Jammin' Gemini

by Aragem

Memories and Machines

When Apple Bloom returned home, she was in one piece save for the scarring on her flank. Zecora provided a special salve that applied each day would allow the scars to fade away. The filly was happy that she wouldn’t walk around forever with scars. She had been fearful that Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon would jeer that the scars were her cutie mark.

But any knowledge of what she endured through the three days she was missing was gone. It was just a black image when she tried to remember. It was like remembering a dream. She would think she remembered something, but the darkness would cover it up before she could visualize it. At first her sister didn’t believe her that she couldn’t remember.

”Now Apple Bloom, sweetie, Ah love ya with all muh heart and Ah promise Ah won’t be mad. Jest tell me where ya were.”

But no matter how hard she tried, the memory just wouldn’t come. If it wasn’t for her family, her friends, and the well-wishers that came in troves with food and treats, she’d never have believed that she had been gone for three days. For her, she had slept for a night in the apple orchard. The last thing she remembered was the small row she had with Applejack in the orchard.

Though she was fine save for her memory, Applejack insisted on treating her as if she had been reduced to a toddler foal. She was not allowed to be anywhere by herself. She did chores with Applejack or Big Macintosh which wasn’t anything new as she had performed chores with them in the past, but she wasn’t allowed to go off and play. And worst of all, that broke her heart, was no more Cutie Mark Crusaders adventures or activities. Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle were welcome to come over and play while supervised.

The whole thing made Apple Bloom look forward to school. At least there, she won’t have Applejack breathing down her neck. Until then, she had to endure being dragged around to all of her sister’s errands and engagements with her friends such as this picnic.

Apple Bloom didn’t have much of an appetite, but she made herself eat the sandwich set before her. She barely listened to the adults discuss the upcoming Winter Welcome celebration which Apple Bloom would have been looking forward to, but now dreaded if Applejack was going to keep her under hoof the whole time. After what seemed like forever to the filly, the picnic ended with the friends bidding each other goodbye and then it was just her, her sister, and Twilight Sparkle with Spike sitting on her back rubbing a full stomach.

“What was it you wanted to speak to me about, Applejack?” Twilight tilted her head in her usual curious way.

“Well, Ah was wonderin’ if ya could help Apple Bloom with her memory.”

Apple Bloom popped her head up surprised. “What?”

“Didn’t the doctor say that it could come back on its own?” Twilight inquired concerned.

“Yeah, but he also said it may never come back,” Applejack replied looking dissatisfied with the doctor’s words. “Ah wanna know what happened to her during those three days.”

Yes, Apple Bloom found that she wanted to know too. She wanted to know how she got the scars on her flank and why her memory was gone. And maybe, if she remembered something, anything, then maybe she can get back the freedom she lost. “And Ah wanna know too.”

Twilight glanced between the sisters, sensing their need for answers. “I..... memory spells can be tricky after a trauma. I advise that you wait a few days and see if it comes back on its own. If it doesn’t come back, then I promise, I’ll see what I can do.”

“Okay, Twilight, we’ll wait and see what happens. C’mon, Apple Bloom, we gotta get back. Big Macintosh will need our help.”

“But all he’s doing is feeding the cows! He never needed help for that,” Apple Bloom bemoaned as her sister led her away.

“Well, today he does, now hush and c’mon.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Mikala Briggs hated her life. She had spent the last three hours decrypting and hacking into files and all she managed to find out was that Noa Laotaner enlisted on planet Haven. She and a million other soldiers enlisted from the Home Planet. Nothing stood out there.

Laotaner was a ghost. Literally, a sheet and chains ghost. There was her service career which was vague and didn’t offer any detail of how and why she won her ranks and medals. There was no information about what her life was before she enlisted. There was nothing about parents, background, family, or any siblings. All Mikala got for her time was just where Noa Laotaner enlisted.

Her console chimed and IRIS, the ship’s computer, spoke to her, “Yeoman Briggs, please report to the Commander’s Office.”

