//------------------------------// // Recovery // Story: Outside the Reaching Sky // by Karazor //------------------------------//         One of the orderlies, a young earth pony stallion, trotted up to Twilight to give her a report when she arrived in the medical bay.  “Summer Breeze was touch-and-go for a few minutes, Commander.” He began without preamble.  “We think we’ve got her pulled back from the brink; she lost a lot of blood and she was awfully close when you got her in that stasis spell, but I think she’s going to make it.  We don’t think her brain was deprived of oxygen long enough to cause irreversible damage, but we’ll find out once she wakes up.  They’re doing the repairs to her neck and keeping her brain oxygenated now, should be about another hour before they can be sure she’s out of danger.  Call it a better than ninety percent chance of survival and full recovery.”         Twilight nodded.  She glanced aside at Fluttershy, who had her head low, her face nearly hidden behind her long pink mane.  Her eyes were squeezed tightly shut, and she was trembling.  The unicorn looked back to the orderly.  “I see.  And Rainbow Dash?”         “She’s in better shape.”         Applejack blinked.  “She is?”         The orderly nodded.  “Yes.  She has a lot of damage, but none of it is to her vital organs or nervous system, and her blood loss is much less severe.  It could have been very bad; the biotech interface on her artificial limb was severely damaged and it nearly compromised a major artery, but fortunately you managed to hold the limb together enough that it didn’t tear free.”  The orderly stepped over to a control panel and tapped a few commands, examining a readout that popped up.  “Both the interface and the limb itself are going to require major repairs, but it won’t need to be replaced.  Fortunately, we’ve got a top-notch cybertech on staff, and he’ll have that leg good as new.  Her other injuries, while extremely painful, are not life-threatening.  She’s got torn tendons on one wing and some badly stretched ones on the other, her left femur is cracked in two places, and she has numerous cracks in her pelvis, but none of them developed into full fractures.”  The stallion shook his head.  “With the high-grade bone reinforcement she’s got, to have cracks like that she must have hit like a meteor.  She’s also got some serious tendon and muscle damage in her left hindleg, which fits with the damage to her right.  I’m not surprised she passed out; with damage like that, every time she moved it would have generated agonizing pain.”         “So she’s gonna be okay?”  Applejack asked, her voice tense.         The orderly nodded again.  “Yes, she’ll be fine.”         The orange-coated mare let her breath out in a long sigh, sagging with relief.  “Thank Celestia.  That’s durn good to hear.”  She looked up again.  “How long is she gonna be out?”         The medical pony shrugged.  “We could wake her up now, if we needed to.  From what we can tell, she passed out from pain, not any kind of neural trauma, and we can keep that pain under control.  Like I said, she doesn’t have any injuries to her brain, and her vital organs are all okay.  It looks like she managed to absorb the impact with her back legs and hips, which is frankly a minor miracle.  She needs to be under while they fix the more serious injuries and start the repairs on her artificial leg, but she should be up and about within the day, though she needs to rest her wings for a week or so.  We’ve already got regenerators hooked to the damaged muscles and tendons, and once that’s done we’ll go in with osseous fabricators to patch the cracks in her bones.  The bone reinforcement is self-repairing, though that will probably take a week or so to completely fix itself.  We could probably fix it faster, but we’d need to open her leg up to do it, and the doctors prefer not to do that unless it’s unavoidable.  The cybertech is estimating a nine or ten hour repair job on her right leg; it’s a really high-end prosthesis, but he thinks he can get it back up to full spec that quick.  The dangerous part, reattaching the biotechnical interface, should only take an hour or so, though.”         Twilight nodded, feeling a sense of relief.  “How soon can we look in on her?”         The orderly glanced over his shoulder.  “I’d say about two hours, ma’am, to get the regenerators finished and most of the doctors out of the way.  The cybertech will still be working, and we’ll have one doctor running the osseous fabricators, but there should be enough room for you to squeeze in then.  