//------------------------------// // Chapter 18 // Story: MLA: Perihelion // by Starscribe //------------------------------// Brigid Curie did not cower as she was brought out before Equestria’s ruling princesses. She had to walk quickly to keep pace with the guards, or else find herself dragged along the floor behind them. It was all pony guards now—Brigid didn’t even know what had happened to her dogs, didn’t know what had happened to Leo or his other two “squires.” She could only hope he hadn’t tried to come back onto the network after his misadventure, or else face the same fate she had. Brigid did not resent the old knight, not for this. It wasn’t as though his help would’ve done her any good against a hacker and an OMICRON core. Brigid had been close. She had subdued one city without losing hardly a man, and had the gratitude of the ponies there. Few who weren’t in the castle had any idea she had claimed the city for herself. No doubt the story would be out now, and all her dogs would be in chains just like her’s. It spoke to the natives’ respect for her that they had taken as many precautions as they had. She had been stripped and searched carefully, before being dressed in plain cloth and had chains locked around wrists and ankles. No organic child could’ve lifted such a weight. As it was, the motors in this civilian body could barely keep up. They whined and clicked with plasticy sounds when she moved too fast, a sure sign of the low quality of this body. Too bad I didn’t make something nicer for the native. I might not have to die in such a crappy body. It didn’t matter what the natives judged—her body would run out of power eventually. No doubt the Federation hacker had destroyed all her machinery by now. After what she had done, she doubted very much that the Federation people would be making her a charger. At least I don’t have to face Richard. She found herself smiling as she stared at the floor. He might’ve deleted me for this. At least this way there’s a chance somebody will find this old body, a few generations from now. Maybe I’ll be able to escape then. It wasn’t as though running out of power would kill her, not permanently. Power and repairs could bring her back online as surely as they had restored Leo from his death. A thousand years could not rot the polymers and alloys used even by the cheapest bodies. The throne room looked much better than it had during her tour. Several of the windows were still broken as she passed, filled over with boards instead of the elegant worked glass. All the rubble had been cleared away, along with the slime changelings seemed to like to smear everywhere. There were still signs of the occupation—soldier ponies lined all the walls, all armored and watching her with dark eyes. She saw no other prisoners, no dogs lined up in chains or blood from executions. At least there was some hope for some of them, then. Brigid would have felt far worse to know she had led the soldiers of the Great Pack to their deaths. They might’ve been organics, but they were her organics! The guards stopped before a throne so large it filled the end of the room. Even if Bree’s head was equal with the guards, it wouldn’t have even met the eyes of these massive ponies. There were two of them upon the throne, and any resemblance to the feeble natives trapped in their pods was long gone. She supposed it was a good thing she hadn’t planned on releasing them, if this was going to be the result. Bree’s body had no magical sensors, but even so she could feel their presence, feel it by the way it burned in her chest and didn’t let her look away. Their manes didn’t look like flat slimey hair, but flowing curtains of light. Wisdom and light radiated from those eyes as real as any illusion she had ever crafted in the Imperium. Guess I won’t be seeing that again either. I hope you caught those slavers, Charles. The guards glared at her, and the lead speaker barked, “Give proper respect to Princess Celestia and Princess Luna, Diarchs of Equestria.” “I bow only to my king,” she responded, disabling her pain receptors in preparation for what she expected next. Even civilian bodies could do a few simple things. Not pull weapons out of her arms and fight her way to safety, or vanish behind active camouflage, but… she still had a few advantages. Her mind was still digital. The natives couldn’t take that away at least. The guard looked like he was going to hit her, but a sound like someone clearing their throat stopped him. Instead he looked up, then lowered his head in a respectful bow. “Of course, Princess.” Instead of striking her, the guard took the chain and anchored it into an iron loop at the base of the throne, then turned and walked away. The soldiers in their primitive