C
HAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN
INSPIRATION
I stared at him blankly, just too plainly overwhelmed by the days events. The Timelord looked hurt.
“Don’t look at me like that! I promised you one, and I always keep my promises. As far as I can, anyway… usually. I’ve got quite a good track record as far as these things go. Oh…!” He abruptly changed tracks. “I understand congratulations are in order! I just heard the news. It rather surprised me, actually! For some reason I had the impression that the Blessed Event happened later on. Oh, well, I was just sort of skimming the information about you in the database anyway....” He looked thoughtful. “Something about the news just stuck in my mind so I called up an image to see if it would strike a spark. Nothing sprang to mind, though. As I said, it was just a feeling.” He shrugged and smiled waiting and looking coy.
I remained silent… though I did have to keep myself from reaching out for the picture. I won’t lie; I was about beside myself for a look! However, given the nature of the knowledge…
The Doctor dug me on the knee with an elbow. “Are you sure? It’s my understanding that on Equestris you lot arrange just about every aspect of your children just after conception. Gender, physique, intelligence, pretty much the entire package! You won’t be breaking any cultural rules as far as I’m concerned and it certainly won’t change future events… given the state of flux in the Timeline already.”
“We try to do all that.” I said as my curiosity began to get the upper hoof. “It doesn’t always work out that way. Our genes are already reworked to the point where it’s pretty hard to modify them. One of our Augmentations is a resistance to genetic change as a protection against genetic weaponry. The Augmentation works both ways. Look at me! I came out as a borderline dwarf with a personality inclined toward um… unconventional behavior.” I chewed the inside of my lip for a moment and cocked an eye at the expectant Timelord.
“You’re just dying to show me, aren’t you?”
“Quite.” He waggled his eyebrows at me. “But if you’d rather not…”
I squirmed, tempted. “It probably wouldn’t be set in stone anyway. It occurs to me that anything we do from this point forward could alter the outcome…” I gave the Doctor a meaningful look. “Is it a picture of What Will Be, or just one of What Might Be?”
“As things stand now it is an image of What Should Be, if you take my meaning.” He said softly. “It occurs to me that you, ah, need to see this. It is important that you see this especially at this particular instance, not to put too fine a point on it, for your sake.”
“Uh-huh.” I grunted. I fixed him with a hard eye. “You got this place bugged, Doctor?”
“Nothing happens in the TARDIS that I’m not aware of it, Starry. We’ve been together a long time, she and I. We have quite the symbiotic relationship! At any rate one needn’t be a Timelord to see that you’ve been crying… or to understand why.”
It’s discomfiting, as an Equestrin, to seem so transparent. We like to keep our personal troubles to ourselves. Nopony likes to appear weak… as they deem it…but I’ll be the first to admit that sometimes we Equestrins take it to extremes. I didn’t say a damn thing for long moments. What I would have shared with Sunny I never would have revealed to a comparative stranger.
I cleared my throat quietly. “Do you usually keep such detailed tabs on everypony on board this thing?”
The Doctor refused to meet my gaze. He began speaking as he rummaged through his pockets.
“I rejoined the others after I picked up a few things that we may need for what comes next.” He began laying things on the deck as he encountered them. The first object was the muffin he’d been snacking upon back on the Bridge. Next came an apple, a yo-yo, and a ball of twine the size of my fist. He kept on searching.
“They told me you left the Control Room in something of a state after you’d heard about Sunny’s condition…” A hoof-full of honest-to-Luna wooden pencils in a variety of bright colors, bound together with a rubber band, were added to the pile. Then came a thin cloth bag that clanked as he laid it down. The drawstring sealing it had come loose and a couple of metal jacks fell out as well as a tiny, red ball. The next item was something I recognized only from an image in a database, a newspaper folded open to expose a very smudged crossword puzzle. Well… that explained the presence of the pencils anyway! Most of a dull pink eraser bounced around on the deck after it.
“The TARDIS can be quite the labyrinth so I asked the Old Girl to show you the way back to where we were…” His voice became muffled as face disappeared up to his ears as he delved. It became clearer as it reappeared. He frowned.
“I know I had it! I distinctly remember printing it up an putting it in a pocket somewhere…” He began nosing into his right pocket and extracted a bright brass compass and a brilliantly multicolored cube with nine squares to each side. A smooth, gray rock thumped down next to it. The Doctor pointed a stern hoof at it, addressing it as one would a pet.
“Stay! Sit! Good boy!”
