Chapter 8: The Krogan and the Human

It took time for Starlight to regain her composure. Being back on Armchair, with his windows and humming engines, was somehow relaxing. Every time she thought about what she had done, though, she would freeze. Sometimes she would just stare out a window for several minutes. Other times she would collapse on the floor or just cry.

Eventually, though, she found herself back in the medical bay, lying on a table while Fenok worked.

“Of course,” said Fenok, who had been periodically babbling about things since Starlight had walked in. “Leave it to Jack to get…this. ‘Right size’ she says. Yes, it’s small, but omnitool’s don’t even work that way!”

“Will it still work?” said Starlight, only half paying attention. She understood that Fenok was working on the gift that Jack had purchased for her.

“Volus neural architecture is actually pretty close to yours, so yes. Probably. I just need to re-coat it.” He stepped back from the machine he was using to adjust the device, which to Starlight looked something like a bean surrounded by a number of flat, almost translucent fins attached by long, narrow wires. “Hold out your arm.”

“It’s called a forleg on ponies,” said Starlight, sitting up and extending the appendage in question.

“Really? I guess that makes sense.” He pulled up an industrial grade stool and took Starlight’s foreleg in his scaly, three-fingered hands. “Okay…” He reached down to a table and removed a large scalpel.

“WHAT are you doing?!” cried Starlight, pulling back her hoof sharply.

“Installing the omnitool. Isn’t that what you wanted?”

“But that’s a knife!”

“Well, yes. Oh.” He smiled. “Don’t worry. I’ll inject the actual tool with a needle. See?” He reached down and picked up the device, holding it in front of Starlight’s face. She gaped at it; it was hardly a “needle” so much as a nearly inch-wide bore spike. “It’s not even that big. You’ll hardly even feel it.”

“Are you insane? How would I not feel THAT? Can’t- -can’t I just get an external one, like Sjdath has?”

Fenok sighed. “The only reason hers is on the outside is…well…have you ever seen what the vorcha immune system does to implants? It’s not pretty. But if you actually take that thing off her- -and I really, really don’t recommend it. It’s gross- -her entire left arm is adapted to control it. You don’t do that. At least I don’t suspect you do. It has to be linked to the nervous system.”

“But…won’t that hurt?”

“I’ve done this surgery hundreds of times. Usually on children. I installed Zedok’s. And Jack’s. Although Jack did punch me in the face. Have you ever gotten punched by a biotic? I used to be pretty…”

“She…she made you look like this?”

Fenok’s eyes narrowed. “That was a joke.”

“Oh.”

He held out his hand. “Arm?”

Shaking, Starlight reached out.

“You’re probably going to want to look away for this part.”

Starlight did, looking at a shelf of supplies on the wall. She heard the sound of Fenok picking up his tools, and then felt a slight pain in her foreleg. She closed her eyes and waited for the surgery to be done.

“This isn’t even that bad,” said Fenok. “Do you know how we get them on Tuchanka? You stick your hand in the ‘pain hole’. Omnitool, total set of vaccinations, nanotech enhancements, all in one dose. Not fun. Of course, you are a bit of a special case.”

“Really?”

“The only person I’ve ever seen with this much metal in her body is Jack. I don’t know what Cerberus did to her, but they sure did a lot of it. The pain she must be in every second…”

“Cerberus?” said Starlight. “Like…the dog?”

“It’s an organization,” said Fenok, putting down his scalpel and picking up the needle. “Some human society. They specialize in…well, let’s just say they’re not exactly ethical.”

“And they did something to Jack?”

“More than just something.”

“What did they do?”

Fenok shook his head. “I know what Jack told me, but I don’t think it’s my place to be telling you. If you want to know, you have to ask her. But from what I’ve seen…she has a lot of scars, Starlight. Not just from fighting. Most of them are surgical. But the worst are in her mind. She’s a lot like you, kind of.”

“What do you mean?”

“I don’t know who did this to you,” said Fenok. “But they did it for a reason. As for Jack…Cerberus made her to kill.”

“Killing…” said Starlight.

“This next part is going to hurt. A lot. On the count of three. One- -”

“EEP!” cried Starlight, pulling her foreleg back as her arm spasmed in immense pain. “I thought you said on three!”

“I lied,” said Fenok, putting his bloody tools on a tray. He stood up and took them over to the autoclave. “By the way, you’re done.”

Starlight looked down at her hoof. It did not look any different from before. “There’s not even a scar,” she said, turning it over and looking at it.