plate-mail followed behind him, leaving Brigid about thirty meters of clear ground around her. About the length of the chain. She probably could’ve made it all the way up to where the natives sat, if she thought it would’ve done any good. Somehow, under these eyes, she wasn’t sure even a combat body like Leo’s would’ve made any difference. The dark blue princess rose to her hooves, leaping down from the throne to stand at the base. She watched Brigid with harsh eyes, taking in her every detail. She did not seem the least bit intimidated by her strangeness, or even confused. This pony knew humans. “Your name is Brigid Curie, correct?” She nodded. Brigid had sworn to secrecy, but… she also wasn’t a soldier. Engineers weren’t given training to resist torture. “You freed Canterlot from changeling control. You drove our enemies out and made the city safe for ponies. Correct?” Again, she nodded. Brigid did not look away from the towering pony, even as she advanced on her. She didn’t flinch or avoid her, holding herself still before her. If nothing else, Brigid would teach these natives of the courage of her kind. I’m not helpless. I’m not weak. This isn’t London. “It’s a shame that isn’t all you did.” The other speaker came from higher up. Princess Celestia’s voice wasn’t nearly as harsh as Luna’s, though there was something almost as painful in it. Instead of anger, she sounded disappointed. Why did it hurt so much more to hear than Luna’s hostility? “A great shame,” Luna agreed, though none of the softness of her words made it to her eyes. “The word of many witnesses declare you betrayed your promises and used your troops to seize control of Canterlot for yourself. You intended to subjugate all of Equestria in time. Correct?” There was no sense in lying. Brigid did not see Second Chance here, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t around somewhere. The princesses would’ve heard from her by now. If not her, than any of the squires. Leo’s squires would not lie for her, even if they knew it would hurt their own cause. Knights were well known for their honesty. I wish you’d come to help me, Charles. I wouldn’t be here if you’d come. Charles was far too practical to fight a losing battle. If he had been with her when the hacker broke into her network, he would’ve severed their own nodes from the rest of the network and escaped. He didn’t need any remote assistance to be a good pilot. But Charles hadn’t stopped her, and Brigid had fought on. She hadn’t been able to believe she could be hacked by a native from within the network. She hadn’t even bothered scanning her for the Nanophage before starting the procedure. Brigid nodded again. “I did not intend to harm your ponies. I would’ve treated them fairly… given them more than you ever could. I still could: the Steel Tower can offer Equestria far more than our enemies.” “Is that so? I assume you had absolutely nothing to do with the disappearance of the pony we had guarding relics from your world.” She snorted. “I think we’ve had enough of what the ‘Tower’ can offer Equestria if it has many ponies like you.” Princess Luna turned away, fluttering back up onto the throne. She didn’t even look back. “I’m not a pony,” Brigid called up, stepping forward. She didn’t follow all the way, though she couldn’t have said if it was for fear of reprisal or just because she didn’t think it would do any good. “I’m a citizen of the Steel Tower. Its king will reward you handsomely for my return… or strike you down in rage if you harm me.” “This king, were you acting at his orders?” Celestia’s voice remained as disappointed as before. There was nothing else there, just her cool eyes on her. She hadn’t moved from her seat. Bree considered that a moment. Eventually she shook her head. Whatever else she might be, she was no traitor to the Tower. She had been following Tesla’s suggestions. That didn’t mean Richard would’ve been happy with her, though. “My King would have wanted me to help Equestria in its need. When he learns of what I’ve done, he will be furious.” Assuming any of her drones even survived to receive a message from him. Almost all of them had been made destructible, given Bree was working in an alien world and couldn’t be sure of the safety of her hardware. Most drones were made to detonate if they went off the network, to prevent them from falling into Federation hands. “Well, at least she’s honest.” The new voice spoke from ground level, not high up on the throne. It was also male, and though it lacked much of the unearthly wisdom of the princesses, it lacked none of the power. Bree turned, and looked up into the face of the strangest creature she had ever seen. It stood well over the height of a man, with brown fur on its torso and mismatched