Sierra Sky

I concentrated on it, struggling to figure it out. “I don’t understand what I’m looking at,” I replied. Then, I saw some sort of tube rotate into view until it reached over one end of the craft.

“I’ll tell you about it, but we shouldn’t waste any time. Every last moment can be precious,” she said while walking toward a door I hadn’t noticed, which connected to the near end of the tube.

We climbed more uncomfortably sized stairs until we were above the craft and entered a tight elevator. A door closed behind us, and it descended. Then, just a moment later, it opened into a tiny room.

We both went inside. The room was sort of shaped like a regular box, but the edges of the floor to our left and right curved up to be flush with the walls, which also curved the same way to connect to the ceiling. The whole room was made with white panels and warm lighting. The only other door in the room was up on the ceiling, but I figured the human was smart enough to know that I couldn’t reach that without flight. She did ‘rebuild my body’ after all. I had no real idea how she did it, but I figured Valerie would know what I am and am not capable of with this body. I saw that there were two chairs right in front of the elevator doors. They were strangely embedded into the floor with their heads toward the opposite wall. I intuited that I was expected to lay down on the one that seemed to have space specifically meant to support my wings.

I was inspecting the furniture when Val prodded me into action. “If you want us to make the best time, we’ll have to get you strapped in. I can help you if you like.”

I waved the human off with my wing. I wasn’t so inept that I wasn’t at least going to try. A handy bar curved up from beneath the chair that was placed just right to help me get into place as I put my back hooves into the shallow receptacles that were obviously meant for them.

I carefully laid back. The shape perfectly fitted against my knees and hocks. For a moment, I was surprised to have anything fit my wonky proportions so well until I remembered that I was the only pony Valerie had ever met. Her machine magic was very impressive. A large cavity opened up on either side of the chair with a gap between cushions that opened right at dock level that allowed me to not crush my tail. Best of all, my lady bits were not bothered by this setup. From there, I could just lay down with my wings spread wide.

The lights dimmed, and several panels opened around the room and extended what appeared to be little metal balls on sticks. An image suddenly appeared in the air above me. It was a blue diagram of the spaceship and the structure it was attached to. It was a strange form of magic because looking around seemed to drag the illusion around in my vision.

There were also four circles above the image, and the one furthest to the left was slowly vanishing as a pie slice of emptiness grew in the clockwise direction. I twisted around to face Valerie.

“I have a question.”

“Ask away,” she said from her chair.

“Why did you agree to help?” I inquired.

Valerie let her focus drift away from me before she replied, “We humans have nearly everything we could want. We can reshape the universe and ourselves, but we are alone in a fundamental way. I want to tell myself that I am doing this for my people, but, honestly, I am doing it for me. I have made mistakes before, but they have led me here to this chance to do some actual good. There’s nobody else around to do it instead. Maybe I can make humanity some friends.”

“Maybe you and I can be friends… if you want,” I said and cringed a little on the inside. That was a sad delivery.

Valerie smiled, and I knew my concern was unjustified. “I like what you’re saying. I try to be a fun person, but my humor sometimes bites, or sometimes it’s just dirty. Think you can handle that?”

Never mind then. Maybe this would be easy. This alien might not be so alien after all. I smiled slowly, “I think I can. Um, if you can change how you look, you may want to try looking more like a pony. If you remember how I acted when I saw you, then you know we can be a bit panicky. It gets a lot worse if were are in groups.”

Valerie turned her head further to look at me more directly. I think she was reevaluating me. “Is that so.” She smiled and said, “That sounds like fun. I think I can do that. In the meantime, you wanted me to explain the ship to you. We don’t have a lot of time before we start accelerating.”

She pointed to the blue image of the circles. There were three left. From the same blue light, a diagram appeared in the air that had a depth to it. It was only the fact that I knew this was supposed to be our ship that I recognized parts of it that I had seen from the outside.

“I’ll start with the largest parts. We have the three fuel tanks full of… I don’t have the words yet. A certain type of the lightest gas. Each tank feeds its reactor, which forces that light gas to combine, releasing lots of energy. It creates a special kind of explosion that we release out those nozzles to the rear which pushes us forwards,” she said. I could see that these nozzles lined up in a row, with the middle one much larger than the other two. That one was fed by a much longer reactor and larger fuel tank. Valerie continued, “If we need to use the engines, then we need to shed the heat they create from the ship. We have a pair of rather large extendable heat radiators in front of the smaller fuel tanks and on either side of the large one. Those are rolled up right now. If we didn’t have those, our reactors would have to shut down to avoid melting the ship. On this side,” she explained, somehow causing the image to flip over, “We have the heat shield and four flaps. These are essential if I am to land this ship on your world safely.” The image flipped back over. “Up here is the habitat module. That’s where this room,” she gestured around us, “is. I’ll show you around later. Toward the bow, we have sensors and communication systems that fold away and between us and the large fuel tank is the payload. That includes a reactor designed to make energy my machines can use and a compartment with other things we’ll need for the trip and after we get there. Finally, between the ship and the heat shield is where the laser sail is stored. We’ll see that soon.”

