The Equine Starliner

by computerneek

Chapter 5: Hydroponics

One of the first things that Kayla noticed about the first wave of her crew when she met them outside the bay was that there wasn’t a single stallion among them. The very next thing was that some of them had spiral horns sticking out of their foreheads.

But even so, stumbling around and fumbling with robo-helper control panels they might have been, it still didn’t take them very long to stow their belongings in their assigned chambers. They filled the last of the ship’s dedicated crew quarters- and, as noted on the orders, further crew would be assigned cabins in the first class passenger quarters.

And after that, it also didn’t take very long for them to move to their duty stations and start their work. The Officer’s Mess was stocked in no time, and hydroponics was well on its way.

After giving them a full day to get settled in and start on their duties, Kayla met up with her bridge crew. As expected, every single one of them was a mare. Which was strange; every ship she’d flown under the Space Police had over eighty percent men, and even under the United Star Navy she’d never been aboard a ship that had less than seventy percent men in its crew.

“Okay then,” she began, looking between them. They were seated around one of the larger tables in the Officer’s Mess.

Her exec officer, Captain River Song, nodded sharply. “I’ve been in contact with the ground; I’m told the next wave will be the rest of our medical contingent.” She turned to look towards the most junior officer present- her supply officer.

Lieutenant Supply Crates, her supply officer, sounded a little unsure of herself when she spoke. “Most of the supplies we took aboard have been stowed; we should have Hydroponics planted past the threshold within the next three hours. Captain Wrench was down there earlier, looking at what she said looked like mass farming facilities, so it may even be faster than that.”

Kayla nodded silently. Captain Turning Wrench was her Head of Engineering- and, like both her exec and supply officer, had been caught in the ‘baby job naming fad’. Turning Wrench was the third in seniority aboard the ship, and so would normally be present for a meeting like this- but had instead sent them a message to inform them that she was busy with her duties.

The purpose of the meeting was for the otherwise unoccupied senior and bridge officers to conduct a quick examination of how things were proceeding about the vessel, after all.

The next person Captain Song turned to was Commander Loose Cannon, her tactical officer.

Commander Cannon spoke firmly, with an air of experience. “We have yet to start taking aboard either munitions or fuel, as far as I am aware. As we also haven’t had any of my people come aboard yet either, I haven’t been able to get started on that front. I was, however, able to run a few tactical exercises on the bridge.”

“Wait, you found the bridge?” Lieutenant Commander Sharp Ears- her communications officer, and the only bridge officer with a horn- asked.

Commander Cannon smiled. “Yep. Just punch ‘bridge’ into the lift control panel. Or say it, those are the best lifts I’ve ever seen. You’re looking for the main bridge, not the secondary or tertiary ones.”

“... She has three bridges?” Captain Song asked.

Commander Cannon nodded silently.

Captain Song stared for a second, then facepalmed- no, facehooved. “Oh boy.”

Kayla nodded briefly, and turned to Lieutenant Commander Quick Thought, her electronics officer. “What kinds of AI systems does she have?”

Lieutenant Commander Thought blinked. “I haven’t noticed any. I’ll get right on that.”

She nodded. “I noticed a communications AI on my way in, and she predicted where I was going when I entered the lifts. Might be a good place to start.”

Commander Cannon raised one forehoof. “She also presented me with what felt like a custom-tailored tutorial exercise when I launched my console simulators. I thought at first that it was a standard tutorial exercise, but it recommended using my wings to help boost my efficiency.”

L.C. Thought rubbed her chin with a hoof. “So either the builders knew we’d become ponies, or someone adjusted the exercises to match? But Commissioner West didn’t have wings, so it’d have to be… what, within the last two days? Yet…” She scowled. “Yeah, that’d have to be some kind of AI system.”

Captain Song waited for a second, before looking expectantly at the last mare in the room- and the only non-navy mare in the room.

Corporal Bringing Thunder, the only marine to have come aboard so far, bowed her head. “I’ve had no trouble so far- Marine Country is ready and waiting for my people. In the meantime, your ship has some pretty good solo training facilities.” She rubbed her chin. “As a matter of fact, I’m not sure if I’d be surprised if she is successful when I request a deep swamp thunderstorm in one of the training caverns later.”

Kayla raised an eyebrow. “Caverns?”

She nodded. “Yes.”