limbs. It had crooked horns and red eyes, eyes that looked her over with more concentration than the lackadaisical tone suggested. “Either that, or you’re a very good liar. You metal men never make it easy to tell.” “Discord, there’s no need to lead her on.” Even so, Luna’s voice didn’t sound all that corrective. “Can you dispense her punishment or can’t you?” The strange native stopped about a meter away from her. It looked down towards her with burning red eyes, then nodded. “I’ve done stranger magic.” “Very well.” Princess Celestia rose to her hooves. All around the hall, the hushed mutters of conversations stilled to silence. The eyes of a hundred soldiers all fell on her, and she waited for this to complete before she started to speak. “Brigid Curie. You led hostile action against Equestria. You occupied her in a time of war, and your actions may’ve resulted in terrible consequences. You also saved her, and did not abuse the city you had taken. For that kindness, your punishment of banishment to Tartarus is stayed.” Yeah right. Brigid found herself glaring up at the princess. Luna already knew this Discord creature was going to be the one punishing me. We both know that banishment never would’ve happened. Even so, the guards seemed to be satisfied by these words, as though the banishment had been what they expected. Evidently the fact it had still been considered was close enough to please them. “We discussed your punishment with the ponies you hurt most, and considered how you might help repair some of the pain you caused. It is our verdict that you will be sentenced to life, effective immediately. Once the sentence is carried out, you will be transported to a remote village, where you can live out your life without causing any more trouble. Thus is my ruling—” She looked up, out at the crowd of soldiers that gathered just outside the reach of her chain, and packed the room all around. “Should anypony wish to speak against this ruling, this is her only opportunity.” More silence. Celestia nodded. “Our judgement is rendered. May justice settle in balance.” She sat back down. “I’m going to enjoy this.” The creature named Discord cracked the joints on its birdlike claw one at a time, loudly enough that Brigid could hear. “Ever since I saw your types in little Chance’s memories, I wondered.” He walked past her, standing between Brigid and the throne. “You probably don’t even remember what it’s like, do you?” Brigid did not feel afraid. The natives had their supernatural powers, there was no denying it. She had seen objects float, and heard stories of ponies that could teleport short distances. The winged ones could fly and even make the weather change when they wanted. That did not translate into the impossible ability to make a fully synthetic human “alive.” Of course, it was possible the creature would kill her. Magic could destroy easily enough. “Wait!” Brigid put up both her hands, glancing around the towering creature and up at the throne. It wasn’t that hard with as thin as it seemed to be. “Before you do this, there’s one thing I’ve got to know!” She didn’t wait to be interrupted, even though it looked like several of the natives wanted to. “There was another like me, human instead of dog. A knight named Tullius Leonidas. Has he returned yet? If he hasn’t fought to free me yet, I can only assume you captured him. Please don’t punish him the way you’re punishing me… he didn’t have anything to do with what I did!” There was an awkward silence. Eventually Luna broke it, her voice coming in as a hoarse croak. “Leo… died. To save Equestria. Again.” Her eyes burned with anger as she looked up, and Bree didn’t need any magic to read what she was thinking. It should’ve been you. It wasn’t as though Brigid could argue. “Enough of that.” From beside her, the strange creature spoke again, his voice almost amused. “Time to wake up, little robot.” He reached out, with the glittering yellow fingers of a claw. Brigid could’ve struggled out of the way, but there wasn’t any point. For the second time in her short life, Brigid felt magic. The colors of the throne bled together into a single mass of glittering metal. She stumbled sideways, and the few feet to the floor seemed to go on forever. Brigid’s scream stretched and lengthened into a single cry no human mouth should’ve made. For the first time in many years, Brigid dreamed. She couldn’t have said how long it took for her to wake. Dreams were a thing of living creatures, and in their manner there was no perfect record. Brigid saw huge fields of grass, swaying forever under a strange moon. It spoke kindly to her, though for some reason this didn’t encourage her. She couldn’t remember why. Brightness woke her, brightness and a sense of motion