“No.” Mikala covered her face with both hands. “No, no, no, no, I don’t think my heart will handle another meeting with her.”

Alas, when the commander called you, you went. Period. Mikala collected her jacket from where she hung it on the back of her chair and pulled it on. A spy program she installed on the computer would alter the logs showing that she had been playing games instead.

She ran through a list of things that the commander would summon her for. Maybe she wanted to test her again, have her write a letter, or drilled her about the pony she cared for. Or maybe she found out?

She felt a shudder crawl through her arms and back. If she found out would she be angry or, hopefully, happy?

When she entered the office, Noa Laotaner was behind her desk, but with Dr. Tibbs in the room.

Laotaner glanced at her with her usual disdainful stare, but there was something behind it. There was a wicked glee that Mikala could imagine in a wicked boy who was enjoying pulling wings off flies.

“You wanted to see me, ma’am.” Mikala could only brace herself.

“I wanted to inform you that this morning I had a meeting with my, as I affectionately call them, my Think Tank.” Laotaner’s voice was thick and sweet, like poison. “I’m going on a mission and I need a partner. You’re it.”

Mikala’s face lost all feeling save for the tingling in her lips. “Ma’am. . .what?”

“Oh, don’t piss yourself.” Mikala leaned back, her teeth flashing in a rare smile. Pluck; there went the fly’s wing. “There will be a low possibility of combat involved, but we will be going behind enemy lines.”

“I. . . I don’t know. Isn’t that still dangerous?” Mikala’s brain was nothing more than mush.

“We’ll be using the TIGGER.” Pluck, there went the other wing.

Mikala felt the dire need to sit down before she fainted. Dr. Tibbs must have noticed for she came around the desk drawing a chair with her. She helped Mikala sit down, with a hand on her forehead.

Dr. Tibbs spoke to her, but she couldn’t hear her. She just wanted to go somewhere and lie down or just escape from this horror.

Laotaner has a wisp of a smile on her now stoic face. “Trevor has been performing tests and assures me that it will operate perfectly, but I will go first to make sure that it operates as he promises before it is used on you.”

Her words did little to calm Mikala’s pounding hard. The distraught yeoman managed to croak, “Why me? I don’t have any training.”

“Cortez pointed out a lot of things about you that makes you a worthy candidate. You have firsthand experienced with one of the natives and you are you green, you’re practically still a civilian which will be of some help.”

“That doesn’t make me qualified!” Mikala blurted out in a choke that made her eyes water.

“The fact that you don’t have the extensive training of a ‘real’ soldier is off putting, but Cortez also said that my skills make me worth two soldiers, so it’s pretty much even.”

Dr. Tibbs arched a sharp eyebrow. “Are you sure he wasn’t kissing your ass?”

“No, remember back on Palimo? When he was drunk he said that anyone that bothered kissing my ass would need to get a tetanus shot.”

She may remember to laugh at that later, but right now she needed to get through this meeting without passing out. “So, is there anything I should do in preparation?”

“Yes, you’ll need to go to the lab. Trevor has the native language translated and has it recorded in a chip that’ll send the information to your brain via an eye injection.” Now the wicked boy was frying the hapless fly with a magnifying glass.

Mikala had been fearful of needles when she was a child. Going to the doctor always carried a sense of dread due to fear of shots or blood tests. When she was older, she no longer had to be held down for an injection, but she still cringed as she felt the needle touch her flesh. Now she was looking at having a needle going into her eye. Now she was feeling sick.

Dr. Tibbs was speaking to her now. “It’s not as bad as everyone thinks. Trevor can give you something to help you relax.” Mikala noticed the cold look the CMO was giving the commander. It made her feel better that there was at least one person on her side.

“When will the mission start? And what are our goals?” Mikala figured she might as well have a countdown to her doom.

