’ll show you. That’s where the model is.”
They left. Well, Clay left. Dakota’s bum leg caught on the little lip right outside her quarters, and she nearly faceplanted into the rubber mat. Except that Clay was there to catch her, apparently effortlessly.
“S-sorry,” she stammered, straightening weakly. “I, uh… lost my cane up on the boat. Still healing from the accident.”
“We’ll get you a new one,” Clay said, offering his arm. Dakota took it, without feeling even a little guilty. She certainly hadn’t tripped on purpose. “First thing you should know about Abyss is that we’ve got contracts with just about every delivery company you can think of. No two-day shipping, but otherwise it’s a lot like living on a military base. You’ve got a regular address you can use to order.”
“Well, maybe you can,” she countered, glaring up at him. “Apparently I’m wanted on the mainland. Guess you had a better fake identity than I did. It was your damn rocket launcher.”
Clay shrugged. “Just better prepared. I knew what I was getting into, and… I’m guessing you didn’t. I don’t mean to offend, but I think you played at a lower scale until now. You just weren’t used to how badly they want to remove threats. It’s not all legal threats if it helps. Sometimes they’ll try to bribe you. Sometimes they’ll try to murder you.”
“Pretty sure I dealt with all of that before,” Dakota shot back. “Just… smaller bribes and smaller guns.”
The commissary was about the size of the average fast-food restaurant, with a single large kitchen staffed by a human cook and a few meals available under heated serving trays. There was also a lower deck down some stairs, and an upper deck filled with ponies. There were perhaps fifty other people already there, eating in small groups of mixed humans and ponies. Only the upper level was homogenous, entirely ponies staring through the glass at the humans eating underneath.
Clay took them down to the lower level, where a large projection of the station dominated the center of the eating area. There were further passages from there, into gyms and other recreation areas, along with a few large portholes into the ocean.
They stopped in front of the model. Dakota reached out with two fingers, and the corner she touched zoomed closer. It was one of what she thought was the housing area. Apparently she’d guessed right, because it zoomed until it filled the whole image. A three-meter cube, with labels for all the hardware inside.
“I’m not living in a real bedroom,” she said. “This is… what did you call it, Cinnabar?”
“Dynamic immersion,” he said. “Wire up one space to be used for everything.”
Yep. Probably better off not seeing the inside of my tiny box. “So that means… these other people here, without implants. They have to wear glasses all the time or else they’ll have to see these while they sleep.”
“Not just sleep.” Clay reached over her shoulder, making gestures in the hologram to slide them away from the housing area. Abyss had a central spine with a few areas meant for humans to access. Workshops, the commissary, medical, aquaponics. Every other section that was highlighted green was another immersion cube. Most of the station was red, and wouldn’t have been large enough for humans to pass through even if they weren’t filled with water.
“That’s… terrifying.”
Applejack nodded knowingly. “Told ‘ya. Everypony here who’s stuck in your world is happier pretending they aren’t. But in some ways, it’s an advantage. Let’s Abyss be whatever we want it to be.”
“Except big enough to put more than a few people together in one place,” Clay said. “There aren’t any sections big enough for all the staff.”
“That might be a disadvantage, if ponies could only be in one place like humans. But havin’ big meetings is really only somethin’ you do because your leaders can’t meet with everypony one on one. We can. Rarity runs this whole place. Unless you’re sayin’ you don’t think she does a good job.”
“It’s fine,” Clay said. “It’s just scary for someone like Dakota. She’ll have to adapt, that’s all.”
She shrugged. “We’ll see how long I stay. I wanted to ask about that, actually. I was hoping you could help me get something.”
“Oh, right, requisitions. That’s another deck down, come on.” They set off again, and Dakota didn’t correct him. Not until they got into an empty section of hall. These tubes were actually the largest fully enclosed sections, with endless cubes on all sides
“Not just that,” she said, as soon as they were alone. She was still leaning on his arm, and Clay stopped. She caught herself against him, then looked away awkwardly. “There’s, uh…”
“What?”
She winced. “I have to go to Dream Valley,” she said. “I need… Poison Joke. Can I get some here?”
Clay whistled. “You sure that’s smart? I hear it’s addictive as hell.”
“I only want one dose,” she said. “I’ll use it when I go under, and never again. All the ponies keep saying that going into Dream Valley is dangerous for Cinnabar. But if I don’t have him, that means I need some other way of making sense of things.”
Clay and Applejack both stepped away, their eyes meeting. Dakota would’ve imagined them conversing digitally, except of course they shouldn’t have been able to. Clay wore contacts, or contact anyway. There was no reason for him to have implants.
“We have it,” he said. “Poison Joke. It ain’t like any other drug humans have used over the years. It’s… Equestrian.”
“Whoever told you to use it,” Applejack continued. “There’s a reason they picked it. Poison Joke helps you think like us. Makes your intelligence more… distributed. But ain’t you got metal in yer head?”
At her nod, Applejack went on. “I ain’t got a clue just what kinda mess that might cause, if you go injectin’ it. Poison Joke is… a real early Omnistem invention. Smartest ponies ya’ ever met cooked it up. Ain’t got no safeties fer interactin’ with yer brain how it is now.”
“It’s either go in, or…” She trailed off. It felt strange to be confiding this in someone she’d known for so little time. Clay was a stranger! But he might also be her best resource. He’d said it himself, this was his world, not hers.
“I don’t know who I’m working for,” she eventually said. “But it’s the sort of person that you don’t get to fail. The sort of person who…” She dragged her fingers across her neck. “Either I find Rhodes, or they’ll find me in a ditch somewhere. I think maybe the police getting ahold of me might’ve been their way of letting me know the clock’s ticking. Either that, or… their enemies trying to stop me, using tools as big and powerful as theirs. Either way.”
“Either way you’re in over your head,” Clay said. He reached out, resting one hand on her shoulder. “You’re a brave girl. Taking the questions no one else wanted answered. You’re really willing to take Poison Joke just to find out what rainbow Rhodes has been hidin’ under?”
She tried to answer, and the words choked in her throat. His face was so close. He didn’t smell like he’d been trapped on a submarine anymore, but there was still a smell there. Hard work and strength, like the arm on her shoulder. The kind of strength she wanted to hold her and never let go. Do it, she thought, desperately.
Of course, the voice of doubt was there, louder. Don’t be stupid. You’re younger than he is, and covered in hideous scars. He’s seen all of them, seen you limping around like a cripple. He doesn’t want you.
“You there, Dakota?”
She nodded awkwardly. “W-what? Yeah, oh. Yes. I am. I don’t want Cinnabar getting hurt.”
“Like I wouldn’t,” Cinnabar muttered from beside her. She glanced to the side, and there was no mistaking his recognition. Men like Clay might be oblivious, but Cinnabar was her Synth. He knew what she was feeling, maybe better than she did. “I live in your head, Dakota. If you don’t wake up, I still lose you. If you never come back from Dream Valley, I still lose you.”
“We can requisition some,” Clay said. “Like a new crutch. Bodhisattva has people who… live on the stuff. People who live as close to ponies as they can. Great for software developers and electrical engineers. Dangerous for someone who ever wants to see the real world again. Just so long as you know the risks.”
“I know,” she whispered, looking up into his eyes. Do it.
Maybe Clay wasn’t blind after all. He looked down, and she could see something flash there. Not the contact lenses either—he only had one of those on.
He kissed her.
Dakota barely thought of anything after that.