> Hc Svnt Equus Pinnis
>  by Masterweaver
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> Et Rvrsus Est
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	An aggravated sigh slipped from Applejack's lips as she looked at Rainbow Dash's efforts. "No, look, yer gonna over-water it if you try ta do it like the acres! Then tha roof will cave in again and Mac will have ta come here again ta fix the thing again. Light sprinkles, not major downpours!"

"Look, if I made this cloud any less dense it would just be mist. JUST. MIST." Rainbow groaned, maneuvering the white puffball away. "What do you want me to do, get out watering cans and sprinkle the cottage?"

"Ya know, that might be a fine idea. Ah'm sure that's how...."

Applejack trailed off for a moment.

"...that's how Fluttershy usually does it."

Rainbow's face contorted for a moment, emotions warring for dominance. Resignation won. "Yeah, it... seems like something she'd do. I'll disperse this and go fill some up."

She bucked her cloud and landed, kicking at the ground for a moment.

"...Applejack. Do you... do you think...?"

Applejack kept her patient gaze on her.

"...do you think... that I should ask Pinkie Pie where the watering cans are, or Rarity?"

The farm mare blinked. Then she chuckled, shaking her head. "Ah reckon Rarity's probably going ta be done patching up tha birdhouses in a few minutes, but if ya want results now--"

"Actually, I just finished," piped up the unicorn as she stepped around the corner, idly combing her mane back into something resembling its usual pristine form. "What exactly was it you were considering calling Pinkie Pie for?"

"Watering cans. For the roof." Rainbow gestured. "Clouds aren't delicate enough."

Rarity nodded, glancing at the cottage for a brief moment. "Well, I do believe I saw a shed of gardening tools around back. If there aren't watering cans in there, I can just nip into town for them."

"Nah, it's cool. I can be there and back faster than you," the pegasus replied, hovering into the air. "Let me just check the shed first."

Rarity watched Rainbow dart behind the cottage, a sad smile playing on her lips. "...she's still in denial, isn't she?"

"Ah dunno. It's like she knows, but she doesn't want to admit it." Applejack took her hat off, holding it to her chest. "Element of Loyalty, Ah reckon. Shy was one of her childhood friends..."

They stood, silently looking at the cottage they were working hard to maintain. Various chirps and purrs drifted through the windows, a counterpoint to Pinkie Pie's humming as she fed the animals who lived within.

"...it's been three months," Rarity murmured. "Three months, and those two still haven't..." She shook her head. "I want to get this over with, AJ. I want to be able to grieve and move on, but... it feels wrong for me to try when those two still haven't..."

"Ah know. It... took lil' Bloom a while to accept it when ma and pa dropped. Ah mean, she was almost newborn, so she couldn't really get it, but..." Applejack shrugged. "It can hurt not ta hurt."

"Yes." Rarity nodded. "That's... that's it, exactly."

"...still," the farm mare mused, putting her hat back on, "Ah reckon that plain old denial's a bit better then tha wafflin' Twi goes through. Ah mean, knowing how Shy went would help and all, but obsessively researchin' every dang critter in the Everfree, or long lost magic spells, or whatever? That filly's a few steps away from being a wreck. If it weren't fer Spike, Ah think she'd have fallen apart by now."

"Yes.... he's quite the little champion isn't he?" Rarity sighed. "I... admit, perhaps we take his help too lightly."

"Maybe ya should take him on a date or somethin'."

"Applejack!" the unicorn cried, shocked. "I am a lady! And as fond as I am of Spike, he is six years younger than me! Surely you would have some objections to that?"

The other mare rolled her eyes. "Fine, fine. Wait fer him ta come o' age, then."

"I very well might," Rarity scoffed, ignoring Applejack's quiet chuckle.

They watched as Rainbow re-emerged from behind the cottage, dangling a watering can from each hoof.

"...have you seen Discord?" Rarity suddenly asked. "I mean, has he been around since Fluttershy vanished?"

"Don't rightly know. Sometimes Ah find strange things when Ah'm goin' through her gardens, but... ain't seen hide nor tail o' him fer a while now."

"Mmm. Somebody should find him. If only to make sure he doesn't go insane from grief."

"Ah'm more worried 'bout Shy's kin. Do ya know where her family lives?"

Rarity shrugged. "She never talked about them much with me. I think she might have mentioned a brother at one point. I don't know much more than that."

Applejack nodded to herself. "She always kinda quiet 'bout herself. Dash might know somethin', but..." She waved at the pegasus trailing water over the cottage roof.

"Yes, I can see how 'informing the family' would be difficult when the only pony that could doesn't want to believe it herself." With a sigh, Rarity turned her gaze away. "I just wish... I just wish I could see her, one last time."

"I think we all do."

Both the ponies turned to Twilight as she walked up behind them. "Gosh, Twi," Applejack managed, "Ah didn't even hear ya comin'."

"Well, I got caught up in analyzing a particular spellform that could possibly have resulted in... you know." The purple alicorn rubbed the back of her head. "After I realized I was late, I... decided to fly here. Turns out flying is a little quieter than walking." She shrugged. "Due to the dispersal of energy transferred into the the air being greater when not in direct contact with the ground. I think. I'm sorry, right now, I feel a little scatterbrained."

"Not too surprising," Rainbow Dash quipped as she glided over, gently dropping the watering cans from her hooves. "Reading all of those books over and over again, you've got to have, like, a gazillion tons of knowledge bouncing in that egghead of yours."

"...how would you measure knowledge in tons? It's an abstract concept derived from the idea of intellectually beneficial memory existing in a format that can be reiterated to others!"

"Maybe it's a transfer of an inquantible concept to a metaphorical measurement?"

Three sets of eyes stared at Applejack.

"What?" Applejack tried, and failed, to hold back a grin. "Surprised that tha ordinary farmpone knows some fancy words?"

"I'm not sure inquantible is a word," Twilight mused. "Infinite, maybe... Although that has connotations of endlessness where you were attempting to indicate something that could not be counted or measured--immeasurable, maybe?"

"Yeah, okay, AJ's got secret smarts or whatever." Rainbow landed on the ground. "Now all we need is for Pinkie Pie to get done feeding the animals--"

The door to Fluttershy's cottage slammed open, a larger burly bear throwing something pink out with a small growl. It bounced on the dirt path, rolled over the footbridge, and stopped suddenly when it reached the group, resolving into a brightly smiling pony. "Hi there girls!"

"Pinkie!" Twilight rushed up to the pony. "Are you okay?!"

"Of course I'm okay! Harry just isn't a fan of my musical meanderings. Which is weird," Pinkie mused, "because I know he likes Fluttershy's singing, and we kinda sound similar." She shrugged. "But I did get all her animal friends fed, so yay!"

The alicorn sighed. "That's... great, Pinkie. It really is."

"So how are you doing with your finding Fluttershy research stuff?" Pinkie chirped brightly.

Twilight winced. "I'm... I don't know. There are fewer and fewer options available. Even if she is still out there, I don't know if I could ever track her down."

Pinkie Pie nodded in understanding. "It's hard to figure out what happened when you weren't actually there. I've tried asking Angel and all of Fluttershy's animal friends, but I don't speak animal, and trying to read what they write is really, really hard!"

"I suppose it would be," Rarity mused. "I'm rather surprised that you managed to convince them to write at all."

"Actually, the spider does excellent poetry. But apparently he wasn't there for whatever happened." Pinkie flicked her mane back. "It's too bad that Fluttershy's not back yet, we could just ask her."

Applejack sighed. "...look. Pinkie. Ah... Ah think ya ought ta--"

A loud crack resounded through the air as, without warning, a bolt of light materialized mere feet away from the front door of Fluttershy's cottage. Sparks of electricity fizzled through the air in unnatural ripples, breaking apart and lancing into the ground as soon as they hit any object in their path. As the five ponies tried to shield their eyes, peering into the strange shimmering presence, they could see a form that twisted, shifted, grew from something eldritch down to disturbing and then, somehow, into a very familiar outline.

With a final boom, the light dispersed, dropping a panting yellow pony onto the ground.

The five of them stared at the newcomer. At the scars across her body, at the bandoleer around her barrel, at the objects strapped to her thigh. At the torn ear just visible from under the long pink mane, at the strange metal foreleg she had, at the pair of rods on her back that projected faint outlines of wings.

And at the three butterflys emblazoned on each flank.

Rainbow Dash was the first to make a move, stepping cautiously up to the footbridge. "...Fluttershy?"

The pony's panting stopped. She lifted her head, pulling her long mane back to reveal a scarred eye with strange, shifting rune projected on its surface.

"...Rainbow Dash... it's you."

Her face broke out into a grin. "It's you, it's really you! Oh my gosh--" She looked behind her. "You're all here! Oh my gosh, you're all here, it's all you! I'm home! I'm finally home!"

"....Sweet Celestia." Applejack winced. "Fluttershy, you... what happened to your leg? Or your eye, or... or your wings?"

"Oh, uh... it's a long story." Fluttershy shook her head, letting out a laugh. "It's a very long story--"

"You were gone!" Twilight blurted. "For three whole months!"

Fluttershy's brow furrowed. "Three months? No, I'm... pretty sure I was gone for more than a year. Then again, I was in a whole 'nother universe--"

"Another universe?!" Pinkie Pie bounded past Rainbow. "YOU HAVE TO TELL US EVERYTHING! Did they have parties there? Tell me they had parties there!"

"Well, yes, but--Look." Fluttershy gently but firmly pushed Pinkie back. "I promise I'll tell all of you everything. But right now, I just want to be... home again, you know?"

"Well, far be it from us to begrudge you that," Rarity finally managed. "But I can't deny my own curiosity... How about a compromise? We just got finished maintaining your house for the day--"

"You were looking after my cottage? I..." She turned to look behind her, staring for a few moments; when she looked back at them, there were tears in her eyes. "Thanks... thanks girls."

"You're quite welcome. But as I was saying, maybe we should all go to the spa together, and you can regale us with your extra-universal adventures while we're there."

"That... that actually sounds pretty good." Fluttershy nodded.

"...You're back," Rainbow said, stepping slowly forward. "You're really back."

Fluttershy nodded. "I'm back."

Rainbow Dash stood there for a moment. Then she shook her head--"Ah, to hay with it!"--and wrapped her forelegs around the yellow pony. "I missed you! Celestia, Fluttershy, I missed you!"

"I missed you too, Rainbow Dash." The yellow pony carefully wrapped her remaining foreleg around her friend. "I... I have a lot to tell you about."
> Deiecit Ien Mare
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	"...so Macintosh had to reset that part of yer roof entirely," Applejack finished as the six of them entered the spa. "But he accidentally got a different color o' wood. So if anything seems wrong in yer water closet, that's why."

"Oh my. That sounds... well, horrible, in the 'have to laugh' sort of way." Fluttershy tried to hide a small smile behind her hoof. "I'm sorry, Dash, but... seriously?"

"Hey now," the blue pegasus defended, "I thought it was an ordinary plumbing problem, not--not whatever it was!"

"...Miss Fluttershy?"

The six of them turned to look at the stunned pony behind the desk.

"...Hello Lotus." Fluttershy smiled gently. "I... I'm sorry I couldn't come to your spa for a while, I was... away. But I'm back now..."

"My word." The blue mare's eyes roved over her. "...I zink... zis once, zere will be no charge for services."

"Oh, you really don't have to do that--"

"Non, Miss Fluttershy, you are a valued customer. And a good friend, atop zat." Lotus glanced from her to the rest of the group. "I take it zat zis is a group visit?"

The yellow pony frowned. "A free ride for six ponies? Lotus, that's not good for your business!"

"Business? Zis is not about business, Fluttershy--"

"Everything's about--!"

Fluttershy stopped, her hoof frozen in midshout, blinking in confusion for a moment.

"...right. Right, this is Equestria. Not everything's about business..."

She slowly lowered her hoof, taking in the concerned looks her friends were giving her.

"...I'm sorry, Lotus. I just... I don't feel comfortable taking advantage of your hospitality that way. I mean, I'd like a free treatment, but--"

"If it's really that important, I'll cover the costs," Twilight interjected.

"But--"

"Hey, I'm a princess. I don't have to worry about money that much."

Fluttershy opened her mouth to speak... and sighed in resignation. "Alright. If you're sure..."

Rarity cleared her throat. "Well, now that that's settled, shall we head in? You're quite in need of relaxation." She trotted into the main spa facility with a nod to Lotus, waving the group after her. "I think we'll start with a coat treatment, Celestia knows that I need it after all the gem gathering I do."

"And Fluttershy's all covered in scars and stuff!" Pinkie added brightly.

"Yes, darling," Rarity sighed. "She is. I was trying to be subtle."

"Oh, like when you have a super-duper mega-luper birthday present that you just want to blab about to the birthday pony but it wouldn't be right but you can't just keep your mouth shut so you say things like 'YOU LIKE GOLFING RIGHT' all the time?"

Rainbow let out a small snort of laughter. "Sorry Rares, that's about as subtle as you're going to get from her."

"I don't know," Fluttershy mused. "Back when the crystal empire first appeared, she had that costume of me."

"Ah, before we continue, is zere any... precautions I should take regarding....?" Lotus trailed off, nodding to the still shimmering image of wings on Fluttershy's back.

"...Oh! Let me turn those off." Fluttershy grinned sheepishly as the feathers flickered out of existence, the two rods folding flat against her back. "The skin near the base of the grafts is a little sensitive, but aside from that it should be okay."

"Ze oils will not... gunk up the machinery?"

"I have a sub-vibronic scrubber in my Progenitus emergency response kit here," the yellow pony explained, gesturing to one of the objects strapped to her thigh. "Even if the oils do cause issues, which I seriously doubt, I can clean them out easily enough."

"I... see. Well zen. I suppose we can start with ze coat treatment. Where would you like for me to place your zings while we do zat?"

Fluttershy blinked, glancing at the bandoleer she was still wearing. "Oh... um, well. Some of this stuff can be very dangerous to leave in the open... do you mind if I just hang it off the corner of the bench while you do your work?"

"Of course not."

Applejack watched as Fluttershy carefully pulled the bandoleer off. "If ya'll pardon mah askin', why exactly were ya wearin' that anyway?"

"Well, it's kind of hard to infiltrate a TTI research post without a little firepower--"

"A what research post?" Twilight asked.

"TTI. Transcendent Technologies Incorporated. They were the ones that launched the tether in the first place, so they were the only way I could figure to get back."

"The tether?" Twilight asked again.

"Well, that's what it was called in the files..." Fluttershy gently hung the last of her strange artifacts in the bandoleer. "...I think a lot of this isn't going to make sense unless I start from the beginning." She pulled herself onto the bench, letting out a sigh of contentment as Lotus moved to arrange her more comfortably on it. "I've missed this, you know? This... being home, with ponies that understand what it's like to be a pony..."

Twilight glanced around, seeing that the others were all setting themselves up on their own benches, and shook her head with a smile. "I guess that's what we came here for, isn't it? Hold on." Her horn glowed intensely, a notepad and quill materializing beside her as she mounted her own bench. "Okay. I'm ready!"

Fluttershy glanced at the notepad for a moment. "...Never change, Twilight. Never change." She smiled as Lotus applied various ointment treated bands to her body, the runes and patterns projected on her eye shifting. "Hmm... the beginning. Well I didn't know what was going on at the time, of course--all I knew was that one moment I was watering my garden, then the world suddenly went very... strange. When things finally settled down, I was... well, I was in the middle of a pretty weird place."





Screams and murmurs--metal and flesh--light and dark--

Fluttershy blinked, shaking her head and trying to gain her bearings. It didn't help that the very walls were shifting, curving in and out in some sort of slow breathing. There seemed to be quite a few metal desks, torn open to show masses of wires and odd sparking plates of silver runes. The light above her was flickering between a sterile blue and an eerie green. A single sliding door was wrenched open, and through it she could see a long hallway... with walls that were scratched and bleeding, somehow, a disturbing purplish color.

It was through the hallway that she heard various voices, some trying to give orders, others begging for help, and... a third group, quiet voices that seemed oddly calm. This far away she couldn't tell what any of them were saying.

"Um... hello?"

With some trepidation, Fluttershy stepped off the raised platform she had found herself on. She winced as she heard the sound of glass crunching beneath her hooves, only just realizing that the ground all around her was covered with clear shards that were hard to see in the flickering light.

"Is anypony here?" she asked, carefully making her way around one of the metal desks. "I don't mean to be a--meep!"

She covered her muzzle in shock, unable to tear her gaze from the corpse in front of her.

It had the face of a cat, eyes frozen wide in rictus terror, with the rest of the body was structured more like a diamond dog and clothed in a strange, skintight shimmering suit. She couldn't be certain, since the lower half was laying a few feet away from the upper, but she guessed that the creature would have been as tall as Luna if it stood upright. Pinned to the breast of the creature was a small, broken namtag--or at least what Fluttershy assumed was a nametag, the lettering was unfamiliar....

"Oh my...." The pegasus gently took the nametag, nestling it in her mane, and shut the creature's eyes. "I don't know what happened to you, but... I hope you find a better place beyond then you did here..."

A loud shriek broke her from her reverence, bringing her gaze once more to the wedged open door.

"...and I'm sorry, but I think I need to get out of here."

With a steadying breath, she trotted out the door, into the bleeding hallway... and toward the sounds of screaming.





"Wait, hold on." Rainbow held up a hoof. "You went toward the screaming voices?"

"Well, it wasn't like I had much else to go on," Fluttershy replied, twitching as Lotus delicately wrapped the last cloth around the base of her metal leg. "It was either that or stay in the trashed creepy room with the bisected cat person."

"No, I get that, it's just..." The blue pegasus rustled her feathers. "...Okay, I'm just going to say it. You're usually such a wimp!"

"Rainbow Dash!" Applejack scolded.

"What? It's true! I mean she's gotten better, but she's gotten scared of her shadow!"

"Oh I'm not worried about my own shadow anymore," Fluttershy corrected. "There are others that have worse shadows than me. And Dash is... kind of right. I did get spooked pretty easily before I was caught by the tether. But..." She shrugged. "It's like I was with that dragon. I can't just stand by when somebody else is in trouble, you know that."

"My word," Rarity managed, her face paler than usual. "I can't imagine what that must have been like for you... did you ever find out what happened to that cat creature?"

The yellow pony let out a small snort. "Oh, I found out. Pretty quickly too..."





The shifting, bleeding hallways had been more than a little disturbing to walk through. Every now and again she'd see another sliding door torn open, or run into a partially shredded corpse of another animal-thing, taking their nametag and shutting their eyes with a gentle hoof. Sometimes a strange blinking sign would be embedded in the wall, various images and words shifting around inexplicably. And the screaming. It grew more descernable as she drew closer, joined by strange rapid noises that reminded her vaguely of a thunderstorm, lots of rattles and zaps.

Her ears perked as she turned another corner. There was another wrenched open door, but this time she could see motion through it, hear the words more clearly.

"--them off the generator! Don't let them--AAAaUGH!"

"Moruk! Oh crap, they got Moruk!"

With no small amount of trepidation, Fluttershy moved toward the door, keeping herself pressed against the wall as she approached. She peered through cautiously... and gasped, her eyes going wide.

The center of the room was dominated by a large object that looked like a generator from the Ponyville dam, merged with a still-beating heart. It was large enough that the door she was looking through opened onto a catwalk, and she could see another one between it and the floor. But the object, strange though it was, wasn't what caught her eyes.

It was the battle between a group of animal things, one with an extra set of legs, and the strange grey creatures they were fending off.

The creatures vaguely reminded her of Discord, in the sense that they made no sense--but where Discord was a bombastic hodgepodge of animal parts, these things were strangely quiet and uniform even as they attacked. Some had too many limbs, others too few--joints in the wrong places, eyes where they should not be, gaping holes in their bodies that didn't bleed.

"Such pretty toys," one murmured, almost tenderly strangling a badger-thing. The four-legged animal thing, which had a squirrel's face and a long metal tail, whipped his large boxy weapon around and released a spray of... something at it; all that accomplished was gaining the creature's attention. "Naughty, naughty..."

Fluttershy gasped in horror as the creature tossed the badger to one of its companions and launched itself at the squirrel-thing. It was clear, even to her, that the animal-things were not going to last long if something didn't change. Flashes of her own animal friends, and the memories of the various adventures she had been through with the other bearers of harmony, swirled around her mind like a storm as she watched.

It didn't take long for lightning to strike.

The pegasus leapt at the largest of the grey creatures.





"You did WHAT?!" Twilight shrieked.

"Well, I had to!" Fluttershy defended. "I couldn't just stand by and do nothing!"

"Well, no, but... I would have thought you would have tried to talk the creatures down or something!"

The yellow pony sighed. "...I did consider it. But... there was something about how they moved. About what they were saying. They were... I don't think they were even taking the situation seriously, they were playing, like it was just a game. Like killing was just for fun." She rolled a hoof. "I mean... Back before Discord was reformed, he was also kind of playful, right? He didn't care about ponies, he just wanted chaos for the sake of his own amusement. But even he never actually hurt us, not directly."

Fluttershy looked Twilight straight in the eye. "These things would tear your head off to figure out how your neck worked."

The alicorn gulped, leaning away from her intense stare. "Oh."

"Wow, it sounds like you had a really bad time there." Pinkie Pie folded her ears back. "I'm going to need to plan a really good party for you, aren't I?"

"Well, it wasn't all bad," Fluttershy hedged. "I mean, I've had to fight for my life sometimes, but... that wasn't all it was. Amazon station was pretty nice..."

"Amazon station?" Twilight asked.

"Oh, yes, it's this space station with a lot of exotic plants and animals--"

"Twilight," Applejack interjected, "Ah think it might be best if ya just let Fluttershy keep tellin' her story in chronologistical order, so we don't all get confused."

"...It's chronological, Applejack." The purple pony sighed. "But you do have a point, I guess..."

Fluttershy couldn't help but giggle as she saw Twilight write something down on the notepad. "How many questions do you have listed already?"

"Twenty seven, but thirteen of those have already been answered."

"Well, I guess I should see if I can answer more questions then you think of..."





The moment Fluttershy touched the creature, she felt something. Something she hadn't felt in a long while. It wasn't quite the same as when she and her friends defeated Tirek, but it was familiar nontheless. A power both ancient and young flowed through her, channeling the warmth of her soul into the warping of reality and forcing it to behave.

The creature shrunk from a hulking giant to something merely the size of a diamond dog. Its head twisted on a thin neck, an eyeless face staring at her with bemusement.

"That's a new way to dance..."

"A new dance?" Another of the grey creatures turned to look at them. "It's been a while since a new dance found--"

One of the animal things took advantage of the creature's distraction to fire their weapon into it; Fluttershy squeaked in surprise as the creature slurped into nothingness before her eyes. She just had time to realize that the animal was turning its weapon at the creature she was grappling, and jumped off mere moments before the spray filled the thing's chest.

"Wha--Survivor!" The fox who had shot at them quickly whipped her gun at another grey creature, but her gaze remained on the pegasus. "Get up here, we need to stick together!"

The voice of authority was enough to jump Fluttershy to action, and she flapped up to the small group around the heart generator. "Um, what's going on?"

"I was hoping you could tell me. A bioship suddenly appears in orbit, we get sent in to figure out why it's listing, and now we're in a firefight with manifestations." She shot at another gray creature, making it slurp out of existence. "You're with TTI, right?"

"Um, no. What's TTI?"

The fox frowned for a brief moment. "Transcendent Technologies Incorporated. Only megacorp with bioships. Also the guys who screw with these things!" She punctuated her statement by blasting away another gray creature.

Megacorp, bioship, transcendant... Fluttershy heard the words, but what they actually meant escaped her. Still, she understood enough to recognize that the same group that owned wherever it was she found herself was also responsible for these gray creatures.

"How the hell did you end up on a bioship without knowing about them?!"

"Um, well, I was watering my garden and then--"

"You know what, tell me later. Right now we've got to fight off the manifestations." The fox winced as a rat went flying over her head. "What combat training do you have?"

"...um..."

That single utterance was enough to make the fox groan. "A civvie, fucking great. Can't even hand you a gun cause you're a lateral. You have any medical training?"

"Oh yes. I've helped many of my animal friends when they get hurt--not that I'm calling you animals!" Fluttershy added quickly.

The fox looked at her with a strange expression. It didn't last too long, she went back to blasting into the horde of monstrosities, but it was an expression that the pegasus had seen often before; usually, though, it was directed at Pinkie Pie or Discord. It was the face that ponies made when something they did was so abrupt and unrelated that the mind had to take a second to fit it into the situation.

"Just--just try not to die while we handle this."

Fluttershy glanced from the fox to the small group of animal things--a quick headcount put them at under a dozen, while there seemed to be countless gray creatures in the room.