“Depending on how well it goes with me, tomorrow before noon.” Laotaner’s voice carried as poisonous cloud. “Our goals is to determine the social structures and if there is any military prowess, and some other things I’ll go over tomorrow if the TIGGER works. Don’t look so glum. This way, we can take the planet with minimum casualties. You’ll be helping me prevent another Shraxi.”

“Ohhhhh, god. . . .” Mikala rubbed her face. “May I have permission to go to the lab and get my procedure over with?” And throw up.

“Permission granted. You’ve been breathing up too much of my air already.”

The doors barely hissed shut behind Mikala who had swayed out the door before Dr. Tibbs turned flashing a heated glare at Laotaner. “What is your deal with her?”

Laotaner reclined back in her chair, taking on a relaxed pose. She hiked her feet up onto the corner of her desk as she regarded the doctor with a small tilt of the head. “There’s something about her that rubs me wrong. I never really liked her.”

“Try not to be ‘you’ around her, okay? She’s a good kid, she really is. She doesn’t deserve the Laotaner treatment.” Dr. Tibbs raked long fingers through her white hair, “She isn’t like the. . . others.”

“What others are you referring to?” Laotaner lazily asked as she eyed the doctor.

“Don’t you dare play that game with me, Noa. We’ve served the Havensguard together for over thirty years, and we know stuff about each other that’s turning our hair white. Like for example, back when we were fresh recruits and were on our first stint on Grova’s swamps, our bunk leader tried to sexually assault you after lights out. I told you to report him to our drill sergeant, but you wouldn’t do it. I didn’t know very well back then, I thought you were too afraid or embarrassed, but then we found the bastard’s corpse out in the bayou half eaten by the wildlife.”

Laotaner studied her nails, running a thumb over them. “It’s dangerous to walk alone at night in a swamp.”

“Yeah, I would be willing to give you that, but then we come to the reporter that traveled with our unit out on the desert planet of Tansa. The journalist who kept giving away our location and mission plans live on her camera drone to up her ratings. She got some our guys killed doing that. Our CO tried to get her to stop, but she raved on and on about freedom of the press and how she had his superior’s permission to be there, yada yada. She was found dead outside of the camp with a bullet in the head.”

Laotaner scratched an itch by her nose. “We were behind enemy lines.”

Then we come to Terrence Butler. He was a real asshole that joined just so he could hold a gun and swing his dick around. The last we saw of him was when he went with you to secure a relay tower then he fell to his death from the top of the tower.”

Laotaner yawned stretching her arms above her head. “It was raining. It was slick up on that tower.”
“Noa he had contusions on his face and shoulders that didn’t result from him hitting the ground.”
“He hit every rung on the ladder on the way down.”

Dr. Tibbs rolled her eyes as she unclipped the bag she had earlier set on the desk earlier. “Those are just the few that I know of. I don’t know many bones paved the way for your career. And how many more it’ll take to get you where you want to be. Was rank climbing what you had in mind when you enlisted?”

“Moira,” Loataner’s voice was as sharp as a blade of ice. Dr. Tibbs could feel the weight of that cold glare. Ah, she had touched on a raw nerve. “You don’t have fucking clue of where I want to be, or what was going through my head when I enlisted.”

“Sorry, I broke your cardinal rule of getting too personal. Let me just take your blood so I can get out of here.”

Though Dr. Tibbs had known Noa Laotaner for thirty years, she didn’t know any more about her than the day they first met. What she did understand that Laotaner was very private about her life before enlisting and would aggressively lash out when it was prodded.

She never asked Noa why she enlisted. Everyone enlisted for their own reasons, for good or bad.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
That evening, a visitor came to Sweet Apple Acres bearing a gift.

“Oh, Smokey, ya shouldn’t have,” Applejack told him over the cake he bought from Sugarcube Corner.

“Well, I still feel guilty for not being able to help in the search.” Smokey was sitting at the family dinner table with a coffee cup between his hooves. “And I had to pay you back for the apple slices and stopping me from getting myself banned from the market the other day. So I brought Ember by for a visit.”

