//------------------------------// // II. Mother May I // Story: Absolution // by Cynewulf //------------------------------// II. I’m going to be sick. Flying is one thing. I can handle flying. The ground’s beneath me and the clouds are above, everything is right. Those words had meaning planetside. They were like bookends to life, helping you find where everything was. There is none of that in space. “Scoots, don’t be a chicken! C’mon girl, it’s fun. I promise! Just... let go.” If Rainbow Dash, for all her awesomeness, think that I’m about to let go of the hoofhold, she’s crashed about five times too many. There’s no way I’m going to let go of my only security up here, and there is absolutely no way I’m going to continue this exercise in madness. This is crazy. Not even I’m this crazy! Nopony should be up here, like ever. “I...” The words stick in my throat. Come on Scootaloo, do this and get over it. It’s either this or you’re out. Rainbow put in a lot of good words for you. I take a deep breath. “If I get stuck, you’ll help me right?” I ask again. In the mist, Rainbow sits on a pod with strange umbilical cords sticking out of it. She grinning that beautiful, award winning smile. The one that always gets me to do stupid things, always has ever since I was her kid sidekick. Above her, another pod wanders by, glowing with the same cerulean blue of Rainbow’s coat. “Of course! I’d never leave ya hanging. First time in real zero-g is tough, but you’ll be fine. C’mon, just let go and push. If you fail it’s no big deal, we’ll get you to a hoofhold or a pod and you can try again.” I swallow my complaints, and then free my hoof from its anchor. Timidly, I push off the wall with my hindlegs. It’s awful for the first few seconds. There’s nothing to hold on to. I flail and tumble through the mist, crying out in a panic. The Heart spins around me, blurring together and my limbs have that weird itchy feeling as adrenaline floods through me. “Calm down!” Rainbow’s voice is firm, and I stop my panicking. As I roll about, I can see her still sitting. “Chill out, squirt. Just float your way to the other side.” I try to stay calm, and the rush dies. If Rainbow’s comfortable, then I can be, too. I need this. I need to fly. Seconds tick by in silence. The Heart’s strange mist envelops me, and to my shock I realize that it’s warm and isn’t nearly as thick as it seemed. It’s somehow both relaxing and unnerving. The mist is like being in the spa that Sweetie was always talking about, but it was also a lot like being right before the maw of some great... thing. Like it was breathing all over you and kind of waiting for you to turn around. It reminds me of my nightmares as a foal when Rainbow had me convinced that Spike was going to grow up and be a five hundred foot tall pony-eating monster and eat me. I’d dreamed of his hot breath on her back and his gaping toothy maw for weeks, and even though I knew it was stupid… some of that fear returns. But I take steady breaths, and it, too, leaves. I reach the other side and fumble around for the hoofhold. “Got it? Good. How was that, Scoots?” “I... okay, I guess. I got used to it as I went.” I turn around to face her. That smile is back again, and it’s clear through the mist like the sun through the storm clouds as they dissipate, exhausted. “Good! Now, push off a little harder. Aim for the door you just came out of. You see it?” She gestures with a hoof, and I nod. “Yes, Mist isn’t that thick. Rainbow... should we be in here?” “Go, then,” she says, challenging me. “Heart is complete, just some panelin’ missing. Go on! You’re gonna have to do this for real someday.” I roll my eyes at her, but something about the way those eyes bore into me and that voice… I push off, more forcefully than before. This time I feel the mist mat my face with moisture as I make little waves, and then the wall’s in my face and I find a place to hold on. I grin. Yeah, I can do this. It’s not even that hard, once you get used to the whole lack of an up and down thing. Rainbow was right! I push off again, calling out. “Hey, Rainbow! This is kinda fun!” I soar by one of the colorless pods, laughing. I could get used to this! If anything, it’s an improvement over my normal sucky flying. Heck, I can almost pretend I’m Rainbow or a Wonderbolt or something up here. Or both, I guess. Or anything. “Scoots!” Her tone of voice is sharp, and I almost feel it like a knife in my spine. I try to turn and look at Rainbow, but as I do, it’s too late. We’re inches apart, and Rainbow’s trying to yell something else. I miscalculated. Badly. I hit Rainbow hard. In gravity, it would’ve been minor. In the weightless Heart, it was devastating. Dash loses her perch and falls backwards, trying to clutch for something. I reach out a hoof and she tries to catch as she reprimands me. She misses, and continues her fall back. I can see where she’s headed but I just open my mouth and can’t manage to warn her. It can’t happen. “Look where you’re going, Scootaloo! You almo—oh Celestia! Oh goddess! Get it off! Oh, fuck, get it off!” She’s tumbled too far, right into the exhaust of her own pod. The bright glowing well on the side of the blue pod has pulled her leg in and begun burning through the space suit with ease. It draws