"...are you sure you can deal with this?"

"Well, unless you've got some miracle up your sleeves, we're going to---URK!"

The fox was hauled into the air by a grey creature that had slunk up and grabbed her leg. She aimed her weapon at it, but the thing just slapped it out of her hands, grinning.

"What color do you bleed?" it asked innocently, a bladed tail slinking up.

The storm that had roiled in Fluttershy, the memories and feelings that had led her to jump into this fight, grew virulent and powerful. Somewhere, deep within her mind, she saw a dragon smashing her friends against a rock with its smoky breath--a cockatrice, stalking closer to a set of innocent fillies--a field of apple trees encased in ice...

A strange fox, held in the grasp of a sociopathic abomination.

And suddenly, she knew what she had to do.

Her wings flared as the reared up, eyes narrowed, and summoned every last scrap of willpower in her. Her forehooves sparkled as they descended, racing the bladed tail's own fall toward the fox's face. It was the space of a few seconds, but it might well have been an infinity.

The hooves met the ground, and a shimmering shockwave of pink light spread through the room.

In less than a second the majority of the gray things rippled and twisted out of existence, some laughing, some screaming. The fox let out a grunt as she dropped to the ground, no longer held aloft. Here and there a few of the creatures managed to remain... a few that quickly gained the attention of the animal creatures, who pointed their weapons at them.

One looked directly at Fluttershy and bowed. "Clever girl."

The sight of it being shot down was the last thing she saw before she blacked out.
> Advna In Tera Alina
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	"Wait a minute," Twilight interrupted. "You blacked out?"

Fluttershy nodded, absently holding out a hoof for Lotus to file away at. "Yes. I mean, I did use a lot of harmony magic in one go."

"But that doesn't make sense!" the alicorn protested, her feathers ruffling. "The only time we've ever fainted use harmony magic is the first time we used them against Nightmare Moon, and that was only because our magical signatures were adjusting to them!"

"Well, you see... there wasn't any magic in the other universe."

"...what?"

"No magic," Fluttershy repeated. "In order to fuel a harmony blast, even a partial one, I had to feed my own magic into it. I didn't realize that until after that time on Ganymede, and that didn't happen until over half a year passed for me. All I knew was that harmonizing things took more out of me than it should."

"That... does actually make some sense," Twilight mused. "Assuming you weren't able to absorb ambient magic, your body would have to maintain its own magical system with calorie conversion.... you must have been hungry all the time!"

"Well, until I discovered superfood I was..."

"Superfood?" Pinkie piped. "There's something even better than normal food?!"

"I... wouldn't say better," the yellow pony hedged. "It's packed with more nutrients, yes, but that doesn't make it tastier. Just... more filling. And I wouldn't recommend eating it unless it was absolutely necessary."

"Why would the inhabitants of this other world have food with an unusually high caloric count?" Twilight asked curiously.

"Well you see..." Fluttershy began.

Then she stopped, her eyes dropping to her mechanical leg.

"...actually," she amended, "I think this is one of those things that won't make sense without context."

"So you're going to keep telling us what happened over there?" Rainbow asked.

"Oh, yes."

"Good." She ruffled her feathers. "Cause all this egghead talk was getting boring."

Fluttershy giggled. "Oh, Dash... the egghead talk has only just begun."

The blue pegasus let out a small groan as she continued to tell her tale.





Fluttershy stirred, bleary, a pit in her stomach as she slowly blinked her eyes open. Whatever bed she was on wasn't nearly as soft as her own, and she couldn't hear her animal friends nearby.

"Easy now... you're safe."

The voice was... familiar, but only just. She couldn't quite peg a name onto it....

She looked around as her vision began clear. The room was... white, with blue stripes that ran up the rounded corners and crossed on the ceiling and floor. Light came not just from the fixtures above her, but from small circles embedded regularly in the walls. There seemed to be a small mirror across from the door, but... no, it had strange words and runes running across it, moving even as she watched. The bed she was laying on had a matching one across the room...

...and on the edge of that bed was a strange fox-thing, wearing a uniform.

The memories began to return, the ruined bodies in empty halls, the gray creatures, the wave of Harmony...

"W...what happened?"

"Well, after you did whatever that thing was you did, you fainted. We cleaned up the rest of the manifestations quickly, took you aboard our ship, and brought you to the station."

"Oh." Fluttershy kicked her hoof gently. "Um... thank you, miss...?"

"Sergeant Reinhild Ca'Fo." The fox put on a smile that didn't reach her eyes. "Just doing my job."

"My name's Fluttershy. It's... nice to meet you, Sergeant. I mean, meet you when there isn't danger around," she quickly added. "I mean, we met before, on the ship, but we didn't really talk because of the gray things and--"

"No, I got it." Sergeant Reinhild rolled her shoulders. "Now, I'm supposed to question you before we can let you go. You know, ask how you got on the ship, if you know anything about what TTI was doing there, stuff like that."

Fluttershy nodded. "Um, well... I don't exactly know how I got on the ship. I was watering my garden and then... well, I don't exactly know how to describe it," she admitted. "There was a lot of, um, strangeness. I... I guess it was like one of those gray things, except that it was the entire world that was a gray thing. And when that was over, I was... in a room, on that ship. And I heard you fighting those things and... well, I found a body when I looked around the room and there was glass and broken things everywhere and I didn't know what else to do so I just started following the noise and I collected all the nametags from the corpses I found on the way and I put them in my mane and then I saw you all fighting those things and--"

"Hey." Reinhild had moved across the room, putting a gentle hand on her withers. "It's okay, Fluttershy. You're safe, remember? The manifestations are gone."

"I..." The pegasus felt tears welling up. "I... I don't know why I'm scared now but I'm so scared and I just--"

"It's the adrenaline fading," the fox explained gently. "You had to push back your feelings to survive back there, and now they're coming back full force. It's okay."

Fluttershy sniffed, taking a few deep breaths.

"You going to be alright?"

"...I... I think so." The pegasus blinked the tears away. "I... oh... sweet Celestia, how am I going to get home?"

Reinhild shrugged. "Where are you from?"

"I'm from... Equestria."

The fox tilted her ears. "Equestria, huh? I've never heard of it, but I can run a search through the files." She took her hand off and walked over to the strange rune-mirror, fingers tapping across its surface.

"Oh, thank you, that... that would be nice." Fluttershy managed a small smile. "I guess I was very lucky you went out to the ship."

"Yeah, well, that's what the IRPF does." Reinhild chuckled, still focused on the odd mirror. "MarsCo hires us to keep people safe, and come hell or high water we'll do it."

"Um.... what's MarsCo?"

The fox's hand froze. After a moment, she turned to look at the pegasus, her expression utterly nonplussed.

Fluttershy wilted slightly. "I'm.... I'm sorry, am I asking too many questions? I'll be quiet now..."

Reinhild stared at her for a small while longer. Then she swiped her hand across the mirror, clearing it of all the runes. "I think I need to go get the chief." She walked to the door, pointing a finger at her as it slid open. "You, you stay where you are, I'll be right back."

The door clicked shut behind her, leaving Fluttershy confused and alone.





"Well, that was quite rude of her," Rarity commented dryly. "Leaving you alone after all you'd been through."

Fluttershy gave her a flat look. "Rarity, if you met a pony who had no idea who princess Celestia was, how would you react?"

The white unicorn tapped her chin thoughtfully. "Well... I suppose I would be rather surprised. She's such a fixture in pony culture that to be entirely unaware of her would imply having been raised outside Equestria... oh, I see. I take it this MarsCo was important?"

"Very much so. MarsCo makes everything over there. Well, almost everything. They make the buildings. They make the food. They make the clothes, the tools, the books. They even made the Vectors themselves."

"Vectors?"

"The animal people," Fluttershy explained. "When Reinhild came back with the chief, they sat me down and told me the whole history. Apparently, there was this race called humans that lived somewhere called Earth, and at some point a younger generation got so fed up with the older member's constant feuds that they used their technology to colonize the planet next door--"

"Wait, humans?" Twilight interjected. "Like the ones through the mirror?"

Fluttershy looked at her for a moment. "...You know, I was wondering the same thing, but I don't think so. I saw some pictures of humans on the net and, well... they didn't look like you described. Sort of like them, but not really. Not that many colors. And then I found out about the animal that they called a pony..." She shuddered. "Look, let's just say they might use the same words sometimes, but it doesn't mean the same thing."

"I see..." Twilight nodded. "So, you were telling us about MarsCo?

"Oh, yes. The planet next door was called Mars, so the humans who made the colony named it MarsCo. Then somebody on Earth decided to tweak the genetic code of the animals, and that led to animals that walked on two legs like humans, and the humans on Earth didn't react very well at all to that... so the person who had been fiddling with the animals sent all the data about their experiments to MarsCo, and..."

She rolled a hoof. "Well, Vectors might look a little like animals, but their genetic code is basically human. A little cleaned up, with some animal bits tacked on, and a few extras beside that, but... I have met a skunk who was married to a snake and they had a small bundle of children. MarsCo called them Vectors because they were 'vectoring' the human race down a new path. It was meant to be this grand triumph of science that would lead to a golden age. Then Earth was nuked to death."

"Nuked?" Applejack asked.

"Nuclear bombs. Terrible weapons... the small ones can level cities. And thousands of them were all launched at once..." Fluttershy shook her head. "That was seven hundred years ago. Nowadays, Earth is a wasteland populated by terrifying monsters. Every attempt by the Vectors to look around there has ended in... well, the whole planet is quarantined for a reason."

"My goodness..." Rarity breathed. "That's... horrifying."

"I thought so too. But to the Vectors, it's ancient history. MarsCo saw the death of Earth, the humans that still remained realized their time was almost up, and... well, they did their best to give the Vectors a good future. Of course, a lot of things happened in the seven hundred years after that, but at the time the chief just wanted to give me a basic outline of the world."

"Well, how'd they react when you told them you were an alien?" Rainbow asked.

"Actually," Fluttershy replied with a sly grin, "they didn't think I was an alien. They thought I was an abductee from a simulation Vector colony that TTI had experimented on."

"....what."

"They were totally wrong, of course, but it fit with what they knew. I had strange abilities, didn't know basic history, and believed in crazy things like magical unicorns with wings raising the sun and moon." She shrugged. "A Vector raised in a highly controlled environment with no knowledge of the outside world... apparently it's happened before."

Applejack shook her head. "That's terrifyin' in so many ways, Ah don't even know where ta begin."

"So what happened next?" Pinkie asked, tossing some popcorn into her mouth.

Fluttershy blinked, peering at the popcorn bin. Then she shook her head. "Well, Reinhild was assigned to be my societal adjustment monitor. And we walked out of the station..."





"You know, I never thought I'd be setting up somebody's ledger," Reinhild quipped, her fingers dancing across the rune-covered mirror she had called a smartboard. "Didn't plan on ever having kids."

"Oh, I really appreciate it." Fluttershy blinked as she stepped into the sunlight. "I'm sorry I'm being such a... bother..."

"Eh, it's just paperwork really. Nothing new there..." The fox glanced back at the pegasus. "Fluttershy? You okay there?"

Fluttershy was standing stock still, staring wide eyed at the sky. She'd expected oddly colored clouds. Or a sun or two, or maybe some strange moon. She had not expected the sky to be filled with translucent moving images and scrolling runes.

Reinhild followed her gaze. After a moment, she gave an amused snort. "Right. Simulation-born. Should have figured you'd be surprised by the Lightshow." She waved a hand dismissively. "Right now it's just ads."

"...Ads? As in... as in advertisments?"

"Yep. See, there are satellites around the equator that project holographic images onto particles scattered through the atmosphere--"

"I'm just... astounded that you'd come up with something so amazing and use it for... for business," Fluttershy breathed.

Reinhild stared at her for a few moments.

"...Okay." She held up a finger. "First rule of the real world: Everything is about business. And I do mean everything."

The pegasus managed to tear her gaze away from the Lightshow and give her a sardonic look. "That's a little bit dramatic, don't you think?"

"You were rescued by an IRPF crew, so you're expected to pay a rescue fee. You're standing on a MarsCo brand sidewalk, which means you've agreed to spare a few creds to maintain it. That air you're breathing? Progenitus will tax you to keep their atmospheric scrubbers running." The fox leaned in, her expression sincere and firm. "Everything. Is about business."

Fluttershy blinked. "You... You're completely serious."

"Yep."

"That's... that's just... that doesn't make any sense..."

"I think you'll find it makes plenty of cents. Usually for the corps."

"I--I don't have any money on me," Fluttershy pointed out. "How am I supposed to pay for all this? What happens if I don't pay?"

"That's what the ledger's for." Reinhild held up her smartboard. "It's an automatic stock investment program that trades and sells based on a heuristic algorithm, basically runs itself. You get a small constant income, most of your debts are paid for before you notice them, and almost nobody can hack it."

"...hack?"

The fox rubbed her snout. "Right, no computers.... Hacking is basically finding a way to manipulate digital data to do whatever you want."

Fluttershy looked at the tablet for a moment, before returning her gaze to Reinhild. "...if everything's about business," she asked, "then why are you helping me?"

Reinhild leaned back into a standing position. "Whatever you did on the bioship, it got rid of that manifestation literally half a second before it could slit my throat. You saved my life, and I'm helping you set up yours--that makes us even, in my mind. Plus I'm getting a stipend for every week I help you out," she added.

"...oh." Fluttershy kicked at the ground, her mane dripping over her eyes.

The fox sighed. "...come on, don't be like that. Just cause I'm getting paid for this doesn't mean I don't actually care. Hell, I jumped at the chance when the chief offered. And not just because of the money."

Hopeful eyes looked up at her. "Really?"

"Yeah. I figured you could use a familiar face while you got used to all this."

"Oh." Fluttershy glanced away. "That's... nice, I guess."

"Sure is!" Reinhild tapped a few final things on her smartboard. "And... done. Huh, that was a lot less tedious than I thought it would be." She flipped the thing around. "Now all we need is an eyescan and a handprint. Or hoofprint, in your case."

The pegasus looked at the collection of runes in front of her for a moment. "...I can't read any of this."

"What, seriously?" Reinhild looked at the smartboard herself. "Is the font too small or something?"

"No, I mean... I can't read that language," Fluttershy explained. "It's not Equestrian."

"...right, simulation. A conlang would make sense if they wanted to control you completely..." Reinhild snapped her fingers. "It's decided. Your very first purchase is going to be a neuroplex." She shook her head. "Because I have no idea how to teach somebody to read english..."





"So, a neuroplex is some sort of learning tool, I take it?" Twilight asked.

Fluttershy opened her mouth to reply... then paused, looking at her leg again.

"Fluttershy?" Rarity raised a hoof. "Is... everything alright?"

"...You know, maybe I should just skip ahead to when Reinhild took me to her apartment." The yellow pony smiled faintly. "Neuroplexes aren't really that important, it's just a thing. It's not that important."

Twilight sighed reluctantly. "Well, if you're sure--"

"Whoa, time out!" Rainbow gave the alicorn a look. "You mean you're not interested in some new learning tool all of the sudden?"

"Well, I mean, if she doesn't want to talk about it--"

"You're Twilight Sparkle, egghead extraordinaire! You won a medal in your first race because you read about racing! You became a freaking alicorn when you solved some old spell! You've memorized I don't know how many books on science and stuff!" Rainbow flung her hooves in the air. "I thought you of all ponies would be interested in this!"

Fluttershy coughed. "Actually... that's kind of the reason I didn't want to talk about it."

The purple alicorn frowned. "What?"

"It's not so much that I'm uncomfortable with the neuroplex as..." Fluttershy shifted, awkwardly. "Well... as the thought that you, Twilight, might be a touch too comfortable with the concept."

"OOOOooooo," Pinkie Pie breathed. "Twilight tempted by technology totally transported from territory not traveled to terrible and terrific tendencies? Now you HAVE to tell us what a neuroplex is!"

Fluttershy glanced from Pinkie to Twilight. Her eyes roved over Rainbow and Applejack, both trying to hide mischievous grins, and over to where Rarity was rolling her eyes.

"Well, when you put it like that," she quipped, "I guess I have no choice."

Twilight's ears perked. Rainbow chuckled.

"A neuroplex," Fluttershy began, "is a device that reads and reacts to the brainwaves of the recipient, projecting images and information onto their cornea as they sleep. It's a quick way to pick up new knowledge without having to go to an actual class--although there's obviously a difference between 'knowing' something and 'having experience' with something."

The alicorn was writing constantly in her notepad. "Wow. So how does a neuroplex manage to bypass the eyelid while you sleep?"

Fluttershy coughed. "Actually... this is the part I thought you'd be too comfortable with." She pointed a hoof at her face. "I think it's pretty clear my left eye was replaced--the scars and all--but if you look at my right eye... you see how it's grayer than it used to be? The neuroplex is actually mounted to the inner surface of my iris."

Twilight blinked. She peered over her notepad with a frown. "So... let me get this straight. In order for you to have a neuroplex..."





"...you want to cut open my eye?!"

"Zere vill be a zenzory deading vield on it durin ze whole zurgery," the six-armed gecko vector assured her. "You von't veel a zing."

"That--that's not the point!" Fluttershy protested. "You want to cut open my eye!"

"It's not that big of a deal," Reinhild commented, looking up from her smartboard. "I mean, it's not as simple as a hand, but it's not like you're getting a neural connectivity suite or anything. Most people don't even consider the nueroplex a real implant."

Fluttershy stared at her. "...Reinhild, this doctor is asking me to subject myself to radical surgery for what amounts to, basically, a minor convenience. I could probably find somepony--er, somevector who would be willing to teach me english, even if they wanted to be paid. This isn't even a life threatening issue--this is literally asking me to change my body for no other reason than to make my life easier!"

"Yeah. So?"

The pegasus gaped at her. "...so? I--I can't even--why are you taking this so casually?!"

"Perzonalized zurgical augmentation iz quite commonplace in our zociety," the gecko explained gently. "After all, it iz our bodiez, zo vy not chooze to improve upon zem?"

"You saw the chief's antlers, right?" Reinhild gestured over her head. "Completely holographic. Had them cut off and replaced so he would stop getting caught in doorways."

"And you do not zink zat I vaz born wiv four extra armz, do you?"

"Hell, I had my tail removed during my secondary schooling."

Fluttershy blinked, leaning to look behind the fox. "Um... but you still have a tail."

"Yeah, I was born with two. Great for getting laid, but when I joined the IRPF I wanted to be taken seriously." Reinhild shrugged. "Look, the point is that there's nothing to worry about, this is completely normal, and if you really want I can get you a tutor but that's way expensive and would be coming out of your own ledger. This is a one-time payment of a hundred creds, and you can get that paid off fast."

The pegasus looked from the fox to the gecko, her wings curling and uncurling fretfully. "I... can't believe how casual you are about this. I mean, you're asking me to just... be altered, with no concern about how much this changes."

"Change is the only constant in the universe. So why not make it a change for the better?"

Fluttershy stared at Reinhild.

She shrugged. "I can quote ancient philosophers like anybody else."

After a moment, the pegasus looked at the innocuous device standing in the middle of the room. It looked very much like one of the coin operated tower viewers from Manehattan, if the tower viewer had a squarish profile and was made of black plastic and had clamps around the eyeholes and various small lights on its surface.

"...are you sure I'll be okay?"

"Abzoluty," the gecko assured her. "I have performed ziz operation zouzandz of timez. And it vill only take a minute.

"...okay." Fluttershy took a deep breath... and stepped toward the black device.
> Fortvna, Bonvm Et Malvm
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	"Whoa, time out!" Rainbow Dash shoved the spa pony massaging her flank away. "You let them cut open your eye?!"

"It was a little strange, but it seemed like it was a good idea at the time--"

"That's--Fluttershy!" Dash hovered into the air. "You don't just--altering your--this is your body! How could you do that to yourself?!"

The yellow pony smiled broadly, her chilling gaze meeting Rainbow's. "You know, a Whisper clawed my other eye out. My leg got torn off in a pirate attack. And hey, my wings were cut off and vivisected right in front of me."

Rainbow paled.

"Right in front of me," Fluttershy repeated. Her smile tightened. "Did you know there's a vein near the base of your wing that feeds blood to all your inner feathers? I sure didn't!"

"Fluttershy..." Rarity whispered.

She blinked, ripping her gaze away from Rainbow and looking over the horrified, worried expressions of her other friends. She let her ears droop with a sigh, rubbing her forehead.

"I... I'm sorry, Dash, you... I shouldn't be mad at you. But..." She looked back at the pegasus. "You have to understand, from my perspective I've been gone for longer than a year. I've... been through some... intense stuff. I... broke. A lot. I always picked myself up, but..." She shook her head. "The point is that I've changed, Dash. I've changed and... and this is part of me, now. I don't... I want to be back home, I want to tend to my animal friends and just, you know, go back to being the hermit I used to be, but...."

She rose her metal hoof.

"I can't forget what I've seen. Or where I've been. I... Maybe I've been hiding how much I've hurt, trying to be the old Fluttershy, and I can't say if that was for your benefit or for me. But... maybe I shouldn't have."

Rainbow took a breath, lowering to the ground. "...I should be the one saying sorry. I mean, I... Look, I'm uncomfortable with, you know, ponies who change how they look or things about them. Because, well... I'm awesome, and it's all natural. And the idea that somebody could become more awesome, or more pretty, or more anything just by slapping on some makeup--or by getting their eye cut open and putting in a magical miniature dream library thing--I... that's..." She shook her head. "I mean, I'm not blaming you, I'm not saying you're suddenly evil or anything like that. But it's just... if you can suddenly become better by just paying for a change, where does that put me?"

Fluttershy rolled her eyes with a small smile. "I can see where you're coming from, but you're starting to sound like a Cog. Don't worry, even with augmentation surgery nobody has managed to figure out how to break the sound barrier under their own power. You're still pretty awesome."

"Really? Uh, I mean, yeah. Obviously." Dash puffed up her chest. "Like I said, pure concentrated natural awesomeness right here."

"So..." Applejack paused. "Um."

The yellow pegasus gave her a look. "Yes?"

"...Ah can get ya needed replacement parts after... ya know, all that." She rubbed the back of her head. "But... did you... get any other sort of boosts that ya, um, didn't need? Anything like that nueroplexer thing?"

Fluttershy looked at her for a long moment.

"...A few," she admitted. "But I think I'll explain why when I get to that. Is that alright?"

"Yeah, that's fine. Just want to know how much ya changed, is all."

"A lot." Fluttershy nodded, settling back down as the spa ponies continued their treatment. "A lot happened. I mean, it didn't really hit me until Reinhild took me back to her apartment, but..."





"And here we are," Reinhild proclaimed, gesturing with an arm. "Home sweet home. I can have the nanofab make you nighter, or you can sleep on the couch until we get you a more permanent bed."

Fluttershy stepped in, looking around. "Um... nanofab?"

"Nanofabricator. Comes standard with the apartment." The fox stepped by her, gesturing to a small slot in the wall. "There are bigger ones in the factories and buyspots, these ones are really only good for disposables, like dishes and nighters--everything that comes out of it is meant to disintegrate in a day or two."

The pegasus shuddered. "I'm... okay with the couch."

"Alrighty." 

Fluttershy nodded vaguely, staring at the wall for a moment.

"...this is really happening, isn't it?"

Reinhild turned to her. "What is?"

"This. Me... here. Just this morning I was tending to my animal friends, and watering the garden and... I was thinking it was nice for Dash to take Scootaloo to the Sisterhooves Social... and then suddenly the ship, and then I woke up in that.... cell..." Fluttershy ruffled her feathers. "I'm on an alien world, and... and I don't know how to get home." Water began to fill her eyes. "I don't know if I even can."

The fox winced, folding her ears back. "I... can you just... Mrrrrngh. Look, Fluttershy, this world isn't as alien as you might think. I mean, just because you're simulation-born doesn't mean you're not a vector. Everybody here has the same genetic code, we just also have... tech." She shrugged, flicking her smartboard onto what looked like a kitchen counter. "Look, if it makes you feel any better, I'll set up a contract for spacers to locate the Equestria grotto--it's better than nothing, right?"

"...that would be nice," Fluttershy murmured, slinking onto the couch. "...Are you... really sure that Equestria is... fake?"

"Not fake. Simulated. A lot of reality is what we decide it is." Reinhild tapped the wall--a complex pattern radiated from her fingertip, various runes grouping into segments and pages. She looked them over and gave a low groan. "Oh for the love of--!"

Fluttershy stared at the strange writing that had appeared out of seemingly nowhere. "Is... this like the lightshow?"