Big Macintosh was out by the barn gathering barrels for storing apple cider while Granny Smith was giving the cider press a firm talking to about its performance for tomorrow. And on the floor nosing a ball across the floor was Ember. The small colt lifted his head upon hearing his name. Smokey nickered softly at him and the little foal whinnied back to him in a high pitch wiggling his small dark tail excitedly.

“How is his ear infection? He looks a lot better,” Applejack inquired, pleased to see the colt playing with Apple Bloom’s old baby toys.

“Oh yes, he’s fine now,” Smokey replied.

Applejack noticed that he still looked tired and his mane looked stringy as if it hasn’t been washed for a few days. “If ya don’t mind muh sayin’, ya look pretty tired.”

Smokey nursed from his coffee cup, his eyes disappearing behind the tilted mug. When he set the mug down, his eyes look wet, but he managed a broad smile. “I’ve been busy with the fire station and training the recruits. I plan on having training drills all this next week then they can enjoy Winter Welcome and then it’s back to work.”

“Same here for us. We gotta lotta work to do to get ready for Winter Welcome and a lotta work after.” Applejack beamed at him, hoping that being cheerful will help cheer him up. She wasn’t fooled by his forced smile; he was being chewed up by stress and having recently endured her share of stress over Apple Bloom’s disappearance. “Now don’t read anythin’ into this, but I was wonderin’ if ya gonna go to the Winter Dance.”

“I wasn’t planning on it. I think Ember will be too tired after Winter Welcome that I’ll probably just take him home after the festival.”

“Yeah, Ah may not go dependin’ on how tired Apple Bloom will be afterwards.” Applejack stole a quick glance at the stairs. When they finished feeding the cows, Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle arrived to play. The fillies retreated upstairs to Apple Bloom’s room where they had remained.

“How is she doing?”

“She’s fine. She doesn’t have any memory of where she was, but we’re hopin’ it’ll come back to her. Twilight said she may help us out if it doesn’t.”

Smokey finished his coffee and stood. “Ember and I have to go. I have to get ready for that training I was talking about. C’mon, Ember.”

Ember had learned to bounce the ball off the floor with his front hooves. He was rearing back on his hind legs when his father called him and he ended up lying on the ball staring at his father. Smokey genuinely smiled for the first time that night and lifted his son by the scruff and placed him on his back. “Say goodbye, Ember.”

“Bi bi.” Ember burrowed his face into his father’s mane shyly peeking at Applejack through it.
“He can keep the toys. Apple Bloom is too old to play with them.” Applejack grinned at Ember. “Oh, and ya gotta take one of Granny Smith’s pies with ya.”

“Ah, that reminds me. The Cakes say they’ve been pranked by Mites,” Smokey said glancing around as if he might spot one.

Applejack’s eyes grew wide. “Oh lands sake! That ain’t good, not around Winter Welcome! Last time they came around here, they threw rotten eggs into the apple cider press and seven ponies got food poisoning. Ah best take this pie outside by the fence. And mebbe put one by the barn also.”

Meanwhile upstairs, Apple Bloom was lying across her bed with her face burrowed into a pillow. Sweetie Belle was patting her back with a hoof while Scootaloo paced the floor.

“It’s not fair! It’s not like ya ran away from home,” Scootaloo muttered under her breath, her brow furrowed. Then she looked at Apple Bloom’s prone body with an arched eyebrow. “Or did you?”

“No! Ah don’t think I did!” Apple Bloom bemoaned as she rolled onto her side. “Ah can’t remember.”

“Maybe you hit your head,” Sweetie Belle offered.

“The doctor said Ah’m fine and that Ah might remember one day. Applejack asked Twilight ta help me out. Mebbe if Ah remember, then Applejack will leave me alone.” Apple Bloom rolled onto her back and stared at the ceiling. It had been suffocating to have her sister constantly on her tail.

“I hope she lays off before school starts again.” Scootaloo reminded her of something she had been trying to forget.

