Chapter 110
Send the computer pones. 57%
They watched from the bridge as their digital crew-members crossed the strange bridge of light into the waiting station. It was a strange sight, the three of them walking away without space-suits through the void. Nothing drew them in to be consumed and processed into scraps, or blasted them with lasers.
Twilight could do nothing to intervene, but she could watch from one of Node’s fancy new displays. Because as Spike pointed out. “I’m not actually out there. I’m controlling that body using the Equinox’s upgraded transmission systems. Which also means I’ll lose control of it if I can’t get a signal through.
That made the mission seem understaffed, but it was too late to second guess. Ponies crowded around the full color screen, watching through Spike’s eyes almost as though they were there themselves.
The Signalers’ station was even more impressive on the inside than it was on the outside. There were vast empty cavities inside, populated with machines that moved along cables thicker than the Equinox itself as they performed unknown mechanical tasks. Twilight might not know what it was doing, but she knew the goal. All this was designed to create a highway through space, one that wasn’t running. Or… one stop along the highway, pushing a ship to the next stop.
Things went well enough, with Node leading the way through to a section that was fully pressurized and apparently safe. “We’re going to try and find the control section,” she explained. “That way we can see why the Canterlot is being held, and try to release it.”
Is the control room defended? Critical yes.
Then the view got fuzzy, view shaky and uneven as Spike dodged around a corner and the constant feed of conversation and mechanical noises went out.
“Hold on.” Rainbow jerked upright, pointing at the display. “Spike, what the buck is going on?” Lightning flashed on the screen, and a section of deck-plating ripped right off the wall in front of him, dribbling down in molten globs. “Why is it so fuzzy?”
Spike’s voice sounded strained, not even trying to be neutral like the computer usually was. “Very limited… bandwidth,” he said. “We’ve encountered a defensive system of some kind. Node failed to disarm it, and it’s trying to vaporize us.”
Twilight didn’t want to say anything at all, afraid she might be distracting him. But her fear won out. “Should we shut up so you can concentrate?”
“Unnecessary,” Spike answered. “The one body requires minimal concentration, but it’s penetrated so deep into the station that I’m controlling it at considerable delay. I’ll reallocate spectrum for video when we win.”
Flashes of sound came in over the line, played back like awful recordings. Some of it sounded like their weapons, but more was a kind of rumbling thunder that cracked with every shot and melted whatever it touched. Occasionally a single back and white still would appear on the screen—now Spike poking around the corner, now Node taking a hit and losing one of her arms to the flames.
Finally the gunshots stopped,. And the image buffered back into life.
Spike and the others walking past the wreckage of a robotic drone broken into many pieces, over to a large holographic projection surface, with lots of little squares waiting for input. Node went right to work, muttering to herself. “Got to shut that system down. Obviously we aren’t the first ones onto this station. Some part of the maintenance protocol thinks it’s being boarded. But the whole thing doesn’t, or it would’ve dusted the Equinox before we could approach. Hold on…”
Can Node disable the defense system? Yes.
Random Event: The Attainment of Pleasures.
“I want a report,” Twilight said, gripping the straps of her chair so tight she was shaking. “I see all three of you are still standing. Are you hurt?”
“Node and I,” Spike said. “Nothing serious. Node lost an arm and my exterior shell was partially melted. We have replacement parts aboard.”
“Got it!” Node declared, turning to grin back at Spike with her alien face. Flat and strange and naked, but a smile was a smile. “Defenses are off. Let me see what I can find out about your ship…”
Apple Bloom paced past her, reloading her massive earth-pony shotgun. “I’m out of depleted uranium,” she said, annoyed. “I don’t think I can bring down another one.”
“If the station was really trying to kill us, we wouldn’t be having this conversation,” Node said. Her fingers blurred through the projected space for a few seconds, and she bit her lip. Spike got closer, trying to get a better view of the computer. Twilight couldn’t read any of the text, but Node obviously could.
A few moments later and the projection changed enough that even Twilight could guess what must be going on. A much better image of the Canterlot appeared in light, with lots of red icons all over it.
“Launch history… here! Looks like your ship was trying to use the highway. They… turned it on. But they didn’t have any of the right reflectors. They got pulled in for maintenance, but… your ship looks like someone ripped a mountain into space and called it a ship. The highway didn’t find it in the database, so it didn’t know how to fix it. It phoned home with a service request, and has been holding it ever since.”
She winced. “Looks like… some ponies tried to come over. That’s why the systems were hostile to us. They didn’t know what they were doing, or maybe they were trying to destroy the highway to get it to let them go.”
“Can you do that?” Twilight asked. “Make it release the Canterlot?”
Is that the random event? Yes.
“Yes,” Node answered.
