Ch.08 Part 3
After tucking in the filly, Keyan started heading back to his room. He was pretty happy with things so far. The filly had been taking this remarkably well. Keyan couldn’t say he was ever in a similar situation, but one could guess he wouldn’t take it as well.
“How's Rainbow Dash doing Aura?” The capsuleer asked.
“Shes been in surgery for 1.5 hours sir, any prediction could be easily rendered void in the future.”
“Just give me an answer Aura.”
Keyan could swear he heard the A.I sigh.
“The nanites have repaired 74% of the damage so far. They will finish repairing her body to the extent they can in another hour. I rechecked my earlier evaluation for cybernetics and my earlier predictions remain, the nanites cannot repair her ocular nerve nor her wings to working order. Implants are still necessary.”
“Was that hard Aura?”
The A.I didn’t respond.
Keyan continued down the hallway. He didn’t know why he cared so much about Rainbow Dash surviving. He had seen thousands of people die in the vacuum of space when their ships were destroyed. Life to him was a commodity, something to be traded and exchanged in the journey of acquiring more isk and power. He could rationalize that saving Rainbow’s life would indebt the ponies to him, so he could extort something from them later.
But that really wasn’t the truth.
He genuinely wanted Rainbow to survive, seeing her die would hurt him. He could barely consider the other ponies' reactions. Even the image of Twilight’s face forced him to start thinking about another topic.
What was happening in the rest of the galaxy? Was anyone even looking for him? Maybe Copheros was. He could only think of a few other people that would spend the time searching for him. It was a sobering thought, before coming here his lack of friends barely registered with him. But after seeing the impact it had on the ponies below, it suddenly forced itself to the fore front of his mind.
Was Rainbow Dash a friend? and the others?
No, he just was doing this in exchange for a favor later, a big one.
His thoughts were interrupted by Aura speaking,
“Sir, Twilight Sparkle wants to talk to you.”
Keyan sighed,
“Isn’t it past her bedtime Aura? It's the middle of the night for her.”
The A.I responded a few seconds later,
“She was not amused by your question. And respectfully asks you to 'get your flank to the radio.”
Keyan chuckled,
“Alright, tell her I’ll be there in a second”
Seeing the door to his quarters he quickly stepped inside. He sat down at his desk and pulled up the holo-display.
“Twilight you there?” He asked.
The response was immediate.
“KEYAN! How is she!”
“Whoa whoa, calm down Twilight. As of now Rainbow Dash is fine. The surgery is going as planned.”
Keyan could feel the relief from over the radio,
“So what did you have to end up doing to her?”
“Well, keeping her alive and making sure she stays that way afterwards is pretty simple. We just inject nanites into her body, and they repair the damage, it's really simple.”
“Nanites?”
“I’ll explain later, don’t ask.”
“Okay.”
There was a pregnant silence before Twilight spoke again,
“And her wings?”
“Thats a different story.”
“What does that mean?” Keyan could hear her voice crack.
“Listen to me Twilight, don’t jump to conclusions.”
“okay”
“Her wings were beyond repair, there wasn’t enough remaining bone to fix them. And the bones the Nanites could make wouldn’t be able to give her flight. The 'magic', as you call it, wouldn’t flow properly, she'd be grounded. So what I’m doing, is building her an entirely new set of wings out of sleeper components. They’re the only things that the magic can flow through. And don’t ask what sleepers are right now, that's a whole other story”
It took a few seconds for her to respond,
“So she’ll be able to fly again?” Her voice was full of hope.
Keyan smiled,
“If everything goes according to plan yes.”
“THANK YOU KEYAN! THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU--”
“Theres still 12 hours of surgery that something could go wrong in, all you can do is hope right now okay?”
“I know I know, but.. thank you Keyan. Thank you.”
“Not a problem Twilight.”
“So how's Scootaloo doing up there?”
Keyan chuckled,
“After she talked to her friends she fell asleep on the control panel. I just tucked her into bed, she's dead asleep right now.”
“That's nice of you Keyan.”
Something then just occurred to Keyan.
“How are her parents reacting to this. I assume you told them.”