We can wake her up then if you want, or leave her under until everything’s done.”         Twilight glanced at the other occupied operating room.  “And Summer Breeze?”         The orderly bit his lip.  “Her you’ll have to wait longer for.  We’ve got her in a neural regenerator field, and she’ll probably be in there for several hours, minimum.  It’s not safe to go in there without protective gear, so there’s no visitors until that gets done.”         Twilight looked briefly at Fluttershy, who was trembling hard and remaining silent.  “All right,” she said to the orderly, “Thank you.  We’ll stay here for the moment, if that’s all right.”         “Of course, Commander.”  The orderly bowed his head briefly before running off to attend to something.         Twilight turned to Fluttershy, not caring that Applejack was there listening.  It was time for a serious discussion; no sense putting it off any longer.  “You made a serious mistake, Fluttershy.”         “I know.”  The pegasus’s voice was very quiet.         “You were supposed to maintain separation.  You were supposed to be ready to run if you had to.  You promised me you’d be careful.  That’s why I was willing to send you down without Warden guards, in spite of Rainbow Dash and Applejack’s advice.”  Twilight worked her jaw angrily.  “You didn’t do that.”         “They were so happy,” Fluttershy whispered.  “I don’t understand… there was no sign that they meant us any harm.  I’ve seen creatures that attacked invaders, I was watching for it, but they weren’t acting anything like that…”         “And so you let yourself get surrounded.”  Normally, Twilight would feel terrible about pushing her friend this way, but not right now.  “You let them cut you off and keep you from running.  Because of that, ponies are dead.  You nearly died, and so did Pinkie Pie!  You’d both be dead now if Rainbow Dash hadn’t almost killed herself coming to save you!”         “One Warden coulda kept this from happening.”  Applejack’s voice was flat.  “Just one.  One pony in armor that those things couldn’t hurt with a year of tryin’ could’ve rushed ‘em and bought you time to get out.  You might still’ve lost the first one, but the others would still be alive, and Rainbow wouldn’t be in surgery because she almost ripped herself apart again!”  The last four words came out in a shockingly loud shout that made Fluttershy flinch back.  “All because you ignored us!  Again!  You let that stupid fight with Dash make you do something stupid.  Just as dumb as what she did!  And you,” Applejack transferred her emerald glare to Twilight.  “You should never’ve let her do it.  You’re here to keep the rest of us from doin’ something stupid like that.  You shoulda sent at least one of us down with her, whether she wanted ‘em there or not!  Why the heck did we even come if you’re gonna buckin’ ignore everything we say?”  Applejack gritted her teeth, shaking her head.  “I’m so mad right now I ain’t thinkin’ straight.  I know I said I was gonna wait with y’all, but I feel a powerful need to be elsewhere right now.  I’ll be back to check on Dash.”  The orange mare whirled on her heels and stalked out angrily, horseshoes slamming on the deck.         Fluttershy sniffed hard in the silence left in Applejack’s wake.  “She’s right,” the pegasus whispered.  “This is all my fault.  I’m so sorry.  Peppermint Drop, Eloquence, Summer Breeze… I’ve worked with them all for years.  I’ve known Eloquence since she was a foal.  Th-they trusted me.  And Rainbow Dash…”         Twilight sighed.  “It’s not solely your fault, Fluttershy, it’s mine too.  You made a serious mistake, but Applejack’s right, and I should have caught it.  I should have insisted you take at least one guard along.”  This one was going on the list.  It was going on the top of the list.  It was the stupidest mistake she’d made in a long time.  She should never have let Fluttershy talk her into anything this reckless.         They waited in the anteroom to the medical bay, quietly, neither speaking, both tense as the time ticked past.  They heard the soft bell that announced shift change, but neither moved.  After about an hour and a half, the outer doors whisked open, and Twilight looked up, expecting to see Applejack returning.  Instead, there were three figures in the door, all of whom had paused, surprised to see somepony already there.  Two of the newcomers were pegasi, both wearing gold rank-bands, and the black coat of Night Breeze provided an almost startling contrast to the light gray of Wingblade’s.  