"Wha--oh." Reinhild pulled her finger off the wall, and the runes vanished. "Not exactly. Almost everything we make our homes out of is a smart surface--incorporated circuits and micro projectors. They connect to the cloud, and we access that with our toggles." She indicated a small coin-like object between her fingers. "So, yeah, there are ads and all, but it's not nearly as bad as the lightshow. Think of it like... I don't know, a personal virtual office."

"That.... sounds useful."

"It's basically a necessity these days. We've got to get you a toggle..." The fox glanced at her, quirking an eyebrow. "Scratch that, you don't have any fingers, you're going to need a zipchip."

Fluttershy bit her lip. "...okay. If you say so..."

Reinhild looked at her for a few moments... before walking over and sitting down next to her. "So... I'm not exactly good with the whole emotional sympathy thing. I'm just letting you know that ahead of time. But I'm also going to say... that I'm here to listen if you have any questions or... worries, or anything."

"I don't mean to be a bother." Fluttershy folded her ears back, looking at her hooves.

"You'd only be a bother if you didn't do anything to make yourself useful," the fox replied. "And knowing about the world you're living in makes you useful, so you should never be afraid to ask me anything."

"...do you think I'll ever make it back home?"

The question prompted no reply, only silence.

Fluttershy sniffed. "I live a small ways out of Ponyville. My animal friends, they... they're smart, they'll know something's wrong... Angel will probably go into town to get help, but I don't know if even Twilight would be able to figure out what happened to me. And... and my family, they live in Cloudsdale, and.... I visit them, sometimes, but we don't talk much--they wouldn't know until my friends told them, and... I didn't even get to say goodbye, Reinhild, I didn't even know all this was going to happen, and--"

"It's going to be okay." The fox wrapped an arm around her neck. "I promise, it'll be okay."





The spa was quiet for a few moments.

"Reinhild really helped me those first few days," Fluttershy murmured. "She wasn't... exactly good at the people thing, but she explained... a lot about how that world worked, how... well, how things were bought, and made, and shuttled around. The nueroplex helped, of course. She was the one who convinced me to get that in the first place, though, so it counts toward her." She chuckled. "Also the one to figure out I needed superfood after I emptied her fridge the first time--I didn't know why I was so hungry, she chalked it up to something to do with the stunt I pulled on the ship."

"Fluttershy." Twilight put down her notepad. "I'm... so sorry you had to go through that."

"It was pretty horrible," the yellow pony admitted. "I mean, nothing bad happened--well, nothing worse then what had already happened, but being thrust into a whole new world? I guess you understand what that's like, going through that mirror. It was... overwhelming, in its own way. Not necessarily bad, they were all very friendly in their own way, just... different. Things that I thought I recognized, things that looked familiar, they... turned out to be just slightly different... it all built up."

Pinkie Pie stood up, walking over to her. "I am going to hug you until the bad feelings go away."

"Pinkie--"

"HUGS!"

Fluttershy let out a meep as a pair of pink forelegs wrapped tightly around her barrel. "It's okay Pinkie! I'm not sad anymore! It's in the past!"

"Then this will make me less sad!"

Lotus cleared her throat. "Miss Pie, while I appreciate your intentions, ze fact is I cannot give Fluttershy a proper massage while you are, how do we say, ensaring her?"

"Embracing," Twilight corrected absently.

"Ah, yes. Zis might actually reverse some of my progress," she added. "So, if you don't mind..."

Pinkie Pie reluctantly released Fluttershy. "Ah, phooey. I am still sad that sad things happened. Super sad."

"Well, good things happened too. Like... oh! When I told Reinhild about my special talent, she found me a job with the E.M.L.A. ground crews."

"Emily ground crews?" Twilight asked. "What's... that, exactly?"

"Environmental Monitoring and Logistics Administration. They're the group technically in charge of making sure the forests and plains stay stable, but they're a joint subsidiary of MarsCo and Progenitus." She noticed the look of confusion on her friend's faces. "Right... we don't have megacorps in Equestria..."

After a moment, she shook her head. "Well, that's not important right now. The point is, I got to go out and meet some new animals..."





Fluttershy fidgeted her wings, glancing around at the vectors sitting in the transport as she adjusted the camo shirt and saddlebags she was wearing. One of them, a tiger, leaned forward and looked her over. She shied away a touch--there wasn't much room in the passenger chamber, but there was just enough to back off.

"...Huh. You a blip?"

"Um." Fluttershy tilted her head. "I'm sorry, what... do you mean by that?"

"Nothing against blips," the tiger assured her, holding up a hand. "Just curious."

The pegasus kicked at the metal plating nervously, trying to process the question. It was clear enough that whatever blips were, they were common enough to not need explanation, but that he felt a need to assure her he had nothing against them... For a moment she wished she had taken up Reinhild's offer of accompaniment.

Then she took a breath and looked him in the eyes. "Well, um... If it doesn't really matter, there's no need for me to answer that, is there?"

The tiger leaned back. "Right, right. Sorry, didn't mean to offend. You're just pretty unique looking. I guess you get that question all the time, huh?"

"Not really, actually."

"Oh, geeze... Look, I guess we got off on the wrong foot." He stuck his hand out. "My name's Suchart Kearney."

She placed her hoof in it with a small smile. "I'm Fluttershy."

"...That's an... interesting name," Suchart mused. "Where are you from?"

"Equestria."

"No, I meant... what megacorp, who gave you your primary?"

Fluttershy took a bit to process the question, before finally giving out a small chuckle. "Oh! I'm self-taught. Equestria is a little distant from the corps." Her ears flattened. "I mean... I think it is."

"Oh." Suchart tilted his head. "That's... interesting." He looked around awkwardly for a moment or two. "Oh, look, landing light. Brace yourself."

The pegasus was almost about to ask what he meant when the floor beneath them jolted, causing her to let out a small squeak.

Suchart chuckled as he undid his restraints. "Not a fan of flying?"

"I prefer to use my own wings," Fluttershy replied, glancing out the unfolding boarding ramp. "I'm not an athlete, but they're there for a reason."

"...You can actually fly with those things?"

"Yes...?"

"But they're so small..."

Fluttershy trotted out of the plane. "Well, I wasn't the best flyer at flight camp, I'll admit, but I'm good enough to get around. And I was even on the Ponyville team for the Equestria games... well, really I was there to fill out the numbers, Rainbow was the one that carried the team."

"Rainbow?"

"Rainbow Dash, one of my old friends..." The pegasus stopped, breathing in the fresh air as she took in the tall trees and various flower patches around her. "Oh, my. It's so good to be out of the city... Do you all mind if I take a look around?"

"Our job is to check the local animal population," Suchart reminded her, fingering a red and white ball on his belt.

"Oh, I can start on that easily enough." Fluttershy smiled fondly. "Talking with animals is my special talent."

"....right." The tiger tapped the ball and tossed it in the middle of the clearing; it opened with a hiss and started pouring... something out onto the grass. "Well, just remember to check back in ten minutes. Think we'll have camp set up by then."

"Ten minutes. Okay." She nodded, hovering into the air and fluttering away. "I'll be back soon!"





"The rest of the week was basically just note-taking; talking with the animals, checking on their diseases, recording details. Because they didn't have magic, the vectors were surprised at how easily I handled the creatures around them." Fluttershy giggled. "Honestly, half the stuff they brought didn't even need to get used, because I would just lead a deer or a bear into camp for a scan. They were constantly checking to make sure I hadn't actually convinced some lateral or other to play the part--the tech-gal continually tried to figure out how I was screwing with her sensors, I don't think she was ever convinced I wasn't."

Rainbow chuckled. "Yeah, I know I could never pull off what you do with the animals. Remember that time they stuck me in a cauldron?"

"Oh yes. I did get them to apologize, though."

"I know, I know. Still." Rainbow's ears went a bit flat. "It's... good to know it wasn't all bad."

Fluttershy took a moment to examine her. "...This wasn't your fault, Dash. This was all because of the Tether, and you had nothing to do with that. You couldn't have stopped it even if you were around when it happened."

"Well, still..." Rainbow flared her wings. "If I was with you, maybe things would be easier, somehow."

"There's no way to know," the yellow pony replied. "Best not to dwell on it."

The room was quiet for a few moments.

"...so, anyway, I got paid for doing that. And immediately used all that money to pay off the debts I'd gotten during that first week. Suchart even put in a good word for me with Progenitus."

"Progenitus?" Rarity tilted her head. "You've mentioned that before. What is it?"

"Oh, Progenitus is one of the top megacorps..." Fluttershy paused, looking around. "...I should explain what a megacorp is. Oh, how do I put this... Actually, Rarity, you own the Carousel Boutique and Canterlot Carousel, right?"

"Well, yes, to some degree. Honestly, Canterlot Carousel is more a joint arrangement between me and Sassy Saddles. She does most of the actual saleswork, I just drop by every so often to update the dresses."

"She's your employee, but she's also the leader of her own business, which she owns."

"Yes. Are you saying megacorps are some sort of... business arrangement?"

"Very much so. Sassy works for you, but she runs the business her way. Multiply that sort of thing by... a population of a few billion per four inhabited planetoids, and another billion spread out among starships, independent stations, smaller moonbases and inhabited asteroids, and... basically, everyone is working for somebody. The ledger trades stocks automatically, just to keep everyone in the system, but it's all a web of employment and employers, contracts and agreements..."

Rarity blinked. "I... can see why everything is about business over there. Has it always been that way?"

"Yes, actually. MarsCo was a corporate entity when it was founded, essentially a group of businessmen who wanted to ensure they had paying customers. And since they were on another planet, it was much easier to just ignore the governments of Earth... especially after they were killed off. The idea that everything is bought and sold is intrinsic in Vector culture--and I do mean everything. You can sell a few apples to buy a dress, you can auction off a home and procure a starship, you can cancel a few dozen contracts with your employees to free up enough creds to own a city, you can give your life to purchase morality."

Fluttershy looked at her hooves. "Everything has a price. The corps hand out free food and shelter, but it's basic, survival. If you want to live... you've got to pay." She sighed. "And sometimes, that means making others pay for you."





Fluttershy couldn't help but stare in nervous awe as the machine in front of her whirred and chirped, levered arms whisking thin bands back and forth in rapid procession. She'd known this would happen, intellectually--her time with the nueroplex had brought her up to speed on the concept of three-dimensional printing, and honestly it wasn't too far off the occasional summoning spell Twilight did conceptually. But she had put in an order for food--specialized food, at that--and here, this device was going to make a week's worth in ten minute's time. With no magic behind it.

And everyone around her treated this as normal.

And everyone around her treated it as a business.

Nevermind that she had made the order twenty feet away and been directed to the machine by a clipped mechanical voice. Nevermind that what she had requested was usually only eaten by individuals who had willingly let themselves become bulwarks of muscle. Nevermind that the people themselves were the result of artificial creation...

Things like this. Wonders like this, considered normal enough that Reinhild had trusted her, after only two weeks, to go grocery shopping on her own, and not stare in amazement.

And here she was, staring in amazement.

The machine chimed finished, and Fluttershy shook herself, taking a moment to settle back into reality. She quickly moved the assembled meal into her saddlebags, deciding to trot back to the apartment; the vectors gave her odd looks whenever she hovered into the air, almost as if she herself was the strange one, and she didn't quite like the attention. Besides, it gave her a chance to take in the cityscape, look around at the various animal people as they went about their lives, and... simply consider this society. She didn't want to stay--she wanted to go home, eventually, but for the moment she was here, and for the moment, she had to make do.

Distracted as she was by the world around her, Fluttershy missed the figure rushing out of the alleyway behind her, and was taken by complete surprise when a furred arm wrapped around her barrel and cold metal clicked against her head.

"Don't scream," a voice hissed in her ear. "Don't make any sudden movements. If you want to get out of this alive, you do exactly what I say."

The pegasus gulped, trying to twist her neck around--and felt the grip on her barrel tighten. Footsteps sounded from behind her, and her captor whirled to face the newcomer--a shaggy goat-faced biped who froze as soon as he saw the situation.

"Give me the codes," the voice growled. "Or yellow here gets a new hole in her head."

The goat tilted his head warily. "I don't have them."

"Give me the fucking codes!"

"I don't have the codes! I was hired to capture you, nobody told me why!"

Fluttershy's heart was pounding as she struggled against her captor's grip, trying to find some way to push out--all for naught, as the furry arm simply pressed tighter against her. "Well, I guess you're going to have to call up your contractor," the voice snarled. "Because otherwise--"

And suddenly her world was pain. Noise reverberating in her right ear, a sudden ripping sting followed by agony in the fold of flesh. She barely registered that the voice was still talking over the ringing she heard, all she saw was the goat holding up his hands warily.

But the same pain that deafened her sharpened her focus, gave her awareness of her situation, pumped her body full of adrenaline. One moment she was gripped tight and the next--the next the mongoose was pinned beneath her as she slapped his weapon into the air, and she wasn't exactly sure what had happened but as she looked into his face she realized he didn't either.

As Fluttershy's hearing began to return, she heard the goat saying something, the tone of his voice wary and warning. She couldn't quite make out the individual words, focused as she was on the mongoose; her eyes formed into an intense glower, one she had used on dragons, cockatrices, and fruit bats alike.

"I think we're done fighting... aren't we?"

The mongoose gulped, nodding once.

"Good." She stepped off of him taking a breath, and turned to the goat. "Could you, um...?"

"...what I came to do anyway." The goat stepped forward, pulling a set of hoofcuffs--handcuffs, she reminded herself, handcuffs--from his belt and clicking them around the mongoose's wrist. "Now you can either come with me to the CompuMax outlet or I can let the IRPF handle you. Your choice."

The mongoose looked from him to Fluttershy. "...I'll take my chances with CompuMax."

"Good choice." The goat glanced at the pegasus. "Uh... thanks for the help, sorry you got caught up in this. You've, uh, got a missing chunk of your ear there, you know?"

Fluttershy's hoof traveled up to the side of her head, feeling the ragged flesh; she pulled it back, taking in the red stain on it. "Oh. I... I should be fine, it's not... it looks worse then it is."

"If you're sure." The goat shrugged, giving her a last look, before shoving the mongoose forward. "Come on, buddy, let's go."

The pegasus looked after them as they walked away for a moment or two. She set about gathering her groceries, her trembling hooves putting them gently back into her saddlebags, and turned to head back toward the apartment.

Her eyes fell on the mongoose's weapon, still resting on the street. Almost without realizing, she slowly approached it, looking it over with large, dewy eyes.

After a moment, Fluttershy sat down, her breath heaving in and out. "Oh sweet Celestia--"

Nothing like that had happened before. She'd been in danger plenty of times, but nothing so intimately impersonal--she had always been up against threats to Equestria or, sometimes, ponies or animals that were upset with her for some reason--she'd never been threatened just because she was conveniently present.

And yet here, not an inch away, was a device that had torn her ear off just because somebody else couldn't deliver what somebody else wanted....

Fluttershy took a deep breath, slowly letting it out. "I am safe. I am alive. I can... get better." With a faint twitch of her wings she stood, sparing the weapon one last look. "I can... get better. I will get better."

Then, softly, she continued on her way.
> Cvm Vetvs Amicita Capit
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	Fluttershy took a long, slow breath, looking around the spa room. Not another pony was moving--not even Lotus and her staff. They were all staring at her, wide-eyed.

"...I... think that's enough for today," she finally managed.

"What?" Rainbow Dash slid off her table. "You just told us part of your ear was torn off when you were taken hostage, and--"

"I've been dumping a lot on you, without much context. And it's not all... it's not all going to be nice." She stepped off her own spa table. "Besides, I need to check in on my animal friends, and... and I have so many questions for you as well, I have so much to catch up on--have you make it onto the Wonderbolts roster yet? What was the CMC's last crusade like? Did I miss any world-threatening adventures? And what about Discord, and my family, and--"

"Alright!" Rainbow held up a hoof. "Alright, alright, I get it. You've got a point..." She sighed. "I just... I want to know all of what happened to you, how you got like that, and--and I want to know you're okay."

"...I will be, Dash. I promise." Fluttershy smiled, taking her bandoleer and turning to Lotus. "Thank you for... allowing all this. I know that it must have been a little off-putting--"

"Non, Fluttershy, zis is ze place ponies come to rejuvenate, and you seem to have needed zat quite a bit." Lotus hesitated for a brief moment, before wrapping a foreleg around her. "It is good to see you again, zough."

"Heh." Fluttershy wrapped her own foreleg around the spa pony. "I think me and Rarity will be starting up our weekly spa dates... not next week, maybe the week after."

"I shall look forward to it."

Twilight cleared her throat. "So... we start this up again tommorrow, at the castle?"

"OOOOOO!" Pinkie hopped up eagerly. "I haven't even thrown you a welcome-back-from-another-world party! I'm going to need to invite everyone--the cusaders, the ponytones, the princesses, your family if I can get their address--"

Rainbow winced. "Yeah, um. I never actually told Flutter's parents she was missing so--"

Fluttershy broke from her hug and gave the other pegasus a flat look. "You kept my family out of the loop?"

"...H-Hey! So! You know that sisterhooves social me and Scoots went to? You'll never guess who Apple Bloom convinced to be her own partner--"

"Rainbow. Dash."

"BIG MAC WORE A DRESS!"

Fluttershy blinked.

"...Big Mac... wore a dress?"

"...Y-Yeah! Called himself cousin Orchid Blossom. I mean, nobody bought it for a second, but he was really fun to watch." Rainbow grinned broadly. "How 'bout I tell you all about it on the way back to the cottage?"

Fluttershy looked at her for a moment. "...Yeah, sure. You can catch me up on everything I missed, and tomorrow I can tell you more about my time on Mars." She gave her a pointed look. "And I expect to see my family at that party, Dash. Zephyr included."

"...Unngh. Fine." Rainbow Dash groaned. "I'll tell 'em you vanished and you're back after I drop you off."

"Thanks, Rainbow. Oh, how's Scootaloo doing, by the way?"

"Heh. Shy, you'll never guess what happened..."

The other ponies watched them trot out of the room, talking amicably between themselves. Finally, Applejack cleared her throat. "Well, Ah think we can all agree... Shy's been through a lot."

"And we don't know the half of it," Rarity pointed out. "She said her leg was torn off by pirates, and her wings..." Her face paled beyond its usual ivory coloration, before she shook herself. "My... my point is, we... might not be entirely equipped to handle the situation. That sort of trauma isn't anything any of us have gone through."

Pinkie Pie's mane went limp with an odd squeak. "Yeah. My usual method might not be best here. Heck, some of my unusual methods might not be good here. I'll need to talk with some ponies."

Twilight sighed, putting down her notepad. "...I'll alert the princesses of Fluttershy's return and condition, but I don't know how long it will take them to find appropriate help. Maybe get some doctors from the hospital to look her over after the party... for the moment, though, the best we can do is be patient and gentle."

Applejack nodded slowly. "Yeah... Ah reckon you're right. Still... wish Ah could do more."





"...and right then, she pulled out a musical triangle, and Applejack went and hit it. I mean--it was a little thing, but it clearly meant so much to the both of them."

Fluttershy smiled. "I can imagine.... our Applejack, childhood friends with the Coloratura?"

"Yeah, it amazed me too. You think you know a pony." Rainbow Dash shrugged. "She's actually super nice in person. Really cares about the foals, and... once we got that manager away from her, she apologized for all that he put Pinkie through."

"That's good..."

Rainbow continued walking for a few moments before realizing that the yellow pony was no longer beside her. She glanced back, seeing the other mare standing on the dusty road. "...Shy?"

"...I've missed so much. The Crusaders finally getting their cutie marks, Shining and Cadence announcing their pregnancy..." Fluttershy looked up. "I mean, I'm half-expecting you to tell me that Rarity found a prince to marry or something."

"No, not yet. You know how it is in Ponyville, Shy... crazy stuff happens all the time."

"I know, but..." Fluttershy kicked the ground with her hoof. "I'm just... I'm just wondering if I'll be able to fit back in if--"

"Hey." Rainbow walked back, putting a hoof on her shoulder. "It'll be weird, sure, but you know what? We're going to work through it. All of us. Together. I promise, in a few weeks, it'll be like you never left."

Fluttershy half smiled. "You sure about that?"

"Abso-posi-lutely. Look at what happened with me and Tank after he was done hibernating--after a few days we were back in our old routine, and everything was good again."

"You practically used him as a second pillow for three weeks straight."

"Wha--!" Rainbow sputtered, backing off. "No I didn't! Who told you that?!"

Fluttershy's expression grew sly. "I can talk to animals, remember?"

"...okay, fine. So I cuddled the guy a few nights." Rainbow narrowed her eyes. "You can't ever tell anypony, got it?"

"Yes, yes, your tough-mare reputation is safe with me, I promise." Fluttershy rolled her eyes. "I guess some things never change."

"Nope. I'm awesome, you're good with animals, and we're fillyhood friends."

"Hmm." Fluttershy paused. "Hey Dash?"

"Yeah?"

"I've never really considered this before but, um..." she gestured at herself. "As a friend, seeing all... this, do you think I'm dateable?"

Rainbow blinked. "Er... what?"

"I'm not asking you to date me," Fluttershy clarified. "I'm asking if you think anypony would date me, seeing as I'm missing a leg and--"

"Oh! Um. Well, sure!" The blue pony chuckled awkwardly. "The leg's actually pretty cool looking, and it's not nearly as bad as the eye--"

She cut herself off at Fluttershy's raising eyebrow.

"--I, I mean, the eye looks awesome too, very techy, but the scars are--uh, that is, any pony that wanted to date you would probably be the kind that, uh, didn't want to upset you--because they respected you! Not because they were afraid of you, I mean--Oh, geeze--"

Rainbow Dash noticed the corners of Fluttershy's lips twitching. "...Wait. Are you... are you messing with me?"

"Maaaaaaaybe," Fluttershy replied, trotting down the road.

"Huh." Rainbow followed after her. "You know, you never did that before. I mean, maybe you got a little snarky at times, but I never took you as one to pull a prank."

Fluttershy paused. "...Huh. You know... I think you're right."

"It's not a bad thing," Rainbow assured her. "It's... different, though."

"Yeah. I guess it is."

The two of them trotted on in silence.

"...you still a virgin?"

Fluttershy gave an exasperated sigh. "Yes, Dash, I'm still a virgin."

"Oh good. Cause I thought, with that dating joke and all, you might have--"

"Yeah, no. Aside from physiological incompatibility, the way Vector culture approaches sex and romance is just too blatant for my tastes. And really, do you want me to tell you my first time was with an alien shark?"

Rainbow Dash made a face. "Good point. Er. I mean, if you two loved each other I'd be totally cool with it but I'd also be weirded out." She paused. "Actually, you being so open about it is kind of weirding me out."

"The whole shy thing kinda dropped after the fifth time I was ambushed. It helps to be able to call for help, you know?"

"...I guess. Um." Rainbow rubbed the back of her head. "I just... your name is Fluttershy, you know? Outside your family you've always had issues being... casual."

Fluttershy was quiet for a moment or two.

"...am I really that different? Did I really change that much?"

"...I don't know, Flutters. But... you know, I'm not sure I care." Rainbow smirked. "Far as I'm concerned, you're my friend, no matter how much you've changed. I just have to get used to the new you, is all."

"Well... I'm happy you're willing to try." Fluttershy smiled at her gently. "Really. And it is... good to be back."

Rainbow nodded. "Yeah. Well!" She coughed, pointing behind the other pony. "There's your cottage. You... probably have animals to check on and calm down and... they're going to mob you and give you animal hugs or whatever."

"They might," Fluttershy allowed. "And you have to go to Cloudsdale to get my family ready for their first ever Pinkie Pie party."

"...You're holding me to that."

"You're the one that kept them out of the loop. You should be the one to tell them." The yellow pony smirked slyly. "And I'm sure my little brother will be so happy I came back that he'll give you a nice. Big. Hug."

She turned around, humming happily as she trotted into her home, leaving Rainbow staring after her.

After a moment, the pegasus sighed. "I guess a prank-pulling Fluttershy isn't the weirdest thing I've ever seen..."





"Mmmmrngh." A yellow ear twitched as the pony under the blanket rolled onto her stomach. "Grmph. Alright, I'm up, I'm up, no need to shout."

Fluttershy yawned wide, stretching her four legs out before grumbling and kicking the blanket off her body. She took a moment to look around her room--her room, one she hadn't seen in so long... and a faint smile formed on her lips.

Her head tilted for a moment.

"...We check on the nocturnal animals first. Should be just getting to bed right now." Her hooves hit the floor, almost automatically heading for the door. "Then breakfast, take a shower, then we look over the little animals waking up."

She rolled her eyes as she trotted down the stairs.

A few owls were fluttering onto their roosts, quietly hooting as they took their positions. Fluttershy glanced at them--looked closer. "Hello, friends. It's... been a while. How have you handled things?"

One or two looked at her, hooting curiously.