---

“So how’s it coming?” Kayla asked, walking down the hydroponics bay. She wasn’t yet confident enough in her balance to try trotting.

Captain Turning Wrench looked up, from where she had an access panel open on a massive sliding gantry. “Mornin’, Cap. It looks like this thing is electronically controlled, but I’m not seeing any control stations.” She gestured around the room.

“Could it be computer controlled?”

She looked over at the massive hydroponics spread, completely devoid of water or plants, and up at the gantry. “Possibly.” She slapped the access hatch closed, and reinserted the bolts holding it secure. “Would be a rather significant departure from the norm if it is.”

Kayla shrugged. “This ship is already a departure from the norm,” she informed her. “Weapons, observation deck, enough passenger capacity to carry every human being left on the surface of the Earth, and enough engines to get them elsewhere in a reasonable amount of time. Nevermind that only a tiny fraction of her volume is dedicated to livable spaces to begin with.”

Captain Wrench shrugged. “True, I suppose. Everything down in Engineering looks much more like I’d find in a warship, though, so I guess I keep thinking of her as one.” She trotted over to the computer console on the wall near the door.

Then she paused. “... Oh.”

Kayla looked at it, and smiled. “I suppose we should start expecting her to have an unprecedented degree of automation, shouldn’t we?”

The header across the top read ‘Automated Farm Management System’- but more importantly, there was a dialog right in the middle, with an image indicating that the computer had identified the supplies that had been left in the room- and offering to engage the automated system to bring this bay online.

Captain Wrench smiled. “Yes, she certainly does seem to have that.” She tapped the ‘yes’ key, and the gantry ground into motion, towards the standing supplies. They watched, and as it drew close, doors all along the gantry opened up, revealing a legion of manipulator arms with various tools. Some fairly generic grabber arms picked up the supplies and started partitioning it across the other tools, which also started their tasks, as the gantry started sliding, slowly, back down the length of the bay, leaving planted soil behind.

---

Chef Sharp Knife, who was really considering changing her name, walked up to the door into the first farming bay she’d planted the day before… out of the four total she’d managed. She needed to water the crops, to properly germinate the seeds.

If she was entirely honest with herself, she had been amazed she had managed to plant two entire bays before any of the rest of the new crew were available to come help. As it was, assuming Captain Turning Wrench had gotten the planting gantry in that one room working, there were probably a total of nine bays planted. She had quickly grown envious of most of her crewmates’ wings- though glad she didn’t have to deal with a horn to bang on things.

As expected, the door slid open in front of her- then she stepped in… and froze.

Tomatoes. Potatoes. Beans. Wheat- no, only half of the wheat line was grown; the other half looked like it had already been harvested and replanted by the massive gantry sliding slowly across the spread, all amidst an amazingly natural looking rainstorm coming down from the ceiling. The tomatoes were also being picked as she watched, but the potatoes and beans didn’t look quite ready.

Then, she had planted it the day before. How in the world was it harvesting already?

She stared for almost two full minutes before her head snapped around, and she headed right back out to check the next bay.

Naturally, it was also already harvesting.

The third bay wasn’t quite ready for harvest. When she glanced at the computer panel next to the door- which she’d ignored before, since it hadn’t displayed anything immediately useful- she saw a similar display to the ones she’d noticed in the first two bays on her way out: It was displaying a top-down view of the spread, with color-coded patches for what she had planted where… and statistics.

The section at the top of the display- closest to her on the spread- indicated “Romaine Lettuce: Growth factor 973.6x; Harvesting in 0:31:08”

She blinked. The harvest timer was ticking down in seconds- and as she watched, the growth factor dropped to only 973.5 times.

“What the hay…?”

She had a sneaking suspicion she wouldn’t be preparing pre-prepared rations for the crew today.

At the bottom, there was a soil moisture readout. “Raining in 1:02:37.”

She dashed back to the second bay.

Growth factor… almost four thousand times.

She rushed back to the third bay. Still 973.5.

She looked at the spread. She had done the first and second alone, but a couple other officers- one a pegasus, one a unicorn- had helped with this one.

She had an experiment to perform.

She jumped up on the spread, and trotted down the length of it, between the aisles of plants. She repeated her trip between each of the other rows- and noticed when the massive gantry suddenly started moving, arms shifting down to harvest the lettuce and the carrots.

Then she trotted over to the panel again.

