First Contact Protocols (Goldfur's "Cosmic Lotus")
Bluequill frowned from his place in the Captain’s chair. “Sir, I don’t like you being part of the First Contact party. My primary responsibility is to keep you out of potentially dangerous situations.”
Wandering Path nodded. “I appreciate that, but we’re already in a dangerous situation. And the success of this mission falls on my withers first. I can’t delegate this to anyone else.”
Playbitz looked up from the conn. “The alien ship’s corridor has successfully attached itself around airlock 12. Readings show a breathable atmosphere and approximately 0.8 Equus-standard gravity.”
Wandering looked over his team of two unicorns and one dragon-pony. The pictogram showed 2 bipeds and 2 quadrupeds from his ship meeting the same contingent from the other ship. Well, hopefully the aliens were flexible on the number of hooves that were on the floor. He wasn’t going to change his team: Eon Path for Security, though he wouldn’t be bringing a weapon; Random Dawn to best gauge body language; and Amethyst Scroll for Linguistics.
He cleared his throat. “Is everyone ready? Please, everypony, be relaxed and friendly. And no sudden movements! I don’t want our first meeting with aliens to be exciting in the wrong way.”
“Wa-ter. We call this ‘wa-ter’ .”
“Wa-DER”
“No.” Amethyst shook her head at the female, nearly hairless simian seated next to her. “Emphasis. One. No. D – D – D. Yes. T – T – T.”
“Ah,” nodded the alien. At least some of the non-verbal cues were the same. “WA-ter. OK?”
“Yes! OK! Now … your word for wa-ter.”
“OK. A-gua-la.”
“A-gua-la”
“OK!”
“Still better than being too exciting, Captain?” snarked Random Dawn.
Wandering sighed. He looked up and saw a part-exasperated, part-bored expression on the biped female. No doubt the look on his face matched hers.
The alicorn had noted that superficially, she looked like an Abyssinian. She also had the most pips on her collar, marking her as the leader of their first contact team. A pictogram named her “Flower Petal.” Like his crewmembers, her team waited two meters behind the pair of linguists who were sitting side by side on the floor in the middle of the corridor. On either side of the commander were a light brown and white feline creature with four legs and two arms and a similar being that was pure black. Both had dark rosettes covering most of their bodies, though it was much easier to see them on the lighter “Forest” than on the darker “Nighttime.” The linguists Amethyst and her counterpart named “Rod-reeg-ezz” were busy taking notes on their respective notepads. One a thick tome and the other a flat plate with constantly changing view screen.
The captain snorted softly. “Really jinxed myself, didn’t I? I didn’t stop to think that it would be this uneventful until our vocabulary was built up. Still, we can’t afford to let ourselves get bored and do something that could be misinterpreted.”
“Oh, I’m not bored in the least,” rumbled Eon.
Wandering belatedly realized Eon had not moved or spoken for the two hours they had been exchanging language lessons. He frowned. “And why is that?”
“I’ve been trading stares with their security officer off and on for some time. She is quite impressive.”
Random smiled up at the dragon-pony. “Actually, when I watched their ‘Forest’ lay down, I saw a penile sheath. If some of their other features translate accurately to Equestrian races, the most obvious being female breasts, then I’d say we’re looking at a true hermaphroditic species.”
Eon’s attention didn’t waver. “Hmm. Interesting, but doesn’t change much from the security perspective. I’ll call her a ‘she’ for convenience, then.”
Wandering smiled and decided to test him. “So run down for me what makes you sure she’s Security.”
Eon grinned slightly. “She was the first in the corridor from their squad, just like I was. She’s the only one with a sidearm. I’m guessing it delivers an electrical charge given our fragile environment. She has the lowest body fat ratio, though they’re all physically fit. The biggest tell is that her eye scanning is random enough that I can’t predict it. Plus, you know how Warmaster Blue Streak has that air of relaxed readiness about him with no unnecessary movement? She’s got that in spades. I estimate her to be a very confident and capable hoof-to-claw combatant, especially considering that prehensile tail of hers that is heavier than it looks. I’d put my bits on her against a charging minotaur bull any day.”
Rosepetal spoke without moving her head. “Midnight? This is the first time their dragon-hybrid has spoken. What do you think he is saying?”
Midnight likewise did not change the direction of hir gaze. “He’s giving his commander a positive evaluation of my combat capabilities. Despite their overall smaller size than ours, and the fact that I’m carrying a weapon, I’m not seeing any signs on his part that he thinks any of us besides myself would be a challenge to defeat in combat.”
The commander turned to look at her Security Officer. “And do you think he’s right?”
Midnight replied calmly. “Given the fact that they possess unknown combat capabilities? Yes.”