“Of course not. Medigel is a great thing. Weird that it was the humans that invented it. Go ahead. Try it out.”

“How?”

“It’s a part of you. Like moving a leg. Just…do it.”

Starlight did not understand, but she tried anyway. She stretched out her foreleg and, in a flash, an assembly of orange holograms formed around it.

“Neat,” said Starlight.

“We all have one. Well…no. Si’y doesn’t, but he has something similar in that suit he always wears. And Armchair doesn’t need one. Arachne…well…I don’t even know.”

“Thank you,” said Starlight, closing the device.

“Yeah, it’s just my job.”

Starlight jumped down from the table and began to walk toward the door, but stopped. “Doctor Fenok?” she asked, turning back.

“Yeah?”

“Have you…have you ever killed anybody?”

Fenok froze and dropped the needle of the device he was holding. It clattered to the ground, but he just sighed. “This is about what happened back there, isn’t it?”

“Yeah.”

“I knew something was bothering you. More than just the omnitool.”

“I…I killed them, Fenok. I just…killed them. It was so easy. They were just there, and then I…I made them go away. Those were people, Fenok.”

Fenok sat down on his stool. “The answer is yes,” he said.

“You did? Who?”

“One of my best friends, actually. It was back when we were kids on Tuchanka. We got into an argument and…we fought. You know, I don’t even know what the argument was about.”

“I’m sorry,” said Starlight. “At least…at least I didn’t know any of the ones I…I…”

“It doesn’t matter,” snapped Fenok. “A person isn’t any less of a person because you don’t know him. A death isn’t any less of a death if they were soldiers and expecting it. You still killed them. And I still killed Enzres.”

“How do you live with it?” said Starlight. “I…every time I close my eyes, I see them. I see the bodies. I did that. I DID THAT. What can I do?”

“I don’t know,” said Fenok. “That’s not a question I can answer for you.”

“What did you do?”

“I left Tuchanka, and never picked up a gun again. I became a doctor. I’ve saved lives…but sometimes I still remember. I remember what I was, and what we are.” He looked Starlight in the eyes. “Do you know what Tuchanka looks like, Star?”

“No. I don’t even know what Equestria Prime looks like. Is it pretty?”

“No. It’s a burnt out, radioactive wasteland. A planet covered in the ruins of once-great cities that have stood empty for thousands of years. Do you know why they’re like that?”

“No.”

“Because of us. Because of the krogan. Because of our wars. Because we can’t stop killing. You know how I said I killed my friend? Do you know how my clan reacted to it?”

“They forced you off the planet.”

“No. They cheered me on. They cheered me on while I stabbed my best friend. Starlight…” he let out a long groan. “Please. You have to understand, see what I do. My people, we destroyed ourselves. It’s a parable. War destroyed our planet. When we were given a chance to leave, what did we do? We fought everyone else in the galaxy. And they won. They didn’t just win, they crushed us, destroyed our race. Because of our own failures. Don’t you understand?”

“I’m trying,” said Starlight.

“I have always held out hope, though. Always. A belief that the krogan were moving forward. My mentor, he believed the same thing. Or I thought I did. Except where I saw the krogan evolving into more than just killing machines, Okeer just wanted us to return to some mythical glory age of conquest. He was a fool. But someone has to take the first step. One of us has to put down our guns, to see what’s wrong with this.”

“But what if someone was in danger? Jack says I have to protect my friends. That’s all I was trying to do. What if it was Zedok who was in danger? What if you were in my place?”

“I would find another way.”

“What if you couldn’t?”

“I would. I always would.”

“I don’t share your optimism.”

“Well, it’s not my choice to make for you. Like I said. The choice isn’t an easy one. If I could, I would take you someplace where there isn’t so much violence. But that’s all this galaxy seems to have.”

“And if I decide that I should kill?”

Fenok put his oversized hand on Starlight’s small pony shoulder. “You’re not a murderer. Not like Jack, or Sjdath, or Si’y. Starlight, you have a good heart. So you either put that light out, like they did, or every time you kill it will cut into your soul. Like it is now.”

Starlight looked up at him, and she knew that he was right.

Later, in the dead of night, Starlight awoke screaming. She panicked for a moment, feeling the blackness closing in around her, not understanding where she was or even what she was, still reeling from dreams that she could remember so very vividly- -dreams, she knew, that were far more than simple images.