Bringing up the rear, and looming over both pegasi, was the enormous, light green figure of Wintergreen.         Wingblade’s eyes locked on Fluttershy and narrowed angrily, her ears turning back just a bit.  Night Breeze blinked in surprise, but smiled instead of looking angry.  “Sorry, we weren’t expecting to find anyone here.  Do you mind if we come in?”         “I don’t think we’re welcome here, Night Breeze,” Wingblade observed, her voice tight and angry, but controlled.  She stepped into the room, still staring straight at Fluttershy.  “But I don’t think we should let that matter.”         The pilot frowned at the younger pegasus, her gold eyes worried.  “Hey, ‘Blade, chill it down a little.”         “Why?”  The gunner neither glanced aside nor blinked.  “We’re Wardens.  It’s not like I’m gonna make her hate us more.  I’m wondering why she’s even here; we all know how she feels about the Commander.”         Night Breeze frowned more deeply.  “One of her ponies is in here too.  She’s got as much right to be here as we do.”         Wingblade nodded.  “Yeah, that’s probably it.  I’m not leaving, though.  I’m staying right here until I get a chance to see the Commander.”         “I don’t hate you.”  Fluttershy’s voice was soft.  “And I don’t hate Rainbow Dash, either.”         The young pegasus’s gaze sharpened.  “Could’ve fooled me.”         “Then you’re easily fooled.”  The yellow pegasus looked up, her soft teal eyes meeting Wingblade’s hard gaze.  “I disagree with Rainbow, yes.  And Applejack pointed out to me that it made me do something very stupid today, but I don’t hate her, or you.”         “Oh, so you just think I’m a rabid killer, then, huh?  A sad, dangerous critter.”  Her words were aggressive, but her tone was utterly level.  It was a little unsettling.         “Back it down, Wingblade,” Wintergreen said, softly.         The pegasus’s head whipped around to glare at Wintergreen, and her eyes flashed.  “Excuse me?  I don’t think I heard you right, Sergeant.  Want to say that again so I can hear you clearly?”  There was a snap in the young mare’s voice.         The muscles in Wintergreen’s jaw bunched.  “No, ma’am.  Ensign.”         Wingblade nodded curtly, and turned back to Fluttershy.  “So, ma’am?  Is that it?  Am I a rabid beast?  Do I slobber over a bowl of bloody bones?  I think I saw that picture in a newspage once.  One of your interviews was next to it.”  Her voice had gone straight back to calm.  It wasn’t uninflected… it sounded even, as though she were having a pleasant discussion on a completely neutral topic.  Twilight fidgeted internally, trying to decide whether she should intervene or not.  One the one hoof, the young Warden was being awfully confrontational toward one of her closest friends… but on the other, this might be what Fluttershy needed to be able to see past the image of the Wardens she’d built in her head.  On the horn, the way the young pegasus was acting was more than a little frightening, with her expression and tone completely divorced from what she had to be feeling.  Should Twilight step in to stop this?  Would it possibly be damaging to discipline?  Or was it worse to let her go on?  Oh, she wished she was back in the lab, working with ponies she knew!         “‘Blade, seriously.  We’re just here to see the Commander, not start a fight.”  Night Breeze touched Wingblade’s foreleg gently with her hoof, keeping her voice soft.  “Let it go.”         “No, I’ll answer her.”  Fluttershy interjected.  She looked the angry pegasus in the eye.  “I don’t like those cartoons and I never have, but I do think you’re wrong.  I think you need to stop what you do.  It’s part of an argument I’ve had with Rainbow Dash for a very long time now.  I don’t think you’re evil… but I do think I’ve gone too far with what I’ve said, and I’m sorry for that.  I’ll try to change it as soon as I get home.”         Something flickered in the gray pegasus’s hard, dark blue eyes, and her voice when she spoke actually had some heat in it.  “Really.  You think we’re wrong. Well, ma’am, let me ask you this: how many do you think you killed down on that planet today?”         Fluttershy blinked hard.  “I… maybe, if I had taken some guards, Eloquence and Peppermint might still be alive.”         Wingblade’s gaze didn’t flicker.  “Yeah, that’s the start.  Let me tell you something else:  there’d probably still be two aliens alive that are dead now, too.”  She snorted at Fluttershy’s blink.  “What, you thought we’d’ve killed them?  Wintergreen!”  The pegasus looked over her shoulder at the big earth pony.  “If you’d been down there as a guard, in armor, what would you have done?”         “Not let us get surrounded.”  The sergeant replied without hesitation.  “Mission brief said that there was supposed to be a minimum separation with a guaranteed route of egress, if I remember right.  I’d’ve made sure to hold to that.”         “And if one slipped by you to cut that one pony’s throat?”         “Tackled them, ma’am.  Kicked them back and drove into the group to keep them occupied with me while the others grabbed the casualty and ran.  Spears and claws would never be able to get through power armor, not even at the joints.”         “Really?”  Wingblade glanced aside at Fluttershy to make sure she was listening.  “So you wouldn’t have opened fire?  Why not?”         Wintergreen rolled her eyes in irritation.  “No, ma’am.  There would be no need.  There would be no possible way for them to hurt me in my armor, and the rest of the party could outrun them.  Of course, I’d recommend not having me there at all; Sergeant Ironsides would be a better choice.  She could just shockwave the hostiles much like Commander Sparkle did in order to hold them back without harming them, though she’d have to make sure she was between the team and the aliens.”  The big mare shot a glare at the gray pegasus.  “Now, no offense, ensign, ma’am, but if you feel like engaging in further theatrics, would you mind leaving me out of them?  I don’t like being used as an anvil for you to hammer against.  Ma’am.”         Wingblade nodded.  “Noted.”  She turned back to Fluttershy.  “Ma’am, we’re not interested in killing.  We don’t like it, or at least most of us don’t.  We will do it if we have to, though, and we do it to keep everypony else safe.  I’ll thank you to remember that in the future.”  She stalked past Fluttershy, her hooves not even clicking on the floor, seating herself at the far end of the room and glaring fixedly at the wall.  There was anger in the young mare’s face, though it swiftly disappeared when the pegasus closed her eyes for a moment, drew a deep breath, and let it out very slowly.         Fluttershy blinked hard, and swallowed.  Twilight blinked too; she felt a little shell-shocked from just being next to that.         Night Breeze cleared her throat softly, catching Fluttershy and Twilight’s attention.  “Ma’am, ‘Blade just gets angry sometimes.  Don’t take it personally.”  She bit her lip, looking a little anxious.  “All the same, though… you might want to remember that, Wardens or not, we’re still ponies, ma’am.  Ponies trying to do a job.  It’s hard enough already on the border, and it makes it harder when we get home and see the newslines calling us monsters and murderers.”         The yellow pegasus sighed, closing her eyes.  “I know.  I guess I’ve just gotten so frustrated with Rainbow Dash that I’ve been taking it out on all of you, too.  I guess I didn’t realize how mean I was getting.”  Her mouth twisted.  “I don’t like it when I get mean, and I’m sorry.”  Fluttershy squeezed her eyes shut, lowering her head.  “I just wish I’d realized it sooner. Th-then today might not have happened.”  She looked back up.  “You’re here to see Rainbow Dash?”         Night Breeze nodded.  “Yes, ma’am.  I owe her.  Commander Dash pushed me to take the tests to get into the arcane theory courses after I graduated from Warden training.”  She smiled in memory.  “She was a little bit of a jerk about it, but after I started taking the courses and loved them, I was glad she had.  I owe her a lot.  It’s part of why I came back to the Wardens, even after I finished all my degrees, so I’m here to let her know we’re all thinking about her.”         Twilight chuckled, a sound echoed by Wintergreen.  The big mare smiled wistfully.  “Yeah, that’s her.  Auntie Dash can be a complete jackass sometimes, but she’s been there for me whenever I needed it since I was a filly.  Helped me deal with some pretty serious anger problems when I was a kid, too.”         Twilight blinked in surprise.  “Rainbow Dash helped you deal with anger problems?” she asked incredulously.         “Yes, ma’am.”  Wintergreen’s smile turned hard for just a second.  “Who better to help than somepony who knows?”  She sighed.  “I tried to help with hers, later, but hers are a lot worse than mine ever were.  She won’t talk about whatever they come from, and they run deep.”         They would, Twilight thought sadly, remembering the conversation she’d had with her friend in her quarters.  Oh, they would.         “What were you angry about?”  Fluttershy asked, softly.  