“… How in Hell can you be loaded down like that anyway?” I asked, irritated with the preposterous things that just seemed to swarm around the Doctor. “Your pockets aren’t even bulging! And why for Ponies sake are you talking to a rock?”
The Doctor looked at me innocently before he answered one question and ignored the other. “They’re bigger on the inside. What, you didn’t think we just did it with the TARDIS, did you? Handy things, nested dimensions! Oh, wait! Wrong pockets!”
His head dove into the inside of his jacket. He emerged with a small leather carrier dangling from his lips. I’d seen ponies carry their credit chips in something similar.
“Drat! Grabbed the wrong one, just hold onto that a moment, will you?” He asked out of the corner of his mouth.
I took the thing and his head disappeared back into his coat. There was something small and hard in it. Not a credit chip, it felt like an ID card or something similar. Out of curiosity I flipped the cover open…
It was an ID card! The Great Seal of the Federation of Pastures, with the stylized star map of the founding star systems embedded within, was emblazoned on it. The card informed me that the bearer was a Special Agent of the Federation Council reporting directly to the Federation President. The seal of the Security Division was appended to it.
I caught the Timelord’s eye as he came back out of his coat and flicked him a questioning eyebrow.
“Psychic Paper.” He said…like that just explained everything! I held his gaze until he felt prompted to explain. “It shows the viewer whatever they need to see to convince them I’m here to help. Apparently you needed a little more convincing!” His eyes twinkled. “This is how I got Tyllae’s call. Now that you know the truth, look again!”
My eyes flicked back down to the document. Now it was just a creamy yellow blank.
“Cute.” I said flatly. “Trade you!” The thing the Doctor held carefully in his mouth, quite frankly, held a lot more interest for me!
He held it facing away from me and deposited it upside-down onto my waiting palm. The Psychic Paper went back into his coat and he sat back on his haunches expectantly, looking so pleased with himself that I would have glared at him if my attention wasn’t elsewhere!
I tenderly flipped the thing over and stopped breathing!
It was a very good tri-vee pic, taken by a very expensive imager, giving the impression of looking through a tiny window at something in the next room.
The room in question was the Library back in Alicorne Keep. The very room where I asked Amber Rose for his daughter’s hoof in marriage! That ancient clock sat it the background mutely informing one and all that it was eleven thirty-eight in the morning. Brilliant sunlight streamed through unseen windows, striking rainbows from the facets of the cut glass decanter on the massive oak table. Uskebaugh glowed warmly within it.
There, behind the selfsame chair I sat on the fateful day, I was seated wearing my dress uniform beaming like an idiot, my meager collection of awards concealed behind Sunny as she sat in my lap, wearing a gleaming white, gauzy gown that clung to her like a second skin. Her shoulders were bare and she wore neither necklace nor earrings for propped up on her lap swaddled in a pure white blanket The Most Adorable Foal In The Universe blinked directly at whoever took the picture. One chubby arm was caught in the act of waving vaguely while the other one held tight to a gleaming white plastic ring upon which dangled brightly colored baubles in the shape of a red apple, a blue diamond, a pink and yellow butterfly, a mauve starburst surrounded by five littler stars, a rainbow bolt depending from a cloud, and a little trio of blue balloons.
A single lock of void-black mane hung down over a rich chestnut forehead. The foal’s right eye was surrounded by a bright patch of white and white was its muzzle. My heart melted. My palette… our child had my palette. Then and only then did I notice the stubby ebon horn next to that wayward lock…
“A Unicorn? …We had a Unicorn!” Fresh tears came to my eyes and I found myself smiling as widely as my holographic twin.
“Well, you’re half right.” The Doctor corrected me. “You can’t tell with the blanket and all, of course, but your daughter is an Alicorn. An Equestrin Alicorn at that! I daresay those twentieth-century Eugenicists would certainly have been proud to see that! …Some of them, anyway!” He amended. “Quite the first, in any case! Congratulations, my dear!”
“Thank you.” I whispered as the tears ran. Despite of the fact I knew it was just an image, I couldn’t help but to reach out with a forefinger to touch that tiny hand and stroke that perfect face.
I sensed rather than saw him dive back into his pockets. I was too busy sharing the image with The Mare In My Head who immediately began dabbing her eyes, grinning like a maniac! She paused in her adoration only long enough to archive the image, flying to her Science Station and jabbing buttons with a lightning-like flurry of her hooves before flinging herself back into her Command Chair so hard that it spun!
Something light touched my free hoof. I looked down to see the Doctor holding a large white hoof kerchief adorned with purple question marks.