Then the room slowly came into focus, and she remembered where she was and what had happened. The others had been kind enough to give her space in a storeroom. All around her were crates, cylinders and various fragments of equipment that had been stored haphazardly but at least moved aside part of the way to give Starlight a mostly clear space in the middle of the floor to sleep. They had even given her a blanket and a makeshift bed that consisted really of little more than a crate lid filled with small fragments of foam, but she was grateful none the less. It was the only bed she could remember ever having.

Starlight wiped the cold sweat away from her forehead, feeling the metal ports in her skull brush against her foreleg. She looked to her right, where the wall was entirely an enormous, slightly curving window. The sight of the stars provided what little light there was in the large room, and seeing them was calming. The peace they brought her made Starlight wonder if that was why her parents had named her after their glow.

“Is everything all right, Starlight Glimmer?” asked Armchair, his disembodied voice lowered slightly for the night cycle.

“Yeah,” said Starlight. “Just another nightmare.” She looked back out the window, and then into the darkness of the storage room. “Armchair, are we being followed?”

“We are not detecting the signal of any mass cores within our immediate vicinity,” said Armchair. “Nor are we detecting any recent ionization trails of any known ship make or type. We are quite alone. Relatively speaking.”

“Yeah. Yeah, I know how that feels.”

Starlight stood up, putting the blanket back into her box. She stretched, feeling the metal protrusions on her spine clicking together. Trying to find a comfortable position with that much metal in her body was almost impossible, but she knew that with her dreams, there was no way she would be sleeping.

“I’m going for a walk,” she said, perhaps more to herself than to the living ship that surrounded her. She approached her door and pushed her hoof against the control, causing it to hiss open.

The hallway outside was just as dark as the rest of the ship. From what Starlight understood, the lights were dimmed to replicate “night” every fifteen hours. She did not see the need for it, but apparently it was important for the biology of several of the crew members, most notably Si’y and Jack. Starlight liked it though. Armchair had an overabundance of windows, and with no strong light for millions of miles, the galaxy outside looked like a soup of lights and colors that were normally invisible with the lights on. They filled the corridors with the most subtle and beautiful light, and when combined with the low, perpetual hum of Armchair’s engine, it was an extremely calming experience.

The only sound as Starlight moved through the ship was the sound of her hoofsteps, whether they were clicking on the hard, uneven surface of the actual corridors or clanking all-too loudly on the catwalks set up to cover areas where the floor curved or gave out entirely.

At one particular intersection, however, Starlight suddenly felt her heart leap into her chest. She had been traveling down a perpendicular hallway that went into the darker innards of the ship when something crossed her path. She had simply been walking when she heard something. She paused, and then something immensely large lumbered silently across an intersection. In the darkness, Starlight saw at best a silhouette: an enormous creature that stood upon four legs- -although Starlight somehow knew that it had a lot more than that- -slowly drifting down the empty hallway.

Starlight could do nothing but freeze. She stared up wide eyed at it and, for just a moment, it stopped. The creature looked down at her with numerous glowing, white eyes, and released a low and almost musical wail. Then, slowly, it turned back to what it had been doing and started walking away.

Clutching her chest and panting in fear, Starlight fell against a wall. “Arm- -Armchair!” she whispered. “There- -there’s something on the ship!”

“I am aware of that,” said Armchair, as cheerful as ever.

“What- -what is that thing?!”

“Arachne is extremely sensitive to normal levels of light,” explained Armchair. “As such, he only leaves our ventilation system during the night-cycle.”

“That- -THAT’s Arachne?!”

“Yes. It is a pun. He was our very first friend when we were separated from the main geth process. Our relationship with him is the only one that we consider symbiotic rather than strictly parasitic.”

“Oh…okay.”

“Is something wrong, Starlight Glimmer?”

“Just…can you tell me where Jack’s room is?”

“Yes. Her quarters are in a service closet near our central processor.”

“Can you…I don’t mean to bother her this late, but can you take me to her?”

“No. We do not at present have enough geth to spawn an independent, internal body. However, Arachne can show you the way.”

Starlight never saw Arachne clearly, but whatever he was, he eventually lead her high into the ship. The hallways toward the top were narrow, more like thin ventilation ducts populated mostly by fiberoptic cables than true corridors. Whoever had set up the catwalks- -presumably Sjdath- -had not bothered to place full walks this high up; instead, the walking surface consisted of thin metal grates without railings. Not that railings mattered much to Starlight anyway; she had no appendage to hold onto them while walking.