She took a glance at the pair of rods on her back. "...Somebody stole my wings, and somebody else made me replacements." She sighed. "The same thing happened with my leg, actually... I'm sure that Angel will tell you about it, I'll take him along to the castle so he can listen in while I tell my friends that story."

The owls seemed to be satisfied by that. One by one, they coughed their pellets into the shared bowel Fluttershy had made for them, before nestling into the nooks and crannies of the cottage. A few raccoons, a large number of mice, and one particularly curmudgeonly badger skittered across the floor, taking roost in their own hidden places. Many of them looked at her, a few sending chitters and welcomes back, but despite their curious stares they kept their questions to themselves. 

It was a courtesy that both pleased and saddened her.

With a sigh, Fluttershy trotted into her kitchen, opening a pantry and pulling out a small tube of oats. A faint smile hit her face as she poured them into a bowl, moving it over to her table and taking a deep breath. "Genuine Equestrian oats. It's the little things, isn't it?"

Her ear flicked again.

She gave a small snort. "I'll get back to more complex cooking after I've settled in. Quick meal, for the moment." Her muzzle bent down, and with almost bestial efficiency the bowl was soon emptied. The pegasus nodded, moving the bowl to the sink, before trotting back up the stairs and entering the bathroom. "Hmm. Ceiling is different..."

Her hoof went to the faucet, twisting it on--

Fluttershy sagged. "Is now really the time?"

The hot water splattered against her back as she stepped into the stall, closing the door behind her.

"Look, I know you're getting antsy," she groused as she grabbed the bar of soap, "but you knew going in--"

Her ear twitched as she started up a froth on her forelegs.

"It doesn't change anything. I just need to speed up the plan a bit."

The rods on Fluttershy's back snapped up and she started scrubbing her withers.

"Then recalculate the parameters. I shouldn't have to spell this out."

She lathered up some suds on her back, pushing them across her coat.

"I'll talk to Twilight about it today, I promise."

Her hooves moved to her scarred haunches, slathering them with soap.

"That's an easy enough fix, I'll leave a note."

Reaching into the kit strapped to her thigh, Fluttershy pulled out an odd device, switched it on, and ran it along her mechanical leg.

"Oh don't worry, I can handle Discord."

The rods on her back snapped flat, and she moved the device along each of them before putting it back in its place.

"...no, not yet. I don't think they're ready for it. But... maybe tomorrow. Maybe."

Grabbing the shampoo bottle, the pegasus squirted its contents into her mane and tail.

"It'll all work out, okay? Trust me. I know what I'm doing."

Her pink locks, drenched in soap and water, glistened as she stepped out and reached for a towel.

"And take notes, will you? Because today you're going to see how ponies really welcome guests."





"...so we absolutely must not draw attention to her leg, or her wings, unless she herself points them out."

"Ah know, Rares, Ah ain't a fool."

"And we don't make any sudden motions or startling noises. That could trigger some sort of reaction, the book said."

"Yep, Ah could see that happening."

"And above all else, we treat her like a pony. We make sure she knows she's home, and she's safe--"

An orange hoof covered a white muzzle. "Look. Let me sum this up fer ya. Fluttershy's jumpy and unsure. So we be calm and friendly. That about cover it?"

Rarity rolled her eyes, moving the hoof down. "Yes, in essence, but you must understand--"

"Ah get it, really. It takes time ta recover, and it ain't going ta go away completely forever. Ya don't have ta overcomplicate things, Rares."

The unicorn sighed. "I suppose I am letting my perfectionist tendencies override my common sense just a tad..."

"Yeah, you do tend to get intensely focused on things that are important to ya." Applejack smiled. "Won't begrudge ya that."

"Oh, hello!" Fluttershy waved as she walked down the road. "Good to see you two! Let me guess, you're my escort to the castle?"

Applejack blinked. "Er, yeah. We kinda thought we'd need ta pick you up from the cottage, so--"

"Well, thank you for your concern. Really, though, I'm..." Fluttershy considered. "Hmm. Let's call it eighty-five percent fine?"

Rarity winced. "So that's fifteen percent not fine?"

"Six percent worried about how ponies will react to my appearance, five percent traumatized by horrific experiences, and four percent excited to finally be home."

Applejack quirked an eyebrow as the three of them started walking. "Only four percent?"

"It still hasn't quite sunk in," Fluttershy admitted. "It's an abrupt change--one I've been working toward for more then a year, but even with that I... I keep saying 'I'm home' and it feels like it's not complete. Like, there's something missing."

"Well, I don't know if a Pinkie Pie party will solve that," Rarity mused, "but it certainly couldn't hurt!"

"Oh, I'm looking forward to it, really. But... how have you two been, anyway? Rainbow tells me the Crusaders finally got their marks?"

Applejack smiled fondly. "Yep. All at tha same time, can ya believe it?"

"I have to say, that was quite the day," Rarity agreed. "Everyone in Ponyville was celebrating their cutecenara. Even little Diamond, she... well. She turned over a new leaf, and she's stuck with it."

"Oh, wow." Fluttershy's eyes widened. "I mean Rainbow said it was helping her reform that got them their cutie marks, but... I didn't realize it would last that long. What do their marks look like, anyway? Rainbow never told me."

Applejack and Rarity shared a knowing look. "Weeeeeeeeeell," drawled the farm mare, "you're gonna get a chance ta see fer yerself."

The yellow pony half smiled. "They're going to dogpile me when I walk through the door, aren't they?"

"Don't be so dramatic," admonished the fashionista playfully. "We told them to announce you when you came in."

"And speaking o' entering... here we are." Applejack gestured toward the castle.

"Wow. Really?" Fluttershy blinked. "That... was a surprisingly short walk."

"Well, you did make half of it on your own, and Ponyville is a small town." Rarity cleared her throat. "...Are you ready?"

Fluttershy took a breath. "No time like the present."





"ANOUNCING!" shouted Apple Bloom, her voice echoing into the castle hall.

"The Bearer of Kindness, Tamer of Animals, Rebuker of Cockatrices, Admonisher of Dragons, Befriender of Discord, Heroine of Equestria, and World Champion of the Shush Game!" Sweetie Belle pontificated proudly.

"The One! The Only! FLUUUUUUUUUUUUTTEEEEEEEEEEEEEEERSHYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!" Scootaloo proclaimed.

The castle doors swung open, to much hoof-stamping applause and not too few cheers. It  died down just a bit when the guest of honor stepped in, her metal hoof clacking ominously against the crystal. It almost died as she strode to the center of the atrium, mane drooping over her face. By the time she looked up, the room was entirely silent.

Her eyes roved over the collected population of Ponyville.

And then... she smiled. "You know... it's good to be home."

"PREACH IT SISTER!" Pinkie cried. "Come on everypony, let's party!"

The next few minutes were a bit of a blur. Various ponies headed her way, welcoming her back and giving her gifts. The Mayor offered a brief tax exemption while she got her hooves back under her, something Fluttershy accepted warmly. Her parents and her brother pulled her into a shared, tight hug--Zephyr Breeze was bawling, babbling about how he was so sorry he didn't know what she'd gone through, and she had to very firmly push him off in the end, though she never stopped smiling. Spike had even brought out a list of the things the others had done to keep her house running while she was away, and was in the middle of checking it over with her...

....and then Fluttershy noticed one pony, awkwardly standing to one side while Twilight spoke with her.

Her smile dropped. "Hey, Spike?"

"Huh? What is it Fluttershy?"

"What," she asked in a tone of very forced calm, "is Starlight Glimmer doing here?"
> Svbtilis Terores Cvmvlat
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Spike glanced in the direction she was looking. "Oh. Right, you wouldn't know. Twilight's taken her on as her new student of friendship. See there was this whole thing with the cutie map and time travel and... uh... well, let's just say that in the end Twilight decided it would be better if such a powerful unicorn was shown the ropes on how friendship worked."

Fluttershy quirked an eyebrow. "So... basically, Discord reformation two point oh."

"...Yeah, actually. That's a pretty good way to look at it."

"Hmm. Incidentally, do you have any idea where Discord is?"

"Uh, no. He kinda vanished after you did."

The yellow pony frowned. "Weird... I'll have to check on him." Fluttershy flicked her tail. "If you'll excuse me, Spike, I think I should have a chat with our latest reformed villain."

"Uh, okay." Spike nodded as she walked off. "Just remember, she's still new to the whole friendship thing!"

Fluttershy's ear twitched in acknowledgement, but she was more focused on the pair of purple ponies standing near the stairs. Twilight looked up with a brief smile, which faded as she saw the stern look on her friend's face.

"Um... Fluttershy--"

"Starlight Glimmer."

The unicorn blinked at being so suddenly addressed. "Uh--Hey, there, Fluttershy." She smiled awkwardly. "You... look... different."

Fluttershy's eyes simply remained on Starlight.

"...Um. So..." Starlight rubbed the back of her head. "I... I'm sorry about, you know, what happened with the whole cutie mark thing, and, uh, locking you in a room... and... stuff."

"I hear you did something with time travel."

Twilight winced. "Fluttershy--"

Fluttershy held out a hoof. "I want to hear it from her."

Starlight took a deep breath. "...yes, I modified one of Star Swirl's spells and used the cutie map to... attempt to stop the Sonic Rainboom from ever happening, because I kind of thought that your cutie marks led you to destroy everything I worked for and... I was wrong... I really am sorry."

"Hmm." Fluttershy put down her hoof. "...You're growing your bangs out."

"I... what?"

"Sorry. Your forelock." She gestured at her head. "It's longer."

"Um. Yes. I thought it was time for a..." Starlight paused. "Fluttershy, you're... not going to say anything about the time travel, or the cutie mark thing, or... anything?"

Fluttershy gave her a flat look. "Your cult--and don't deny that it was a cult," she firmly interjected as Starlight opened her mouth, "was at least founded on the ideal of equal opportunity, even if it went about it the entirely wrong way. And as for the time travel thing... I'm friends with a spirit of chaos. A little reality warping isn't enough to faze me. And you seem to have cleaned up after yourself, as far as I can tell." She managed a faint smile. "Frankly, Starlight, if I got caught up on every little thing everybody did that hurt me, I'd probably have moved out of Ponyville long ago."

"So... you're... okay with me?"

"Well, I'm willing to forgive you and give you a chance, if that's what you're asking."

"Oh." Starlight smiled. "That's good."

"Of course," Fluttershy continued, "I've also been through a lot recently and come back with a few extra tricks so..." The rods on her back flicked up and the holographic wings flared out. "...try not to screw up your second chance, okay?"

The unicorn gulped. "Got it."

Twilight looked between them. "...Soooooo! Fluttershy, I have a lot of questions about, you know, everything that happened--"

Fluttershy's lips quirked. "Of course you do."

"--and I was wondering if you'd want to keep telling us about your crazy adventures on... Mars?"

"Not just Mars, but that was where I left off. Actually..." She glanced at the snack table and sighed. "Well, it looks like I'm going to have to stop Angel from hogging all the chopped carrots--again. Why don't I get him, and you and the girls meet me on the upstairs patio?"

"Right now?"

"I mean, after the party has wound down." Fluttershy smiled faintly. "I don't want to kick anyone out of a Pinkie Pie party."

Twilight nodded. "That sounds good--hey!" She rushed into the crowd. "The banners are not for climbing, Pinkie!"

"But they're just so fun to climb!"

Fluttershy chuckled to herself. "Pinkie Pie..."

Starlight smiled. "That pony is an enigma."

"Mmm." She turned to look at her. "Time magic, huh?"

"...yes." The unicorn kicked the ground. "That's... something I did."

"Are you familiar with hyperbolic curvature and cross-quantum threadwork theory?"

Starlight blinked. "Uh... I did study some of that to make the time portal, yeah. Why?"

Fluttershy looked at her for a moment or two.

"...So you know how I disappeared three months ago?"

Starlight Glimmer looked around the party. "I kind of gathered, yes."

"Well, I spent the whole time in another world."

"Really?"

"Mmmhmm." Fluttershy shut off her rods, gesturing for Starlight to walk with her. "You see, when I first arrived I was in a very weird place..."





"...and that's how I got this hole in my ear."

"Oh sweet Celestia," Starlight murmured, closely following Fluttershy as they trotted out onto the large west-ward facing veranda. "That sounds... horrible, really. I don't know how you kept your cool after that."

"Well, to be honest, I focused on getting back to Reinhild's apartment..." The yellow pony put the rabbit on her back down, looking around with a faint smile. "You know, this garden wasn't here when the palace first sprang into being."

"No?"

"No. AJ and I planted it ourselves, when we realized how good the space up here was for it." She ran her hoof against a flower. "Twilight was up in Canterlot, working on the grand equestrian pony summit, and we figured it would be a nice surprise for her to come back to."

"Well..." Starlight smiled awkwardly. "It certainly looks pretty!"

"Yeah."

Silence descended for a moment, Angel Bunny hopping around the bushes as the two of them stood there.

"...Sooooooo." Starlight rubbed the back of her head. "This Reinhild... fox. She sounds... like a grumpy sort."

"Grumpy?" Fluttershy gave an amused snort. "Yeah, she's grumpy, when she's not too busy ripping into you for making a dumb move. She's strict as a ruler and just as smart, and she doesn't really tolerate any jokes." Her smile grew nostalgic. "And despite it all, she's one of the best friends you could possibly have."

"Reminds me of Spitfire," Rainbow Dash quipped, gliding down. "Hey, you haven't gotten past that mongoose attacking you, have you?"

"No, I was just catching Starlight up on what we talked about in the spa."

The blue pegasus shot Starlight a look, earning her a wince and a slight backing up from the unicorn. "Really. Shy, you do know she kinda tried to break time, right?"

"I've been so informed," Fluttershy replied, her tone level.

"Okay. Um. I'm... just saying... are you sure you want her to know about--?"

"I am."

"Okay, your decision." Rainbow gave Starlight a final look. "So... anyway... the girls are wrapping up the party downstairs, and they sent me ahead to make sure you're ready to talk about your cool adventures on Mars.

"Oh, I am." Fluttershy smiled. "In fact, I think I'll get to the part where I lost my eye."

"Really?!" Rainbow grinned--then frowned. "Er--I mean, uh. That sounds terrible. Like really bad."

Silence set down once again, resting as the two of them stared at each other.

"...You think my eye looks cool," Fluttershy stated flatly.

"I think your eye looks cool," Rainbow Dash admitted reluctantly. "But I totally get that losing your eye was a horrible experience and that it wasn't cool at all!" she added quickly.

"Mm, by your own definitions I believe my actions in that situation were cool, awesome, and radical," Fluttershy pointed out.

"...Really?"

"Although yes, losing my eye was very traumatic."

"Oh."

"Can we agree that image-emotional-impact is morally neutral?" proposed the yellow pony.

Rainbow blinked. "Uh..."

"That coolness, awesomeness, and radicalness are neither good nor evil," Fluttershy clarified, "but can be used in the application of good or evil."

"...you know, actually, yeah." Rainbow Dash nodded. "That... kinda makes sense."

The sound of hoofsteps caught their attention, and they turned to the four mares and dragon stepping out onto the patio. Fluttershy couldn't help but chuckle as she saw the foldout lounge chairs that Twilight was levitating. "You always think ahead, don't you?"

"Well, maybe a little. I don't think we all want to stand while you're telling us about... you know." The alicorn set the chairs up, glancing at Starlight. "I'm assuming you... want her in on this?"

"Well, yes. There are certain things I need to talk to you about later, and I suspect Starlight would be able to help." Fluttershy glanced at the mare, who fidgeted at the attention. "I just got done catching her up, actually, at least to the point I was back at the spa."

"Well then." Rarity took up a position in one of the chairs. "Don't leave us in suspense, darling. I'm sure we all want to know what exactly happened to that ruffian."

Fluttershy chuckled dryly. "Never saw him again. But Reinhild certainly got her fur ruffled when I made it back to the apartment..."





Reinhild walked into main room with a grumble, tossing her toggle case on the table as she sagged onto the couch beside Fluttershy.

"...Um." The pegasus held up a hoof. "So--"

"Out of our jurisdiction," she replied with a grumble. "The hostage situation is trumped by corporate sabotage. Apparently he tried to rig an MV into a CC fabricator, or whatever."

Fluttershy frowned. "MV and CC...?"

"Master's Voice, Core Consciousness--have you read up on Cogs?" Reinhild noted her look of confusion. "Right... you've probably seen some of them. They look like Vectors, but they're made of metal or plastic--"

"Oh, the robot people." Fluttershy nodded. "Yes, I have seen them on the streets."

"Yeah, don't let them hear you call them robots. Cogs are people, not tools, so they're never going to give themselves that heavily specialized stuff you see on drones. The big difference is the Core Consciousness unit. Ordinary computers are programmed, CCs learn and grow like Vector brains. So trying to hack a fabricator is a bad thing." Reinhild gestured at nothing in particular. "Especially if he was trying to install some sort of Master's Voice."

"And, um... what's Master's Voice?"

Reinhild shrugged. "Mysterious control program all Vectors have. If we hear a human singing--not a digital recording, but analog works--we become... placid. Susceptible to suggestion."

Fluttershy blinked, her eyes turning to the toggle case. "That... sounds like it could be dangerous."

"It could be. Problem is, nobody knows how it got there, nobody knows what part of us controls it--or if they do, they're not telling." Reinhild shrugged. "And the humans are all dead anyway. So, not a big threat. Just a mystery of the past."

"So..." Fluttershy took a breath. "If I'm understanding this... that, um, mongoose was going to implant a secret possible control method into the next generation of metal people."

"That's what CompuMax says, anyway." Reinhild rubbed her forehead. "Of course it's possible he just found out their CEO had been skiving money to a top-secret something or other and wanted to find out what that was. Or maybe he was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Or something else. Point is, they're handling it, and we're not allowed to look into it further."

Fluttershy frowned. "So... is he a good mongoose, or a bad mongoose?"

"He's a mongoose that's out of our hands, and that's what matters."

"...oh."

"That," Reinhild added firmly, "and making sure you can get hold of me if something like this happens again. If I'd been there, I could have kept you safe and gotten the guy to a proper IRPF building."

Fluttershy rubbed her ragged ear quietly. "That... would be nice."

"Problem is, you have a zipchip. If you had a toggle... maybe I could get you a PDI to handle the calls. It'd have to be installed on something you can handle... a UI lens might work..." The fox picked up her toggle case and started tapping through it. "Hmm. Almost 200 creds put together."

"That's, um. That's what my EMLA job paid me."

"So if you take another contract, it's probably just within your budget then. Especially if you can negotiate a better payment based off your work on the last one..."





Twilight cocked her head. "Why didn't she just pay for the thing herself?"

Fluttershy sighed, rolling her hoof with a flick of her ear. "Everything is about business. Giving a gift isn't something you do lightly, not even a casual one. It's... more intimate, in a way. Not necessarily romantic, but very forward. Telling people about things they'd like is fine, but if you buy it for them and don't expect a payment back it... it's not something you'd do outside close family, or specific celebrations."

"What?!" Pinkie Pie shrieked, her jaw agape. "No surprise cupcakes or surprise hoof-carved statuettes or surprise gyrocopters or anything?"

"They do still have birthday parties," Fluttershy assured her with an amused grin. "And a few other holidays--some are holdovers from Earth, and some are more business-based. The fact is, Reinhild was already letting me live with her, without paying rent. Even with the stipend she got that was considered pretty generous." She rubbed her metal leg. "I think she got teased about it at her workplace--not in a bad way, but apparently I was supposed to be calling her 'Auntie Reins' or something. I only really heard about that once, and that..."

She trailed off for a moment, her eyes downcast.

"...well, I had other things on my mind at the time."

The other ponies glanced at each other warily.

Rarity cleared her throat. "I, ah... know this normally goes without saying, darling, but... we are your friends, and we will be ready to listen and support you. Entirely free of charge."

Fluttershy chuckled wryly. "I know. I'm sorry. It just takes a bit to get that rooted back into my mind."

She glanced around. "So... as I was saying, Reinhild pointed me toward a place I could get a UI lens with built in PDI."

Twilight tapped her quill to her scroll. "And that means...?"

"Oh, right. UI stands for User Interface--basically I got a monocle that acted like a miniature smart surface, letting me call up network stuff on demand. And PDI, that was a Personal Data Interface... kind of like an assistant that lived in the monocle and could look up anything for me."

"So, kind of like what I do for Twilight," Spike said.

"Kind of," Fluttershy agreed. "But Votum never ate gemstones. He did help me land another EMLA contract, though, one that actually paid better than the first..."





"It's good to see you again, Fluttershy. And look at you!" Suchart clapped his hands together. "Little miss bigshot, official animal handler and everything."

Fluttershy hid behind her mane. "Yes, well... I had some help."

"Really?"

She tapped the translucent pane in front of her eye. "Votum, my new PDI. He's been such a big help."

A sigh came from behind her, and she turned to see a disapproving expression on a plastic face, catlike face.

"...Um... hello. My name's Fluttershy. What's yours?"

"AleaFaulkner."

Fluttershy smiled brightly, holding out her hoof. "It's nice to meet you, miss Faulkner."

The cog kept her arms crossed.

"...um..." Fluttershy glanced to the side, slowly lowering her hoof. "Is... something wrong?"

"It doesn't have a gender."

"What?"

"Your PDI," the cog said flatly. "It doesn't have a gender. It's not a person."

Suchart rolled his eyes. "She didn't mean it like that, obviously. This girl talks to everything. Birds, beasts, I'm pretty sure she can get a conversation going with a nymph if she wanted to."

"Well, I've tried," Fluttershy admitted, "but they tend to be remarkably chatty about nothing and I can't get a word in edgewise."

The tiger snorted. "My point is, she treats organic animals with respect and care. I'm not surprised she extends that same respect and care to digital ones."

Alea quirked a brow. "Really."

"Yes, really! On our last--" Suchart cut himself off, coughing for a moment or two.

"Oh dear." Fluttershy hovered up. "Are you alright?"

"I--hmmph! Heh... I'm fine, really. Just a cough... I'll get a checkup when we get back to the city."

"You'd better," Fluttershy admonished firmly. "That's a pretty deep cough you have there, it sounds like you might have a build up in your lungs."

"Huh, I was fine this morning... maybe it's something I ate." Suchart chuckled for a moment, before his cough returned. "Ugh... alright, alright! I'll set up a quarantine tent, if you tell Alea about the bear."

The cog looked between them. "The bear?"

"Oh, yes, fuzzlebuckets was such a good girl--"

"She was a full-grown grizzly!" Suchart shouted over his shoulder, pulling something out of his pocket and tossing it on the ground. "Three months pregnant!"

"...Well, yes," Fluttershy allowed, "but she was very understanding about the whole thing, and I made sure she got extra fish for her troubles. I don't see why everyone kept insisting she had to be a lateral."

Alea stared at her for a moment. "...you're shitting me."

"Um. No." Fluttershy looked her in the eyes. "No I am not."

"...Huh." After a moment, the cog shook her head. "Right, well. I suppose if you're actually able to do that sort of thing, this should go relatively smoothly." She hovered over to the few crates of equipment in the center of the camp. "I'll have to double check to make sure this isn't some lateral scam, of course."

Fluttershy opened her mouth for a moment, about to protest, and then shut it with a sigh. "I'm going to go out and find a nice deer for you to examine..."





Starlight cocked her head. "Hey, what's a lateral, anyway?"

"A morphism." Fluttershy shrugged. "It's... a sort of natural mutation. Most vectors walk on two legs, but there's enough animal genetics in there that around one in two hundred vectors look like actual animals. They can still talk and they're all fully intelligent, though." She managed a small giggle. "Every time I'd bring an animal in, Alea would come up with a new test. First it was the gene scans, then intelligence tests, then she tried to have some sort of communication thing where.... well, she didn't believe me until Venus, let's just say that."

"Venus?"

"Yes, it's... well, I went to Venus after I got off Mars, so maybe I should wait to talk about it until then."

"Hold up." Applejack held up a hoof. "Ya said laterals were 'a' morphism? Thar more than one?"

"Oh, yes. Plantigrade and digitigrade are the most common, so nobody comments on them, but then there are taurs--they're kind of built like Tirek was, four legs and two arms, but the lower part is always like the animal it's based off of. Micros are about half as common as laterals, they're essentially small Vectors--about as big as rabbits. They classify a lot of what falls outside the normal as a morphism actually--strange fur patterns, hooves or horns, hybrids, Reinhild was born with a twin-tail morphism--she got her second tail removed before I met her."

Twilight nodded, scribbling down notes on her pad. "That's a remarkably wide spread of genetic variability."

"Well, they were literally created as a demonstration of the mastery of genetic control," Fluttershy pointed out.

Rarity nodded. "I suppose, with that sort of variety, it makes sense they thought you were one of them..."

