AMICITAS FLIGHT THREE – MISSION DAY 33
ARES III SOL 36
TRANSCRIPT – WATER TELEGRAPH EXCHANGE, ESA BALTIMARE and ESA SHIP AMICITAS
(note: all standard telegraphy / Mares Code shortcuts and abbreviations translated)
AMICITAS: Amicitas calling Baltimare, over.
ESA: Baltimare calling Amicitas, over.
AMICITAS: DF – go for communications experiment Beta. Over.
ESA: Copy go for comm Beta. Stand by. Over.
AMICITAS: DF – dragonfire spell collapsed this side of air transfer system, leaving small pile of soot and ash. Over.
ESA: Copy no joy on dragonfire. Status on experiment Gamma? Over.
AMICITAS: DF – go for communications experiment Gamma. Over.
ESA: Copy go for comm Gamma. Stand by. Over.
AMICITAS: DF – Unable to decipher message due to disorientation of life support alarm. Could not concentrate on blinking warning light.
ESA: Copy no joy on cycling suit life support. Over.
AMICITAS: DF – our host is annoyed. Too much water. Over.
ESA: Disable water outflow. We can use indicator light as signal. Over.
AMICITAS: DF – unable to disable flow without permanently disconnecting water flow. Water flow needed for future food production procedures. Over.
ESA: Understood. Will await your signal for comm Alpha. Out.
MISSION LOG – SOL 36
Dirt doubling yesterday. It’s a good thing ponies are so resilient, because two days after her breakdown Starlight was able to put in a hard day’s work, and we needed every hand or hoof we could get.
For one thing, I decided to dig up and separate the alfalfa sprouts I’d planted, and that ended up taking me all damn day. I had to let the ponies and dragon do the actual dirt-doubling in the rest of the hab because the sprouts, which are a good two feet tall now, had grown huge root complexes so entangled with each other that I couldn’t pull them apart without killing most of them. My fault- I planted them way too densely and the soil is way too shallow for them- but it was still a lot of delicate, painstaking work.
The alfalfa plants spent the night sitting with their roots in water in a large sample bin. Today I replanted them a little looser to allow them to grow. They’re doing surprisingly well for the non-optimal conditions.
My ultimate plan for these plants isn’t food. In the short term I’ll use these plants to infect the rest of our farm soil, here and in the cave if we get that going, with the nitrogen-fixing bacteria in the roots. I can’t be sure the alfalfa seeds from the pony packs have those bacteria. They probably do, if they’re viable at all, but I feel better with a second source. Of course alfalfa plants naturally inhibit their own seeds from sprouting right next to them, but I’ll only have them in the ground next to the seeds for a couple of days- just long enough to give the baby alfalfa a nice case of the nitrate cooties.
But beyond that, these plants are seed plants. As long as I have a potato I can grow more potatoes, but our alfalfa seed stock is finite. I figure we have enough for almost an acre, and if we can cultivate an acre of Mars we deserve to go down in history right next to both George Washington Carver and Merlin. But that assumes all the seed is viable and that something doesn’t happen to kill off the plants.
So, if we lose the plants, I want a way to restart the farm. If the Hab and the cave fail at the same time we’re just plain fucked- and not just for food. But if one or the other fails and we can fix it, we can use the soil from the good one to restart the farm- if we have seeds.
So these plants are going to be allowed to flower. Normally you don’t do that, because the optimum balance between nutrition and digestibility of alfalfa is the day the first flower buds begin to open. After that the plants become woody and harder to digest.
Alfalfa requires insects for pollination, but we don’t have any. What we do have are cotton swabs from the geology kit, my medical supplies, and the pony first-aid kit. (Though I’m not sure I’d want a cotton swab after a pony has held it in her teeth…) When these plants bloom we’re going to spend a dull, dull, dull couple of days passing pollen from one itty bitty flower to another, all in the hopes that the mommy pistil and daddy stamen love each other very, very much. And four weeks after that- seeds, dozens of seeds per plant!
Look at me- I’m actually coming up with backup plans. That means I’m moving beyond basic survival. I’m actually feeling good about my situation for once. I think I might even believe I could survive this! So far everything’s been going my way!
I'd just like to note that this is an amazing sentence.
And yeah, Mark's definitely doomed them. The question is how.
Oh dear. He's just done tempted Murphy. Sorta on the level of standing at ground zero of a nuke test, drinking sulphuric acid, hanging onto a lightning rod, while making rude remarks about assorted thunder gods.
Just watched The Martian again last night, and I couldn't stop thinking about this fic durring it. You sir/madam/whatever your persuasion have created a great world, and then successfully crossed it over with another.
Marky's getting his hopes up, eh? I take it Mars is going to get him down by causing Olympus Mons to spontaneously erupt just to spite him.
😂😂😂😂😂😂 He's screwed.
Good job, Mark. You've just doomed us all.
You'd think he'd know better.
Yes, but unlike you, Deadpool, he isn't aware he's in a story.