Keyan could hear Twilight’s facehoof,
“I completely forgot about that, I’ll do it in the morning. She was supposed to sleepover at the clubhouse tonight so they wouldn’t be worrying anyway.”
“Alright.”
“So is there anything else I should know Keyan?”
“Umm…. Rainbow is also going to need a new eye, but that's an easy fix.”
“So for you, replacing an eye is nothing.”
“Yea, pretty much. And don’t worry it won’t look crazy or anything like that, it will just have a slight glow in the dark.”
“And her wings? how will they look?”
Keyan paused,
“I don’t know Twilight. It's still too early to tell.”
Twilight sighed.
“Listen Twilight, I know you’re worried. But go to sleep, I’ll be able to tell you more things in the morning.”
“Okay Keyan, good night. You’re a good friend, I hope you know that.”
“Thanks Twilight, peace”
The radio beeped.
“Alright now it's my bedtime.” Keyan said to the empty room as he flopped onto his bed and pulled the covers over himself.
****
Keyan woke up the next morning without much fanfare was the same as the night before, except for one key difference.
Snuggled up to his front was Scootaloo, still snoring softly. Her bangs were twitching with every exhale. Keyan froze, he had no idea what to do.
Yell at her for sneaking into his room? Get up without waking her? Just lay there until she wakes up?
Thankfully the question was answered for him. Scootaloo let out a huge yawn and widely stretched her tiny hooves pressing into him as she stretched her back. Her eyes opened sleepily as she finished, when she saw Keyan staring at her with a raised eyebrow, she thrust herself away from him.
With a cry of surprise she plummeted from the side of the bed, hitting the ground with a soft oomph. Keyan instinctually moved to check on her. When he saw that she wasn’t hurt he then allowed himself to break out in laughter.
He stopped it abruptly when he saw the hurt look in the filly's eyes.
“Crap, I’m sorry, didn’t mean to make you feel bad.”
Scootaloo tried waving it off but even Keyan could tell she was still hurt.
“Oh don’t be like that, I’m sorry.” Keyan reached down and picked the filly up. She squirmed but Keyan held fast. Plopping her back on the bed next to him he asked her,
“What were you doing in my bed anyway?”
Scootaloo nervously pawed at the bed,
“Well I woke up a while ago. And I wasn’t scared, or nervous, or anything like that.”
Keyan smiled.
“I just wanted to… make sure you were okay! I thought maybe you were scared or something, so I came to make sure you weren’t.”
Keyan nodded,
“Uh-huh”
Scootaloo's resolve wavered before cracking,
“Okay, maybe I was a little bit scared.”
Keyan raised an eyebrow.
“Only a little!” She quickly added.
Keyan chuckled,
“Don’t worry, I understand.”
Scootaloo managed a weak smile.
“I’m ready to get up, do you want to go back to sleep?” Keyan asked.
Scootaloo nodded.
“Alright, you can stay here for a while. Want me to tuck you in?”
Scootaloo nodded again.
Keyan smiled as he lifted up the blanket. Scootaloo crawled underneath it, placing her head on the one Keyan recently vacated she turned and looked at him,
“Thank you.”
Keyan tucked the filly in again, smiling as she curled up in the blankets. She looked positively miniscule in the large bed.
“Hey Keyan, could give you give me a kiss goodnight?” Her voice was small.
Keyan looked at her,
“How would your parents react to an alien kissing you goodnight?”
The answering silence was so deep Keyan could hear a pin drop.
“Scootaloo you okay? What's wrong?”
“I don’t have any parents,”
“What?” Keyan really hoped he didn’t hear her right.
“I... don’t have any parents.”
“Oh, umm ok then.” This was a pretty awkward situation to be honest.
Keyan never really expected to have to give a kid a kiss goodnight, even tucking one in was an entirely new experience. He tried rationalizing it in his mind and the only reason he could come up with was that making a filly sad wouldn’t make him look good to anybody.
Keyan awkwardly stopped over the filly and planted a soft kiss on her forehead, just below her mane.
“Night Scootaloo.”
The filly murmured a response.
Keyan quickly exited the room.
“Aura what's Rainbow's status?"