Rosepetal frowned a bit at the frank evaluation. Belatedly, she realized that Midnight did not include herself as being inferior to the dragon-pony.
Forestwalker shifted herself slightly in hir prone position. Hir head height was still nearly level with the standing pony commander. “Well, I still think they all look as cuddly as a bunch of circus prizes…even the half-scaled one. I’m not detecting any strongly felt positive or negative emotions from the three at this distance from my passive monitoring. Most emotions are getting swamped by the ecstasy of the two language specialists living ‘in the flow.’ I swear those two are bonding.” Shi turned to look at hir superior officer and firstwife to hir mate. “Would you like me to try actively reading their emotions?”
There was a long pause as Rosepetal considered. “Not quite yet. I don’t want to spook them by taking that risk.”
“I think it’s time to take a calculated risk,” thought Wandering to himself. He activated his changeling senses and tried to get an emotional reading on all the beings around him.
The multi-colored quadruped suddenly glanced his way and smiled. Wandering felt a warm wave of happiness wash over his senses from her direction. Sheepishly, he returned the friendly emotion and shut down his senses again.
Forestwalker snickered. “Well, well. Looks like the minds-in-charge think alike. Their commander just tried empathically reading the emotions of everyone in the corridor. I sent some happy feelings his way and he sent them back, though I think with some chagrin.”
Rosepetal gave a thin smile. “So they also have empaths. Perhaps even in a similar proportion to us, too, since no one else reacted to your side conversation. We just keep finding more and more ways their races are similar to ours rather than different.” Her expression turned serious. “I can also sympathize with his desire to move things along. The longer we don’t trust each other, the longer it will take before we can ask their help with the Swarm.”
Midnight spoke up. “So you are convinced they are a separate species or set of species that just happens to have the same technology and just happened to appear right when we need them the most?”
The Caitan nodded. “I made that determination just looking at their ship.”
The security officer smiled slightly. “Good. I’ve come to the same conclusion.”
“And I,” voiced Forestwalker.
The commander sighed. “Now I want to know what they can tell us about the Swarm and their tech. Their ship is damaged and they’ve lost their solar sail, but they still have propulsion and are not desperate for our help. And I don’t want to waste weeks getting us to trust each other.”
Random Dawn continued. “… and from their body language, I think they are definitely being guarded, Captain. They are worried about something and it may or may not be us. Is there any way we can build trust with them sooner rather than later?”
Wandering’s eyes widened and he smiled. “You just said the magic words, Random.” He turned to her. “I think it’s time to unleash our secret weapon.” His smile grew wider and he talked softly to her for a moment.
Rosepetal straightened her stance. “Their captain wants our attention.” All discussion stopped while the winged unicorn tapped the unicorn lying next to him on the back, motioned back towards his ship, then made a wide sweeping motion from a different part of the ship to the spot she was resting now.
Forestwalker spoke up. “He wants to replace one of his team members with a new individual.”
The Caitan nodded to show her understanding.
The unicorn rose and slowly traversed the corridor back to the airlock. She entered it and closed the hatch behind her. The linguists resumed their two-sided conversation.
Midnight frowned. “Forest, I want you to verify something for me. What emotion is the dragon feeling right now?”
Trusting the judgment of her Security Officer, Rosepetal nodded to Forestwalker.
Forest looked at their largest crew member and emptied herself of emotions, allowing hir empathy to fill hir mind with what the other was feeling. “Smug. Plus he’s smiling with all those teeth of his. Huh. Would have expected more incisors. In any case, he reminds me of Ember when shi draws an inside straight.”
The dragon-pony’s smile grew fractionally larger. “And now he’s quite aware that we are aware. He’s amused mixed with some … pity?”
“Everyone be on your forepaws,” said Rosepetal. “I think we’ll have something unexpected arriving from their side.”
Several minutes later, a dark blue pegasus mare exited the airlock with her wings covering the small of her back. She carefully stepped forward until she stood sideways next to her captain. After a nod from him, she lowered her wings.
Four gasps went up simultaneously from the Federation crew members.
“Oh, by all the gods. That is the cutest little darling I have ever seen in my entire life!” declared Forestwalker. Shi got no argument.
“Looks like my hunch was right,” chuckled Wandering softly. “What we’ve got here is a bunch of mommies.”
Skyborn blinked slowly at the sudden increase in light. After stretching, he rose to his hooves and gave a huge yawn. After that, he promptly curled back up into a ball on his mother’s back.
“Awwwww. Isn’t he adorable?” gushed Forest.
“Try to stay focused,” reminded hir commander.
“But he just is!” protested the chakat.