her in, like a hungry animal. It was a void yearning for filling and Rainbow was the best source. She screamed and screamed. I start screaming, I don’t know what I say. I can smell burning flesh and hair and I’m about to hyperventilate. I try to swim or reach but there’s no use, hitting her is sending me the wrong way. I’m rebounding. “Rainbow!” Rainbow can manage no reply but wordless rage and terrible pain. The doors open. Twilight and a cadet enter, and Twilight starts giving orders. My back hits something at last and I push off, headed back towards Rainbow. Hold on, hold on! The suit is helping, but it’s going fast, and the heat is starting to get to her actual skin, I see her trying to get off it, but it’s almost sucking her in. The pod’s flashing wildly, blue everywhere. Twilight’s pulling at Rainbow’s body while the cadet plants four hooves on the blue pod and tugs on her space suit. My flight carries me to the pod and I hit it awkwardly, hugging to it to stay on. My heart is in my throat, my vision swims before me as the smell of burning flesh suddenly becomes much stronger. Rainbow keeps screaming. It hurts my ears, I can almost feel it in my chest like someone’s ripping out my heart. I bite the edge of her suit and pull with the others. Rainbow comes free. And then it gets blurry, sorta rushed. Rainbow tumbling in space, crying. Twilight panicking, trying to move her out into the Spine. They ignore me; I ignore me. Rainbow groans and there are tears in my eyes and I feel so damn worthless, and I know it’s all my fault. The suit’s all torn and burned, I think something’s wrong with her wing, and when I see those burnt feathers I swear I can hear my heart about to burst in my ear. Twilight’s about to cry, her voice is going hoarse when we get to the shuttle. She wants to know why Rainbow would bring me here. Rainbow just groans about her wings. There’s not enough room for all of us, and her, and the equipment. As the door closes I can hear her asking questions. “Why couldn’t you use the zero-g chambers? Why do you always have to be so… so stupid!” And she’s groaning again, I can’t see her anymore. “Get off my case!” Is all I hear. The door is closed. I stare at it, and the shuttle’s engines begin warming up. As I back away, it begins to rise and soon it’s gone, leaving me alone in the hangar. I jerk awake. There’s a little red warning light blinking in my face, telling me that my heart rate is beyond normal limits. Not that I need the warning, because I feel it in my throat. It’s not just from the dream—I’ve had that one about three times now since the Ghost first appeared. No, this is the feeling I get every time another one is born to find me. I have no idea why, and I think it has to do with being connected to the ship. Yet it’s worse. It’s so much worse than before. My hooves are cold, and my head is hot like fire. I don’t know what this feeling is or how I know. I simply know, and every time it comes true, and there is a Ghost waiting for me out in the ship somewhere. The door pops open. I’m instantly assaulted by thick, roiling mist. It pours into the opening, filling the newly empty space, and I can’t see a thing for a moment. This isn’t how I left things at all. The Heart’s supposed to be misty, but not like this. “Gods, this is awful!” Bad choice. I can feel it on my tongue now, and it’s all in my mouth. I cough and it burns my throat. I push off from the pod towards the wall, reaching out for a hoofhold and finding on My lungs try to grab onto air but there’s too much in the way and I start choking burning. The wall in front of me is swimming. As I watch, it comes closer and closer until I make contact and run my hooves over it. There’s nothing, no interface, but I know there has to be. There has to be one somewhere! Gods, there’s like a dozen of them on this thing! But then I find the door, and after I punch the lit-up buttons beside it, it opens for me. I tumble out into the bright white of the Spine, gasping for air. When I can regain my breath, I call out. “Star Mother!” “Yes, Scootaloo? We sense that you are in trouble. W-we sense... sense... do you need...?” Her voice... it’s broken, the many layers of it frayed and disjointed. What the hell is going on? A shiver runs down my spine. “Star Mother, what’s going on? Star Mother!” She tries to answer, but it’s all fragmented and lost. I can hear voices echoing off of the white walls, all of them trying to reach me and none of them clear. My heart is in my throat. I can hear my pulse like a drum. Oh Luna, how long did I sleep? Where’s the Ghost? Star Mother is murmuring, but I can’t understand her. Words just leap out at me as I finally make it to the wall of the Spine. I’ve missed all the hoofholds, somehow, and I just bounce off, tumbling again in midair. I’d curse, but I can’t seem to catch my breath. My eyes dart everywhere, looking for a blue form to fall on me at any moment, crying out my name. Or will she? It’s different. Somehow I can feel it. Nothing about the Ghost makes sense, and this is no different. All I know is that the game has changed on me. I try one more time. “Star Mother!” The voices stop, and there is an eerie quiet. I wait for her to speak. I wait for there to be any noise at all, but there’s