Lines that resembled railroad tracks appeared and began moving slowly. Some metal limbs were pulling some straps over me. I noticed the same had happened to Valerie, so I didn’t worry too much. The ship stayed in the middle of our view, but it rotated to follow the tracks, and I felt myself get pushed lightly one way and the other.

Then the weight hit me.

The curve we had just taken raced to our left until it was off the edge of the image. I sunk deeper into my seat. My legs and wings were now so heavy, and I could feel the flesh on my face and my sides trying to drag me deeper. We were accelerating hard. Thirteen and a half circles appeared in front of me just as it felt like four ponies had piled on top of me. This scared me at first because it was far more than I thought I could handle, but the fact that it wasn’t painful reminded me that my body was not what it once was. There was an odd moment when I realized that the bottom of the chair was rotating into the floor, but it seemed just to be matching the change in the direction of the downward force.

Soon thirteen whatever units of time had passed by with only the last half circle withering away. The blue image of the spaceship attached to the rails seemed to flicker occasionally when some surface detail of the structure we were hurling down would flash by.

“Be prepared for weightlessness,” Valerie said to me with a voice that showed no evidence of strain. That wasn’t fair.

The carriage connecting the ship to the rails suddenly released us. All the force that my seat was absorbing was suddenly released, which threw me against my restraints. I should have been hurting after that, at least, but I felt only the pressure.

Then I felt like I was falling. I started to laugh at one of my favorite sensations while flying returning to me. It was the beginning of a dive that I loved the most because that was when my pain was at its lowest. I had seriously enjoyed that feeling while I rode the AMSTER while it searched for the nearest human.

I was distracted by new changes in the image. The ‘laser sail’ slid out from the space behind the heat shield before unfolding into a large circular sheet. The forward side had a webbing of thin trusses that grew denser near the center. Soon the sheet extended far beyond the ship, and one last piece covered up the nozzles.

Then my chair rotated until the bottom was well away from the wall. The image of the ship turned with me, staying ahead of me. Then, once again, I had weight, but in a new direction. The elevator door was now the floor, and the other door was now straight ahead rather than above. The mechanical arms that held the restraints over the two of us retracted. Valerie’s chair had not rotated away from what was once the floor, and he simply walked out of it instead of climbing out. I rolled out of my chair and dropped to the floor. The strangeness of the reorientation was...exciting.

“We are now being pushed by one of the light beam stations from one of the other moons. The laser sail catches this light like a heavy wind which lets us avoid using fuel until much later. We can move around now. I’ll show you the amenities, but then I have some work to do,” Valerie said.

Now that what was once a wall was now the floor, the previously inaccessible door was right in front of us. I followed Valerie and listened to the explanation of the place.

“The room we were in is the center of the habitat and very safe. We want to be in there for maneuvers.”

In front of us was a wide window divided into triangular sections. The wall behind us had two more doors other than the one we came through.

“Do you remember how I said I could arbitrarily modify my body?” Valerie asked. I nodded gently. “I will be doing those modifications in the room on our left for a few hours or so. It takes time. You can visit me if you need to, but I want the final results to be a surprise. The room on our right is your private space. I have set the ship’s intelligence to open it for you and not for me except in emergencies or with permission from you. The computer will be aware of you, but I will not be informed about anything that happens in there that isn’t, again, an emergency. It contains another room that can be set up to facilitate any needs that require plumbing. They are empty, but you can fabricate nearly anything from the computer with voice command, and those things can be quickly built and installed with no effort on our part.”

I walked up to the glass and saw how heavily reinforced it was. Metal beams separated the glass into obviously strong triangles. I couldn’t see any part of the ship from inside, however.

Valerie spoke, but it quickly became apparent that she was not addressing me. “Okay, computer, set up common room layout one, but with a hammock.”

The room made a ding sound at the beginning and end of the instructions, and a timer appeared in the air with eight circles and three-quarters of another.

“If you address the computer just as I did, you will hear that sound, and it will start listening to whatever you say. Just tell it to stop listening if you change your mind. You can ask it questions or tell it to do all sorts of things, including giving you suggestions for something to do. Just remember that it is not a person and has no sense of self. It is not capable of holding opinions or experiencing emotions and is incapable of growth. Just keep in mind that that won’t be true for every artificial intelligence you may talk to. I don’t foresee the occasion, but there exist some that can be offended and will demand respect,” Valerie explained. “Can you think of anything to ask of it? Food might be a good idea.”

I pondered the incredible machine magic once again. That it could make invisible butlers that could follow such complex instructions was amazing. I knew I wanted to see what it could do. I knew I would need time to think about the implications of this.

I shrugged with my wings and gave it a go. “Okay, computer, what food is there?”