“Should we?” Spike asked, on that side of the screen. “The Canterlot was trying to use the highway. Maybe we should… help retrofit it correctly. Could we do that?”
“I know how to put in a design,” Node said, skeptically. “But that’s not my field. Someone else would have to design that.”
Twilight considered for a moment, then ordered…
1. Release the Canterlot now. We need to see what state it’s in and speak to the ponies aboard.
2. Rarity and I are coming over. Between the two of us and the scans of the Canterlot over there, we should be able to come up with something.
3. Stay there, send a team onto the Equinox from this side. If they have control access, they can stop the prospector from being grabbed.
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I'm no engineer but if the Canterlot is in such bad shape, I doubt releasing it would be a good plan. Darkness is alrdy after them, get a reflector so if it catches up they have a chance to flee.
I do love the little reminders that pony technology advanced in a very different direction than our own.
"How else are you supposed to make a capital ship?"
"I don't even know how to respond to that."
They'll definitely want to see what the condition of the Canterlot's crew is at some point. Letting them know that help has arrived could be a tremendous boost to morale... assuming anypony's alive and sane enough to care.
I feel like the second option should be a "Part 2" of whatever we pick. We need to see if there are survivors and speak with them if so. After that we can send it on it's merry way through the superhighway. Option 2 on it's own is basically sending a box of Schrodinger's Ponies on their merry way. We may never know what happened aboard that ship.
Unless the chance appears to speak with the survivors during the task before sending them through. That sort of thing happens sometimes. Eh, sure. I'll pick option 2.
Service request on hold? As goofy as Spaceballs "Gas, Meals and Tolls"
As bad as AAA
Any choice is preferable to releasing the Canterlot and the secret option.
I suggest boarding the Canterlot, Get a proper idea of what's going on. We need the morale! A reflector would be useful, but we need to reunite with the rest of ponykind.
No option to fire Rainbow Dash at something, so I’ll go with boarding the Canterlot. Releasing it would be foolish without knowing if it can maneuver on its own and it doesn’t seem like they are in the most dire need to get it retrofitted when it might just be a rock full of corpses now anyway. They need to see what’s still kickin’ I’m Canterlot before spending more resources on it.
Rolling for insanity....
....20....PARAMETERS SET, ENGAGING HYPER-HEURISTIC MODE!
On one hand, releasing the Canterlot now could have some unintended side effects, but we do need to assess what state the ponies onboard are in. For all we know though, they could all be dead and their distress signal could be purely automated.....
I'm very much tempted to go with option 2 here. Two more minds to think on this doesn't hurt at all, although it may risk the prospector somewhat.
We aren't even sure about the inner condition of Canterlot right now. So it seems rather premature to build it anything before we add anything new to it. And simply releasing it would simply be like dropping a rock right now from the looks of things.
Any number of things could have happened to Canterlot, for it to be there. Maybe they got curious and that curiosity got them stuck there. Maybe they did try to use it. There's also the possibility that some of the crew might have suffered from the Hunger and tried to kill the crew by trying to swing them in there. I remember symptoms of the Hunger cause dangerous madness, right?
Let's go over in see what it is like over there before trying to do anything. They can decide what they do next after they know what they'll be working with.
Board Canterlot. Releasing or using the highway without at least checking for survivors and critical damage to the station could lead to VERY bad consequences for the forementioned station. Additionally, Rarity & Twilight creating a design is a good idea, but a bit premature. Canterlot has had many upgrades since they were last there, and that's just to turn it into a starship. Any design made would be using outdated knowledge, so they would need to board anyway just to be sure the repairs and refitting don't break anything important.
Make sure it can fly if things go pear shaped and then try to board and talk. Releasing it now would probably spell doom for those souls, for even if they're ok they'd hardly accept to be moored again for those repairs to happen.
We need to board the Canterlot, because the crew might have useful information that we can use to both help release the ships and build a reflector.
I say design a reflector. We could probably board later right?
Try to board the Canterlot if it is possible to make the Highway leave the boarding ship alone.
one of the options isnt really represented in the poll
This is EXACTLY why you dont send squishies into n unknown area and send your tanky characters instead. Ok lets see, I choose option ... *rolls a die* ... *rolls 1, fuck* ... Whichever option is most likelu to destroy the canterlot
9837828
I got a 14 myself.
Crap.
Hey, that could have gone worse.
Huh, surprisingly simple of a problem.
Definitely board the Canterlot, let's not upset the current status quo until we know more about what is going on.
If they provide repair plans, then Canterlot will presumably automatically be sent along as soon as modifications are complete, destination unknown.
Releasing it should let them bring it back out of the atmosphere (why isn't "instruct the gate to reposition Canterlot" an option?), at which point the other options can be pursued at leisure.
9837758
But I know:
Best comment I had seen all day!