Try to Persuade them 62%
It was absolute madness to Twilight. Everypony on her damn station seemed to want to get their friends back—despite all of them knowing how dire their situation was. We don’t have the medical personnel. We don’t have the drugs. They’re just asking for us to lose people.
But she hadn’t served for all her years as princess by mistreating those beneath her. There was really only one way to solve a personnel problem: talking to them.
So she called them in—the captains of each mining ship, after sending to each that she was going to hear their demands. It was about the kindest way she could possibly respond, even if what she wanted to do was break up the union and be damned what they said about it. Our entire universe is this ship. What do you ponies expect me to do?
The meeting was tense. Despite inviting only the captains, each one brought a pony or two. The toughest looking of their crews, though it was hard to seem tough when you didn’t have a mane and your skin was splotched with revival necrosis. Twilight didn’t mind—they could bring an army if they wanted, and it would be equally effective. Even if she wasn’t an Alicorn, she knew the station’s computer. Did they really expect to intimidate her?
After a brief welcome, she invited them to share their reasons—all of what she’d expected. They each had only loved one left in the world, they needed them back for morale reasons. They’d be better miners once she did what they wanted. It wasn’t much, really. Just two hundred doses of a drug they were currently making only ten of each day.
Then it was her turn. She showed them images from Proximus B, of the most horrific monsters they had faced. She couldn’t show them a vague hunger and a creeping disease, but she could show them simpler things, and distort the truth a little about how dangerous they might be to them out here in space.
“This is why we can’t wait,” she finished. “We can’t have your ships sitting docked while danger advances on us. We can’t leave until we have those supplies, or we’ll die in transit. You, and your families, as well as me and mine. We’ll all die together.
“But what I can offer you is this: I’ll put your families at the front of the civilian priority list. They will be the first to wake, as soon as we have essential crew to run the station.”
The captains confided with one another, whispering quietly from their end of the dusty map. It still showed ghostly flickers of Equestria, though they were faded and faint. More a memory than the real-time recreation it had once displayed. But you still had it waiting for me, Celestia. Did you know I’d survived, after all those years?
Do the Captains accept the deal? Yes.
“We want guarantees,” said one. Her name was Sturdy Harness, if Twilight remembered right. “Specifics, too. Your written contract specifying how many ponies you wake before our families.”
“Five hundred,” Twilight supplied, entirely by reflex. That was the size of the Canterlot’s standard crew shift. But plenty of those were bureaucrats, or police, or other things they probably didn’t need right now. She could tell from those glares it wasn’t going to get what she wanted.
“One hundred,” somepony else said. “We flew here with less.”
“Agreed.” Twilight stuck out her hoof. “One hundred maximum, before I wake your families. It might be sooner—but we have to repair Canterlot as fast as we’re waking ponies. I know you don’t want your loved ones living in squalor.”
“No,” Harness answered. “We just don’t want them frozen forever, while we grow old. We ain’t all immortal like you, princess.”
Not yet you’re not. We have the means now. Twilight wasn’t sure where that thought came from, but she shoved it back just as quickly. Their very limited sample size of that conversion process hadn’t exactly enjoyed it.
Less than an hour later, she had the contract signed. “We’re agreed,” Harness declared. “We go to work, and we have this to prove you’ll give us our ponies back. We have every reason to trust you, Princess. Don’t make us regret that.”
“You won’t,” she snapped. “Talk to Applejack, my chief engineer. See if she would ever let me lie. I keep my promises.”
They left. Within the day, she was looking at the retreating dots of their drives fading into the horizon. Together they would replenish the Canterlot’s supplies of everything they could find in orbit. There were still a few sticking points—nitrogen, primarily. Their population would be eternally fixed by the nitrogen they had to cycle through themselves and all their food. They were not likely to come upon much of the stuff in the interstellar gulf.
But that worry would have to fade, because she had her next set of priority reports to worry about. While mining went on, she’d have to dictate the Canterlot’s new production directives. Get them wrong, and she might very well be singing everypony’s death warrants.
It wasn't like ponies wouldn't do a little bit of everything. But what was her focus?
1. Prioritize clearing space for farming and biofabrication. More drugs, more food. No harvest grows in a day.
2. Prioritize repairing living space and morale. The shiprats have their fancy new section, but everypony else is squatting in ruins. We’ve got to fix this sooner or later.