Apple Bloom groaned as she covered her eyes with both hooves. She could imagine the taunts and jeers from Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon when she showed up with Applejack walking her to school and back. And worst of all, Applejack was planning on walking around with her at the Winter Welcome festival. She’d rather just stay in her room for the rest of the week, or the month.

“Just try to remember.” Scootaloo approached the bed, placing her hooves on the edge. “Try really really hard.”

Apple Bloom groaned, “I tried. I’ve been trying since I got back from wherever it was I went to.”

“Everyone thinks you went into the Everfree Forest. Is that where you were?” Sweetie Belle asked.

Apple Bloom closed her eyes and concentrated, “Ah . . . Ah think so. It’s always dark when Ah try to remember.”

“It was dark because it was nighttime. You disappeared just before sunset.”

Then Applebloom saw it. It was only for a second, but she saw the Evergreen forest at night. At first glance, she believed it was when they had a sleepover at Fluttershy’s house and had crossed paths with the Cockatrice. However, for a moment, for one heartbeat, she heard the bubble of a river. She snapped her eyes open, sitting up suddenly as if she had waken from a bad dream.

“What is it, Apple Bloom? Did you remember something?” Scootaloo was looking eagerly at her.

“No. . . no, Ah don’t remember.” She crossed her forelegs over her chest, her heart thrumming. When the image crossed her mind, she felt the sense of being chased. If she didn’t run fast enough, then her life was over. And a chill crawled over her flesh making her want to wrap a blanket around herself.

She quickly changed the subject to the newest Daring Do book which they discussed in great length before her friends had to go home.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Twilight Sparkle wanted to make one last stop before calling it a day. Rarity had gotten a head start in decoration which was wise since she was likely to change her mind about the decoration a dozen times before the day of the festival.

She had been expecting to see Rarity hard at work matching fabrics and using her magic to put then in place to see how they complimented the great hall. Instead, Rarity was sitting dejected on a deep cushion chair with the decorations laying forgotten over a clothing rack which she used to wheel the fabric in.

“Rarity, what’s wrong?” Twilight trotted to her friend who looked as if she was near tears.

“The fashion world has suffered a great lost,” Rarity moaned with a foreleg cover her eyes in a swoon. “A truly inspiring asset of the world of beauty and elegance has been taken long before her time!”

“What happened?” Twilight wasn’t certain if she should be concerned or not. With Rarity it was really hard to say since she would consider a stain to be as grievous as an open wound.

“Little Sweet Hearts has disappeared!” Rarity pointed at a newspaper that had fallen on the floor, likely from when Rarity had seen the front page. On the front page was a picture the most adorable little unicorn filly Twilight had ever seen. The filly was too young to get a cutie mark and had a long wavy purple mane and tail with large blue eyes with a coat of seashell pink. She was sitting on an embroidered cushion wearing a silky little dress for fillies.

Twilight had seen her image numerous times. She was the cover child for Cutie Markz magazine that catered to fashions for foals. Twilight’s eyes scanned the article and learned that Sweet Hearts parents had stated that when they checked on her in her nursery she was missing. There was no sign of breaking and entering and so far there have been no leads.

“This is horrible.” Twilight laid her ears back. She didn’t have a foal of her own, but she could imagine the horror of finding your child missing. “They have no idea of who took her?”

“None at all.” Rarity drew a silken cloth from her bag and dabbed at her eyes with it. “She was a small little gem who promised to grow into a fashion star.”

“Didn’t days ago the zebra ambassador’s daughter went missing? And she was the same age as Sweet Hearts?”

Rarity stopped short of blowing her nose. “I. . . I believe so. And I don’t think they found that poor darling either.”

First Apple Bloom goes missing, then the zebra filly, and then the fashion star foal. Was it connected somehow? But the problem is that it didn’t fit. The zebra and the filly were of the same age and where upper crusts of society with the zebra’s father an ambassador and the filly a star. And they both disappeared in Canterlot.