"Oh, I still stood out," Fluttershy assured them quickly. "By their standards I looked like an unusually-colored lateral equine with a trait from a completely different family. The wings," she clarified at their confusion. "That happens, but it's rare, and stacking that on top of another two morphisms made me..."

Her ear flicked.

"...let's see, I'd guess something like a one out of fifteen thousand chance of existing naturally, at best? Probably a lot more than that. Most people thought I was a blip of some sort."

"A what?" Rainbow Dash asked.

"A blip, they're... basically, custom-tailored vectors." Fluttershy let out a sigh. "Everything is about business. If you want a super special and very unique child, and you have the money... well, the vectors were created artificially anyway, it's not like they have any grounds to stand on. Of course there are a few laws--you can't make a child that has to obey you, and the child has to be sterile because technically they're an untested genetic combination, it's... they treat child rearing differently over there." She shook her head. "It's one of the more unnoticed horrors."

The gathered ponies fell silent for a moment or two.

Then Fluttershy cleared her throat. "Well, speaking of horrors, it was three days later that I saw Suchart die."

"D-D-Die?!" Spike squeaked.

"...it wasn't pretty," she admitted. "If anybody wants to throw up after I explain what happened, I won't blame you..."

Twilight took a breath, slowly letting out. "If you don't want to talk about it--"

"This is something I can't gloss over," Fluttershy insisted. "It's... it's what really kicked things off. What made me realize I needed to do something myself, about the situation. It was gruesome and terrifying and... and without it, I don't know who would have found me in the end but I certainly wouldn't have come home on my own terms."

She folded her ears back. "Suchart wasn't just sick. He was... infected."





"Suchart?" Fluttershy warily poked her head into the tent. "How are you feeling?"

The tiger groaned quietly. "Whoever whipped up this--cngh--this virus must be an evil genius or something..."

"Oh dear..." With a light flick of her wings, Fluttershy glided over. "Let me just look you over--"

"You--hnf, cnnn--you've done more than enough, Fluttershy." Suchart tried to smile. "Don't you want to go talk to--cnf, hrnf, hnng--animal friends?"

"The animals out here can wait." The pegasus was already pulling out equipment from the bedside bag. "They already know how to survive on their own, and they know we're only here to check up on them." She wrapped a small band around his wrist. "Everyone's worried about you, you know?"

"You're just saying that."

"No no, it's true, they're all wondering if you're going to make it the full session. Alea's even considering calling for a medical evac, just for you."

"Alea didn't--krrnf--strike me as an altruist."

Fluttershy rolled her eyes. "Well, okay, she said if you had to die it should be somewhere where she didn't have to deal with your corpse. I think she was joking, though?"

Suchart's chuckle suddenly morphed into a deeper, hacking cough, accompanied by wild beeping from the band on his wrist. Fluttershy's eyes shot to it, widening as she saw the fluctuating numbers. Her hooves dove into the bag, tossing aside various objects until she found what she was after; strapping the two pads to her forehooves, she flicked a switch and prepared to give the tiger a stabilizing jolt--but she never got the chance.

A wretched squelch announced the rupturing of Suchart's skin, tangled streams of red rushing from rends on his limbs, from under his clothes, from his ears, from his eyes. Fluttershy gasped, dropping the machine as the threads sought each other out, gathering tightly above the still writhing form of the tiger. An outline was formed, and then a hand--a twisted hand like none she'd seen, gripping her friend's arm with two fingers and two sharp blades as the rest of the blood steadily condensed into a glittering, diamond-like body. Two powerful legs and a sweeping tail poured out a set of hips that looked almost akin to an axeblade; as she backed away, Fluttershy witnessed the formation of a head that was half teeth and scattered with nine, orb-like eyes.

The creature looked down at the torn, still form of Suchart. Slowly, it turned, its alien gaze fixating on the trembling pegasus. The fanged mouth opened, a single, gentle hiss emerging with sibilant cadence.

"...mmmmmiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiinnnnne...."
> Ocvli Capit
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The gathered ponies and dragon stared, shocked and silent, at the yellow pegasus rubbing her metal hoof.

"...around two hundred years ago," she began hesitantly, "there was a sign of life back on Earth. The vectors decided to look into it, of course, but... the crew that went was the first infected with the Whispers. Most of them died on Earth. Some made it to the colony on Luna--Earth's moon, not our Luna. They all died. A few managed to make it back to Mars, but the Vectors were warned and killed them to keep the threat contained--but ever since then, Whisper outbreaks have been known to happen."

Twilight folded her ears back. "...Why? What are they? What do they want?"

Fluttershy shook her head. "Nobody knows. Well, TTI might, they've managed to capture one, but if they do they're keeping it secret. They don't screech or roar or even talk, they just... whisper. That's how they got their name. You have to be almost next to them to hear them--and at that point, they're probably going to kill you anyway."

Pinkie swallowed. "You said... you said your eye was clawed out by a Whisper. Back at the spa."

"Yep."

"So... that's what you're going to tell us. About how you lost your eye."

"Yep."

Rainbow Dash looked around at the worried, terrified looks on her friends' faces and groaned. "Okay, yeah, this is going to be horrible, but come on guys! We've fought changelings and dragons and parasprites, this... is scary in a different way, but we can't just back out because we're scared, right? Fluttershy's still our friend."

Fluttershy smiled faintly. "That's a nice sentiment."

"Yeah, well, I mean it." The pegasus leaned forward eagerly. "So, come on Shy. Did you charge the blood monster head on? Maybe you got a medical thing and cut its tail off... or, oo, did you fly up and try to divebomb it?"

That got a laugh out of her friend. "Dash, really? I was still pretty fresh from Ponyville. No, I did the smart thing: I ran and warned the others."





Fluttershy burst from the quarantine tent, already in the air. "WHISPER! THERE'S A WHISPER HERE!"

The others all turned their attention to her, just in time to witness the crystalline monstrosity stalk out after her. A few of them swore loudly or gave cries of terror, scrambling backwards or hopping behind crates. Alea twirled her left wrist, plates sliding aside on her forearm to reveal a long cylinder.

"Shy, call for help!" she shouted, peppering the creature with metal pellets as she charged forward. "Everyone else, guns!"

The pegasus blinked, just registering her slamming into the monster. "R-right! Votum, line to Reinhild please!"

"Opening line to Reinhild..."

Fluttershy galloped to a nearby crate, her eyes still fixated on the red creature Alea was trying to pin. The image of a fox reclining at her desk popped up on her lens.

"Hello, Fluttershy, what's--?"

"There's a Whisper out here!"

The fox sat up straight, her hand darting across the desk's glass surface. "Say again, Whisper?"

"Yes! Suchart just burst and, and Alea's holding it back, she's a cog but--"

A screech of metal and plastic signaled the red monster tearing free from the cog's grip. It tossed half her body aside, cocking its head as bullets clinked into its shoulder.

"It just tore her in half--it's going after the others, they have guns--"

"You can fly, right?" The fox made a brushing motion and walked out of her vision. "Keep out of reach, and keep on the line, I've just requisitioned a squad to your location--"

Fluttershy's eyes widened when she saw Alea's hand twitch, darting left and right before falling on a small toolbag. Without a moment's thought, she rushed over and hooked her hoof through the handles. "Votum, look up repair of critically damaged cogs please!"

"Searching, one moment."

A panicked yell caught her attention, and she looked over just as the Whisper dove into a rabbit--pouring into her mouth and horrified eyes. The girl had just enough time to clutch at her chest before she exploded, two red forms glinting in the midday sun as bullets ricocheted off their forms.

"Cog repair instructions located. Displaying blueprints."

Fluttershy swallowed, turning back to Alea and darting over. "Prepare overlay. Reinhild, are you still there?"

"Yes, we're en route. Keep telling me what's happening."

"It got a rabbit, there are two now." The pegasus rifled through the toolbag, pulling out items both strange and familiar as she tried to ignore the gunshots behind her. "Alea, are you still with us?"

The catlike ears twitched. "Shy... what....?"

"Focus on my voice, just keep listening to me." Fluttershy glanced at the image on her lens, pulling out a few tools as the flickering outline matched up with the torn form before her. "Why did you charge at that Whisper, that was dangerous!"

"Cogs can't... get infected..."

"Maybe not, but you can get torn apart." The pegasus started applying devices to the ragged metal dangling out of the torso. "I, uh, haven't done this before. Can you tell me if anything is wrong?"

Alea looked down at her wound weakly. "...how are you holding things with hooves?"

Fluttershy gave her a look. "I don't mean to be rude, but is now really the time to be asking that?"

"OH GOD MY ARM IT CUT OFF MY ARM!"

Alea gave a conceding shrug. "...point..."

Fluttershy glanced over to the rest of the crew. A badger was clutching the stump of his arm, backing away from the first Whisper as a nearby dog tried to attract its attention with a spray of bullets. The second Whisper lunged over another crate, its claws just barely missing the racoon that scampered away from it.

"Okay, Fluttershy, we're over the forest now." Her ears caught the roar of an engine, faint but growing louder. "We don't have your exact location, so if you can signal us--"

"I, uh--" The pegasus looked around. "Signal, signal--"

"Bug spray," Alea managed, pointing at a crate.

"Right! The nymph repellant grenades, they spit out big clouds when--"

"That'll work. It'll make visibility a bitch, but we can clear it out with our engines."

Fluttershy rushed over to the crate, putting her hoof to the scanner and folding her ears back. She flinched as she heard another scream, peeking over the crate just in time to see the first Whisper dive into the badger's face. The dog pointed his gun at his former comrade, shooting as soon as he saw the badger explode--one of the Whispers that emerged shattered before it could completely form, the red fluid splattering indiscriminately on the one looking over to the dog... whose gun was clicking futily.

As soon as the crate was open, Fluttershy reached in and grabbed a few orbs. "There's help coming!" she shouted, flying up into the air. "I'm throwing down a cloud signal, be ready!" Once she could see the whole camp, she threw her payload down as hard as she could.

The roar of engines was almost on top of her, and she spun in midair, quickly locating the blue-streaked heliplane. "Reinhild! I see you, I'm on your left bearing about thirty degrees!" She waved at the aircraft as it turned, gesturing downward. "The camp is right below me--"

A red figure leapt from the fog below, its clawed hand clutching at her head as gravity dragged them both back to the ground. She screamed in pain as she broke free, the motion sending her rolling backwards across the grass until she bumped into a crate. The fog she had created distorted her vision, but the glints of sunlight outlined a figure flicking something off its long fingers and turning toward her.

Fluttershy barely had time to get to her hooves before it sprung forward--

--and was intercepted mid lunge by foxboots to the shoulderblades.

Reinhild's gun fired into the Whisper's mockery of a skull four times in rapid succession, shattering the creature into a pool of red beneath her feet. The heliplane descended moments later, its propellers dispersing the fog as a small squad jumped out and aimed their guns. The last Whisper tried to deflect the stream of bullets with its blades, but the sheer mass of the metal slugs overwhelmed it quickly.

Fluttershy sagged, taking a breath--and regretting it instantly as the smell of blood almost overwhelmed her. "Oh... Oh sweet Celestia..."

Reinhild hung her gun off her hip and walked over. "Hey, it's over, it's--" She froze, grimacing for half a second, before steeling her face and putting a hand Fluttershy's shoulder. "It's going to be alright."

The pegasus took a much smaller breath, careful to keep her muzzle away from the pool of red, which led to her spotting another figure. "Alea! I tried to save her, I don't know if--"

"Right." Reinhild glanced over her shoulder. "Somebody get that cog on life support, stat!"

One of the newcomers rushed over, scooping up the metallic torso. Fluttershy managed a brief sigh of relief when a plastic arm twitched, wrapping around the officer's shoulders.

The fox turned back to her. "Just to make sure we got them all, can you tell me who got infected?"

"Right, there was... Suchart, and then the rabbit, and one of those got into the badger--"

Her hand went to her gun. "Shit, where's the third one?!"

The dog leaning against a crate held up his gun. "Shot it when it was coming out of Jeffery, ma'am. Shattered it before it could form fully."

"...Good man." Reinhild nodded, relaxing her grip. "Right. We're getting you all to the station, and--"

"Reinhild?" Fluttershy swallowed. "I don't... I think there's something wrong with my eye. I can't see out of it."

The fox took a breath, looking at her. "Yeah. There's something wrong. Your eye's gone."

Fluttershy rose a hoof, gently feeling at the still bleeding scratches on her cheek, and the odd hollow midway through them.

"...oh. That... makes sense..."

The pegasus took a few quiet steps toward the heliplane, before collapsing to her knees. She barely registered the arms wrapping around her barrel and the voice reassuring her as her vision slowly faded to darkness.





Rainbow held up a hoof. "Shy, I have a question."

"Yeah?"

"And I want to make it clear I know full well it is a stupid question."

Fluttershy rolled her eyes. "There are no stupid questions, only stupid ways to ask questions."

"Right. Fluttershy... do you ever not faint after a big fight?"

"I had just lost my eye, Dash!" The pegasus pointed at her face. "My! EYE! You know, the delicate organ responsible for translating random light rays into coherent data for the brain to process and is generally locked into place by so many tiny muscles you could form a backup Harmony squad with them?"

"Whoa, hey, no, I get that! I'm just saying, first it was the thing with the grey guys, and then it was the Whispers--"

"Discord. The changelings. Tirek. That mongoose mugger, the Venus incident, that whole thing with the pirates--who, may I remind you, took my leg?" Fluttershy managed a small, sardonic smirk. "Yes, Dash, there are plenty of times where I have managed to get through a 'big fight' and not faint."

"Oh. Well. Good!" Rainbow nodded firmly. "Shows you've got that pegasus toughness, and... also lets you check on friends and... stuff. Yeah."

Rarity cleared her throat. "Well, your replacement eye seems... lively. Is that another enhancement?"

"Oh, yes. The Utilit-i." Fluttershy chuckled. "Silly name, I know, but it's basically a built in UI lens. Reinhild managed to get Votum reinstalled on it too, and I did add a few upgrades later--"

"So, wait..." Spike tilted his head. "Does it just pop out?"

"Spike!" Twilight scolded.

"Well, no. I can remove it, but it's a bit of a hassle getting it out and in again, so I usually only do it once a week to clean the gunk off." Fluttershy giggled. "Wouldn't be a very useful eye if I could lose it easily, would it?"

"Ooo! Ooo!" Pinkie jumped up and down. "Does it do any neat tricks?"

"Pinkie!" Applejack shouted.

Fluttershy tapped her chin with a smirk. "We-eeeeeeell... Votum, access my holo-album, please."

A flicker of light spun around her iris, lancing into the air in a shimmering pattern. The gathered ponies gaped at the colorful image that emerged, slowly rotating in the center of the garden.

"That's me on Amazon station. Before I lost my wings, obviously. That's Reinhild, and Alea, and that's Kryse'is and Bat Sunrod, I met them on Venus, and that's Ko-k0ro. Reinhild and Sunrod butted heads constantly, but then again Sunrod was Spyglass raised, so that makes sense--"

"You have a light projector in your eye?" Starlight finally managed.

"Holoprojector, yes. Like I said, I installed a few upgrades."

Rainbow Dash clapped her hooves together. "You were right, Shy. That is cool, awesome, and radical."

Fluttershy giggled behind her hoof. "~Toooold ~yoooou." She winked with her other eye, and the six figures vanished. "Of course, it took me a day to get used to the original replacement, and... well, we all had to be debriefed, it being a Whisper attack and all."

She sighed, her eyes downcast. "Which, uh, was when I started figuring out that something was going on..."





"A Whisper attack in the forest? Hooooooly shit." The deer behind the desk let out a low whistle. "You're lucky you got your auntie Reins looking after you."

"Um... my who?"

"Reinhild! Hell, if you'd contacted anyone else there'd be a fifty-fifty chance they try filing the paperwork before they even got to the heliplane, but the sergeant moves fast and hard. Probably the reason she's avoiding that final star, once you get all five the paperwork demands more attention than the people."

"O...oh." Fluttershy managed a weak smile. "She's been very helpful, chief. Um... is she going to get in trouble?"

"What?"

"For not... saving everyone," Fluttershy clarified. "Not being on the scene quick enough. I mean I called her right after I warned everyone about the first Whisper--"

"Kid, nobody else could have mobilized that fast. People died, yeah, but what's more important is that we got people saved." The chief leaned into his chair heavily. "Sides, they were Whispers. Thugs, mafia, corporate warfare, hell even the palemen, I can handle all that sort of stuff. But the things TTI deals with? Best to shut it down fast, in my mind."

"TTI deals with Whispers?"

"They've got one locked up around Jupiter or something, for study purposes. Maybe one day they'll figure out how to retake Earth... still. Wouldn't like to be on that crew. Trying to make sense of what those things say..."

"What?" Fluttershy blinked. "Wouldn't it just be easy to listen to them?"

The chief laughed dryly. "Well, if they spoke english, sure. Or any language. Nobody understands Whispers, and I don't think anybody wants to get close enough to try."

Fluttershy folded her ears back, glancing at the three butterflies on her flank.

"Course, if TTI ever did find somebody who did... or hell, somebody who got what those Manifestations they use were saying... well, they're one of the big seven. There are plenty of people who've been vanished for smaller reasons, after all--is something wrong?"

The pegasus looked up, opening her mouth...

...and remembered the cat vector she'd seen torn in half, on a ship full of innocently murderous gray creatures.

"...nothing. It... it's nothing, I was just thinking."

"Yeah?" The chief nodded. "I can get that. Look, sorry, I got sidetracked. I know you gave your story at the medbay, but I have to ask, is there anything else you want to add?"

"Suchart was infected and the Whisper emerged while I was giving him a check up. I rushed out to warn everyone, Alea moved in to grapple the thing and give the rest of us time to call for help and set up a defense... and Reinhild, well, she was listening in on the rest."

"That's basically what I have here.... well, if there's nothing else." He held out the glass pane. "Hoofprint, please."

Fluttershy obediently tapped the scanner.

"And... you're free to go."

"Thank you, chief." Fluttershy hopped out of the chair with a nod and trotted out of the office. She took a deep breath as the door slid shut behind her, trotting to one of the chairs and sagging into it.

"Well well well. If it isn't the mare of the hour herself!"

Fluttershy's ears perked as she turned to the voice with a smile. "Alea! You're okay!"

"Yeah, turns out somebody's jury-rigging of a ruptured power tube lasted just long enough for me to make it to the hospital." Alea hovered over, slowly sitting down next to the pegasus. "Still getting used to the new legs, but the doctors say I should be flying high in no time."

"...Flying high?"

Alea gave her a sly smirk. "Well, with all that money my dear beloved Suchart left me, I thought it might be time for a specialization. Had some maneuvering thrusters installed into my mag-lev."

"...Um." Fluttershy frowned. "I... don't understand. I don't think you and Suchart were married."

The cog leaned in. "Well... you know that, and I know that, and anyone that wants to go through the files would figure that out pretty quick, but who's going to care to look?"

The pegasus folded her ears back. "You... you stole money from a dead man?!"

"He's dead, what's he going to use it for?"

"Fluttershy!" Reinhild walked up to the pair, glass pane in hand. "Sorry, had to file the last paperwork on the Whisper incident--oh, hello. You're AleaFaulkner, right? Last I saw you, you didn't have legs."

"And you must be the famous sargent Reinhild." The cog smirked. "Dropkicking from a heliplane into a fogbank and pinning a Whisper for a headshot?"

The fox rolled her eyes. "Yeah, yeah, real life action vixen. It was mostly luck, really." She cleared her throat. "I was going over the records. I... I'm sorry for your loss."

"It's... not your fault." Alea's expression grew sorrowful. "Honestly, I'm still... I still can't quite believe he's gone."

Fluttershy stared at her in abject horror.

"But, I think he'd want me to... to come to terms quickly. Suchart was always such a kind soul, he--"

"You falsified a marriage document?!"

Alea blinked, looking at Fluttershy, then to Reinhild. "...I know we never brought it up, Shy, I'm--"

"I cannot believe this," the pegasus grumbled. "Suchart dies, and your reaction is to not only go through his pockets but spit on the sanctity of true romance."

Reinhild frowned. "...Something you'd like to say, miss Faulkner?"

"No."

"Really? I thought you'd like to talk about mister Faulkner. Remember all the good times."

Alea blinked. "...well... uh... there was this one time, Suchart and I went to a dance club--"

"You do know his last name is registered as Kearney, right?"

For a moment there was silence.

"...Look." Alea crossed her arms. "He's got a brother on the Quad and that is it. I only took some of the money, I left all the sentimental crap in the will alone."

"You altered his will?!"

"I was tied up in a hospital bed for three days, Fluttershy, what was I supposed to do? Watch the crap that counts as sports?"

Reinhild rubbed her forehead in exasperation. "...and that's all you did. Take the money, you didn't hurt anyone."

"Yep. Just a few hundred creds."

"...right."

Fluttershy blinked. "Reinhild, you can't be okay with this."

"I'm not. But part of being a cop is knowing how to pick your battles." The fox pointed at the cog. "This lady managed to hack a will from a hospital bed, she probably knows where to get a really good lawyer, and while I certainly could win that fight it would distract me from saving people from gunslingers and Whispers and the like. Plus," and here the sergeant sighed heavily, "she did hold back a Whisper long enough for you guys to call for help and set up a defense, so she did kind of save everyone's life. So I'm inclined to give her this one."

Her eyes narrowed and turned toward Alea. "I'm putting you on a watchlist, though."

The cog rose her hands. "Fine by me. I'm an opportunist, not a villain."

"I... that..." Fluttershy put her head in her hooves. "This place really is different from Equestria."

"Equestria?" Alea turned to her. "Never heard of that, what is it?"

"My home."

"Someplace on Venus?"

"I... don't know."

Reinhild put a hand on her shoulder. "I'm still checking the search contracts regularly, Shy. But it's a big solar system, it might take time to find."

Alea glanced between them. "What, was she in a trafficking ring?"

"If she was, at least we'd have a hint--" Reinhild paused. "...You're good with hacking?"

"...to a degree."

"About two months ago a TTI liveship showed up in orbit. I was on the investigation squad, we got in, we found corpses, manifestations, and Fluttershy. She wasn't on official files before that day, and she didn't know about MarsCo."

"Ah. Kidnapped from a grotto?"

"Maybe." Reinhild's grip on Fluttershy's shoulder tightened. "Legally, I'm not allowed to press any further than I have and check the search contracts. I am, however, entirely capable of arresting a cog for falsifying a marriage license and then opening an investigation into any and all possible forged documents she may or may not have created."

Alea smirked. "And here I thought I was going to get away clean. TTI's pretty top-notch security, sarge. And your cells are actually pretty comfortable."

"IRPF cells do have a standard of living," Reinhild allowed, "but whether the same could be said for every corp that a cog might have scammed..."

That earned a frown from the plastic woman. She turned her gaze on Fluttershy, studying her for a few moments.

"...This girl saved my life. That's why I'm doing this. Not your petty threats." Alea turned back to Reinhild, holding out her hand. "You've got yourself an investigator, fox."

Reinhild shook it. "Keep in touch."





"So... you let a known forger of documents help you?" Twilight asked, incredulous.

Fluttershy shrugged. "We forgave Luna, Discord, and apparently Starlight."

Twilight held up a hoof, paused, and slowly lowered it. "Um. Huh. When you put it like that..."

"It's not exactly like she was a villain," Rarity mused. "She did risk her life to save everyone from that dreadful Whisper creature. And... while I do find the idea of rifling through a dead man's possessions for personal profit obscene, I must admit that taking advantage of opportunity is a viable business strategy--and of course, in Vector culture--"

"Everything is about business," the ponies all chorused.

Starlight shook her head. "Twilight, I think we've found an entire race in need of some serious friendship lessons."

"Wouldn't be the first time," Rainbow grumbled.

"They're not that bad," Fluttershy insisted. "They do make friends, they do care about each other, it's just... They don't quite get the concept of something beyond value. Everything has a value, everything is a resource, and friendship is a part of that. So is justice, and love, and... a lot of things. There's no exact exchange, but...."

She trailed off at the stares.

"...I mean, they don't let people starve," she managed. "There's free food and shelter for everyone. Not quality, mind, but it keeps people alive... and, I mean, they get that keeping each other alive is important."

The stares continued.

Fluttershy's ears drooped. "They're not bad people," she mumbled. "A lot of them are really good. They just... calculate the cost of everything. That's all."

Rarity nodded. "We understand, Fluttershy, truly. But maybe a little reminder that some things are beyond value might be worth it, hmm?"

"Well, maybe." Fluttershy looked up. "And it's not like that's not there, it's just that they can't put words to it. I mean, take what Alea did--she'd been investigating my situation for a week and a half and when she stumbled on a particular file, she didn't just send it our way. She came in person."