Twilight looked at her in surprise; it was the first time she was aware of that the yellow mare had asked a question like that of any Warden.  Maybe they really had gotten through to her.         “What do you think?”  The earth pony mare gestured to herself with a forehoof.  “Look at me.  When I was a filly in school, I was already bigger than any of my teachers.  The other kids called me the Green Hulk.  I was strong enough to make them regret calling me that, too.  More than strong enough.”  She closed her eyes.  “I was teased constantly, and it made me angry, and that made me realize how strong I was compared to the other foals, and even the teachers, and that made me into a bully.  A bad one.” She smiled sadly.  “Auntie Dash saw me beating up some of my cousins at a family gathering and jumped in to help them.  I didn’t like that, so I tried to fight her and she whupped me pretty good, although she stopped the second I gave up.  I hated her for it.  I was ashamed about it too, ashamed about getting my butt kicked so easily by a pegasus of all ponies that was smaller than me to boot… and to make it worse, part of me felt like I’d deserved it.  For beating up on a bunch of kids that never stood a chance against me.  Then, she came by my room that night to apologize for hurting me and to tell me why she did it.  I didn’t want to listen at first, I tried to shove her out, but she didn’t fight and just kept talking.  Telling me how she was trying to keep my cousins from getting hurt.  Telling me why she did it, ‘cause she didn’t like doing it.  I started talking back after a while, and we talked for hours that night.”  The big mare looked at the door to the operating theaters.  “Made an impression on me.”  It was odd, Twilight reflected as she listened to Wintergreen speak, that for all her huge size and deep-chested build, the big mare actually had a remarkably beautiful voice.  It wasn’t particularly deep, but it projected amazingly well and she had a very slight lilt to her speech that sounded almost musical.  The unicorn hadn’t noticed over the comm system, which tended to flatten voices out, or when she’d spoken on the shuttle with all the background noise, but it really was quite pretty.         “Oh.”  Fluttershy’s voice was still soft.  “Thank you.  I appreciate you sharing that with me.”         Wintergreen shrugged.  “Any time.”         “I… what about her?”  Fluttershy asked, darting a look at where Wingblade sat.         Wintergreen shrugged again. “No idea.  Breeze?  You two are pretty tight, right?”         The black-coated pegasus nodded.  “We are.  We’ve been best friends ever since we met aboard Lightning.  She’s never actually said anything, but I know she absolutely idolizes the Commander.  She’s never said anything about why, either.  I think it may have something to do with her past, or something like that.”  She darted a furtive look at the other pegasus.  “Don’t ask her about it, though.  She doesn’t like to talk about her background.  Don’t ask me why.  As far as I know, I’m her best friend, and I don’t even know where she was born, or if she has any siblings, or where her parents’ herd is, or anything.”         Twilight raised an eyebrow.  That sounded like a story.  Then she glanced at the younger pegasus, saw the angry tension of her jaw and body set next to her strangely calm face, and decided not to pursue it.  Though she might glance at the records when she got home.  There were personnel records here on the ship… but that felt a little too much like snooping.         Twilight continued to wait, though Wingblade’s presence felt almost uncomfortable; the pegasus mare was clearly angry, and was just as clearly keeping it under tight control, in a manner that was more than a little spooky.  Night Breeze sat next to her, occasionally saying something in a quiet voice, though the younger pegasus didn’t reply.         Applejack returned just a few minutes before the doctors were willing to admit visitors, nodding calmly to both Twilight and Fluttershy, as though her earlier loss of temper had never happened.  She nodded to Wintergreen as well, receiving a deep nod of respect in return, and sat down to wait.  Finally, the orderly came back in.  “You can come in now.  Please try not to crowd the doctors.”  He paused, looking at Twilight.  “Do you want me to wake her, ma’am?”         “If you can do it without endangering her, yes, please.”  The orderly nodded crisply and motioned them through the door.  Twilight led the way, followed by Applejack and Fluttershy, with the three Wardens in the rear.  