“Better than expected sir, the implants have integrated into Rainbow Dash’s body much easier than expected. The 3 hours of reconfiguring her body to accept them originally planned in the surgery’s time frame have been removed.”
“Oh well, that's good news I suppose. So she’ll be able to fly again?”
“My current prediction is yes. The synthetic wings mimic all aspects of her old ones. Weight, size, and they allow the flow of her magic as well.”
“How are the wings going to look on her? She's not going to look like a cyborg or anything right?”
“No Sir, The nanites were able to reconstruct her skin over the synthetics. 75% of her feathers will grow in normally, the remainder will be replaced by synthetic ones. Only if one knows what they’re looking for will they be able to tell the difference. She’ll be ready to return to the planet in 30 minutes sir.”
Keyan smiled,
“Good job Aura, good job.”
“Thank you sir.”
He continued on his way towards the bridge. He sat down in his chair and activated the radio.
“Twilight? You there?”
He waited a few seconds before a new voice responded, this one sounded like a young boy,
“Hello?”
“Ohh, umm who’s this?” Keyan asked.
“Spike, I’m Twilight’s assistant.”
“Oh, umm I assume you know about me then?”
“Yea, Twilight told me everything yesterday. How's Rainbow by the way?”
“She's actually doing great, the surgery went better than expected. She’ll be ready to come home in half an hour.”
“Oh Wow! that is good news. I’ll go tell Twilight!”
“You do that, Tell everyone down there I’ll send the shuttle to the ruins.”
“Alright, talk to you soon.”
“Peace”
The radio beeped.
Keyan sighed, he would have to go wake up Scootaloo who just went back to sleep.
***
Stepping back into his room he looked at the slumbering filly. He walked closerto the filly and gently shook her shoulder,
“Scootaloo, wake up”
The filly sleepily batted away his hand,
“5 more minutes” She grumbled.
“Scootaloo, get up” Keyan was a bit more forceful this time. Evidently the message got through as the filly’s eyes opened wide,
“Oh hey” She said sheepishly.
“I know you just went to sleep, but Rainbow’s about to come out of surgery.”
“Is she okay?”
“Yea shes fine, it went better than expected. So get up, i’ll be sending you home soon.”
“Okay” The filly said while standing up on the bed. Her normally wild mane was even more of a sight than usual. Keyan couldn’t help but chuckle, Scootaloo gave him a glare,
“Its just bed-mane,”
Keyan waved her off.
“Come on, lets go”
Scootaloo complied and jumped off the bed, her hooves softly thumping on the carpeted floor.
“Hey Keyan?” She spoke up, “Do you have anything I could have, as like a souvenir or something?”
Keyan looked at her. How could he say no to those eyes.
“One sec.”
He walked over to the shelf where he kept some holo-tags, He usually kept one from each time he wiped out an empire’s fleet, which was honestly pretty often. Didn’t really help him in political circles but whatever.
He picked out three of the newer ones and walked back over to the waiting filly. Kneeling down he showed them to her.
“Watch” He said.
He pressed a button on the side of the tag and spoke,
“Scootaloo”
The name of the previous owner of the tag erased to be replaced with SCOOTALOO.
“Umm, what does that say?” Scootaloo asked. “It just looks like scribbles to me.”
Keyan face-palmed, he forgot the whole “other language” thing.
“Its your name in galactic standard, the language I normally speak.”
Scootaloo’s face lit up,
“Oh thats so cool!”
He placed it around the fillies neck, shortening the chain until it fit snuggly around it. He showed Scootaloo the other ones,
“Here’s two more for Sweetie Belle and Apple Bloom as well, so you can all have one. Just don’t show them to anyone else, I still technically don’t exist down there okay?”
Moving faster than Keyan could react to Scootaloo wrapped him in a hug, her tiny limbs stretching to reach around his back.
“Thank you Keyan.”
Keyan chuckled,
“No problem Scootaloo.”
“My friends call me Scoots. You can call me that too if you want”
Keyan smiled,
“Okay Scoots, but call me Key. Its what my…. friends call me.”