8686288 I didn't create Mark Watney, and I didn't create three out of the five Equestrian characters that I just dropped on him. All I did was blend them together and see what changed. But thanks.
Oh sweet Celestia, he's going to die.
*cue hab explosion or something similar*
Mark... What have you done? Honestly just saying those words is worse than any mistake he made in the book. Habdenburg pales in comparison.
Consider fully funded NASA. Everything was supposed to be designed, specced and tested to the nth degree, vastly more than mere cars or even aircraft.
The Shuttle crew was supposed to have an amazingly high chance of 85% of making it back alive. Per launch.
Thats almost an even chance of two consecutive crews dieing due to whatever combination of reasons.
Marks on a flight made by companies who have learnt how to manufacture down to the thousandth point above engineering safety factor, instead of the tenth.
You actually need more material than you might think because if I could find it again, there is a math function that gives the inertial mass limit required for damping. Below that mass, doesnt matter how fast response the dynamic stuff is, its going to move as a whole instead.
Alfalfa turns woody after harvesting? And they have a main unlimited water feed?
Anyone for Pykrete?
Ah. Forgot.
Murphy to Sol 4. Murphy to Sol 4. We got a wise one.
8686400 No, alfalfa turns woody if you harvest it late. This is partly because of the plant growing and ageing, partly due to much of the nutrition going to the flower and then to the seeds.
And now we have Finagle, together with his brother, Murphy, smiling with glee,
Fuck Mark, why did you have to go and tempt fate so? Now you're plainly screwed. Well, at least hope that the hab only blows up after you start making the cave viable.
You know, something came to mind that I think deserves a comment. If this has been addressed already, my apologies. I haven't ready every last comment on this story. Funny that I felt I had to comment on a chapter where the story isn't even really mentioning dietary concerns beyond food/no food in a general sense.
To be blunt with my point: Herbivore merely means opportunistic carnivore.
To elaborate a bit, I have to point out that Earth equines can digest even more proteins than humans can, if I recall correctly. Including the ones we humans are capable of consuming. This is easy enough to verify for yourself on youtube by looking up videos of ponies, cattle, and even deer eating small birds and similar glimpses of carnivorous behavior. When visiting the San Diego Wild Animal Park this past summer, a zoologist confirmed this when I noted this, and added she personally knew of a giraffe that regularly ate rabbits. There is documented evidence that the most frequent first arrival to a carcass in a forest is deer, not what we tend to think of as carnivores like wolves or bears.
The easiest way to explain the behavior entirely revolves around the simple fact of how much energy density there is in meat as compared to plants. Herbivores just happen to be bad at hunting one reason or another (too slow, no natural weapons, etc.), but will take advantage of an easy meal of meat if it comes their way.
To be quite honest, there is a lot of information that suggests horses are quite omnivorous (look up Tibetan blood-eating horses), and our assumption of them as passive herbivores is owed far more to domestication and built up misconceptions, than their true nature.
As for the story itself, perhaps Mark's own perceptions and expectations blind him to this. It doesn't fix the food problem in any appreciable way beyond balancing the problem to be even between most of them again. Fireball and Dragonfly are standouts on account of genuinely unique dietary requirements.
hmm well technically changelings are insects maybe Dragonfly has some pollination ability which will save Mark and the ponies form having to play the part of bees.
Everybody else is commenting on Mark tempting fate, but no one else is pointing out how wrong he is to say everything's going his way in the first place. He wouldn't even be in this situation if multiple things hadn't gone very wrong, and he is by no means caught up luck-wise now, much less when the doomy dooms of doom actually hit.
8686499
Keep in mind three things. One, Mark may not know that little tidbit. Two, these are magical talking ponies and may not have every single ability Terran horses have. Three, even if they can eat meat, these are herbivores with culture, and therefore ones with cultural taboos against doing so. The situation would have to get a lot worse before they'd be willing to try eating the meat rations, and even if they did they'd be taking the food he'd assumed was his.
8686331
I think they meant that you created the world of Changeling Space Program. Admittedly, it's based on not one but two other IPs, but you did create it. (People base fanfic on other people's fanfic fairly often, so don't deny that your efforts mean something!)
8686543
Your points were something I have considered. They are points I have no reason to argue against, either. My main reason was getting my thoughts out of my head and in the open for consideration. My piece said, that is the end of it for me.
As for culture, I do have to agree on that point in particular. It could very well turn out that things happen, the ponies are culturally disgusted, but later have to choose survival over death by starvation.
Of course, this is largely academic for us readers. What the author decides is what goes. Maintaining the current direction is still a compelling story, as is.
8686557 Well, Mark does know they eat scrambled eggs... or reconstituted egg meal-pack substitute... but either way, the penny ought to have dropped.
But it hasn't, yet.
8686507
Uh, size matters. Some plants are pollinated by hummingbirds and the like, which aren't bugs. So even if you count Dragonfly as a large bug, she's probably too large to pollinate the buggy way. The Unicorn way, maybe, but cotton swabs are most likely.