However, Apple Bloom was older and disappeared from Ponyville and came back. Twilight felt in her heart that the missing foals in Canterlot was connected, but what happened to Apple Bloom was a separate issue. But was it a coincidence that both issues started after that Red Comet.

A chill crawled over her back as she remembered it. She had read that Red Comets were signs of terrible things to come, but Apple Bloom’s situation ended happily. Did it mean the missing foals? Will more foals go missing?

She itched to return to her library and study on the subject intensely. And there was something else she wanted to look into also and she might as well get Rarity’s opinion regarding the issue.

“Mr. and Mrs. Cake are concerned about little things called Mites,” Twilight began, but was cut off as Rarity sat up shrieking.

“Those dreadful things are back! Goodness, I have to get back to the shop and set out bon bons! Last time they led a skunk into my shop while I had autumn line set up and . . . it was horrible!”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“There is still the chance that this could go horribly wrong.” Cortez knew he didn’t have a snowman’s chance in hell of changing his commander’s mind, he still had to bring up that important point.

She was sitting on the edge of the exam table wearing only an examination gown. It was made of a fine, but durable white paper and it tied together at her spine. Though she was half naked, her hair loose at her shoulders, and feet and legs bare, she still held herself as the commander that she was.

“If it goes horribly wrong, then shoot Trevor,” Laotaner replied casually. Trevor who was checking the settings on the TIGGER gulped and began double checking his calculations.

Mikala leaned against the far wall looking as miserable as she felt. If the machine fails horribly, then the mission as off and she wouldn’t have her with the TIGGER. But if it does go horribly wrong . . . Mikala sincerely hoped that it didn’t go wrong.

Standing beside her was Dr. Tibbs who had her lips purse and her eyes filled with disapproval of this sordid affair. “Commander, I just want to remind you that I may be skilled at extracting bullets and shrapnel and I am handy when it comes to stitching soldiers back together, but I don’t think my skills are up to par with sorting you out if that machine turns you into a mutated abomination of science. I’m just going to advise we put you down.”

“Noted.” Laotaner craned her head toward Trevor. “Is that thing ready? I’m freezing.”

“Just need two more minutes.” Trevor’s fingers moved over a holographic keyboard that levitated near the TIGGER.

“I thought the TIGGERS were destroyed after the Kova Embarassment,” Mikala inquired.

“They were, but when the order was issued, we didn’t receive it because we were keeping communications with command off due to our location,” Cortez replied.

“Can you tell me what exactly the Kova Embarassment was? That’s what it’s called by the military, but no exact details of what happened were released to the public.” Mikala felt nervous for asking. She feared what the answer would be. Was it because the TIGGER failed and what was left was only mutated soldiers with a thirst for human blood?

“It’s pretty stupid. Basically what happened was one of the soldiers fell in love with a native woman and switched sides. He fed the enemy sensitive information about our defenses and attack strategies that we lost the ground war.” Dr. Tibbs adjusted her glasses giving Mikala a quick glance. “That’s why Kova was won by a bombardment from orbital strikers. It may be a while before the planet is inhabitable again, but we got a dutiful little workforce out of the Kovians that are willing to do anything for clean food and water.”

“What happened to the traitor?” She asked chewing on her lip.

“Not sure. Some say that he was captured and rotting away in prison or he was killed in the bombardment,” Dr. Tibbs replied.

“It’s ready.” Trevor stepped away from the machine. The center of the wide cylinder cracked down the center and spread opened revealing a white inside that glinted silver. “Just step inside and we’ll get started.”

Noa Laotaner slid off the table and walked without hesitation toward the white cavern. If there were any fears or doubts, they couldn’t be read from by her confident walk.

Mikala hugged herself, her fingers digging into the sleeves of her uniform. She wanted to speak up, to stop this and point out how insane this plan was and how dangerous. Yet, she knew that if she spoke up, any argument she offered would be shot down with cutting words. So she kept her silence and prayed while Laotaner stepped into the machine and it closed around her.