Night Breeze and Wintergreen didn’t make any kind of fuss about it, accepting without resentment, but Wingblade was almost seething at having to follow Fluttershy.         Rainbow Dash lay limp on an operating table, sterile fields glowing around her back legs and hips, with transparent readouts and body images floating above her.  A mask was fitted over her nose and mouth that fogged slightly with each slow exhalation, and one doctor stood on each side of her.  She had been set on her stomach so the doctors could reach both hindlegs, and they were working carefully.  One, an earth pony, was directing the output of a bone fabricator with careful motions of her eyes, its brilliant silver beam directed into Rainbow’s left thigh.  The other, a unicorn, had a waldo set similar to Rarity’s except for its miniscule size.  It was perched on his nose, the wires that interfaced with it trailing back up to his horn, and the device was projecting magnifying lenses over his eyes to enable him to work more closely on her damaged right leg.  Multiple arms flicked in tiny motions on the waldo device, moving components, fusing them together, even building them in place.  Twilight had never seen a cybertech at work before, and found the delicate, tiny movements of his tools to be fascinating.         Rainbow’s eyes opened slowly as Twilight and her friends approached, the orderly clearly adjusting the anesthetic spell from another room.  She blinked a few times, still slowly, before her eyes focused and a hint of awareness entered her face, displacing the foggy blankness that clouded her expression.         “Huh.  Well, here I am again.”  The pegasus’s voice was slightly muffled by the mask over her muzzle.  She looked up.  “Hey, guys.”         “Hey, there, Rainbow,” Applejack said before anypony else could speak.  “Busted yourself up pretty good down there, sugarcube.” Her eyes narrowed. “Thought we’d agreed you weren’t gonna do that again.”         “Had to.”  Rainbow said without moving.  “Wasn’t anyone else that could’ve.”  A hint of a triumphant smile touched her lips.  “Besides, I told you I’d figured it out after the last time.  No Rainbow pancake today.  Totally pulled that landing off.”  The pegasus’s eyes tracked slowly across the group, and she frowned in confusion.  “Fluttershy?  That you?  What’re you doing here?”  Her voice was slow, puzzled.         “Hello, Rainbow Dash.”  Fluttershy said softly.  “I just… I wanted to thank you for what you did.”         Rainbow fidgeted uncomfortably, but didn’t shrug, clearly realizing she shouldn’t move her wings.  “Eh, don’t worry about it.  Doing what I do.”         “Stay still, please,” the doctor running the osseous fabricator interjected.  An irritated expression flickered over Rainbow’s face, but she held still.         The other pegasus nodded, ignoring the interruption.  “I realize that.  Or, at least, now I do.  I also…”  She drew a deep breath, “I need to apologize to you.  I let our argument go to my head, and it affected my judgment.  You were right; I should have brought some of your ponies down there with me.  I’m sorry.”         Rainbow sighed.  “Yeah, I’ve let that happen to me once or twice.  The whole argument-making-you-dumb thing.  It sucks to realize it, I know.”  She offered a smile.  “Friends again?  At least, until we fight again?”         Fluttershy nodded.  “I think I can do that.”  She smiled gently.  “Until we fight again, like you said.”         The Warden commander laughed.  “Yeah, I think I can too.  Oh, and hey,” her expression turned serious, “it hurts to lose ponies you were responsible for.  Listen, if you need somepony to talk to… talk to Applejack.  I suck at counseling.”         They all chuckled a bit at that, though Fluttershy’s laugh was strained.         “You need to quit hurtin’ yourself like this, sugarcube,” Applejack’s voice was quiet, and pained.  “I see you like this too dang often.  Sooner or later you’re gonna push yourself too far.”         “Listen to her, Auntie Dash.”  Wintergreen put in.  “That drop was dumb.”         Rainbow’s rose-shaded eyes drifted closed.  “You don’t get to call me that on duty, Wintergreen.”         “I’m off-shift right now.”         “Yeah, I figured.  It’s still a bad habit to get into with us all cooped up on this ship.”  Rainbow heaved another sigh.  “Listen, guys, I really do appreciate you coming down to see me, but could you get them to put me out again?  I freaking hate these bone-beam things.  It’s like this achy itch inside my leg.”         “Of course, Rainbow.”  