I learned how to use the computer. It also got on my case about ‘requiring that I set up my bathroom before consuming food.’ Valerie excused herself. I wondered what magic Valerie used to change her body and why she felt the need to have on all that clothing when I thought about it. On further thinking, I realized that humans might not be as comfortable in colder temperatures without fur.

I carried myself to my room. I discovered a bare space with no windows. I managed to explain to the computer what I found to be an acceptable toilet, and I got it to send me a huge bath along with soaps, brushes, some super nice towels, and a rug. I didn’t even need to ask for a mirror. The walls could just show images of me, mirrored or not. It turned out that the walls could somehow turn into windows, so I had it make some.

I furnished my room despite the huge disappointment that a cloud bed would be impossible to procure. The bed I did get was huge, and a dining nook in front of the window was comfortable. Everything was delivered using teams of small-wheeled machines that carried things using arms or little platforms on their backs. They were all composed of very round shapes that I found to be quite adorable.

The only foods available right away were fruits, but I could choose new things from a list that would become available in a while. Then I could pick through a frankly staggering selection. I didn’t understand what could possibly need to be done to pasta for six hours before it would be ready to cook, but I didn’t worry too much. I was distracted by the fact that every fruit I saw was something I recognized. Much of several other lists were also extremely familiar, especially the vegetables.

I ordered some apples. I only then realized, to my shock, that I couldn’t grab anything with my hooves. It was like they were just bricks on the ends of my legs. I felt like a foal. At least I could still handle fruit by using both of my hooves. I realized I would need careful planning whenever I used the bathroom for anything. Maybe I could get the computer to get one of those cute machines to wash me and feed me. At least I was already used to the hospital staff doing that with me. The apples almost could have been from Sweet Apple Acres, that was for sure. They were good.

I had only been awake for a few hours by then, from waking up to traveling through space, so I was wondering what else I could do. I returned to the common room. Valerie’s machines had transformed the place. There were now all sorts of seating options that faced the windows, including a large piece of thick cloth suspended from each end over by the end of the room near Valerie’s room. It looked comfortable. Maybe it was the hammock that Valerie had asked the computer for.

I shrugged to myself and went straight to it. It was not a stable surface, and I nearly ate the floor before settling down on my side. It was very nice, aside from my stupid legs making it difficult for me to fold myself comfortably. I decided to follow the advice that Valerie had shared with me earlier.

“Okay, computer, what are some things I can do?”

It dinged at me and said, “Options for entertainment during long voyages are mostly limited to sedentary activities. Categories are limited to visual entertainment unless you would like to learn English. Other stored languages are also available. Time to perform translations on selected content is negligible assuming a written language is known.”

It took me a moment to realize that that must have been Valerie’s language. “How long would that take?”

“There are two methods. Traditional education can take weeks, months, or years depending on the learner. One option is the construction of a brain-machine interface from nanomachines that can be integrated with your brain. One package can perform functions including the manipulation, recording, and sharing of sensory data, and another can perform the implementation of knowledge, skills, and other data directly.”

I thought about what the disembodied voice was saying to me. I wasn’t sure what some of those functions could be used for, but learning skills without the learning part would be incredible. “Why would someone want their… um, their senses manipulated?”

It replied, “This capability is usually used to fool the senses such that the mind experiences events that are not real. All imaginable scenarios are possible. Some examples include performing activities or partaking in competitive activities that would otherwise be dangerous. Having an outlet for satisfying desires to perform antisocial activities in a safe environment. Performing sexual activities that are unavailable or unrealistic. Experiencing the outdoors, other cultures, or any other action that could be desired. Fidelity is limited due to restrictions on the pain-inducing package.”

I was blushing as I thought about one particular option that I was definitely not going to do. Definitely. As I thought about it, it became obvious that it hadn’t listed all the possible choices in the first place once it mentioned pain. “Are there more packages beyond those three?”

“There are two more packages. One is designed to control motor function, and the last involves the manipulation of thought. The final three options are restricted pending special permissions from the First Custodian. All these options carry a small risk of subversion, but the final three could result in very negative consequences if a hostile entity gained control.”

I used one of my wings to push the air back and forth to get the hammock to swing while I considered the incredible feats of machine magic that were on offer. “Can they be removed?”

“Yes,” it said.

“Then give me the first two, please.”

“Acknowledged.”

There were a few moments of empty silence until I wondered who this ‘first custodian’ was. Valerie, maybe?

Author's Note

Another great song, if an odd one.

This chapter has actually been ready for a week, but the image needed to be rendered and that didn’t happen because I had work then it was my birthday on Wednesday so that’s been holding me up for a few days. Hopefully, I will continue to get these chapters out at least semi-regularly.

Fun fact. I considered making this story as a 3D comic, but that would be too much, I think.

Should I post more images of the ship? Some of the details described in the story are not so visible in the image.