"Alright, alright, I'm coming!" Reinhild rolled her eyes, walking to the apartment door and sliding it open. "Oh. It's you."

Alea shoved her aside. "We need to get Shy out of here right fucking now."

"What?" Fluttershy looked up from the glowing set of panels on the table. "What's wrong?"

"What's wrong is there's a cap-squad five minutes away from taking you to StarThread!"

Reinhild stalked over. "StarThread? The TTI subsidiary that--"

"--that owned the liveship Fluttershy appeared on, yes, let's cut this as you know shit and get moving!"

The fox frowned. "I'd ask if you have evidence of this, but if you're right we're on a time limit." She rushed up to a wall and slid it aside, tossing a vest to each of the others before putting on her own. "You still have that gun in your arm?"

Alea put her vest on with a nod. "Yeah. Wait, were you prepared for this?"

"Not this specifically." Reinhild took a gun from the wall and checked its clip. "Random robber, maybe this place becoming a hotzone, after I picked up Shy I figured somebody might look for her."

Fluttershy clipped the final buckle on her vest before looking up. "You did?"

"That thing you did with the manifestations. That'd attract attention." The fox moved over to a window. "What's the cap-squad got?"

"Car with chameleon skin and 'spectral' resources, which is code for 'we're bringing the freaky shit' in my experience."

"No flyers?" Reinhild opened the window.

"Not that I know, could be."

"Right." She tossed a small rectangle to the cog. "Get Shy over to the Remora complex and ask for Kleitos, I'll be after you in ten."

"Got it." Alea hopped out the window, the vents on her legs springing open with a roar. "Come on, Shy, let's get moving!"

"I--" Fluttershy looked toward the fox.

Reinhild rolled her eyes. "I'll be fine, I dropkicked a Whisper, remember?"

"...stay safe."

"I should be saying that to you. Go on, they're almost here!"

The pegasus nodded, hopping out the window. "Votum, location of the Remora complex and overlay please."

"Searching, one moment."

Alea snorted, zooming after her. "You got the PDI reinstalled in your utilit-i?"

"Well, he did show me how to save your life," Fluttershy noted, her gaze flickering between the real world and projected image. "I figured he was worth keeping around--this way, if we cut under the bridge we should be able to lose them before we leave the building."

Alea managed to just dart out of the way of a skycar, and boggled as Fluttershy wove around a few dozen. "Hold up! How the hell are you doing that?! I mean I know I'm new at flying but you're just spinning around like physics is your bitch!"

"It's a pegasus thing." Fluttershy shrugged. "I'm actually a pretty weak flyer. You should meet my friend Rainbow, she can break the sound barrier unassisted."

"You call that weak flying?"

"Um." She stopped, hovering in midair--and winced as Alea went sprawling off in a direction. "Oh dear. Are you alright?"

The cog managed to set herself to a stop, glaring at her. "You grab things without hands, you fly like a goddamned hummingbird, you talk to animals as easily as people--"

With the loud sound of shattering glass, a bizarre form was sent through Reinhild's window.

"--and you've got guys with living armor trying to take you somewhere?" Alea turned to her. "Fluttershy, what the hell are you?!"

"...um, your friend?"

"Well, no, duh, I was talking in a more 'genes and abilities' sort of way."

"Oh." Fluttershy shrugged. "Just your run-of-the-mill pegasus." She winced as the brown figure started climbing up the wall. "Maaaaaybe we should get going."

"Right, lead on. And remember I'm new at this whole flying thing!"
> Stridorbvs Avfertvr
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Oh my gosh did you lead them on a dramatic chase through an alien city?!"

Fluttershy rolled her eyes. "No, Dash. Reinhild kept the cap-squad's attention long enough for us to escape."

"Oh. Oh, but I bet she kicked butt, right?"

"A bit," Fluttershy allowed, "but from what she tells me she eventually just bribed them to give her the contract records and told them I was at a Progenitus kiosk negotiating for another job."

"...Oh."

The yellow pony grinned wryly. "What, did you expect my entire stay would be one action scene after another as I dealt with horrible alien abominations?"

"...maybe a little," Dash admitted. "I mean, you are one fifth machine now."

"Rainbow Dash!" Twilight scolded. "Don't be rude. It's more like one eighth anyway."

"No, no," Fluttershy waved her down, "she was closer. Maybe just one sixth though."

Applejack rolled her eyes. "Right, cause determinin' how much o' ya is metal clearly's tha most important thing here."

"I could do a scan!" Starlight offered.

"I could just ask Votum," Fluttershy countered. "He's got all my surgical records. Votum, calculate percentage of my body mass that's artificial, please."

She paused.

"...Oh. Huh. Okay then, I... didn't realize I'd had that much done. I guess it builds up over time."

Twilight blinked. "What?"

"So, as it turns out, I'm actually about a quarter cyborg." Fluttershy shrugged awkwardly. "The optional bits piled up, I guess. Plus wings are actually pretty complicated."

"...Well, I wouldn't have guessed that to look at you," Rarity offered hesitantly.

"I'm not ashamed of it," Fluttershy pointed out. "I mean, sure, a lot of this was necessary, not by choice, but... it's not like it's something I should be ashamed of, you know?"

"Oh no, I wasn't saying that at all!" Rarity assured her. "I'm sure I could design some ensemble for you, actually, the scaled plates on your leg would translate well to a dress, and while your eye scars are certainly striking, they could be visually counterbalanced by... a lovely hat, I suppose..."

She frowned to herself. "Twilight, darling, do you happen to have a spare pad and quill I can borrow?"

"Hmm? Oh, sure." Twilight teleported away.

Fluttershy blinked, staring at the space she had occupied.

Very quickly, Twilight teleported back, levitating the quill and pad to Rarity. "There you go."

"Curiouser and curiouser," the yellow pony murmured.

"What?"

Fluttershy shook her head. "Nothing, it's... just part of an old human story. Where was I?"

"Running from a bunch of freaky people that wanted to capture you for no discernable reason," Pinkie Pie replied.

"Right, right, the cap-squad... Well, anyway, me and Alea made it to the Remora complex. A seaside facility, built as sort of a meeting place for aquatic laterals."

Starlight blinked. "Aquatic laterals?"

"The humans wanted to cast a wide net in the omega generation--the vectors they made after Earth got nuked--so they decided to try to give them the widest possible spread of potential environments. Avian and reptilian vectors also came from the omega generation, but the aquatics... they went a little bit wild with that," Fluttershy admitted. "Maybe because there's a lot of water on Earth and they wanted to recolonize eventually. There's the seals, the dolphins... the sharks..."

"Wait, hold on." Rainbow Dash narrowed her eyes. "So you met an alien shark."

Fluttershy chuckled awkwardly. "No, Dash, I... what I told you last night was true..."

"Wait, what?" Twilight looked between the two. "What happened last night?"

"Just maretalk," Rainbow said dismissively. "Or at least I thought it was maretalk."

"...So it turns out that Kleitos was actually a Mako shark vector... not a lateral, just a usual plantigrade..."





"Friends of Reinhild, eh?" The fish-headed man smirked, stepping aside. "I see she's still got fine taste for the lookers."

"Um..." Fluttershy glanced away. "That's... nice of you to say, but, um... I, well... no. Just... no."

"I'm a recent widow," Alea added. "So, no for me as well."

"Alright, alright." Kleitos held up his hand, leading them in. "You never know if you don't try, is all. There's a booth over by the verge, I'll let Reinhild know you're there when she gets here."

Alea flicked the plastic rectangle to him as they followed. "Discretely, I hope."

"Of course. You're not the first people she's sent my way." Kleitos flicked a finny ear in annoyance. "Just tell me, should I keep my head down?"

"...maybe. I don't think so, though, the sargent's probably got this."

"Right. Well, if a firefight starts, I can meet you in the verge." The shark gestured toward a table. "Your booth, ladies, if you'll excuse me." He walked into a nearby pool, submerging quickly and retreating down an underwater tunnel.

Fluttershy looked after him for a moment, before shaking her head and flapping into a seat. "A recent widow?" She gave Alea a pointed look. "Really?"

"It's in the records," the cog pointed out, sitting across from her.

Fluttershy frowned. "Right, in the records. Cadence would probably have something to say about that."

"A friend of yours?"

"...Friend of a friend, if I'm honest. Mi Amore Cadenza, the princess of love."

Alea stared at her for a moment. "I'm sorry, did... did you seriously just say 'princess of love?'"

"Yes. She's Twilight's sister-in-law."

"Riiiiiight." The cog snorted. "So, what, does she just stand around all day and spout cheesy one-liners about true love and all that shit?"

"Actually, she rules the Crystal Empire."

"Uh... huh. What's her species?"

"Alicorn." Fluttershy took note of the nonplussed expression and sighed. "A blending of all three tribes, earth pony, pegasus, and unicorn."

Alea gave her a flat look. "So she's a pretty pony princess."

"Yes. She's... about a head taller than me, not counting her horn--I think she could poke you in the forehead easily, if she wanted to. Oh, but her wings are humongous, gorgeous purple tips, really compliments her pink coat--"

"She's a pretty pink pony princess--okay, Fluttershy, you have to be making this up."

Fluttershy shook her head. "No. I am completely serious. I was one of the bridesmaids for her wedding."

"Really."

"To be fair, her original bridesmaids were still recovering from being brainwashed by the changelings," she admitted.

"The what?"

"The changelings--shapeshifters who feed on love. They're..." Fluttershy frowned. "Well, I want to say they're a mix between a nymph and a pony, but nymphs don't have holes in their legs. Also they tend to be greyer. Changeling chitin is black."

Alea stared at her for a moment or two.

"...Shy, I don't know if you realize just how hard I am working to figure out where you came from, but one thing I can say for certain is these crazy stories just won't help."

Fluttershy frowned at her. "I am telling you the honest truth."

The cog leaned back in exasperation. "So we're looking for a lateral grotto with nymph-vector hybrids who attacked a royal hippie at her wedding, because of course that makes perfect sense."

"I understand that it is a bit... unusual by vector standards," Fluttershy stated calmly, "but this all did happen."

"You know what? That's not even the angle I'm working on. I'm just trying to figure out what TTI wants with you." Alea shrugged. "Or at least StarThread. Could be some independent subsidiary thing, that happens sometimes."

Fluttershy stared at her blankly.

"...The basic idea is that TTI is way too big to know every little thing its employers are doing," Alea explained. "So they don't until they need to. If a subsidiary corp becomes problematic, or if they stop turning a profit, the higher ups will step in and rearrange things, but... Look, Fluttershy. You're just one pony. One incredibly special pony, true, but there's a good ten billion vectors out there. Unless StarThread's been doing something REAL big, or you rattle the system real hard, the higher ups won't think there's enough reason to check up on this."

"Oh."

"Which is actually a good thing."

"Really?"

"Trying to dig secrets out of TTI is like trying to snatch a diamond out of a stream of molten lava. Technically doable, if you have the right tools and perfect timing, but we aren't Spyglass. So long as whatever happened remains relegated to StarThread, we have a much smaller target to dig around in--still difficult, in that you're trying to snatch a diamond from the den of lions--"

"I know how to talk to lions."

Alea rolled her eyes. "These are metaphorical lions, Fluttershy."

"Right. Sorry."

"My point is, the lions--that is StarThread--have noticed you, and they want you back. I don't know what Reinhild is doing, but chances are she can only keep them off for a week or two. You have that long before they set out a stronger set of hunters." The cog leaned across the table. "Which means, you need to find a more defensible position."

"...so... how do I defend myself from metaphorical lions?"

"Find a pack of metaphorical hyenas to take you in. Hyenas hate lions."

Fluttershy frowned. "I'm... pretty sure they're just competitors for the same food source in the wild. Although they will kill each other's young, if--"

She noticed Alea's flat expression.

"Metaphor. Right. Sorry. Um..." She tapped her hooves together. "So... where would I find these Hyenas?"

"StarThread is a TTI subsidiary. TTI and Progenitus hate each other. You need to make yourself valuable enough to some Progenitus subsidiary that you're worth protecting."

"And... how do I do that?"

"Helping us out with the record-keeping in the wild like you have is a good first step. But you need to do something extra, show some special talent, if you really want to get in their good books."

"Special talent..."

Fluttershy glanced at the butterflies on her hips again.

"...I... might have some ideas there."





"So, once Reinhild came and found us, we did... research." Fluttershy held up a hoof. "Yes, Rainbow, it was boring. No, Twilight, it wasn't anything worldshaking. Most of it was along the lines of things that had been done before, what had gotten people picked up by Progenitus before."

"You keep mentioning Progenitus," Twilight noted. "I understand it's a megacorp, and from what you've told us it's a... natural preservation group?"

"Actually, Progenitus is more medicine and health in general. I mean they do make a lot of the environmental maintenance stuff, but they're really famous for their healthcare." Fluttershy smiled. "I may be a lit-tle bit biased, since I did work with them heavily, but... of the big seven, I think they're the kindest."

Applejack quirked an eyebrow. "Big seven? Whatcha mean by that?"

"Most megacorps own a few dozen subsidiaries--a smattering of ordinary corporations, who themselves own minicorps, who might own a few local businesses in every town. The big seven are the megacorps that own megacorps." Fluttershy paused, considering her friends. "I'm just going to summarize, alright? This is important, but in a sort of 'always there in the background' way."

Rainbow Dash nodded. "Yeah, sure, get through the boring stuff so we can go back to the awesome stuff, makes sense to me."

"Right. So, first of all, MarsCo is the great granddaddy of them all--they've been around from the beginning, they make pretty much everything, you can't go anywhere without seeing MarsCo stuff because to Vectors it's basic. Houses, cars, furniture, food... if the other six corps all vanished there would be a lot of chaos, but Vector society would survive. Of course," she mused, "being so big means everyone's watching the company. So it's mostly... passive, so it doesn't provoke the other big seven."

"Are you sure you're describing a company?" Starlight asked. "Because it sounds like you're talking about an entire kingdom here."

"Well, there's a few differences between a megacorp and a nation-state--but, um, I think if I went on about that, I would be rambling for a while. Let's see, MarsCo also spun off ASR, Pulse, and the IRPF. ASR, Applied Sciences and Robotics, they do all the techy stuff--computers, cogs, robots, my cybernetics are actually ASR products mostly. Pulse is... sort of a combination of fashion and sports? They're the ones that make equipment, design games, help vectors look beautiful or noble or awesome or what they like. ASR and Pulse have a bit of a rivalry with each other, but it's kind of like... well, like I'd imagine a rivalry between Rarity and Rainbow Dash would be like."

"A rivalry? Between us?" Rarity scoffed. "Aside from my brief moment of mania during the young flyer's competition, I don't think we would have much to fight over."

"Well, let's say you had to impress some foreign noble in two weeks and I offered you a choice between a sewing machine and a gym set, both of which were guaranteed to make you look good in the time permitted."

"Sewing machine," Rarity said swiftly. "Beauty is innovation."

"Gym set," Rainbow replied casually. "Awesomeness is effort."

"And there you have the core conflict," Fluttershy concluded. "It's not a big one, not like some of the other rivalries, but it is a philosophical one." She cleared her throat. "Now, the Inner Ring Police Force are sort of like the police and the royal guard all rolled into one. Some people don't trust them because they're the army for hire, but they try to keep things civil and law-abiding. Not like Spyglass--they're, well, spies. Saboteurs. They... um. There's no nice way to put it... they don't trust anyone. Not even themselves. But they're honest with that distrust."

"Honest with distrust?" Applejack tilted her head. "That sounds like one o' them oxymorons ta me!"

"They're a little hard to get the hang of," Fluttershy admitted. "But I can't entirely dislike them, they helped a lot with the investigation of TTI after all. And Progenitus was a spin-off of theirs."

"Wait, wait wait wait." Pinkie held up a hoof. "The super friendly guys came from the super sneaky guys?"

"Yes, well, you see... before Progenitus, medicine was deliberately expensive. But when the Spyglass people who were investigating found out that the doctors were deliberately hiding cures, they decided to basically let everyone know and spread the cure around. So now there's life-saving technology all across the solar system, funded by a small tax and free for anyone to use, all kept running by Progenitus." Fluttershy sighed. "Which makes the rivalry with TTI so frustrating..."

"Those are the guys that kidnapped you, right?" Spike asked. "That's what Twilight told me."

"I don't think they were aiming to kidnap anyone," Fluttershy mused, "but, yes, they did launch the Tether. Or a subsidiary did. Transcendent Technologies Incorporated... officially they research extreme biological manipulation and dimensional exploration, creating specialized life forms and modifications. But unofficially, I think what they're doing is messing with magic."

Twilight blinked. "Wait. You told me there was no magic in that universe."

"No natural magic." Fluttershy shut her eyes. "But... from what I felt in the tether base... I don't know exactly what kind of magic it was, but I'm almost certain it was magic. Of some sort."

She looked around at the ponies and cleared her throat. "Anyway. The big seven megacorps. That's them. Of course it wasn't like most of that touched me, it was just background... stuff. Important, but not active. So... where was I?"

"Doing research," Twilight prompted.

"If you don't mind, I'm going to skip ahead to the point where the research paid off. We managed to rent out a presentation room, and... let's be honest, I was very nervous that I was going to be speaking in front of a crowd..."





"Um." Fluttershy swallowed, adjusting the collar of the formal coat she wore. "Hello, everyone. My name is Fluttershy, and, um, I'm here to, um, present a new... technique, which I have developed."

The fourteen vectors around the table looked at her with unjudging, impassive expressions.

She took a breath. "Nymphs communicate through a complex interweaving of signals. Pheromones, minor telepathy, specialized motions, consuming brains of other nymphs... this information is gathered by the colonies and, um, used to determine what forms of nymph the local ecosystem needs to remain balanced. Now, this is all grade-school knowledge, but even among the E.M.L.A. it takes very specialized equipment for vector-kind to read the information that the nymphs have gathered, which raises the expense of every monitoring expedition and outpost significantly."

Fluttershy glanced out at her audience, noting the minor interest on some of their faces. She tapped the glass pane in front of her, and the next part of her speech came up.

"But what if, instead of getting indirect readings by capturing nymphs and observing them, we could communicate with them directly? What if instead of a hundred random specimens, all you needed was one of each type? Ten, maybe twenty, and what if you could ask one to bring a single specimen of each form from their colony? The onus of effort would be on the nymphs themselves, and there would be no risk of accidentally unbalancing the ecosystem by taking too many, um, pollinators or insectivore edibles. For many, getting such easy results from such a large and active system would sound impossible. Today, I'd, um, like to prove them wrong."

With those words, Fluttershy produced the fruit of her effort--a complex bit of machinery with a transparent cube atop it and a digital screen in front.

"This," she explained to the now focused audience, "is the Behavioral Interpretation and Nymph Communication System. Through careful study of nymph actions, interactions, pheromone exchange, and, um, their brain eating, I have managed to not only derive the basic 'vocabulary' of our little friends, but also a minor grammar structure and a way to send more complex messages in real time to them."

Fluttershy held up a hoof. "Now I know this is all possible with advanced degrees, vector kind did make nymphs after all, but in the intervening centuries between their creation and the modern era many ecologies have grown so complicated that the old 'language' requires, well, a dozen checks and rechecks to understand the totality of what the nymphs are communicating. This system, however, is designed to not only use the modern nymph 'language', but to collapse it into easily readable data, and to register when the nymph is attempting to communicate something outside known vocabulary. It can be manually updated with new 'words' and 'grammar structures,' as necessary. And as you can see, it is portable."

She noticed all the eyes on her and blanched for a moment. After taking a deep breath, she pressed onward.

"This is an update in ecological surveillance that, quite frankly, has been overlooked for far too long. The B.I.N.C.S. is not any more expensive than the current nymph observation technology; in fact, it is a third less expensive to make and set up, with most of the cost going into the, um, data system that stores and encodes the nymph translation software. I will admit my testing has been limited, I've only managed to do a few sectors here on Mars, but the data remains consistent with the current methods. Nevertheless, I do believe this is a project worth looking into."

"Indeed," mused a squirrel, rubbing his chin thoughtfully. "Even if it is a dead end, at least we'll know why. I for one would put forth my support."

"I'll second that," said a raccoon lateral standing near the foot of the table. "All in favor of funding a B.I.N.C.S. research and development project?"

Nine of the vectors raised their hands.

"All opposed?"

Two, a horse and a badger, rose their hands.

"Well, that's still around half of us, all told."

The squirrel turned to the pegasus. "Thank you for having us here today, miss Fluttershy. We'll have the company start writing up the contract and send it to you within the week."

"Oh, um, thank you." Fluttershy took the box. "You, uh, don't mind if I keep this until then? I can give you the blueprints and the program..."

"Not at all." The squirrel smiled quietly. "I know the importance of one's own work. We'll be in touch."

"Right, yes." The pegasus nodded, backing out the door. "I'll... be on the lookout for the contract, then."

The door slid shut, and a tension that Fluttershy had felt building drained from her limbs.

"Hey." Reinhild put a hand on her shoulder. "You okay?"

"I, I really, really don't like talking to large groups," Fluttershy mumbled. "But... I'll be okay, yes."

Alea crossed her arms. "Did you get them to look at your thing?"

"Yes. They're sending a contract in a few days."

"Then the only thing left to do is wait."





"And three days later, I was officially put on the head of the research team." Fluttershy rolled her eyes at Twilight's excited gasp. "Which meant everyone else did the research and I just collated the data." She chuckled at the deflated sound of disappointment that escaped the alicorn.

"How did you even pull that off?" Starlight asked. "A random stranger suddenly coming out of nowhere to spearhead a new initiative?"

"It's all in the pitch, darling," Rarity explained. "She hit all the right marks--it was new, it seemed to work, it wasn't more expensive to do then what they were already doing, and by granting the blueprints but keeping the prototype she gave the impression that any mistakes in the product would require her direct intervention to fix. I may not know much about bugs myself, but I do know about business and leveraging abilities."

"And you gave a presentation to a crowd!" Pinkie cheered. "Well done, Fluttershy!"

"Heh, well." Fluttershy blushed, fidgeting with her mane. "It made everyone's life better, and I was staking my own safety on it..."

The mood dropped for a moment.

"...Are ya'll sure you're okay?" Applejack asked softly.

"I've lost a leg, an eye, and my wings. I spent so long away from Equestria, never knowing if I could get back. I... I was attacked by monsters and demons and just ordinary criminals... I've seen friends die. Right in front of me." Fluttershy sighed. "No, Applejack. I'm not okay. I'm alive, and I'm not dragged down by it all, but it doesn't go away like that. I might be, eventually. I'm definitely better, just being home with friends. But... I'm not okay. And I don't know if I ever will be."

"...Of course you will." Rainbow Dash stood up. "Because, like you said, you've got friends. And we'll help you through whatever you need."

Without any other words, she put her wings around Fluttershy. A purple pair joined soon after, then a small set of paws, then a pair of pink forelegs, then white, then orange, and then a set of claws.

For a moment there was silence.

"...Starlight?" Twilight looked up, giving the sole equine still outside the group hug a questioning look.

"I'm... not sure I should be part of this," the unicorn admitted. "I mean, the last time me and Fluttershy met was... the village, and, well..."

"You don't have to do anything you're uncomfortable with," Fluttershy assured her. "I understand."

Starlight bit her lip, but nodded. "So... should... should I just go, or--"

"No." Fluttershy quickly shook her head, pushing off her friends gently. "Thank you everyone, but... well, we've been up here a while. And there are things I need Twilight and Starlight's help with."

"You do?" Twilight asked.

"Yes. So... how about I wrap up telling you about my time on Mars, and then the three of us can head back to my cottage to set things up? Actually, maybe Pinkie should come too, now that I think about it--"

"Ooo!" Pinkie bounced up and down. "What are we doing, what are we doing?"

"I'll tell you in a moment. I don't want to keep all our friends in suspense."

"Oki-doki-loki." The pink pony pounced into her seat. "Storytime, go!"

Fluttershy chuckled. "Well, like I said, I was put in charge of the research team. And, pretty much, the B.I.N.C.S. was a rousing success... on Mars, anyway. Soon enough, the E.M.L.A. decided maybe I should go to Venus and take over tests there. That's another planet in the solar system. Of course, my last experience on a spaceship had been kind of... bad, so I was a little nervous, but I decided to talk with my friends..."





"There's no real downside," Reinhild mused.

"Um... really?" Fluttershy frowned. "It's just... the last time I was in space--"

"--you were on a manifestation-infested liveship and had just been transported from your home with transcendent tech," the fox pointed out. "None of that is space-based danger, just TTI stuff. And if you're on a Progenitus ship it's not very likely you'll meet anyone working with TTI."

"Venus is sort of TTI turf, though," Alea pointed out. "They were the ones that made the wildlife."