3. Prioritize waking as many ponies as possible as fast as is safe. Many hooves make light work.
4. Prioritize repairs to old systems. If you don’t care for your home, what do you have? The void is only centimeters away, waiting to kill us. We shouldn’t help it.
There's a lot to be done. It seems having more hooves could cut down the time required for the other tasks.
They're in space, making sure the ship is in top condition surpasses everything.
Air is an absolute priority in space. Second is an airtight and air filled space. Everything else kills you slower.
3 basically requires 1
2 shouldn't be attempted without 4
Is this the new way of saying "Friendship problem"?
I think 1 is the best option for now.
EDIT: I accidentally read 4 as "weapons," not "systems." Going with 4.
Some of the options on the list seem like prerequisites for others. You can't defrost more ponies without the needed drugs, and you shouldn't if you have nowhere to house them. All things considered, continuing to fix up the Canterlot should probably take priority. Remember, half the reason we got the shiprats their fancy new a comodations would be so they would let the crew replace their kludgework with actual repairs. Let's get make sure the place won't fall apart before we ramp up how many active ponies it has to support.
(And I'll happily vote for that option when Strawpoll stops shoving a privacy policy update with an unclickable acknowledge button in my face. )
"singing everypony’s death warrants" - ponies do like to sing, but that seems a little morbid.
First thing I would have asked for is a list of names, and then ask spike if any of those named ponies have critical skills that we need to get the place running. Heck do that anyways, and put them in the priority Que for revive.
First repairs so we don't die, then farming which can be done underway. More ponies to help would be great right up until something goes wrong and there isn't enough air/water/sanity to go around.
Also, Starscribe, I am amazed at how much writing and how many stories you have going all at the same time. When you branch outside of canon please let us know so we can look for and buy your books. I already have Message in a Bottle and would enjoy seeing to it : )
Part of me was hoping they would play hardball. “Spike, locate all the cryopods containing ponies affiliated with the miners guild. If we don’t have an agreement in five minutes, disconnect them and have them thrown on the recyclers. I need materials, Gentleponies, I can get it from the rocks you mine or the scrap I can find. So, will you be departing immediately?”
In character? No. But having her get pushed around less would be a nice change of pace.
Then again, this isn’t the first time I’ve rooted against the good options just for an increase in danger and drama.
#TeamCozy
Is anyone else hoping that all this stalling around will come to bite them in the rump? I wanted them to be on their way quite some time ago and the void beckons.
Dude... it’s the seventh most common element in the universe.
You can get it from practically everywhere.
Decent compromise.
Excellent.
3, we need the manpower as fast as we can safely get it. Everything else flows from there.
As a frostpunk player, manpower is as essential if not more so then every single resources combined. Without manpower, you will die
10072555
Morale will naturally increase with better living conditions a a result of better water, better air, and better feeling of safety from the reduction in the fear of something spontaneously blowing up.
I know I could tolerate living in a cramped ruin if I didn't feel cold, or constantly heard the sound of rattling pipes just waiting for a new leak.
10071593
After two successive rounds of "can we please not work poor Fluttershy & Co. to death reviving the population faster than she has drugs and tools for", though? Top priority is getting the basic systems running, which is good for morale too.
Not voting this time. All choices provided are likely to go the same fucky direction
10072120
Nitrogen is just heavy enough that most of it is bound to planets. It's a lot more scarce than you might think, especially when compared to other organic gasses and industrial minerals. You're going to have to take a trip to a planet to gather some.
10073126
They are MINING A PLANET. So they are getting a LOT of nitrogen.
As it is written it seems like there is NO WAY to get more nitrogen and that is not true.
As they are getting other material from the mining operation nitrogen compounds are going to come up a lot.
10073232
Yes, but no nitrogen in the interstellar void. All they need must be stockpiled now, as getting that after leaving is going to be impossible.
10073321
Well yes but that is true about practically EVERYTHING apart from hydrogen and helium...
You MAY get some iron with magnetic scoop if you are in an iron rich zone (like where we are currently) but still...
I appreciate that he took the option out of our hands on whether or not we CAN escape it's not implied but with no reason to think that isnt being done in the background I'm ok with this we should pick four who cares if there if your triple bunking if the 8 meters out ward is vacuum
That sounds pretty reasonable and is the best (realistic) deal they can get.
I'm glad it worked.
Yup, not pressure at all.
Also, "singing" is probably a typo and supposed to be "signing" but still funny.