beneath her. There were words somewhere nearby, but she couldn’t make them out. She could only hear metal and wood grinding together, jostling her uncomfortably with every bounce. Bree felt stiff, and a little bit sweaty where she had been on the same surface for some length of time. I hate these real-world simulations… “It’s just like I was telling you.” A familiar voice spoke from somewhere close, and she felt a prodding somewhere behind her. “She tries to take over canterlot, and she gets a cutie mark out of it.” Well, maybe not quite as familiar as she had expected. That voice had sounded obnoxiously high before. Now, though… it seemed ordinary. What had bothered her about her, again? “Didn’t you get yours helping her?” That was another voice, a little harsher than the first and not the least bit familiar. The first speaker sounded defensive. “We didn’t know she wasn’t telling the truth! Tell her, Chance!” Second Chance’s voice didn’t sound as high pitched as the last time, either. Her tone was the same though, that half-English way she had of structuring her sentences. “We did liberate Canterlot. She just… kept it for herself after.” Bree forced her eyes open. They weren’t responding as quickly as she expected. She tried to run a diagnostic on her body, but that didn’t respond either. “My dogs did that,” she croaked, the words sounding strange on her tongue. Her body was acting very strange: every request for the console was ignored, every debug request didn’t respond. There wasn’t a simulation in all Imperium that would’ve treated a Sage as high as herself with such disrespect. With one eye open, Bree found herself looking up at a room clearly of native construction. Soft wood paneling with hearts and other cheerful shapes wrapped around everything, with a bright blue ceiling and gas lamps on the walls. “Oh God.” Bree rolled over, and found her body didn’t respond the way she expected. She made it to her belly, then a cascade of her bright orange hair fell into her eyes, blocking out everything. “Hey, uh… are you up then?” This voice also wasn’t one of the natives Brigid knew, and she had a thicker accent than either of the others. “Cuz’ we’ve only got another hour before we get there. You’ll probably wanna get your questions answered before we drop you off.” Brigid moaned in answer, covering her face with one of her arms. “Get me a systems administrator, I think this simulation is malfunctioning. I’m having nightmares of Equestria.” Second Chance spoke from very close, her voice barely louder than a whisper. “Equestria wouldn’t be a nightmare if you treated it better.” Why did she feel so exposed? Bree must’ve been wearing one of her lightest dresses. Maybe the ones made of clouds. “Organics are the nightmare. I don’t think I can handle being around them for awhile. Tell Richard I want… another few centuries back in Imperium…” “Chance, what the hay is she talking about?” The voice was the harsh one, annoyed. “What did you say she looked like before, again?” Pretending she wasn’t feeling what she felt and hearing what she heard wasn’t going to make them go away. Brigid opened her eyes again, then got to her feet. Well, she tried. She rose to what felt like hands and knees, and tried to push off with her hands into a standing position. Numb stumps pressed on the ground, but only with the force to make her rear back a second. She started to fall again, the air rushing past her fearfully fast as she came back to earth. Bree screeched, but she needn’t have worried. Hooves met soft green carpet without pain on her part. It was an assault of strange sensations. Peach-colored fur obstructed much of the lower part of her face, with orange hair blocking some of the other side. Her hands and feet were unrecognizable now—all her limbs for that matter. Joints bent in ways she didn’t expect, and something swished about behind her. She wore no clothes to speak of, nothing but the peach-colored fur that grew darker on her underbelly. There was little embarrassment, not when confronted with so many other strange sensations. Nothing was quite right. Her ears flicked about on her head, the colors on the train seemed too bright, and even the scale was all wrong. Instead of rising a full head higher, Brigid found herself meeting Second Chance’s eyes almost on the level. Sweetie Belle was a little smaller just behind her, and they weren’t the only ponies nearby. There were two more, a yellow and red regular one and a winged orange one with purple mane. The space itself proved to be a little train-car, with empty bunks all around them. That explained the way the ground shook and the rattling coming from outside, anyway. “They really did it.” She slumped to her haunches, eyes fixed on the ground. “Couldn’t