none. There’s just me, breathing in and out. Seconds pass, and then begin to collect into minutes. “We hear you, Scootaloo.” My throat feels all closed up, like I’m about to start sobbing all over. “Oh, Celestia, I’m glad to hear your voice! What’s going on, the Heart is all messed up and dark! I need to fix it.” “You cannot.” The surety in her voice frightens me beyond words. There is no explanation. No elaboration. There’s only silence, as if I wasn’t here at all. Just nothing, the Spine without ponies or AIs or anything. I have to break that silence. “Star Mother?” “Mother. Just Mother, please. I’m cold.” I shiver. “Fine. Mother. How are you cold? Mother?” “Navigation.” “What? Why are you cold? You can’t be cold! It’s impossible! Star Mother!” She won’t answer. The scattered chattering is gone. I call out her name again, and again her warm voice doesn’t answer. She always answers. I stare at the walls, and then at the Heart, my mouth wide open. The shaking starts in my chest and works outwards, until my hooves are shaking uselessly in space. Oh Gods. Casting a glance above me, I know I have only one choice. Casting my eyes below, I know that I’m too exposed here. I have no idea how the Ghost has changed, but I know she has. I don’t want to know how she’s changed. I want to go home. I want to go crawl into the pod and never come out. It can give me good dreams. Maybe this is just the wires in it. Maybe they’re just... messing up. Malfunctioning. Any moment now, Star Mother will wake me up and her voice will be normal like it should be. I can’t do this. I have to move or I’ll have a panic attack. I have to be brave. I push off, headed for Navigation. My angle sucks, but it’s the best I can do right now. I sail past the Heart, looking down at it briefly. From the outside, it looks fine. I worry about the biocircuitry in the pods, but I don’t have time to fix them, and I don’t want to lead the Ghost there. I’ll hit the wall just below the door to Navigation. If I’m lucky, I might hit close enough to the edge to try and grab on. I’m lucky—I suppose I have to be eventually. My hoof catches the lip, the threshold before the door. The rest of me hits the metal wall and I let out an “oof!” before I’m flipped up. “Star Mother, open the door!” It opens like molasses, but it opens. As I’m whirling about like an idiot, I manage to catch the “upper” lip of the doorway with a hoof. Momentum stopped, I pull my way in and misjudge yet again. I hit the floor of Navigation too hard. Rubbing my face, I manage to float over to the panel. I refuse to tie myself in. I can feel eyes on me, and I know the Ghost is coming. I can almost feel her breath on my neck. I swear I can almost hear her coming. What does she want me to look for? The lights are off in here too, and I have to see by the glow of the nebular cloud and the stars. The tiny buttons and lights of the panel draw me like a moth to a flame. How am I supposed to do this in the dark? I think if I hit anything on the way there, it’ll ruin me—that’s how fragile I feel. But I find it. The navigational controls are unlocked. Seeing that little green light make me grin like an idiot. I’m shaking as I manipulate the controls and bring up coordinates. I don’t have time to do the calculations, but I can’t trust Star Mother. Something’s wrong, and she can’t be responsible for my only way home. I can’t do math like this. It’s always the part I need silence and calm to do, and I only have one of those. Gods, I hate silence. I can’t do this. But the numbers roll down the screen, and they jive. The computer returns back a positive; my math’s right. I don’t believe it. I have to check again. Star Mother could only tell me this. It’s important. I have to do this... for... The screen goes dark. The numbers are all gone, all my math and coordinates and everything is all gone. The lights on the other panels blink wildly and then suddenly begin to work in unison, blinking in an eerie pattern. It’s a waltz. I groan. The computer comes to life again and it has words on it. I swear my heart stops as I just stare at them for a moment, my eyes wide and the trembling returning to my hooves. “RUN. CHILD. TRAP.” I’m crying, I’m moving. Where’s the vent? She’s here. I can see her right behind me, a shadow against the white, standing in the doorway. She’s growling, a sound unlike anything I’ve ever heard. It’s not a pony sound. Oh gods, where’s the vent? She can’t fit. I can fit. I’ll be safe there! I’m in midair, and she follows, saying something, but I can’t hear her over my own screaming. I just have to get into the vent, the service tunnel, whatever it is. She’s so fast, it’s so close my angle isn’t right I won’t make it I can feel her hooves on my legs— I hit the inside face first, and quickly pull my legs in. She’s there, thrashing and reaching, screaming at me. It’s something unholy, not a pony at all. Not even close. No pony’s face should bend like this, like her bones have gone soft. Oh gods, her jaw is unhinged! What if she can fit in here? Her teeth are like tiny knives desperate for my hind leg and I know she’s about to squeeze into my escape. But she doesn’t. I flee, sobbing, and she gives up in frustration. But I know it’s only temporary. She’ll be back. She’ll