“Deal”
***
A short while later Scootaloo found herself in the shuttle, watching out the window as Keyan’s ship became farther and farther away. She sighed as she saw it cloak, Keyan had explained some of it to her but it really went way over her head. A grumbling came from behind her, Rainbow was waking up.
Keyan had said she would wake up after she left the ship. He had made her Pinkie promise not to tell everypony what he looked like, when she asked him why he didn't really have a reason, but she promised either way.
“Rainbow! you woke up! how do you feel?”
Rainbow Dash glanced around the shuttles interior, trying to figure out where she was.
“Oh, you’re in Keyan’s shuttle, hes sending us back now.”
Rainbow nodded.
“So how do you feel?”
Rainbow cleared her throat,
“Surprisingly well actually. So how did you get here?”
Scootaloo rubbed the back of her head with her hoof,
“Umm, can I tell you later?”
Rainbow nodded before her eyes suddenly opened wide. Scootaloo watched as she looked behind her. No, not behind her Scoots corrected herself, at her wings. Rainbow’s shocked look remained as she gave her wings a few idle flaps,
“He saved them” She said in a really small voice, as if acknowledging it would cause them to disappear.
“Technically I didn’t.” Keyan’s voice rang through the shuttle, “I actually built you a new pair. They should function the same way though.”
Rainbow paused, unsure of how to take this new information.
“Can I fly though?”
“Yes, you should be able to”
Rainbow’s eyes suddenly filled up with tears,
“I can still fly” she said to herself, “I can fly.”
“I had to replace your feathers too, some were grown naturally, but some are purely synthetic. I’m sure you can tell if you look at the-”
Rainbow suddenly cut him off,
“I don’t care about that! I can fly Key!” She took a deep breath before continuing.
“When I crashed I didn’t fall unconscious right away. I could feel what happened to my wings Key, I knew they were lost, an entire part of me just gone. The things that got me my cutie mark! When that sunk in, that's what made me fall unconscious.”
“Well, I’m happy that I did good. When you land in a minute you’ll have to try them out.”
Rainbow’s brow furrowed,
“So I can just go fly? no recovery time or anything?”
“Yep, you’re good to go. Perks of technology eh?”
“Key if you were here I would kiss you.”
“No thanks Rainbow, ponies aren’t my thing.”
“A hug then?”
“Sounds good.”
They both chuckled.
“You’ll be landing in 30 seconds, get ready.”
Rainbow turned to Scootaloo,
“Hey, strike an awesome pose with me, we gotta make an entrance.”
Scootaloo smiled as Rainbow hopped of the gurney to the floor. Rainbow Dash smiled, no different than usual.
She struck a dramatic posed and Scootaloo matched it. They stared dramatically off into the middle distance with one hoof raised.
They felt the shuttle touched down and froze as the door opened. The entire group was standing there, Twilight and the gang, Spike, and the Princesses.
“I’m back!--” Rainbow tried to say before she was cut off buy a Lavender blur. Rainbow’s eyes opened wide in shock as Twilight threw her legs around her, crushing her in a deep hug. Tears were streaming from her eyes, matting Rainbow’s fur.
“I thought I lost you Rainbow! Don’t ever do that to me again!”
Rainbow gently patted Twilight’s shoulder,
“Don’t worry Twi, I never leave my friends hanging.”
Rainbow looked at the rest of the group. Rarity and Applejack had matching grins as they stared at the pair. Fluttershy was hiding behind her mane and Pinkie was bouncing in place, waiting for her turn to hug Dashie next.
“GIRLS” Scootaloo cried as she caught sight of her friends who came out form behind the Princesses.
She jumped out of the shuttle and started bouncing in front of them,
“Lets go to the clubhouse, I got something to show you!”
The three fillies then tried to run off but were stopped by a look from Princess Celestia.
“Wait for everypony.”
They nodded dumbly.
“I’d hate to break up the reunion, but I should get this shuttle back to my ship before everybody wakes up.” Keyan’s voice rambled through the shuttle’s speakers.
Twilight and Rainbow broke their embrace and stepped out of the shuttle.
“Thank you Keyan.” Celestia said, “Equestria itself is indebted to you.”
“Damn straight it is Princess, those wings were expensive.”
******