Growth factor… 1013.7. The timers for the turnips and the soybeans had also jumped down a little bit, with corresponding increases to their growth factors.

She bolted for the fourth bay.

The massive gantry was just finishing harvesting the spinach- with a growth factor listed at 723.9. Right, another officer- a pegasus- had joined for this one. The rain was scheduled for nearly two hours. The broccoli was going to be harvested in about half an hour.

She tapped the suddenly obvious comms button on the panel, and called the first two that had helped her the day before.

Then she waited impatiently.

Finally, Commander Silver Spanner- the unicorn, from engineering- and Commander Shock Cone- the pegasus, the commander of their small craft fleet and the one that had flown their shuttle in- walked in… and immediately dropped their jaws.

“Yes,” Chef Knife stated simply. “Commanders- I wanted to ask for your participation in a quick experiment.”

They looked at her.

“Experiment?” Commander Cone asked.

She nodded, and gestured towards the panel. “These plants are growing at just over seven hundred times the speed they normally would- and when I trotted down the aisles in the first bay you helped me with, the plants over there sped up. All I need is for you to trot down these aisles, one at a time of course… so we can tell if it’s unique to the, erm, regular ponies, or if it’s something that works for every pony.”

Commander Cone shrugged her wings. “Sure.” She then hopped up onto the spread and started trotting.

Commander Spanner, however, scowled. “What if it’s something unique to just you, though?”

She shrugged. “Then the next test would be with other regular ponies, to find out.”

They then watched Commander Cone complete her circuit and hop down from the spread. Exactly as had happened the previous day, the soil didn’t seem to like sticking to pony hooves, except when they wanted it to.

She checked the display. “Hmm, no change.”

Commander Spanner then jumped up to make her circuit.

Also no change.

“Well then,” Chef Knife muttered. “I think that concludes it. Either it is just me, or pegasi and unicorns don’t have it.” She tilted her head, and looked towards the two commanders. “Makes me wonder what you have instead?”

Across the room, the gantry started moving, harvesting the broccoli.

---

It was a somewhat amazed-looking Captain Kayla Matthews that appeared when Admiral East answered the call. “Yes, Captain?”

“We’re ready for the next wave,” she answered.

She raised an eyebrow. “Something happen? And have you already got the hydroponics up to establishment?”

She nodded. “Chef Knife just fed everyone a fresh-cooked meal… from the farms, not the initial rations. Yes, we’re already harvesting- something like four or five times so far, I’m told.”

“You’re kidding me.”

She shook her head. “I kid you not. Turns out the earth ponies- that’s what we’re calling the ones without horns or wings now- can make plants grow faster just by touching the soil they’re growing in. And we have regular farms, rather than hydroponics.”

“... Alright. I’ll send the next wave.”

Author's Note:

The fast-growing-plants effect is also present in Equestria, and even at the same strength. The reason it's so much more effective aboard ship is because on a planetary body, most of the magic goes down, and is never exposed to plants. Hence, the reason random gemstones are so common in Equestrian soil: Crystalized earth pony magic. As a matter of fact, this is why rock farms are almost exclusively operated by earth ponies, and never have any vegetation. Shipboard, the magic remains concentrated in the plant-bearing portion of the soil- and so, gets dumped into the plants en masse. It's entirely likely that, if the soil was laid but unseeded and the earth ponies of the crew treated it as a dance floor, it wouldn't take very long at all to become a solid block of gemstones (the magic prefers to pick the plants if they're close enough, hence why Sweet Apple Acres doesn't have gems at the surface, but the Gem Fields- with no vegetation- do).

The reason Equestrian potted plants don't explode like this is in part because they don't touch the soil/plants for long- and in part because the magic can "jump" a short distance to other bodies of soil. Thus, if an earth pony worked a greenhouse on, say, the 5th above-ground floor (or higher) in Equestria, with no pots or whatever else on lower floors, they'd get this rapid growth effect (which stops at "harvest ready" or "fully grown"). Same if it was in Cloudsdale. Here, the nearest body of soil to jump to is too far away, since it can't jump nearly as far horizontally or upwards as it can downwards, and these farming bays are not vertically arranged.

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Comments

[Frazikar]

Here, the nearest body of soil to jump to is too far away, since it can't jump nearly as far horizontally or upwards as it can downwards, and these farming bays are not vertically arranged.

Well, it wasn't made with magic (and earth ponies) in mind ...