wait. She’ll find me. Somehow I know this time she’s permanent. She touched me and her hooves stayed firm and strong and whole. It’s too dark. I can’t stand the dark right now. I feel like she’s about jump out of the black and wrap those awful jaws around my head. “Star Mother? Don’t speak. Can you give me any light?” She does. An emergency light up ahead illuminates my escape route. I lay in the service shaft, trying to breathe breathe normally. My limbs feel like they’re on fire, like I just ran a marathon. How long can I hide? I haven’t eaten well in weeks, and it’s adrenaline that’s keeping me awake. I’m working off an average of three hours of sleep. There’s just no way. I’ve felt alone before, but this is worse. Now I really am alone. The Ghost is not a pony, not even something I can pretend is a pony. Star Mother won’t answer me. Will she? I don’t know what’s wrong with her, and unless I head back to her pod in the Heart, I have no way of knowing. I can’t do that, not while the Ghost is out there. “Star Mother? Can you whisper, if you can talk? Are you there?” Nothing. I come at last to a junction where four tunnels meet. It’s wider here, kind of a hub where tools are stored. I sit down heavily, and stare at the wall. I have to consider the fact she’s dead. Something is in the ship systems; it’s unavoidable now. I’d suspected such before, when the doors first started acting up . When we’d just entered the nebula, I’d figured it was just a bug and ignored it. There’s a Ghost in the machine. What do I do now? The facts float up to me like a face in the water: I can’t stop the Ghosts. Even if I evade this one, another will come. Star Mother can’t help me. She’s either dying or fighting a losing battle. I still need to turn this ship around, and I need to do it very, very soon. “Star Mother?” I don’t know why I keep trying. It’s hopeless. It’s almost a knee jerk reaction now, I guess. “Star Mother, if you can hear me, I’m going down... service tunnel nineteen. I’ll find a place to rest, when I feel safe, and I’ll try to find you. Or you find me. Or something.” When I feel safe. Seriously? When I feel safe? Aw, hell, I’m not gonna feel safe anywhere. But I’m worried about her. Yes, Star Mother is a machine, but she’s not just a machine. She’s my friend. I’ve spent six months alone with myself and Ghosts both real and imagined... and her, all around me. As surely as Rainbow is waiting for me somewhere, something is waiting for her. I know it is. I go down tunnel eighteen. It’s tight, with multicolored wires running along the walls. Metal fixtures poke into my back, but I’m just small enough to squeeze closer to the base of the passage. Being small is what landed me the Absolution , or at least I like to think it did. I’m glad for the glow of the emergency lights and interfaces. Yeah, the green and red is kinda creepy, like little blinking eyes, but... it’s better than just the dark. The dark. Star Mother needs to win. She has to keep the lights on. I need them. They shut off. There’s no flickering or warning. Just one moment with enough light and then another with no light at all. I freeze. No. Oh, Luna, please. Anything but the dark in this awful little crawlspace! I’m a Pegasus, and we don’t do small dark little places, and Star Mother knows that! I’ve told her! I go as fast as I can, nicking my ear on something in the dark. No idea how far I’ve gone, no clue what’s ahead. I don’t care where this thing goes. I don’t care how long it is. Anything longer than a few more hooflengths is too long. I need to see, I can’t do this, my lungs try to grab onto air and nothing comes. I’m coughing and I feel hot, too hot. Oh, gods, is Star Mother dead? Did It win? Did it cut off the air, too, when It won? I don’t wanna die like this, suffocating in a tiny little service shaft like this, just barely big enough for me. I need room, light, space, anything! I don’t know how long I crawl. It’s too long. Ponies weren’t made for things like this! Pegasi weren’t made for these tiny little spaces. This is crazy! Light! There’s light up ahead, I can see it now—thank Celestia! It’s not emergency light. It’s too white and bright for that. It ’s cargo bay two, I’m sure of it. It’ll have to do. Anywhere that’s wide and open and bright. It’s close, closer... gods, I feel like I’m going to faint. I’m through! My wings strain against the tough space suit material as I tumble out into the zero-g, headed for the floor, and I spread my hooves out below me to cushion the fall. I hit the ground, and rebound. As I float up at a moderate pace, I suck in long, heavy breaths. I am as still as I can be, desperately trying to calm myself. She’ll hear me panting; I know she will. The Ghost will hear me. How many ways in? Three, at least three that Rainbow can fit through. I take a deep breath, and then call out, facing the ceiling. “Star Mother? Close the doors?” No answer. “Ship, automated secure sequence. Authorization Crusader Three! My location.” There is a shrill three note tune that’s played: affirmation. Star Mother made the ship more responsive, but it can function without her. For now, there’s light. I can hear the doors locking, and I feel safe. I’ll wait here. It’s not like I really have anywhere else. She’s out there.