Arachne left quickly, retreating into a ventilation channel that should have been far too narrow for something of his size, but Starlight continued until she eventually reached a small open area with a low ceiling. The humming of the ship was different here; instead of the hum of the engine, all Starlight could hear was something like the sound of liquid flowing. The entire room was flooded in reddish light and oddly cold.

There was not much in the way of furniture, but Starlight could definitely tell that someone was living there. The floor was clean, but there were a few items strewn across it, mainly a pair of boots and a crumpled pair of trousers. A few hangers had been put on a conduit against one wall; one held a dark blue pressure suit, while the other supported an extremely dusty and torn leather jacket. A rickety desk against one wall had several clips of ammunition and a pistol on top of it and a shotgun leaning against it.

On the far wall was a bed, and from the lump in it, Starlight knew that Jack was asleep.

“Jack?” she said, softly, walking toward the lump.

“Hmmf…” moaned Jack. “Shepard…no…”

“Jack?” said Starlight again. She approached the side of the bed and reached out, shaking Jack slightly. “Jack?”

That, apparently, caused Jack to wake up- -and violently. She bolted upright, her silver eyes wild and more panicked than Starlight had ever seen any living thing. A blue blast of energy shot toward Starlight, and Starlight cried out as her horn ignited with energy, forming a bubble around her.

The blast hit with tremendous force, pulling Starlight off the ground and sending her bubble rolling across the room with her inside it until she slammed against the far wall, dizzy and confused.

“Star…Starlight?” said Jack, groggy and angry. “What- -what the hell?! Are you insane?!”

“No,” said Starlight, dropping her shield bubble while still not being fully aware of how she had summoned it.

Jack sighed. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” said Starlight. “Just surprised.”

“Well, then, congratulations. You are the second person in to have ever woken me up like that and survived. And the other one was a cyborg.”

“Please refrain from using biotics near my primary cooling manifold,” said Armchair softly.

“Shut it, Armchair.” Jack rubbed her face. “Oh…what time is it?”

“I’m sorry,” said Starlight. “This was a bad idea. I’m sorry I woke you up.”

Jack sighed. “Well, I’m awake now. Might as well talk.”

She threw back the blanket that was still covering her and shifted in her bed, pulling her legs out and putting them over the edge of the bed so that she was sitting on its edge. The metal soles of her feet clicked loudly against the floor, and the visible mechanical elements that allowed them to move adjusted to the new position with an almost imperceptible robotic whirring.

Starlight’s eyes widened. “Jack, your legs!”

Jack looked down at the reflective metal that made up everything from her upper thigh downward. “Oh, yeah,” she said nonchalantly. “Forgot you didn’t know. They’re prosthetic.”

“What- -what happened to you?” said Starlight, crossing the room, unable to take her eyes of Jack’s robotic legs.

“The Reapers happened,” said Jack, darkly. “I was on the front lines on Earth during the final battle. They took my legs.” She looked down at the floor. “They took a lot from me that day.” She looked up at Starlight, her eyes reflecting the red ambient light of the room. “Now what’s up?”

“I couldn’t sleep. I’ve been having dreams.”

“About the krogan you killed? You realize they deserved it, right?”

“No. They didn’t.” Starlight shook her head. “But it’s not that. They’re different dreams. Older ones.”

“About what.”

“I’m…not sure. There’s a light, and I’m being held down. Talking, and then something mechanical. Something coming toward me, and I can’t get away. And…well…” she put her hoof against the ports in her head. “They…they give me these. And I feel every inch of that drill cutting me, but I can’t wake up. Not until…the dream finishes somewhere else. Trapped in liquid. Forced under. Crying, screaming, but they just keep going. And I drown.”

She looked down at the floor, ashamed. “I know, it stupid. I probably sound like a whining little filly…but if felt so real. It hurt so much.”

Jack seemed to contemplate for a moment, and then her expression softened just slightly. “I’m going to say something, but you’re not going to like it.”

“What?” Starlight fully expected to be chastised for her foolishness, to be driven out.

“I don’t think those are dreams. Not in the way normal people have them, anyway. I think those are memories. Memories of what they did to you.”

“Memories?” Starlight shivered. That idea somehow made those dreams far more terrifying. “How would you know that?”

“Because I have the same dreams. Every night. Every goddamn night.”

“You- -you do?”

