Return to Sender

by Starscribe

Chapter 36

"Admiral, meet Delta," Felicity said, the first to break the silence. She walked along beside the plant, close enough that she could be near her the whole way. Someone had to be close enough to protect her. For whatever good it would do them.

"I am... friendly to meet you," Delta said. Her whiplike tail flicked through the air behind her. But Felicity wasn't sure the admiral would even understand equine body language. Maybe some of these scientists would.

One of them was the first to break the silence. Felicity still couldn't tell their sex, let alone their names. It was someone who hadn't spoken in her presence yet, she was pretty sure. "You are from the planet, Delta? That's where Felicity says she found you."

"Yes." Delta didn't turn in their direction, but kept speaking with her attention focused on a random patch of wall—at least that was what Felicity thought it was at first. With a few more seconds of investigation, she realized what she was really looking at; a large, flat light.

But she didn't need to face the scientist, not when she had dozens of weak eyes all over, and her voice was a projection in the space around them.

"I am from Effervescent Meridian. I grew as a sapling there long, long ago. One of the last before the end of all growth. I have been a Grovetender there my whole life, until I... took an interest in protecting the first to grow there new. She is called Tea, I think. This one here, who is a predator now. She was not before. It is confusing, but I try to understand. Maybe you can too?"

"We understand," said admiral Gant, stepping a little closer to her. "Your ship attacked us without warning. You ignored our messages of peace, you ignored our pleas to withdraw. Many lives were irrecoverably lost because of them."

Buck. Felicity tensed, feeling the anger growing in the room. It wasn't just the admiral whose fury was now directed at Delta. Many of the scientists looked about the same.

All this time they'd thought they fought a faceless, intractable enemy—now they had a conduit for their wrath.

"She had nothing to do with it," Felicity snapped, stepping closer to her companion. "I was with her on the surface. They keep their people ignorant, without social mobility. She kept fish from eating plants, that was it. She hasn't attacked a single Varch'nai. She's never seen anything like us."

Delta did not react with fear, except to curl a single tentacle around one of Felicity's limbs. She didn't withdraw from Gant or even look at him. Yet the translator captured terror when she spoke. "I did not come to fight. I came to... convince you. To spare the Sky-Temple. Those who grow aboard do not deserve to die. They serve the sun faithfully, to allow all of us to grow. Without them, we would wither."

"Folk-religions among a spacefaring species," muttered a scientist near the wall. "Are we dealing with techno-primitives? We have little hope of convincing a species like that."

"Captain Felicity did mention an end of new growth on the planet. The alien corroborates her story."

"What difference does it make?"

Felicity struggled to follow the conversation, her eyes darting from one face to the next. She glanced desperately back at Manny, eyes wide and confused. She couldn't ask for help without the room hearing, but maybe he would read her intentions.

He did. "Negotiation with the alien ship has the best chance of recovering the first crew," Manny said. "The three of us volunteer to go within and accomplish this mission. We are experienced in the use of bodies crafted to survive its internal conditions. We speak their language, and understand their culture."

He walked past Delta, circling the room and looking up into every face. "Can any of you nominate a plan with better odds not of military victory, but of preserving life? Speak now, or accept my decision."

"Do you really intend to spare that ship?" Gant snapped. "After all they've done. I thought you cared about the lives of your citizens. Our lives have been lost. Ships in this fleet have been destroyed. If they were more competent fighters, the whole fleet might be gone. Then you would be floating in a frozen ocean, and we would be floating debris out here in orbit."

Manny moved gently up into the air, until he was at eye-level with the admiral. Felicity couldn't see Delta turn to watch, but she could feel her focus on the conversation. "If the life in this system is unique, it is worth adding to the Harmony. You should approve of our intention—your efforts here will imprison them in the life you wish to escape. Is that not satisfactory to you?"

"It might be." Gant looked away. "We have only one kind of body to offer, Harmony. We do not believe in this... madness of constant reconfiguration, like you. We offer only humanity."

Manny landed again, grinning casually up at them. "That will not be a problem. I will transmit the instructions for a thaumic field-wave inductor that will serve for our needs. Outfit the rescue ship sent to recover us with this equipment, and we can fly it directly to begin our mission."

There was little left to discuss after that. Delta was still shaking with nervous energy, but clearly didn't want to look for reassurance around all these frightening aliens. She said nothing until the two of them awoke back on the wrecked ship.

Felicity was the first to sit up, stretching and yawning with the aches of an uncomfortable transmission pod. At least this one hadn't tried to put her in suspended animation while she worked, and thus made the process that much worse.

"You only asked for a magical generator," Felicity said, as soon as she was out of the pod. Manny hadn't ever used one to begin with—his suite of implants and medical machines made the entire process closer to what the Varch'nai did. "Why?"

"Remote transmission will be inadequate. We have already analyzed the strange hull-alloy thoroughly. It resists even our most invasive transmission and scanning techniques. Otherwise, we could have found and extracted the survivors remotely by now."

Delta gasped, sitting up abruptly. She caught the edge of her pod, and stared wildly around at nothing.

"You mean we have to actually go inside," Felicity said. "Good news, Delta. Looks like you get to be a plant again sooner than we expected. We can probably avoid accidentally changing her back when we're finished, too."

Delta looked at her, wide-eyed and confused. But she said nothing.

"The process carries significant risk," Manny said. "Even with implants, it's possible they could kill and completely eradicate any record of your memories and personality. If they murdered the other survivors, we could die too."

"There is so much dying up here." Delta managed to climb out of her tube, but her limbs were still shaking and weak. She'd now been without food for over a day. It was a good thing they were changing her back soon, or else they'd probably have to put her on a drip. "I can see why the Skywatchers say that most of us are not suited to leave our ocean. I should have stayed there too."