Twilight said softly, taking charge like a commander ought to.  “Before I do, though, I’m sorry, too.  I should have listened to you like I promised.”  She glanced at the two Warden pegasi.  “Do either of you want to say anything?”         Wingblade shook her head, as did Night Breeze.  “We’re just here to show moral support, ma’am,” the black-coated pegasus said.  “You know, to represent the rest of the Wardens who aren’t family.”  By ‘family,’ the pilot was referring to Wintergreen, Twilight knew.  Rainbow Dash had long ago become a sort of unofficial aunt to Applejack’s huge brood of descendants, having been more or less adopted as a sister by the orange mare.         “All right then.  Let’s all get out of the doctors’ way.”  The six ponies filed out of the operating theater, and Twilight caught the orderly again.  “Excuse me, but can you put her back under?  She doesn’t like the fabricator beam.”         The stallion nodded sympathetically.  “I can understand that.  There’s a lot of ponies who don’t.  I’ll set the tranq-spell on low; she should go back under fairly quickly, in her current condition.”         Applejack shook her head.  “You’ll need to give her a little more than that.  ‘Parently, a pony can build up a resistance to tranq spells with enough exposure.  She’s the only one it’s happened to, far as I know, ‘cause most ponies over a hundred and ten ain’t still out gettin’ hurt, on account of mostly bein’ dead.”         The orderly looked shocked, but nodded.  “Yes, ma’am, I’ll just increase the level until it puts her out.  She’ll only need to be under for another hour or so while they finish patching her bones; the cyberlimb repair shouldn’t be uncomfortable.”         “Sounds like a plan.”  Applejack nodded curtly.         The small group broke up, headed for the mess halls, the recreation areas, or each pony’s quarters.  Fluttershy chose instead to wait in the medical bay for a chance to see Summer Breeze, saying that she had a responsibility to her ponies, something that made Wintergreen nod in approval and even Wingblade look slightly less thunderous.  Twilight sighed, her mind whirring as she walked to dinner, setting an alarm with her holodaemon as she did so to remind her to come back later to check on the other injured pony.  She hoped tomorrow would go better than today had.  It could hardly go worse, she reflected somewhat wryly.         Twilight was on the bridge, preparing the Dauntless for her next jump, when she was surprised by Rainbow Dash walking casually through the door, showing no signs of the injuries and damage she’d sustained the day before.         “What in the world are you doing out of the medical bay, Rainbow Dash?” She asked, aghast.  A couple of the bridge crew looked shocked, too, including Wingblade and Oculus.  Wingblade, in particular, gave the cyan mare an extremely concerned look before her expression smoothed back out.         Rainbow gave a casual shrug, the deliberate nonchalance of the gesture ruined by how carefully she made it, her wings moving much more slowly than they normally would.  “They let me out.  Said I could walk around all I wanted, but that I shouldn’t use my wings much for a week or so.”         Twilight suspected that the pegasus was presenting a rather loose interpretation of what the doctors had actually told her, but didn’t especially want to argue.  She also noticed, to her endless annoyance, that the cybertech had evidently neglected to fix the irritating whine that Rainbow’s artificial limbs produced.  She made a note in her personal file to have a chat with the biotech doctor about unfinished work.         “You should be in bed, Rainbow.  The kind of tissue repairs they had to do depletes your body’s energy reserves.”         The pegasus grinned.  “Really?” she exclaimed sarcastically.  “Oh, so that’s why I was so freaking hungry when I got out of there.  I would never have guessed!  I’ve never been hurt like that before!”  She stuck out her tongue at Twilight, which didn’t even raise any eyebrows from the bridge crew.  Well, they were all Wardens, after all, they probably had dealt with Rainbow in her more cheerful moods before.  “Chill, Twilight, I got some food and some sleep already.  That cyberguy was really good, and he way overestimated how long it would take for him to finish.  Probably because he’d just looked at the leg and hadn’t had time to work with it yet; these are built to be easy to repair.  He finished in, like, three hours instead of ten, so I’ve had time to rest.”  She paused.  “I… haven’t talked to Fluttershy yet, but I’m gonna.  We’re not really fighting anymore, or at least I hope we’re not, but I think there’s some things I need to apologize for.  I’m kinda hoping she can do the same thing.”         “I think… I think that would be a good idea.”  Twilight couldn’t keep the smile off her face.  The price had been high, and she wished with all her heart that some of the things that had happened could have been avoided, but at least her friends were talking to one another again.  It gave her hope for their mission.  If she couldn’t even get two of her best friends to talk, she’d never be able to manage it with hostile aliens, but since they had made up, at least a little, maybe they had a chance with the Council, too.         “Yeah, me too.  So what’s up?  Where are we off to?”         Twilight quickly summarized the information that Chatterbox had decoded, and the plan she’d worked out the day before.  When she finished, Rainbow looked troubled.         “Uh, not to rain on the parade or anything, but are you, like, completely, one-hundred-percent sure this is a good idea?”         “Well, it fits the criteria you set forward for contact, doesn’t it?”  Twilight wasn’t sure she understood Rainbow’s grounds for concern.  “A Council fleet, at least we hope there’s still one there, at a location where there’s no bases or population centers we know about.”         Rainbow blinked.  “Well, yeah, but I didn’t exactly mean we should go looking for the actual group whose butts we kicked.  They’re probably still gonna be sore over that, and we killed a lot of their friends, depending on how big the crews of those ships are.  I was thinking more a border patrol that might not already hate us.”         Twilight felt a pang.  She’d been so focused on thinking of the Council ships as just ships that it hadn’t occurred to her that they’d had crews on board.  Crews that had almost certainly died to a mare when their ship was violently destroyed.  “You’re right, I hadn’t thought about that.”  She sighed.  “This could be the best opportunity we’ve found to try and open up a dialogue, though.  We have some information on their languages now; we can try to apologize, or explain what happened, or something.”  The unicorn shook her head.  “Still, we should try our hardest to stay out of weapons range.”         Rainbow chuckled.  “Took the words right outta my mouth, Twi.  I’m not gonna say don’t do it… but, seriously, be careful.  Like, super careful.”         Twilight nodded.  She had no intention of discarding Rainbow’s advice again.         The cyan pegasus glanced around the bridge again.  “So how long before we jump?”         “About thirty minutes, ma’am.”  Silver Stars’ response was instant and unthinking.  She looked up almost immediately, meeting Twilight’s eyes guiltily.  “Er.  Sorry.  I mean, um, we’ll be jumping in about thirty minutes, lieutenant, so you’d better clear the bridge.”         Rainbow flashed a grin.  “The Captain’s got a point, Commander.  I’ll get outta your hair.  Probably go grab some more food; I am still freaking starving.”  She gave Twilight a friendly nod, turned and left the bridge… taking that irritating whining of her cyberlimbs with her.  It was no surprise that she’d still be hungry; Twilight was honestly surprised that the pegasus was even awake.  Tissue regenerators took a brutal toll on the body’s reserves, and bone fabricators were worse.         Silver Stars approached quietly after Rainbow left.  “Sorry about that, Commander,” she said, chagrined.  “I served under Commander Dash for years, and it’s hard to shake that habit and think of her as Lieutenant Dash.”         “No harm done.”  Twilight wasn’t upset; the Captain had been thoroughly professional and competent during this voyage, and she was more than prepared to excuse a minor slip of the tongue.         “Thank you, ma’am.”  Silver Stars looked a bit relieved.         The next few minutes were spent finalizing the jump preparations, entering the coordinates, and making sure the communications and sensor gear was functioning at its absolute peak.  Twilight wanted to be able to talk to whoever they might find, and if the comm systems decided to fail, they could potentially be in serious trouble.  Everything was functioning smoothly, Dauntless was ready to jump, and Twilight had the sense that the ship was somehow eager to leap into the unknown once again.         The drive engaged, Dauntless vanished from the system that held the creatures who had slain two of Twilight’s crew, and the ship once more found itself elsewhere.