"That was almost three centuries ago," Reinhild replied. "They didn't start doing the transcendent shit until a lot later. And anyway, most of Venus is a wildland, even the animals. Even if they have more technical control, they'll find it harder to find Fluttershy over there then they would over here."

"So... you think I should go to Venus?" Fluttershy asked.

"I think you'll get more from the trip then you would staying here," Reinhild replied. "Stable job, new animals to meet, whoever's interested in you would have a harder time finding you, and there is enough TTI presence that we could stumble on some sort of clue about how you got here in the first place."

Alea quirked an eyebrow. "What, are you going with her?"

"Might as well. It was my apartment that they found, I'd be the reasonable first link to getting Shy."

Fluttershy's ears folded back. "I'm sorry, I... I didn't mean to put you in danger--"

"Shy, it's fine. Danger's my job." Reinhild shrugged. "Besides, I've been wanting to get off-planet for a while. Go see the sights. Venus is a good place to start."

"Well, best of luck to you two." The cog sipped her drink. "Maybe before you go we can, I don't know, get something to eat together or something."

Reinhild rose a brow. "I think you want to come with us."

"I think you're imagining things."

"I think there's somebody on the Quad who would have very pertinent questions for his sister-in-law, especially if he never met her before."

Alea frowned. "You know, threats don't work on me fox."

"How about this." Reinhild wrapped an arm around Fluttershy. "This girl saved your life. And you still haven't been able to help her find out why she's here. So you're going to be leaving a debt unpaid if you don't come with us."

Alea glanced from the fretful pegasus to the stone-faced fox. Then back at the fretful pegasus.

"...You two make a real carrot and stick routine, you know that?" With a sigh, she put her glass down. "Fine. I mean it's not like you're uprooting me from my own life anyway."

"Oh, I really don't mean to be a bother--"

"No seriously, Fluttershy, I really don't have a life here. It's the reason I've got so much time to pour into your situation."

"...Oh." Fluttershy looked at her. "Do you want to talk about--?"

"No."

"Oh.... okay."

Alea rubbed her brow. "And I can't even tell if you're guilt-tripping me with that look..."

"So it's settled. Shy takes the gig, we three all fly to Venus, and we figure it out from there."

"Yes, fox, it's settled." Alea smirked. "Of course, knowing our luck, everything will go to shit three days in."
> Vistatores Ab Altrivs Regni
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Fluttershy stretched her legs as she pushed herself off the chair. "So, that was Mars. I'd tell you about my trip to Venus, but... there's a party going on and I'm the guest of honor after all."

"Right!" Twilight nodded, glancing at the sun. "We were up here for... forty five minutes?"

"Forty-six and thirteen seconds." Fluttershy chuckled at her bewildered expression. "Votum is very useful to have on hoof."

"It sure sounds like he is," Starlight commented. "I'm... not sure how I'd adjust to having a voice in my head."

"It's actually not all that difficult," Pinkie commented. "The tricky bit is getting them to stay focused."

Rarity rolled her eyes. "Oh, right, yes. Why am I not surprised you'd be the one to say that?"

"You're one to talk," Rainbow quipped as they trotted back into the palace. "You had your whole Shadow Spade thing, and you can't tell me you weren't having the internal monologue of some sort."

Applejack snorted. "Now where in the hay didya learn the phrase Internal Monologue?"

Spike rose a claw. "Guilty."

Fluttershy waved her hoof as they reentered the main hall, acknowledging the various cheers from the crowd. "We can talk about our mental stability later. Right now, I just want to spend time with my friends and family and fellow pony."

"Right...." Starlight coughed. "I'll just... go, then."

"No, I really was serious about needing you and Twilight later. And unless you've got a connection with Harmony I don't know about, you'll get lost in this castle if you go wandering."

Starlight blinked. "Is... that actually a thing? Is that why the rest of you don't get lost?"

"I... don't know?" Rarity managed. "I just always seem to find my way around in here."

"Huh, yeah." Twilight frowned. "Now that you mention it, Spike and I never really got lost in here either."

"Give the castle a few weeks to get used to you," Fluttershy advised. "It'll get easier."

"I don't know if the castle is alive like that," Twilight pointed out hesitantly.

"It was grown from a tiny seed," Fluttershy countered. "Of course it's alive."

"Well, if we assume it has the mentality of a tree, then how would it be able to keep Starlight lost?" the alicorn asked. "I mean, trees are rather docile."

"Just because it's tree-like doesn't mean it's a tree," Fluttershy pointed out. "Also, I've met some pretty non-docile trees."

"What do you mean by that?"

"Let's just say that when you're on Venus, the term Migratory Forest takes on a whole new dimension of meaning..."





The party continued long into the afternoon. Fluttershy meandered about, always attended by one of her friends or family members, and caught up with various ponies; the cutie mark crusaders were eager to tell her of their newfound marks, and in turn all but demanded she show off her 'cool new robot parts'. A few ponies were drawn in by holographic images of another world and its inhabitants, oooing and aaaing at creatures of strange grace and visions of technological wonder.

But time went on, as it always did, and eventually the last guests were saying their farewells. Fluttershy gave her little brother a tight hug. "It really is good to see you again, Zephyr. I hope I didn't pull you away from your latest grand idea."

"Wha... no! No. Of course not, I mean, even if you did, you're my sister, and--"

Futtershy put a hoof on his mouth with a smirk. "I'm just teasing, Zeph."

"Oh." He nodded. "Right."

"Look... I know I haven't been around so much, with the whole... Elements thing, and now the thing where I went to an alien world, but... you know I'd support you in whatever you decided to do."

"I know, I know--"

"As long as you decided to do it," Fluttershy added firmly.

Zephyr grinned cockily. "Hey, come on, you know me."

"Yeah, I do. That's why I'm adding that caveat." Fluttershy sighed. "I'm... I'm going to be very busy in the next few weeks, months, maybe even years. And that means I... that means you're going to have to learn how to live without my guidance. You could be a great pony at whatever you tried, if you just... stuck with it. For once." She shook her head. "I... just... please, Zeph. Don't be afraid to fail, and don't be afraid to pick yourself back up again."

"I--"

"Please. For me, Zeph."

Zephyr frowned for a moment, only a moment, before ruffling her mane with a grin. "Sure thing, Flutter Butter. I promise."

Fluttershy sagged in relief. "Good. That's... good. Look, why don't you and Mom and Dad get going, I... I have things I need to talk with Twilight about. Things about... what happened, and what's going to happen. It's all going to be very technical and boring and... yeah, like I said, I'm going to be busy."

"Alright, alright! I can tell when I'm not wanted."

Rainbow Dash scoffed. "As if."

"See you later Flutters!" Zephyr waved as he and his parents walked out.

"Catch you on the flipside!" Fluttershy replied with a broad smile as they walked off.

Rarity turned to her with a quirked eyebrow. "...Catch you on the flipside?"

Fluttershy blinked, before managing an awkward giggle. "Yes. Well. Um. I'm... I spent a whole year in another world, some... some of the slang... um... What I mean is I... well..."

"Catch. You on. The flipside."

"...Oh come on, it works, right?"

"...I suppose," Rarity conceded reluctantly.

"So!" Fluttershy cleared her throat. "Anyway. Twilight, Starlight, could you come with me to my cottage? And... Pinkie, well, you're probably going to want to hear this too, so..."

"What about the rest of us?" Rainbow asked.

Fluttershy rolled her eyes. "It's going to be a major egghead talk, Dash. Like, numbers, equations, parabolic arcs, non-eweclidean geometry, sines and cosines and thaumic temporal quantum. There is also going to be science."

"But you're bringing Pinkie in."

The yellow pony gave the pegasus a flat look.

"...Uh... fair enough, I guess." Rainbow hovered back for a moment, before narrowing her eyes. "Hey Starlight. Don't give her any trouble!"

"Trouble? I'm not going to give her trouble, I--"

Fluttershy sighed. "Rainbow, I can handle myself, alright?"

"...Right. Still." Rainbow pointed her hoof from her eyes to the unicorn. "I'm watching you." She flew off without another word.

Applejack rolled her eyes. "Right, well... Take care o' yerself, Shy. Ah'll be on tha farm if ya need me."

"Oh, yes. Actually, I should head over to the boutique, start work on a new ensemble for you." Rarity trotted off with a smile. "I have so many ideas, darling, I promise I'll be over first thing tomorrow--"

"Maybe make it some time in the afternoon? Oh, and Applejack! Tell Rainbow that we're all meeting up tomorrow, in the afternoon. After. Noon. Alright?"

Applejack quirked an eyebrow. "...Sure thing, Shy...?"

Fluttershy smiled innocently.

"...see ya then?"

"Yep!"

"...Ah'll... be gettin' a move-on, Ah guess." Giving Fluttershy one last wary look, she trotted away.

Twilight looked from her to Fluttershy. "Sooooo... what was that all about?"

"Oh, I didn't want to ruin the surprise," Fluttershy replied casually.

"Oooo! A surprise!" Pinkie bounced in place! "I love surprises! Can I know what it is, please please please please pleeeeeeeeeeeease?"

"Can you keep it a secret until tomorrow?"

"Of course! Cross my heart and hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye!"

"Well, it's pretty simple. I'm going to be having guests."

There was a pause.

"But... you only just got back," Pinkie pointed out.

"Wait." Twilight's eyes went wide. "Wait. Wait, are you... are you saying that the aliens... they're coming here?"

"Mmhmm. Sometime tomorrow morning, I think."

Pinkie Pie proceeded to perform one of her patented 'Slow Inhalation Of Sheer Excitement And Gradual Levitation' actions.

Fluttershy's ears folded back with a wince. "Pinkie, could you, um, tone it down a bit there? That's a little much for me now."

"Oh. Okay." Pinkie returned to the ground. "Can I bounce around while chanting oh my gosh in a high pitched voice?"

"Yeah, sure."

"OHMYGOSHOHMYGOSHOHMYGOSHOHMYGOSHOHMY--"





"--GOSHOHMYGOSHOHMYGOSHOHMYGOSHOHMYGOOOOOOOOOOOOOSH!"

"Two hundred fifteen," Fluttershy noted with some astonishment.

"Two hundred fifteen what?" Twilight asked.

"Pinkie said Oh My Gosh two hundred and fifteen times."

Starlight gave her a look of amazement. "You were counting that?"

"No, Votum was."

"...That is both impressive and creepy."

Fluttershy gave her an amused smile. "Interesting that you, of all ponies, should say that." She cut off Starlight's reply with a wave of her hoof. "But bringing things back to the matter at hand, I don't know exactly when they'll be here. The plan was for them to wait for two weeks while I prepared everypony, except apparently I've only been gone three months on this side."

"Oh, right, the time dilation!" Twilight nodded. "That would complicate matters."

"I've had Votum run the numbers. There's roughly a two to five time ratio--two days here is five days there. Which is really weird because their day is actually thirty, forty minutes longer than ours... And being fair, I'm rounding a bit and trying to account for unexpected stuff from their side of the equation, and I'm assuming the time dilation is a static factor--which it might not be. So..." Fluttershy shrugged. "Basically, I know they're coming, and I think they're coming tomorrow morning. Hopefully before afternoon. If nothing goes wrong."

Pinkie Pie sighed. "It's going to be awful hard to plan a welcome party for guests when you're not sure when they'll be here."

"And I'm going to have to stay up all night waiting for them." She pointed a hoof at a wooden sign hammered into the lawn. "I mean, I left them a note, in case they came early, but none of my animal friends came to get me at the party so... they're not here yet."

Twilight frowned at the sign. "I... can't read that."

"Not surprising, it's in the Vector language. Basically it says to wait here if I'm not here and explains the time dilation issue. I hope it's not necessary though..." Fluttershy sighed, turning to her. "So, what I need you and Starlight here for is to... basically watch for magical intrusions into this reality. It will probably be them, but the tether is still experimental and they don't necessarily know what's going to happen."

"Right." Twilight nodded, turning to Starlight. "You think you're up for this?"

Starlight bit her lip. "I... guess I can, it's just I don't know if I'm the best pony for... well... first contact."

"Of course you aren't, silly! That would be me!" Pinkie proclaimed. "Well, kind of. Maybe Fluttershy is the best for first contact, but she's already contacted the aliens, so this would be second contact. But luckily I have my emergency alien welcoming kit stocked and ready! Except it's in Sugarcube corner, so I just need to go get it. I'll be back before you can say Vlorginzarch'mporfinkarikitykatchykuri!"

She zipped off into the distance.

"Vlorginzarcham... zarch... zarch'm...?" Starlight blinked, turning to Twilight. "What?"

"It's Pinkie Pie," Twilight replied. "Don't ask me to explain it."

"Well, it might take her a while before she gets her kit," Fluttershy mused, "so she probably chose a complex tongue-twister on purpose."

"...Huh." Twilight nodded thoughtfully. "I guess that makes sense. Never thought I'd see the day."

"Well, if you spend enough time with Discord, you figure out how to see things that don't make sense." Fluttershy paused. "Speaking of... where is he, anyway?"

"He's kind of been gone ever since you were," Twilight said. "Nopony knows, exactly..."

Fluttershy frowned. "That's... not good. What if he's hurt? What if the tether hurt him, and we don't know it?"

"Fluttershy--"

"You have that summoning spell, right? The one you used when the vines were attacking Ponyville. Can you use it to bring him here?!"

Twilight opened her mouth.... and facehoofed. "Why didn't I ever think of that? Of course I can! Hold on--"

The glow of her horn grew more and more intense, magic spiralling through arcane patterns in the space of seconds. There was a great flash and then Discord was before them--hovering in midair and grappling at--

--there was something threadlike about it, in the sense that it was wispy and fragile, but the shape was more akin to a ladder, if a ladder had five sides and was made of crystal and twisted in ways that suggested it might actually have more sides just outside the visible dimensions. They couldn't tell if it was all one thing or four separate things he was holding with his claws paw and tail; they seemed to shrink or fade into the distance, or possibly both, depending on how you looked at it.

Discord turned to Twilight with an annoyed look. "I'm quite busy right now princess--Fluttershy!" His mismatched eyes went wide. "My word, what happened to you?!"

"It's a long story that I'd be quite happy to tell you, but first of all--" Fluttershy pointed at the undulating formation. "What is that and why haven't you talked to anyone since I vanished?"

"I don't know what it is, exactly, but I do know it's what snatched you up." Discord tugged at the assemblage, tightening it. "I've been spending all this time keeping it from drifting away--I was hoping somebody would come check up on me, just so I could send them after you."

Twilight bit her lip. "Um... sorry..."

"Well, whatever. She's back, so I suppose--"

"Don't let it go!" Fluttershy cried.

Discord paused. "What?"

"Don't let it go," Fluttershy repeated. "If that's what I think it is, then it needs to stay here as long as possible."

"I can't hold on forever," Discord grumbled.

"You've held on for three months... or thereabouts. I have friends on the other side, they're bringing an anchor point."

"What?" Starlight demanded. "When were you going to mention the anchor point?"

"...Literally right before Pinkie interjected and got me thinking about Discord."

"Oh. Okay."

"Are you the pony that was messing with time?" Discord growled.

"...Um... yeeeeees?"

"Well, congratulations. This thing has knots in it because of you!"

"Knots?" Fluttershy asked.

"Yes, a lot of temporal knots." Discord paused. "...How long were you on this... other side?"

"...a little over a year," Fluttershy admitted.

"Right. Well, as soon as this gets anchored, I'll see about untangling the knots as best I can. After," he added, "I get to greet you back properly."

"I'm back!" Pinkie declared. "Oh hey Discord! We missed you! And Fluttershy. Has she told you about her adventures in another world?"

"I only just got here," Discord grumbled. "But I certainly want to know what happened."

Fluttershy smiled. "Well, let's see if I can get you caught up. It all started when, in the middle of watering my garden, the world went all... strange..."





"...so we agreed that going to Venus was the best idea," Fluttershy finished as the sun began to rise the next morning. "And, well, that's about where I got to with everypony before I decided to stop telling the story and come back here."

"That's quite the tale," Discord said. His head was resting atop his hooved leg, a fair distance from where his body still struggled with the semicoherent endpoint of the tether.

"And it's not even complete yet," Fluttershy agreed.

"Oh no, certainly not." Discord glanced around, before leaning in. "I take it you haven't told the others about what else you have installed in that new eye of yours."

Fluttershy glanced at the yawning Twilight. "No... not yet. There's a reason, though. I want to break it to them gently, piece by piece..."

"I suppose that would be the kind thing to do. But then..." Discord tilted his head. "Would it be the honest thing? Or loyal?"

The yellow mare sighed. "Discord... this is going to be a big enough adjustment as it is. I am going to tell them... just not yet, alright?"

"Oh, I don't disapprove. A little chaos has always been worthwhile, in my opinion. I just hope they'll be able to understand why you kept it secret."

She glanced at the ground. "...so do I, Discord. So do I."

For a moment, they were silent.

Then Discord's ears perked. "I think... yes. Yes, something's coming through the tether."

Fluttershy's eyes shot up. "Right. Twilight! Starlight! They're on their way!"

Starlight snorted as she woke up. "Hmm... wha--"

"The aliens, Starlight!" Twilight shook her head, forcing her tiredness away as she shook Pinkie. "Wake up! Wake up, they're almost here!"

"Dunwannabrkroks...."

"Pinkie! New friends! Party!"

Pinkie's eyes shot open. "New friends party?!" She near literally sprung to life, running around as Starlight pushed herself up with a grumble. "New friends party!"

"Pinkie, you're at around a seven out of ten," Fluttershy said. "I need you to bring it down to a four, alright?"

"A what?"

"A four. This is their first time in Equestria, they are not quite prepared for..." Fluttershy glanced at Discord. "A lot, so, just... calm down a little, okay?"

"Right. Right! I am awake and under control." Pinkie tapped her head. "Got my party instinct battened down."

"Good, good--"

Discord's head flashed back onto his body, and he quickly shifted the shifting endpoints of the tether toward a blank patch of ground. "Here they come!"

A ball of light grew--or perhaps, it rolled from a great distance, falling out of the strange construction. Unnatural ripples of lightning flew as it hit the ground and unfolded, lancing into the dirt as quickly as it could. The bright object coalesced into six forms, growing less and less strange as the brightness slowly began to dim, till at last they could be seen without the blinding aura.

The moment the light show ended, Fluttershy fluttered up to the six creatures with a broad smile. "You all came! Oh my gosh, this is amazing, I was wondering if one of you would have to stay.... behind..."

Fluttershy's smile faded when her eyes fell on one in particular, a black-and-white serpentine creature with a feathery purple crest, a tightly-trimmed tubelike garment, and awkwardly avoidant blue eyes.

"Spectral Navigator Ekundayo Śniegowski." Her tone was as dry and level as a desert. "I was not expecting you."
> Lt Stella Itineeribvs
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The snake cleared her throat. "<...in light of recent revelations regarding the origins and identity of one Fluttershy, Transcendent Technologies Incorporated wishes to extend its formal apologies and a promise of lifetime compensation for the grievances said individual has suffered from the actions of its former subsidiaries-->"

"<Oh cut the crap,>" growled the largest newcomer. "<Long story short, TTI wanted one of theirs on this, and we picked her since she was the best option out of all the ones we knew.>"

"That makes sense," Fluttershy allowed, still frowning at the snake. "So I'm guessing you have the anchor."

"<...yes.>" Ekundayo reached her head into the sack tied tightly around her lower half. "<It's right here, let me just--ah.>" She pulled out a thick black cylinder twice as tall as Twilight, concave grooves dividing it into seven sections marked with glass panes on the side and bearing a single colored screen at the top.

"Alright then. I'll just give it to our local transdimensional expert, and he'll set it up."

Fluttershy took the device, handing it over to Discord. The draconequus looked at the object with a mild frown, but slid the strange construct he was holding into it. He winced when his talon phased through the material, pulling out a tiny red thing that writhed in his grip.

The yellow pegasus narrowed her eyes. "Ekundayo--"

"<I don't know what that is!>" the snake said quickly. "<I'm not authorized to know what that is!>"

Discord rose his tail, snapped the fur on the end of it, and the tiny red thing burned away. "Best to nip that in the bud. If it had taken root, things could have gotten incredibly messy." He finished his work, noting the screen lighting up with green text. "Should work pretty well without that anyway."

Twilight blinked. "So, what was that anyway?"

"Kudzu, basically." Discord cracked his knuckles. "Well, you've got boring princess duties to do, call me when Fluttershy's ready to continue her story. Chaos knows I've waited a while for that."

With a snap of his talons, he vanished.

Ekundayo blinked, staring at the spot he had been standing. "<What... what was that? What kind of creature was that, the cuil reader-->"

"Discord is a friend of mine," Fluttershy said firmly. "And a good one. Speaking of friends..." She gestured toward the other ponies. "I'd like to introduce Twilight Sparkle, Princess of Friendship."

Twilight stepped forward with a smile. "It's a pleasure to finally meet Fluttershy's friends from another world. I would like to formally welcome you to Equestria."

The aliens all looked at her.

"<...Fluttershy,>" said the fox, "<what did your friend just say?>"

"Oh! Right." Fluttershy cleared her throat. "Votum, could you transfer what you've made of the translation matrix to their toggles?" She smiled at the aliens apologetically. "There was apparently a bit of temporal dilation involved in the tether transfer, I've actually only been back... two and a half days, has it really only been that long? I'll update the translation matrix as we go, but you're going to have to endure a bit of a language barrier until then."

Twilight frowned. "Fluttershy, I may not understand what they're saying, but your special talent--"

The pegasus snapped her head to look at her, still smiling. "Not all of them understand cutie mark magic," she said in an undertone, flicking her tail toward the snake pointedly. "I'd like to keep the true scope of my ability close to my chest right now."

"Um..." Pinkie leaned in. "Why though?"

Fluttershy lowered her voice to a whisper. "She's a good person at heart, but Ekundayo is also the one who... well, took my wings apart."

Twilight's eyes shrunk to pinpricks. "WHAT?!"

Starlight Glimmer looked at the snake, who curled in on herself at the attention. "How though? She doesn't have any hands. Is she telekinetic?"

"Tools," Fluttershy replied, shivering. "Look, I know you want to do something with her, but it won't help now. I'm the one she hurt, I'm the one who will deal with her. Understood?"

Twilight looked from the snake, to the other aliens, to Fluttershy. "We're going to have to talk about that."

"She's only getting one cupcake," Pinkie declared firmly. "Maybe two if she's reeeeeeeally sorry."

Fluttershy snorted. "Never change, Pinkie."

"Change is a part of life, Fluttershy. Sorry."

That got a giggle from the yellow pony.

"<So sorry to interrupt,>" said the utterly unapologetic mechanical alien, "<but we've got our matrixes installed. I'm going to test them now, alright?>"

"Alright, Alea. Go ahead."

The hovering alien cleared her throat. "Many I say nice hello friend pony many friend from graph animal many many. Many I nice thank you of let many I join you at you home place--"

"Okay, stop. We need to tweak this thing."

"Oh sure, Fluttershy, go right ahead."

"Right, so--" Fluttershy blinked, and then glared at the smirk on the catlike face. "You did that on purpose!"





"Ohmygoshohmygoshohmygosh!" Rainbow Dash hovered around the group. "You brought aliens! Actual aliens! And... huh." She tilted her head. "You know, I thought you'd look weirder. Like tentacles and stuff. Or twelve eyes. You just look like animals on their hind legs."

"Rainbow Dash, don't be rude." Rarity cleared her throat, smiling up at the newcomers. "For what it's worth, you do all look quite elegant."

"All I'm saying is these guys don't really look like they're from another planet," Rainbow pointed out. "I mean, huli jing, robot Abyssian, a gargoyle, some sort of griffon wannabe--"

The largest newcomer perked his ears. "You have griffons here?"

Fluttershy cleared her throat. "Rainbow, Bat Sunrod is a bat taur. Calling them gargoyles is... kind of not done. It'd be like calling a pegasus a feather duster."

"Really? Weird, he looks almost like a gargoyle." Rainbow leaned into an unamused scarred face. "I mean, slap a lion's tail on him and you're golden."

"I thought taurs had four legs," Rarity mused.

"Well, it's more like they have six limbs..." The yellow pony sighed. "Sunrod, gargoyles are a known if relatively rare race here. I hope you don't take any offense at my friends' understandable confusion."

"I will keep that in mind," the winged figure rasped.

"Oh, nifty voice, very growly." Rainbow hovered over the others. "Never seen a wingless amphiptere before. And... I don't know what you're supposed to be."

"I'm a seal!" chirped the addressed individual.

"...I've seen seals," Rainbow deadpanned. "You're not a seal. Your mane is too long, your muzzle's too short, and your eyes are too big. They're almost pony-sized!"