“Here you go, my dear.” He murmured out of the corner of his mouth. I took it and mopped up my eyes. It smelled of jelly-babies.
The Timelord patted my knee as I blew my nose. To call attention away from the truly tremendous racket I was making… as has been previously noted, Equestrin lungs are powerful… he began to chatter.
“The image was lifted from a newsfeed, the Elphinstone Times, I believe. ‘Captain Starry-Eyes and Doctor Solar Cross of Starfleet proudly announce the birth of their daughter, Accord, on July 17th, 2217’…”
He never got the rest out because I gathered him up to me in a bone-crushing hug!
To give the old buck credit, he was tougher than he looked! I felt him tense up in my grasp as he squirmed helplessly.
“Oh… dear! Yes, well, you see I’m not, ah, much of a hugger you understand.” His voice became rather strained as he continued. “… But I am very much a breather! Do you know who is a hugger? Sunny! Don’t you think you’d like to share a happy moment like this with… ooohhh dear!”
I picked the Timelord up bodily and whirled him around three times, coat and tail flying while his hindlegs flailed. Before I put him down again I loosened my grip just enough to plant a big, wet one square on his astonished lips! The panicked look in his eyes was simply priceless!
He flopped down on his haunches, narrowly missing some of the loose jacks on the floor as he scrambled to gain his composure. He fussed with his coat and tie and ran a hoof through his mane a couple of times before treating me to a reproachful look.
“Well that was certainly invigorating!” He shook himself where he sat. “I'm glad you weren't having twins or triplets..there wouldn't be an intact bone left in my body! Nearly squeezed all the Regeneration Energy out of me as it was! Madame, you clearly have no idea of your own strength!” He got up on all fours and cautiously stretched. “No harm done... in fact...” He paused and alternately bobbed his forequarters and hindquarters, looking quite pleased. “I feel limber as a monkey's tail! I've had a little stiffness in my back for a while now but it's quite gone now.”
He started humming a catchy tune to himself an proceeded to start kicking both sets of legs alternately into the air, doing a dance step that tickled something in my memory. Once upon a time on that glorious summer on Earth Sunny and I took a day trip to Prance where we saw dancers doing...
“The Can-Can? You're doing the Can-Can...?” It was so preposterous that I said to Hell with Timelord Dignity and all but collapsed into helpless laughter.
The Doctor broke into a tolerable version of a ballet twirl and finished gracefully.
“Oh, that's nothing! Give me the proper shoes and I could show you what I can do with the Flamenco!” He arched his body like a cat and started a series of abbreviated steps punctuated with occasional loud stomps in dramatic poses. “Ole!”
“More like 'Uncle'! I give! I give! I'm glad you're OK.” I wiped my eyes. “It's true, sometimes I forget I grew up in a deeper gravity well. I promise to restrain myself in the future. Uh, stick-a-cupcake-in-my-eye!” I touched my right eye with my left finger in the ancient Terran tradition.
“No harm done, my dear Starry-Eyes.” The Doctor smiled affably, not even a little winded after his display of hoof-work. “Now, if you're up to it, the others are waiting in the Garden. Sunny won't admit it but she's worrying. Fortunately Miss Doo and Tyllae are keeping her occupied... otherwise she'd go tearing off in an effort to find you. The TARDIS being what she is, I thought it would be better if I came to fetch you myself. She'd already started pointing you in the right direction...”
“The lights.” I said thoughtfully. “The lights were going out behind me. That was the AI of the TARDIS, wasn't it?”
Before he could answer a low, discordant gong rang over unseen speakers... perhaps. The Doctor pursed his lips disapprovingly.
“The TARDIS is not an Artificial Intelligence, she's a quite natural one. For the sake of future reference it would be helpful for you to remember that. She and I are the last bits of Gallopfrey in all of Eternity. The two soul survivors as it were... and she's even crankier about her identity than I am, thank-you-very-much!”
“O-o-o-oh, kay! Uh, sorry about that!” I addressed the empty air. When in Roam and all that...
I don't know where it came from. I never saw or heard a trace of anything like a transporter effect, but something came fluttering down in front of me. It was no trick for my reflexes to snatch it out of the air. I found myself in possession of a brilliant blue blossom. A rose on a tiny bit of thornless stem complete with two tiny green leaves.