Meanwhile, Midnight was locked in a struggle of wills with hir counterpart. His smile was open and mocking now, daring hir to forego hir duty and look at the little cherub. Slowly, he started to chuckle in a low, gravelly voice.
Midnight huffed and narrowed hir eyes. Shi obliged him with a split-second dart of hir gaze in the direction of the foal, then returning to the dragon. He burst out in a loud, rumbling laugh, all the while keeping his eyes on hir.
“Permission to stand down, Captain?”
“Granted.”
Eon Path lowered his mass to the floor and went from “battle-ready” relaxed to “lounging” relaxed. He waved obligingly to his black-furred counterpart.
“Shall I likewise relax my guard, Commander?”
“Very well.”
As the security officer sat back on hir haunches, the pegasus mare roused her foal once more. This time he spotted the occupants on the far side of the room. His ears pointed forward and his eyes turned bright. He started trotting towards them, only kept from falling to the floor at the last moment by his mother quickly extending a wing so he had something to walk on. Pausing at the base of her primaries, he extended his wings to their maximum, but still rather tiny extent. He leaped forward and fell directly onto his face.
“AHHHHHH!” exclaimed the four Star Fleet crewmembers.
The colt promptly jumped back on his hooves and pranced forward with a smirk. Bypassing Specialist Rodriguez, he came directly up to Forestwalker’s torso, lifted his body by putting his forehooves on hir stomach, and pressed the top of his head into hir right palm which had been hovering out of reach. Obligingly, shi started to rub and scratch behind his ears.
Rosepetal smiled. “You’ll need to undergo a full decontamination now, you realize?”
“Worth it,” the Counselor replied in a dreamy voice. Shi brought hir other hand down to pet the foal’s back, only to have it jostled backward by the diminutive pony’s efforts to get hir to pat his rump by bouncing it up and down repeatedly as he danced around in front of her. “I am positively going to have to have M’Lai test me for adult-onset diabetes after this much sweetness.”
After a bit, Skyborn abandoned the scratches and gave a few gentle bucks against Forestwalker's flank with his front hooves. The combination of the fluttering wings, huge eyes, and big smile was too much for the chakat to resist and shi obligingly rolled all the way onto hir backs. The pegasus jumped up between Forest's forelegs and happily accepted more head rubs.
Specialist Rodriguez got the attention of the gray unicorn mare next to her and spoke in a few of the alien words she knew. “Small … pony … name?”
A few minutes of miming and drawings later, she declared. “Oh, past tense. Got it. OK. Huh, that’s appropriate.” She turned to her crewmates. Forestwalker was again sitting upright and the colt had somehow climbed up hir back until he was standing with his rear hooves on hir shoulders and front hooves on hir head. He was growling loudly as he stomped in place, wrestling with a large lock of hir hair in between his teeth. “The little foal’s name in their language is ‘Skyborn’.”
The little colt stopped and looked around with wide eyes, searching for the source of the voice. When it didn’t say anything more, he resumed his assault.
“How did he recognize—” began the linguist.
“Cubs know,” replied the other three simultaneously.
A stern remark from his mother made him let go of the hair In his mouth, causing him to tumble backward down the chakat’s back and then down hir side to the floor. Giggling and laughing, he climbed back up again, only to repeat the same daredevil stunt.
“Oh, I’ve missed being a jungle gym,” declared Forestwalker, somewhat loudly just to be heard over the boisterous little pony.
A few minutes later, the foal stopped in the middle of Forestwalker’s lower back and yawned widely. Turning around three times, he then curled up with his eyes covered by a tiny wing.
“And I’ve missed this, too.” Forestwalker sighed.
Rosepetal looked up to see her counterpart poking his forehoof at herself, Midnight, and Specialist Rodriguez, then motioning back to his ship. He wore a friendly smile. She looked down at Forestwalker.
Shi smiled back. “Go right ahead. The mother and I won’t be going anywhere for a while, I think.” Shi smirked. “Plus, this is much safer than having their crew visit the Admiral first.”
“Oh?” replied Midnight. “Why is that?”
“A whole ship full of exotic females for our husband to ‘meet’? I don’t think you’re ready to pick out his ‘twelfth-wife’ quite yet.”
Midnight and Rosepetal snorted in amusement despite themselves.
Rosepetal frowned. “You almost dishonor him with that jest … Almost.”
Midnight grinned. “I, for one, do not wish to test his virility against these travelers’ biology. I would not take any odds on that bet, regardless.” Shi turned to Rosepetal. “I recommend we accept his invitation, but that first I return my stunner to our ship.”
Rosepetal smiled, her first relaxed smile of the day. “Agreed.”