"Maybe." Felicity draped a wing over her back, or tried anyway. She was so much taller that she had to stretch and strain to reach. "But without you, we might not be able to convince the admiral not to destroy the... Sky Temple. Your help might've saved a lot of growing things. Even seeing you for a moment showed him that you weren't just plants."

"What does that mean?" She tilted her head to the side. "Just plants?"

"It means that Felicity is a creature of low-complexity bias, as you are. Even after adapting to life with beings of a radically different type, she still makes untenable assumptions. Do not hold it against her, you do the same."

Felicity glared over at Manny. But the pony was right, as little as it would probably help Delta to understand. "How long do you think it will take them to get the rescue ship here?"

"It is being retrofitted as we speak," Manny answered. "Get some sleep in the meantime. A rescue carrier was already in orbit. It should take less than a standard day."

She did, or she tried. It was hard to get any kind of meaningful rest with Delta tossing and turning beside her. Every minute or so she would roll over, or kick outward with one leg. Like she was actively fighting to stay awake.

Felicity found her own patch of floor, and that helped a little. But then she was left with the painful knowledge of Delta struggling in the room with her, unwilling to eat and barely able to drink anything either.

At least I came here as an explorer, she thought. I knew I might have to do strange things. Maybe even integrate into the native population to get to know them better. Delta was completely unprepared. She's lived even less than I have.

Now they were depending on her to help them save the crew of the Alcyone, along with everyone still alive on the Sky Temple.

Their rescue ship arrived with a roar of sirens echoing down the halls around them. Felicity managed to rise to her hooves before an armored figure appeared to escort them.

Good thing too, when the mirrored visor lifted from their helmet, she saw Escape Gear inside. "Hey Captain." She stepped aside, leaving the door open behind her. "We pressurized a tunnel leading to the exit. But I'm getting at least a dozen little leaks. Can we do this quick?"

Manny rose from his place, where he'd been apparently sleeping soundly the entire time. Now he was up and fully conscious, looking urgently between them. "Do you think Delta is strong enough to walk to the airlock?"

She was, though it didn't come easily. Delta yawned every few seconds, and more than once her legs gave out beneath her as they walked, and she had to take a second to stand up again. She managed only with Felicity to lean on, struggling to keep pace with their escort.

"I thought you would transmit off," Felicity said. "You've been here all night?"

"Someone had to keep the heat on for you. Besides, I wasn't going to let you have all the fun without me. I'm coming with you to the custodian ship."

Felicity gasped. She managed to keep going, if only out of worry for dropping Delta. "You can't go with us. It took me years to figure out how their bodies work. You don't have the time."

"I know that!" She grinned down at them. "Your ship will be the most dangerous assignment in the fleet. The custodian ship hasn't been completely declawed—anything that gets that close is subjected to all kinds of defensive systems. Someone's got to make sure you have a way back off that damn thing."

"We're trying to make peace. Hopefully they'll just let us go."

"Heard that before? Remember when the Alcyone got here, and we planned to greet them in friendship and prepare for a cultural exchange? Here we are, trying to rescue our friends all these years later. Unless they've been frozen, their bodies are all dust by now. We'll have to reconstitute them from their implants."

"It will be enough," Manny said. "We knew the danger of your assignment. They were already safe within the evacuation vessel. Their implants were made with the greatest possible layer of hardiness and redundancy. It would take quite sophisticated material science to damage them in any meaningful way."

You mean like the science it took to build a ship with impenetrable alloys with weapons that could take down the Alcyone? But she didn't voice that fear. She shared Manny's desire for optimism.

The air felt a little thin by the time they reached the airlock and stepped inside. But when the doors finally closed behind them, warm air flowed all around them, in a ship that didn't have exposed conduits and missing components everywhere she looked.

It also didn't have anyone else. The interior was stripped almost to the bulkheads, with only a few closed sections hundreds of meters away. Most of the space was occupied by a gigantic machine, a crystal wrapped in wire coils that stood easily as large as several Equestrian homes.

That was the warmth she felt—a thaumic wave-projector, filling her body and driving off her exhaustion.

"Crash-couch is over there," Escape said, pointing. "Get situated, and we'll burn out of this damn atmosphere. You know where we're flying after that."

Comments

[EverfreeSparkle]

Yay! They're gonna be plants again.

[Booster Spice]

Finally off the planet? But now they have to work out how to get through the trap maze, where only the actual plant soul form will delay things to stop them immediately vapourising them?

Even the hull vapour and shattered remnants dont give ways of detecting what its made of, maybe because it changes so much on damage?

Cant peel the hull or boil it clear?

[Luminous Lead]

She did, or she tried. It was hard to get any kind of meaningful rest with Delta tossing and turning beside her. Every minute or so she would roll over, or kick outward with one leg. Like she was actively fighting to stay awake.

Looks like she doesn't understand how to sleep.

[minibox]

Back to plants again and finally into the ship. We'll see what the Skywatchers have to say.

[KMCA]

11335036
turn out the lights and she'll find it much easier to go to sleep.

[Turquoise pony]

11335036
Sleep, like everything non plant related, would have to be a learned behavior.
It would take Delta years of dedicated therapy, to become a mostly functioning Pony.

[FanOfMostEverything]

We offer only humanity.

I imagine Lucky Day might have a few comments on your form of humanity, Admiral.

Well, that could've gone worse. Let's see if they can keep this up aboard the Sky-Temple. Especially once Delta stops trying to fight everything about her animal body.