even stop a few bugs from taking their city, but… they crossed the silicon barrier.” She looked up, searching for the one who knew so frighteningly much about natives and humans both. “How?” “I’m glad you weren’t like this,” muttered the orange one. “We never would’ve got anything done.” “I was like this at first. I got better.” She looked back to Brigid, resting a hoof on her shoulder. Brigid wanted to scream, wanted to shove the stupid brick on the end of her stupid leg into the native’s stupid face. She found she couldn’t—the anger melted quickly into helpless fear. Tears came unbidden from her eyes, and no command would stop them. The sympathy in the native’s face seemed real enough. Her eyes were still gray, but she didn’t look nearly so faded. There was a mark on her rear just like the others of her kind had, but Brigid didn’t look too closely. “The princesses had given their magic away when the changelings invaded. Otherwise you wouldn’t have stood a chance.” She gestured out the window, at a sun somewhere in early afternoon. “They really do move that.” Brigid tried to pull away, but the gesture nearly made her fall over. She whimpered, but one of the other natives caught her before she fell. “Aww… don’t try tah’ move too soon, now. You ain’t ready fer anythin’ too fast.” She felt the hug before it started, but was powerless to get away. The yellow one embraced her, right along with the white and orange ones. Each one smelled different, she realized that now. The white one had the softest coat, and a flowery smell. The orange one was like feathers, with only horse-sweat for an odor, and the yellow one smelled like fruit and had a coat like her own. How did the natives keep track of all this? It was the new sensations of one of the more aggressively realistic simulations. Only the green one did not join in the hug, for which she was grateful. Somehow that wouldn’t have felt proper. Maybe because she still remembered what she had said, as she took Brigid’s whole world away. Her name was Kimberly Colven, and she was some kind of Federation hacker. There was no doubting the validity of those claims in the face of so much evidence. Anyway, what was the point? She had lost, been caught, and sentenced. Now she was… organic. She would need to eat again, need to sleep, and breathe, and… God, she was breathing right now! Her crying got worse, breaking into hysterics that didn’t seem in a hurry to end. Brigid no longer cared about how she looked, didn’t fight to get her composure back. The last of Brigid’s dignity had fled when she had been shrunk down into a little horse body. “Why did… Why did you come?” she found herself asking through the tears, even as the natives finally gave her space again. She was more than a little relieved to see them pull away. “Don’t you hate me?” “Second Chance” did not look away under her anger. “I hate what you would’ve done to Equestria. The Federation would’ve found you a nice, cold asteroid to live out the rest of your existence…” From beside her, Bree saw Sweetie Belle look up and glare, enough that Chance’s words quickly relaxed. “Equestria’s a nicer place than Earth. Here, people get second chances. Even the really bad ones. My teacher thought… maybe I could learn some about forgiveness if I saw you off.” She looked down then, a little embarrassed. Well, that was good. Brigid shouldn’t be the only one. “See me off,” she repeated, blinking away some of the tears. “I remember…” God, meat memory was terrible. She could only feel the knowledge, not see it perfectly as her electronic life had let her do. It was an approximation, and not even a terribly good one. “I’m being taken far away from Canterlot. To… live out the rest of my painfully short life in isolation?” “Painfully short.” The orange one scoffed. “Says no earth pony ever.” “She don’t know that!” The yellow one—Bree would have to learn their names at this rate—seemed suddenly defensive. “And no, not isolated. Princess Celestia wouldn’t do that, not unless you’d been really awful. What’d you say, Chance?” Second Chance seemed to have recovered by then. “The princesses picked an extremely remote mining village—one so far out it only gets trains once a month or so, and nopony has electricity yet… Motherlode, I think.” “Not that part!” The yellow one reached out, shoving her green friend on the shoulder. Like Brigid herself, she seemed slightly larger than the others, taller and broader. The difference was slight, but this close it was hard to miss. “The good part, not the scary part!” “Oh.” Chance flicked her tail behind her in a way Bree couldn’t read, but seemed significant from the way the others nodded. “The princess picked out a nice family for you.” Something levitated from off a nearby