Now, Kris, about tempting fate: while that is a trope in itself, there's also the trope of the Unspoken Plan Guarantee. Basically, if the audience is going to see a plan go smoothly, the story shouldn't precede that with an explanation that supposes the plan goes smoothly. Contrariwise, if the plan is going to fail, the story should at least explain why the crew expected the plan to succeed, which usually requires explaining the plan too.
As with all tropes, this isn't ironclad. One early heist movie, "Rififi," doesn't follow this because the heist genre was still young. Still, I hope you have a good reason for not explaining the plan before it fails. (I mean, I assume. Success would play weirdly against his expressed optimism, not to mention your chiding said expression of optimism.)
Also, why are they still using the large water supply to communicate? It seems they could continue to use one suit supply to send messages, but use another suit to receive them. OK, a couple rereads of the relevant sections show that cycling the entire life support system sets off alarms, but could they just selectively cycle the water feed?
8686331 I was actually talking about Changling Space Program and how you've blended it with The Martian. Sorry if I wasn't to clear on that. You may not have made the characters or their particular universes, but you've added to them and made quite an entertaining set of stories that belong to no one but yourself. In my opinion, that just highlights your ability as a writer. Keep up the great work, and do your best to not have a Bad Day.
P.S.- ETA on CSP uploads? If you want to finish The Maretian first then be my guest, just try not to burn yourself out. THAT happening would become a Bad Day.
8686629 Maretian has priority for now. I've designed the ship for the next CSP mission, but the last bit I wrote for the story was crap and has to be thrown out completely.
8686627 They'll get around to trying it. It can only be done when the suit isn't needed for EVA, so Equestria can only -initiate- conversations on the big machine. Otherwise they'll have to wait for the castaways to open comms and designate which suit to send to.
8686595
Why do I suddenly suspect you of having plans hiding for future reveals...
Mark.... Why would you say that.
Seriously....you are doomed now. You may as well have said, "What could go wrong."
I wonder what he makes of Dragonfly STILL not eatting. The current translation spell isn't exactly clear enough for him to believe "Eats emotion."
Doom!
Mark... stop, please, don’t do this to yourself.
8686654 OK! thanks for the info.
Mark's about to get bitch slapped by Murphy huh?
*sigh...*
So much doom incoming.
I'll get the popcorn!
Right, so this is when Murphy comes and bitchslaps you, right?
Too bad Baltimare can't send over the basic elemental raw materials for putting organic compounds together on the Amacitas side through chemistry or magic or whatever. Or some phosphate fertilizer. Or even just one, single, viable, chlorella cell. I figure that even if they could, trying to scale up from methane to sugar and viable edible proteins or grow a tankful of edible algae would be a little beyond their capabilities given the deadline they've got and the resources at their disposal. Oh well.
Also: MARK, YOU FOOL! YOU SPOKE THE FORBIDDEN WORDS! YOU CALL DOWN THE WRATH OF THE VERY GODS THEMSELVES!
8687149
When you give him an open invitation like that, how could he not?
They should create a microbot with magic crystals and command it to pollinate the alfalfa!
Then it will begin questioning its existence...
And rebel against its menial task...
And then it will kill them all in their sleep...
And then replicate itself gazillions of times...
And turn into the Star Gate Replicators!
8687415
You mean Pollinators.
I wonder if Equus is missing some ways of sending things to their marooned team.
Spike should try sending things that don't burn
Teleporting various inorganic things with the water could be an option, be it just inorganic food supplements in the water (salt, calcium, etc.) or even larger objects, perhaps tools, various materials
8687490 "Spike should try sending things that don't burn"
(raised eyebrow)
"So far everything’s been going my way!"
Mark...did you just tempt Murphy? You did. I'd say that's going full retard in this situation, Mark.
Never go full retard.
8687490
8687560
(Another raised eyebrow)
You know, I was not expecting this story. It's been out for a while, and I knew about it, but I only picked it up last night. And my goodness I have been geeking out about it ever since.
It's absolutely lovely to read, and I love reading on this...potentially deadly adventure. Plus, I'm a fan of both the Martian and MLP. Of course, I've utterly spoiled myself for Changeling Space Program by reading this, but that's fine-I'll still check it out.
8686507
Aryhropods, perhaps. Insects, certainly not.
Pollination isn't an ability. It's a deliberate or incidental movement of matter. No magic fix for the Martians; they have to shuffle pollen around the hard way.
8687415
As much as it makes me happy that you've seen Stargate SG1, I feel inclined to point to Michael Crichton's Prey as a more likely example outcome. The nanomachines kill things by asphyxiating them invasively with sheer mass, not dissolving them or anything like that.
Cuw the Andromeda strain coming into play.
Aaand you invoked Murphy's law
I see a lot of parralels between this fanfic and the book. And when Mark feels good, you know everything's about to go to hell
Aaaaaaaaand jinxed. Good job, Mark.