Jack nodded. She turned her head and gestured to a device surrounding the edge of her right ear. “You see this? It’s not jewelry. It goes into my brain. And it isn’t the only thing that does.”

“What did they do to you, Jack?”

Jack paused and looked down at Starlight. “What they did to me doesn’t matter. Not the specifics, anyway. They hurt me, though. Since the day I was born. Every day. Every single day. Torture, pure and simple. The made me. They used me. The main theme in my life, really.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Why are you apologizing? Were you the one cutting me open just to see how much pain I could take, or making me murder children my own age for heroin?” Jack sighed and put her head in her hands. “I’m sorry. You didn’t need to hear that.”

“I don’t really know what to say,” protested Starlight. “I couldn’t possibly understand what that is like.”

“Couldn’t you?” said Jack, looking up. “You’re probably the only person I’ve ever met who CAN understand what they did to me. Because they did it to you, too. Not the same people, but the same kind of people. Look at us.” She gestured to her heavily tattooed body and robotic legs, and at the metal on Starlight’s spine and ports in her head. “We could have been normal people. Normal people with normal lives.”

“We still can be,” said Starlight, putting her hoof on Jack’s metal knee.

“No,” said Jack. “It’s too late for me. I tried once. I really did. I fell in love with the only man who didn’t just use me and throw me away, who actually tried to help. I became a teacher.” She smiled- -not the cruel smile that Starlight had seen on Omega, but a real one. “Can you imagine? Me? A teacher? Helping young biotics learn to use their powers.”

“What happened?” asked Starlight, knowing the answer already.

“They died,” said Jack, darkly, her smile fading. “They all died that day. I couldn’t save them. All this power, and I couldn’t do a damn thing.” She chuckled humorlessly. “Sometimes I wonder if God hates me. How all those kids died, how Shepard died…and how I made it out in mostly one piece.” She looked up at Starlight. “I wasn’t made for that life, Starlight. It’s too late for me. But it isn’t for you. Shepard came too late to save me, but maybe I can save you. Or is that just wishful thinking?”

“I don’t know how much you can do,” said Starlight. “I’ve never known my homeworld. I am the only one of my kind in this whole galaxy, save for ones that I think are probably hunting me. The only pony.”

“I won’t let them take you,” said Jack. “I won’t let them do to you what they did to me.”

“Do you really think you can stop it?”

“I don’t know. I really don’t. But I can try.”

“You don’t need to do that,” said Starlight.

“I don’t need to do anything. I only do what I want to. And I want to stop you from turning into me.”

“Then what do you think about what I did? Back on Omega? Am I a monster?”

“You’ve been talking to Fenok, haven’t you?”

“Yes.”

Jack leaned back, tilting her head toward the ceiling. “Look, Starlight. I enjoy killing. It’s the only thing I enjoy anymore, the only thing that gives me the tiniest spark of real emotion. But you’re not like me. And the galaxy isn’t a safe place. Sometimes, if you want to live, you have to kill. It’s just the way things work.”

“Does it have to work that way?”

“I wouldn’t know. I’ve never looked for an alternative.”

“Is that why the others do it, too?”

Jack shook her head. “No…Si’y does what he does because thinks he’s in some weird Blasto fantasy, and Sjdath just has no regard for any life that’s not hers.”

“And Zedok?”

“I think she’s in the same boat you are right now. I’ve had to be a little harsher with her than you, though. She’s half krogan. You…I don’t get the feeling that you’re from a violent race.”

“I wouldn’t know. I hope not.”

The two sat in silence for a moment. Then Starlight looked up at Jack and smiled. “Thank you,” she said, turning toward the door. “You’ve been a big help.”

“Where are you going?”

“Back to my box. Every time I sleep, the dreams wake me up…but I still have to try.”

Jack grumbled for a moment, and then pushed herself backward against the wall. “You can stay here, if you want.”

“W- -what?”

“I’m not going to try anything,” said Jack. “I’ve been with a lot of aliens, but I draw the line at a pony. It’s just that…” she sighed. “The dreams are easier…if you’re not alone.”

“Really?” Starlight found herself turning around and moving toward Jack’s bed. She reached the edge, and then paused before stepping in. She turned around so that her back faced Jack’s chest, and the human pulled the blanket over them both before wrapping her arms around Starlight’s chest.

“If you get hands, though, or if you EVER tell the others I did this, I will personally break your horn off.”

Starlight may have murmured something in response, but before she could think of a concerted answer, she had already fallen asleep.