“She's forgiven you, the sentimental old thing.” The Doctor patted a wall. “She knows about your child, of course. You're getting to be quite an old softie aren't you, Sexy?” The lights around us went off and came on twice and a warm breeze scented with alien blooms wafted over us as the Timelord chuckled. I was suddenly feeling very much the outsider. I reevaluated my interpretation of the relationship between the Doctor and his TARDIS. Initially I had the impression that he was its operator, that it was in essence a machine. A fantastically complex machine, true, but a machine nonetheless. After that moment, though, I wasn't so sure. These two had a history!
“She's older than I, you know.” The Doctor, with his uncanny ability to divine my thoughts, startled me. “By an order of magnitude. She was already an obsolete model when I, um, ran off with her.” His hoof came up once again and stroked the wall in a caress. “But we... synched... I have no other way to explain it. She never tried to alert the Gallopfreyan authorities nor did she ever try to thwart me in my travels, the Dear Old Thing.” He paused to give me a rueful, reminiscent smile. “It took me a while but I realized that she'd been fighting this fight before I'd even considered it. She knows more about, um, things than I do and I do my best to catch up. She arranges things to happen that I need. Things that, because of her nature, she cannot provide. Don't you, Old Girl?”
I had a flash of insight. “Companions. When you said the word it had a...” I paused while I sorted things out to express them tactfully. “Certain weight of meaning.”
“Quite.” The Doctor flicked a bit of imaginary dust off a door frame. “She knew, even before I did, that I should never travel Alone. It took me a while to realize that but I got the message eventually.” He treated me to a private smile. The Doctor was admitting that he was actually wrong about something. It was something that the enigmatic, eccentric little kook would only admit to his closest friends... and I was touched that he said so in my presence.
I kept the warm feeling to myself. It wouldn't have been Equestrin of me to reach out and give him a hug... recent events nonwithstanding. (That was different, so there!) So I tucked the bloom into my mane silently.
“Well, it's nice to know that you're capable of learning even at your age!” What I couldn't bring myself to do physically I did with my eyes as I caught his gaze. Trust the old buck to pick up on it at once! He knew enough about Equestrins to tip me the barest hint of a wink with his left eye just before he sprang up.
“Well even I can see through a brick wall in time, can't I?”
“Sure you can. ...What the hell is that even supposed to mean?”
The Doctor ignored that. Instead, he stuck a hoof tip in his mouth and wetted it. He held it up as if checking for a breeze.
“Picnic, right! The Garden is...” He cast his gaze up and down the corridor. “This way, I should think.” He pranced off down the corridor the way I'd be coming. I had to take a long step to catch up to him.
“Now hold on one gravel-spitting minute, Doctor!” I said as I fell in beside him. “The lights were guiding me the other direction as I recall. If the Garden was back here why would...”
“The geometry of the TARDIS is variable.” He said briskly. “The internal layout can be changed. 'Relative Dimensions' and all that. The Old Girl was pointing you in the right direction but we can get there quicker along this way, trust me. Just a little help, please, there's-a-good-girl!” Until just a few moments ago I would have said that he'd addressed the last line to the empty air, but now I knew better.
“Just around the next corner if I'm not mistaken! Shake a leg, won't you? I hope there's some food left. I could do with a bite.” He looked wistful “ ...I wonder if there's any of that apple pie left? Well, there's sure to be muffins if Miss Doo has anything to say about it!”
I should have known better than to protest, yet I did.
“If memory serves the next corner is way the Hell down along this corridor and I was running when I passed it! How could it possibly be closer...?”
“Ah! Here we go then!” The Doctor turned right so quickly that I had to wrench myself around to follow. He watched me out of the corner of his eyes, just waiting for me to say it.
As long as he was waiting for it, I spoke up.
“OK ...That was sooo not there a little bit ago. Handy trick, that!”
“Isn't it, though? Comes in very handy indeed when you just have to get to the bathroom! Thank you, Sexy!” He paused in front of a brassbound timber door and patted the frame.
I couldn't resist teasing him. “Do you call her that in front of Ditzy?”
“Oh the TARDIS and Miss Doo made their peace ages ago! In that regard she's a better judge of character than I am... just don't tell her I said that, eh?” He tipped me a wink as he paused with an upraised hoof at the door.
Unlike most of the more conventional looking doors in the TARDIS this one didn't sport a knob or even a handle. Instead there was a simple hasp not unlike the ones on the grounds of Alicorne Keep to keep the foals out of the more delicate gardens. He flipped it up and slid it in one careless motion.
“Don't tell who? Ditzy or the TARDIS...?” I trailed off when, after the Doctor gave the door a careless kick, the sunshine made me blink. I raised a hoof against the glare as a mild breeze, dizzy with the scents of blooms I couldn't identify, toyed coyly with my mane.