Her heart leapt as it hummed to life and the light flowed along the line where the doors came together. Mikala swallowed, noticing for the first time that she was shaking.

Then the sounds came that made her blood curdle. It was the sounds of flesh twisting, bones snapping, and organs adjusting. In the background of this symphony of body rips a long wail echoed through the lab. Mikala could decide whether it was coming from the machine or from its occupant. Then the machine switched off.

“What does TIGGER stand for?” Mikala heard herself ask.

“Tran Ionic Genetic Gene Rewrite,” Tibbs replied as they watched Trevor stepped up to the TIGGER.

“What does that mean?” Mikala held her breath as Trevor checked the TIGGER’s results and pulled a release lever on the side of the cylinder to open it.

“It means that whoever built this was bad with acronyms.”

The machine open and out stepped a pony. It had a light blue coat with a teal colored mane with a silver streak. From its forehead was a tall horn with a sharp end. And as it walked unsteadily from the TIGGER, they saw a teardrop on its flank.

Dr. Tibbs moved forward, drawing a small flashlight from her coat pocket. “How do you feel? Can you speak?”

The pony spoke with Noa Laotaner’s voice. “I feel nausea.”

“You might dry heave. You didn’t eat anything all day, right?” Dr. Tibbs held the light in the pony’s eyes. “Follow the light with just your eyes. Good, good. So far reactions are normal. If you need to lie down, then feel free to do so. Is there any pain?”

“There is soreness, but it’s tolerable.” Noa Laotaner, the pony replied as she saw on her haunches, her hospital gown wrinkle around her.

“From the records, soreness is normal and will likely go away over time. I want to run some scans and blood tests and if it all looks alright, then Briggs can go through next.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Within the next two hours, there was a second pony lying across a gurney groaning as she felt sore in places she didn’t know she had. Mikala’s pony version was shorter than Noa’s with a name and tail a solid teal color without a streak and her coat was aqua colored. She too had a horn though with a rounder end without a sharp point that caused a bead of blood to form on Cortez’s finger when it touched it.

Noa was already poring over an overhead photo of the native town, using it as a map. She pointed a hoof at spot on the map. “We’ll enter here; I believe it may be the main road. Trevor reports that the ponies are preparing for some sort of festival which is good as we’ll play the part of tourists. Our cover will be we’re aunt and niece.”

Mikala consented with a weak nicker which startled her. And that caused her insides to hurt more. She moaned, wishing that Tibbs would hurry with that pain killer.

“Trevor says that our bodies may go through a transition where they’ll change back every six to nine hours. We’ll have special watches that’ll monitor our blood and gives us ten minute warning when we’re about to change back to our human selves. So we have to get somewhere private when that occurs and take a shot of nanonites that’ll change us back to ponies.”

“How long will this mission take?”

“Hopefully, twenty-four hours. If not forty-eight hours.” Noa shut down the datapad with a curvature of her hoof and settled onto her hospital bed. She threw Mikala a wicked smile. “Nervous?”

“Well, the worst is over so I can safely say I’m no longer terrified.” Mikala rolled onto her side and winced. It was so strange moving and feeling with a different body.

“We’ll stay in communication with the ship through hidden microphones. They’re adjusting our tools for easier use since we no longer have hands.” Noa sounded almost excited about the mission.

Mikala also noticed that this was the longest conversation that she had with Noa Laotaner without being humiliated or horrified which was a nice change she had to say. “I have a question. Why don’t I have a mark on my body like yours?” She pointed at the teardrop on Noa’s flank.

“I don’t know. It’s likely not important.”

Comments

[Jigoku Luna]

I'm loving this so far.

[DavidPony]

another awsome chapter, i also love the story of how the traitor fell in love with a native so they just bombed the planet i always thought thats how avatar would end in real life

[Lyrken]

Can't wait for another chapter!

[McPoopin]

How in Sam Hill do their bodies change back on their own? Is it an intentional failsafe built into the TIGGER, or did a wizard do it?