bunk, a plain looking manilla folder. Chance dropped it onto the ground at her feet. It fell open, revealing a surprisingly clear photograph of a pale unicorn mare with a short mane and a thin hammer in front of her. Brigid stared for a few seconds, expecting the strange symbols beneath to become suddenly clear to her… but the translation program never activated. She couldn’t read Equestrian anymore. Her head slumped almostly limply to the table, and she couldn’t keep herself from moaning. “I don’t need a foster parent… I’m a goddamn Sage of the Technocratic Order… I’m twenty-nine years old!” She stomped the wood in front of her with a wave of frustration, and was surprised to see a few splinters fly from around her hoof as she did. Guess they don’t build as sturdy as they look. The natives only stared, watching her with expressions ranging between sympathy and discomfort. Brigid didn’t care. She looked back up again, glaring between each of them in turn. “Maybe I think the human way is better!” she yelled, her voice shrill and cracking with her tears. “At least if the Federation executed me, I’d die as myself! Not some stupid alien. This might even be worse than execution…” “Shut up.” She felt a firm hoof near her shoulder again, and wasn’t surprised to see Chance looking at her. This close, she could see the pony had bandages on her neck, and smelled like lavender. Not that it made her words any softer. “Look, I get it. I know how much it sucks to be something else. How confusing it can be… but don’t give up just cuz’ it’s hard. You could’ve been a hero if you’d made different choices… but the choices you made made you a pony. Maybe instead of being angry you should make something of the opportunity.” “It doesn’t matter if we had Equestria’s technology beat in every way. Probably whatever you did back on Earth doesn’t even exist here—I’ve been there too. Coming here taught me that those aren’t the only things that matter.” She let go of Bree’s shoulder, and instead touched herself to the shoulder of the white-furred unicorn. “Like friends. I think Equestria understands friends better than Earth ever did.” Brigid wanted to say something rude, but in that moment the natives all embraced Chance in a far warmer way than they had with her. The genuine love these ponies shared was so intense she could practically feel it on her face, and the words died in her mouth. It was hard to mock something that seemed so wonderful. Charles. She couldn’t call for him now, couldn’t go back to that stupid house on the beach with Sonja Halko and all the boring rules of reality. I never should’ve left. It was too late to second-guess that decision. It wasn’t as though she regretted her work with Equestria. Aside from maybe the one about not listening to the king… The ground wasn’t moving as much. The sound of wheels as they went over each junction of track was fading too, and Brigid realized the train was slowing. The window was a little too high for her to get a clear view outside. Whatever else, at least the natives had kept her young. For now. “Well, we’re almost there.” Chance levitated something else off the nearby bench, with magic as gray as her eyes. She seemed to use it effortlessly, as much as any native. It was a set of saddlebags, in soft brown fabric that looked almost like leather. Before she could protest, Chance slid the folder away inside it, and lifted them up onto her back. Brigid felt the strange weight there, surprisingly light for how full they had looked. “You may want to try walking a little—it’s not as hard as you expect, but you’re still gonna be tripping all over yourself at first. Oh, and there were Celestia’s instructions…” She cleared her throat. “She’s going to be checking on you every year or so to see how you’re progressing. She expects you to stay with your new family until you’re ready to function out on your own in society. Once your mom releases you, you’re off probation and can go or do whatever any other pony could do.” She stopped, smiling in a way that was almost knowing. “Ponies don’t grow up nearly as fast as people do. Oh… and if you run off, she said she’d turn you to stone. So I wouldn’t do that if I were you.” “Like she’d really do that.” The orange pegasus sounded somewhere between amused and rueful. “Have you even looked at how many pony statues there are in the Canterlot garden?” Brigid didn’t see who had said that, and didn’t really care. She grunted, rising to her hooves again. She met Chance’s eyes, one last time, and the two of them stared for a few tense seconds. Then she forced one hoof in front of the other, stumbling past her towards the open door to the hall. It was… time to learn to be a native, apparently. At least she wouldn’t have to face the king.