"Kryse'is is a seal Vector," Fluttershy pointed out. "So, she's... seal-shaped, sort of."

The blue pegasus leveled a flat look at her, gesturing at the alien.

"...Okay, yeah, but her tail's the right shape... and..." Fluttershy shrugged helplessly. "Look, Vectorkind was this big genetic experiment and it was never going to be a hundred percent, alright?"

"Wait, can we go back to where there are griffons here?" the largest one asked.

Fluttershy sighed. "Yes, Ko-k0ro, there are felid/avian hybrids with wings, talons, lion tails, the whole shebang, I'm sure you'll meet some of them eventually. Right now, well..."

"Yes, quite." Twilight cleared her throat. "On behalf of Equestria, I would like to formally thank those of you responsible for caring for Fluttershy and ensuring her return to our lands. You are welcome to stay in my palace, and we will do our best to accommodate you. If you need anything, let me know, and I will see to it personally."

Alea chuckled. "You hear that, Ko-k0ro? You can finally have that megaburger you always wanted!"

"Well, uh..." Twilight chuckled. "I'm not that good of a cook..."

"I meant you could ask your servants to do it."

Twilight blinked at her.

"...Because, as a princess, you have servants," Alea continued. "Because you know, royalty. Pampering."

"...Actually, Spike here usually cooks for us," Twilight corrected.

"Hey," said Spike.

Kryse'is gasped. "Oh my god you talk. I am so so sorry, I just thought you were a pet or something!"

"Nope, Spike's a dragon," Fluttershy explained calmly.

"So you have a dragon as a servant," Alea mused.

"No, she has a dragon as..." Fluttershy considered. "...Family? I don't know if it's a son or little brother thing. How old were you when you hatched Spike?"

"Seven point three two six years old, rounded down," Twilight pronounced proudly.

Reinhild quirked an eyebrow. "You have that memorized?"

"It was one of the most important days of my life," Twilight pointed out. "I got my cutie mark, I became Princess Celestia's personal student, and I hatched Spike!" She wrapped a foreleg around the dragon and nuzzled him fondly, ignoring his half-hearted protest.

"...Ooookay," Alea drawled, "so, just to be clear: Where are your servants?"

"Oh I don't do that," Twilight explained. "I mean, sure, it might be nice, but I feel it makes me less approachable. If I need help with anything, my friends are always willing to lend a hoof."

"Speaking of," Rarity interjected, "Where is Applejack? She and Pinkie should have been here a few minutes ago."

A blur of pink shot through the castle doors, rebounded against a wall, twirled in midair (incidentally releasing a full buffet table), and skidded to a stop with the sound of a party horn. "Hey there new friends--!"

Fluttershy winced, giving Ekundayo a sympathetic look when she hissed in pain. "Pinkie... little much there."

"Oh?" Pinkie glanced to the snake, then to Fluttershy--and for the briefest of moments, her smile seemed very much like Discord's. "Really, Flutters?"

Fluttershy narrowed her eyes. "...I'll ask for your help if I need it."

"Hmmm." After a moment, Pinkie shrugged. "Oki-doki-loki! Anyway, hey there new friends! I brought ~snaaaaaaaacks! Help yourselves! But you only get one cupcake," she added, pointing at the snake firmly.

Rarity blinked. "What?"

"She knows what she did," the party horse said sternly.

Rarity turned to Twilight in confusion, who wouldn't look her in the eye. Then she turned to Fluttershy, who slowly shook her head. "...alright...? So, thank you for the snacks, Pinkie--"

Ko-k0ro rose a feathered arm. "Hey, so I'm not big on science fiction, but isn't it supposed to be dangerous to eat alien food? Biochemistry and all that?"

"Oh don't worry about that," Kryse'is assured him. "Progenitus ran a full analysis of Fluttershy's cellular processes, and while she's genetically quite divergent from earth-derived organisms, her actual biochemistry is fairly similar aside from a few exotic processes which the higher-ups are pretty sure are related to her unusual abilities. So this should be safe to eat... well, safe-ish," she mused. "There is the possibility of ponies being immune to certain toxins, and of course there's always the issue of foreign biological contaminants--but the company prepared me in both cases so you're not likely to die. At worst you'll just suffer through the inexplicable nature of an unidentified illness for a couple of months while Fluttershy uses the equipment I brought to treat you."

Eleven pairs of eyes focused on her broadly smiling face.

"...when, exactly, did the company have a chance to examine my cellular processes?" Fluttershy asked flatly.

"I filed a sample while we were on Ganymede," Kryse'is explained casually. "Got the results back around when we got to Europa."

"Kryse'is," Fluttershy said in a calm but nonetheless unamused tone, "do you remember the conversation we had about how ponies view privacy, especially in regards to medical treatments?"

"Oh yes! It was very interesting!"

Fluttershy raised a brow.

Kryse'is's smile faltered a bit. "...what?"

"Kryse'is, did I ever give you permission to run tests on my cellular biochemistry?"

"You did sign an employment contract with Progenitus," the seal pointed out. "Legally speaking--OH! Oh, is this one of those corporate law versus country law things again?"

Fluttershy sighed. "Yes. Yes it is."

"So I shouldn't run tests without asking permission from the ponies involved."

"That's right... and....?"

Kryse'is frowned to herself. "...and... um..."

"...and since I was unaware of the clause that let you run tests on my sample...?" Fluttershy prompted.

"...you are owed compensation? Wait, that doesn't seem right." Kryes'is tapped her chin for a moment, before her face lit up in recognition. "Oh! You want an apology! I'm sorry, Fluttershy, it won't happen again."

"That's perfectly fine, Kryse'is, I understand and forgive you." The pony turned to Rarity with a long-suffering sigh. "She's a nice girl, really, just..."

"Oh, I understand entirely," Rarity assured her. "Celestia knows how often I've had to explain things to Sweetie Belle."

The castle doors opened again, Starlight and Applejack striding in. "Howdy, yall, sorry Ah'm late--whoa nelly!" She pulled back her hat, looking up. "You're Shy's alien friends?"

"Yep." Reinhild put a hand on her hip. "You must be Applejack, right?"

"That's right. Sorry fer tha wait had a bit of an issue that cropped up on the farm. Caught Starlight on tha way here." Applejack nodded toward the strangers. "Hope you weren't waitin' too long..."

"It's fine. Pinkie just set up the snacks. Oh!" Fluttershy started gesturing around. "Applejack, this is Seargent Reinhild Ca'Fo, AleaFaulkner, Kryes'is Zizkind, Bat Sunrod, Ko-k0ro Skyhope, and Ekundayo Śniegowski, Spectral Navigator. Everyone, this is Applejack, bearer of the Element of Honesty, head of Sweet Apple Acres, and a very dear friend of mine."

"Pleasure ta meetcha," Applejack said with a tip of her hat. "How're ya all findin' Ponyville so far?"

"It's... different," Reinhild mused. "Not bad, mind, just..." Her tail swished as she tapped her hip. "It's... rustic seems to be the best word."

"What," Ko-k0ro chuckled, "cause they've got no tech here?"

"It's not that. It's... the people, well, ponies. We got odd looks, but then they noticed we were with the princess and..." Reinhild shook her head. "There was no panic. Interest, sure, but no... there weren't any of them who didn't trust that we were handled."

"Very similar to where I grew up," Sunrod mused. "Trusting. Welcoming, even."

Applejack rose a brow. "Aincha tha one that was raised by them spy people?"

The bat smiled grimly. "Ah. I see our reputation precedes us. You bear the element of Honesty, right?"

"Did for a while. Can again."

"I take it that means you have a sense of when people are lying."

Applejack narrowed her eyes. "Ah do, yes."

"Well, I may be in the business of keeping secrets, but that doesn't mean I lie unnecessarily." Sunrod crossed his arms, wings curling around his shoulders. "It would be... dishonorable to waste obscurity."

A frown passed over Applejack's face. "Frankly, Ah think lyin' at all is dishonorable."

"It damages trust, yes. But--"

Reinhild groaned. "Drop it, Sunrod, we're not here to debate philosophy."

"Mmm." Sunrod conceded the point with a nod. "So... what shall we do?"

"Well," Starlight mused, "Fluttershy has been telling us all about her time on Mars."

"I actually about wrapped up that yesterday," Fluttershy pointed out. "Maybe you all could join in while I tell them about the trip to Venus?"

Ko-k0ro laughed. "Well, I'm not going to be much help there!"

"Oh, you might be surprised." Fluttershy cleared her throat. "Discord?"

Discord materialized with a flash, startling Ekundayo back a bit. "Oh, are we starting the story again now?"

"Mmmhmm. Would you mind terribly making couches for our guests?"

"Oh not at all."

With a snap of his talons, almost everyone was resting on an array of double-decker couches. Alea blinked, sharing a confused look with Reinhild, who was sitting next to her; Kryes'is giggled, leaning toward the suddenly very wary Sunrod. Above the second pair, Ko-k0ro looked down with surprise, before shrugging and nestling into the cushions; Ekundayo was trembling, keeping scared eyes on the draconequus as she curled into the couch above fox and cog. Arrayed opposite them, Twilight and Spike sat beneath Rainbow and Applejack, while Discord and Pinkie lounged above Starlight and Rarity.

Fluttershy, between the aliens' couches, looked up at her sudden throne, and the pattern emblazoned on it. A small smile came to her face. "...I don't... think my wings were ever that big, Discord."

"Maybe not in flesh," Discord allowed.

"...Well, I suppose this is appropriate, in its way." Fluttershy hummed thoughtfully. "Yes... right, I guess I should start with our purchase of starship tickets."





"I don't know if this is fair," Fluttershy murmured uncertainly.

Reinhild gave her a look. "What, that we need to pay for transport and you don't? It's fine, Shy. It's just a perk of being an employee." She flicked a finger across the table, tapping a few of the glyphs that appeared. "If we were taking an IRPF ship, you'd have to pay and I wouldn't." A small chamber rose from the center, holding a cup of steaming... something, which the fox grabbed and took a quick sip from. "Difference is, you're still starting out. We can absorb the costs easily."

Fluttershy watched the tiny chamber descend into the table, her expression still uncertain. "It's not... exactly that. Progenitus wants me to run tests with the B.I.N.C.S. on Venus, but I want to find... something, some clue why I'm here. And some way to get home. They're letting me ride their ships for free, and I'm grateful and I certainly will do what they're asking but at the same time--"

"Are you whining about taking advantage of corptime?" Alea snorted. "They're megacorps, Fluts! They couldn't care less what you do, as long as it doesn't hurt their bottom line. And let's be real, all you need to do is get the project started and file a few reports. Far as they're concerned, that's it--you could be running a lateral brothel on the side but so long as it fell into their safety regulations, they'd be fine with it."

Reinhild quirked a brow. "What's wrong with lateral brothels?"

"The ones with actual laterals? Nothing, so long as it's legal. But if you want to save money--"

"Ah, yes, that urban myth." Reinhild rolled her eyes. "Corptowns require you to be able to present a license and answer questions if you're selling your body, so that never actually happens."

Alea shrugged. "Not saying it does, just giving an example."

"I, um..." Fluttershy blushed, curling her wings around her face. "I don't think I would ever run a brothel..."

"What, you don't help your animal friends find good mates?"

"N-no! I might give them advice, but they--"

"Wow, geeze." Alea held up a hand. "Fluts, I was joking. I don't really think you're the kind to be so casual about sex. And that's perfectly fine, don't get me wrong, I just mean... it was a joke, alright? It wasn't like I was hurting anyone."

Fluttershy frowned, her ears folded back. "I... suppose...."

"...fuck, whoever was behind your simulation made you too damn cute," Alea grumbled. "It's like looking at a sad puppy, multiplied by ten!"

"And?" Reinhild asked, smirking.

"And I don't do guilt, alright? Guilt's pointless, what's done is done, you either fix it or you move on! But--" The cog waved a hand at Fluttershy. "Just look at that, Reinhild! Look at that! I wouldn't be surprised if she got a manifestation to say sorry!"

Fluttershy managed a small smile. "Actually, I have a friend named Discord--"

"You are shitting me." Alea leaned her elbow into the table, pointing at her. "You do not, I repeat, do not have a transcendent buddy bud, right?"

"Oh he doesn't look anything like the transcendent manifestations here," Fluttershy assured her. "He's much more... hmm... kooky. Chaotic, even."

"And let me guess, he can warp reality with a snap of his fingers?"

"Talons, actually."

Alea threw up her hands. "I don't believe this. That's impossible. You know what? I'm not going to believe it unless I meet this Discord myself!"





Discord flicked his tail, smugly curling up to perch on Pinkie's mane as he smirked down at Alea.

"Well?" Reinhild prompted, crossing her arms.

"All I said was I'd believe it when I met him," Alea groused petulantly. "And I've met him, and I believe it. That's all."

Fluttershy nodded in understanding. "Mmmmhmmm..."

Alea threw up her hands. "And why are you talking about that anyway? That's just... we talked, it wasn't important! Friends talk all the time, right?"

"That's right," Twilight agreed. "Sometimes, you don't have to talk about anything important to be a true friend."

She sat up with a smile... until she noticed the strange looks she was receiving from the aliens.

"...Did... did I say something wrong?"

"No," Reinhild assured her, "you didn't say anything wrong..."

"She is the princess of friendship," Fluttershy pointed out, not hiding her amused grin.

Alea leaned back, "So, what, she's obligated to talk like an after-school kid's cartoon?"

Fluttershy hummed thoughtfully. "Actually... that sort of direct statement about social interactions and/or moral imperatives is pretty common here. I guess it's just a cultural thing."

"Huh. No wonder you fit into Progenitus culture so easily."

"Well... Progenitus is a lit-tle more, how do I put it... pushy? They have a good core message, but..." Fluttershy shook her head. "Sometimes it feels like they can be too invasive."

"I never really felt that way," Kryes'is mused.

"You never really lived outside the corp," Sunrod countered.

"I mean..." Kryes'is considered that for a moment. "...actually, you make a good point. But I'm on an alien world now! That counts for something right?"

Fluttershy giggled. "Yes, Kryes'is. You're in brand new territory, that I've lived in all my life."

"That's right!"

"Anywaaaaaaay," Ko-k0ro drawled, "getting us back on track, what's next, Shy?"

Alea smirked. "Oh, tell them about the chakat, they'll get a kick out of that!"

Fluttershy rolled her eyes. "Of course you'd bring up the chakat..."

Rainbow Dash flexed her wings. "What's this chakat thing? Is it some kind of space dohickey that shoots lasers?"

Fluttershy snickered. "No, no... well, you see, we were taking off..."





"Please remain in your pods until the lock lights turn off," chimed a voice from the cushion Fluttershy's head was currently sinking into. "If upon release you are suffering any issue, our stewards will be ready to assist you. If this is your first starship launch, you may be experiencing disorientation and or symptoms of irrational panic; you will find calming pills in your armrest pocket, and may request further medication throughout your journey. Thank you for traveling with the Progenitus fleet and endorsing our continued care of the Whole."

"Um... you're... welcome?"

Fluttershy's words were strained by the pressure against her chest. It felt almost as though an invisible bear was sitting on her, and given the roar that reverberated through the padding enveloping her she wasn't quite sure that it wasn't what was actually happening. Of course she'd studied on interplanetary travel, but it had seemed so different from however Luna had ended up on the moon and back that she had her doubts.

Then again, there was a lot about this world that didn't make sense. Maybe she really was riding on a vessel that propelled itself with ground-pointing firework cannons. She'd seen Pinkie Pie pilot stranger things.

The image projected on the plastic in front of her continued to tick up the distance traveled, with a stylized golden silhouette of their ship climbing a dotted line from a solid green ring to a dotted blue one. "We will be entering parking orbit within ten minutes. If you have any holoshows you wish to watch, you may tap your toggle on the nearest surface and the usual menu will appear on your cover. Incorporated eye-tracking parameters can be used to simulate limb motion should you feel unable to resist the g-forces..."

The idea of in-flight entertainment didn't really appeal to Fluttershy at the moment, seeing as she was being slowly swallowed by her pod. She decided to take a quick nap instead--it always worked for Rainbow Dash after she went particularly fast.

A few minutes later, a rapping sound brought her back to the realm of wakefulness. She blinked away her sleep and peered through the plastic. "Oh, hello Reinhild!"

Reinhild rolled her eyes, tapping the plastic again and cupping her ear.

"Oh, right." Fluttershy looked around for a moment, tapping a hoof against the release tab. The plastic slid aside with a hiss, and she pushed herself up--and squeaked a bit when she kept floating on.

"Easy there." The fox reached out, grabbing her rear hoof. "We're zero-g now, remember?"

"Right." The pegasus twitched her wings a bit, reorienting herself. "Oh, that is... strange... almost like swimming."

Reinhild pulled her down to the rung-lined pathway. "Well, if it's your first time awake in zero-g, you should probably not get too adventurous. I mean, Alea thought she could just fly around and..." She shrugged, gesturing toward a distant pair of figures. "Progenitus ships. Way too much open space, frankly. Hell, Spyglass ships are easier to get around in... even if it does mean getting lost."

Fluttershy gripped a rung with one hoof, shaking her head to clear the sudden confusion of the floor suddenly feeling like a wall. "There wasn't any zero-g on that, um, other ship..."

"Yeah, that was a cruiser. This is just a frigate." Reinhild glanced at the figures as they approached, releasing her hold on the pegasus. "It's a size thing. If you're small enough to land on a planet, you're too small to get gravity generators."

"Oh." Fluttershy nodded in comprehension, wings fluttering about experimentally. "I suppose that makes sense." She hummed to herself, gently letting go of the rung and flapping carefully.

The fox frowned at her. "Shy--"

"It's alright. See?" Fluttershy flicked her wings and came to a standstill. "I was just surprised. I can handle this."

"Hey hey! Miss life-saver's out and about!" Alea grabbed a rung with a hand, waving off the taur holding her. "And here I was worried you'd miss the jaunt."

Fluttershy gave her a look. "Jaunt?"

"Slang," Reinhild explained. "We're still in parking orbit, but we'll push out to interplanetary travel in... what," she turned to the taur, "two hours?"

"Two hours, fifteen minutes." The catlike face turned to Fluttershy with a smile. "First-time spacer?"

"...Technically no," the pegasus admitted, "but... well, it's my first time in zero-g." She flicked her wings, reorienting herself. "Thank you for bringing back Alea, miss...?"

"Shir, actually." The cat grinned. "Shir Fleetthought."

Reinhild groaned. "Oh, not this chakat crap..."

Fluttershy gave her a look. "Chakat?"

Alea chuckled. "Right, you wouldn't know! See, back before vectors were created--heck, before the geomats were made, lots of humans would sit around imagining 'hey, what if we could actually genetically engineer a race?' And this one guy came up with this out-of-the-world idea about tauric hermaphroditic felines--"

"And now one in every five hundred cat taurs decides 'fuck it, I'm going to stick on a dick and/or boobs and play at being some dead ape-man's fantasy' because of course that makes sense." Reinhild rolled her eyes. "I think it's just because it's a random scrap of surviving human culture so they think it sounds cool."

"Excuse you," Fleetthought snapped, "just because it's 'cool' doesn't mean it's a stupid decision. I thought long and hard about being a chakat."

"Not hard enough. You've got earrings. The original works clearly have the chakats avoiding body piercing or tattoos."

"...wait, seriously?"

"Yeah."

"How do you know that?"

Reinhild shrugged. "I got called a kitsune back in school so much I decided to research old earth myths. One thing led to another..."

The cat taur frowned, glancing away. "Well... dang. I mean on the one hand I do like most of the culture, but I also like these earrings... my mom gave them to me..."

"Um..." Fluttershy cleared her throat. "I know that some families back in Equestria have mixed heritage, but they make it work... and culture does change over time. Pegasi used to be highly militaristic."

"Pegasi?" Fleetthought asked.

"She's simulation-born," Alea explained.

The taur hissed sympathetically. "Yikes. Are you doing okay?"

"She is now," Reinhild assured her. "Hell, she's on assignment from Progenitus, that's why we're going to Venus."

"Well, good for you." Fleetthought gave Fluttershy a sympathetic smile. "Listen, you need anything on the trip, you just let me know. I'll point you right to it."

"Thank you," Fluttershy replied. "I hope it's not too much trouble..."

"Oh, no trouble at all." The taur made to go, but stopped for a moment. "No piercings? Really?"

Reinhild nodded. "Yep."

"Huh." Fleetthought's ears flicked as the taur drifted off to another deck.





"...Ah..." Rarity coughed awkwardly. "About these... chakats... they alter their bodies to become chakats?"

"Well, to mimic a fictional race from before Earth fell," Reinhild clarified.

"And... they alter... ahem... personal, intimate structures?"

Fluttershy sighed. "Yes, Rarity, Vectors can and do alter their appearance, genitalia, and internal structure. It's part and parcel of having a complete genetic understanding of their bodies."

"I went through a lot of frames as a kid," Alea said. "Heck, my first few bodies were male, but... didn't feel like me."

"My family raised me without, um, naming my gender," Ekundayo supplied. "It was a coming of age ceremony... well, in the area where I grew up, anyway."

"I like switching it up every few years," Kryes'is chirped. "Genderbending is fun!"

"And there's the downside," Sunrod quipped dryly. "Some people don't take the benefits we have seriously."

Reinhild snorted. "To be fair, Kryes'is doesn't take anything seriously."

Rarity hummed thoughtfully. "The fashion implications alone..."

"Unfortunately it's not going to be easy at all for ponies," Ko-k0ro pointed out. "You're completely different, genetically speaking. Everything would have to mapped out and simulated and tested and, well, that would take a lot of time and effort. Not that somebody wouldn't put that time and effort in, but we can't just jump in and start handing out body alteration tech right off the bat."

Pinkie snorted. "Well, duh! I don't think Sunrod would like being a table!"

The room broke into chuckles for a moment or two.

"...Wait." Ekundayo raised her head. "That... pun, it works in both our languages?"

"...apparently," Twilight mused. "Huh. That is interesting. Spike?"

Spike sighed, pulling out a scroll. "Study cross-linguistic puns. On the to-do list."

Rainbow Dash flicked her wings. "So you were on a spaceship! Like, on purpose, going to another planet! Did you run into space pirates or anything cool like that?"

Fluttershy shook her head. "No, not on this particular space trip. Most of the time I just read about Venus and worked on learning new skills that would be useful there. But..." She swallowed. "We got to see something horrifying."





"Hey Shy." Alea's voice was unusually somber. "You're... gonna want to see this."

Fluttershy glanced up from the holoscreen in front of her. "See what?"

"We're passing through the Red Horizon broadcast zone." Reinhild let out a small breath. "They keep an eye on Earth, you know? The station that orbits closest... there's a lot of data, but there's also a camera. Real-time, five-second delay."

The pegasus glanced around. The other passengers, and even the crew, were speaking in low, solemn voices. A few had opened vids to watch... something.

Fluttershy nodded, shutting off her holoscreen. "Alright."

Alea tapped the table between them, lines spreading to form a rectangular window. Framed within came the image of two orbs--one, swirling white with blue and brown beneath its surface, the other a pitted, gleaming silver. And between them, rising from the surface, was a long red... it looked almost like an exposed crystalline muscle, to Fluttershy's eyes, comprised of multiple threads twisting, but tapering off in its center to a visible gap.

"There it is," Alea said quietly. "The Ruby Spire. Nobody knows what it is, or what it does, but we know the Whispers made it." She sighed. "Or... became it. It's not clear."

Fluttershy swallowed, watching the lightning spark between the gap. "Is... is this what they're trying to make everywhere?"

"That's everyone's best guess," Reinhild replied. "Even TTI isn't sure what they're doing. Or if they know, they're keeping it quiet."

"There's a fleet assembling to attack it," Alea muttered. "Pulse, Progenitus... even the IRPF, as funders anyway. There's not enough support yet to actually do the thing, but... some people think it'll work." She shook her head. "I don't. If a show of force could destroy that, we'd have nuked it long ago."

"Some people just... want to feel like they can do something," Reinhild pointed out. "Anything. This is the most unknown thing in our solar system, and it's infected the source of all life we know of. No matter what you think about Earth or humanity, that's too big to just... not think about, sometimes."

Fluttershy listened to them with one ear, but continued watching the image quietly. There was something about the lightning that occasionally sparked across the spire. Something... strange. She wasn't any weathermare, but it seemed almost unnaturally cognizant. Not simply following the path of least resistance, but actively choosing how it would move through the void.

"...it's... alive," she murmured.

Alea gave her a look. "What?"

"It's alive," she said, more firmly. "I can see it."

Reinhild shrugged. "That's one theory--"

"--and," Fluttershy continued, "it's... thinking isn't the right word... it looks like it's... aware."