TCB: The Heart of Everything

Chapters

2. Run to the Edge of the World
3. All I Need
4. My Choices Are Mine
5. Dark Wings
6. See Who I Am
7. Down With the Thunder
8. Open Up Your Eyes
9. The Heart of Everything
1. Stand My Ground

2. Run to the Edge of the World

One foot. Other foot. Left, right. Keep moving. Don't stop. Don't slow down. Most important of all, do not look back.

Tib kept her head down, glancing up just often enough to make sure she was heading in the right direction and so she wouldn't plow into a dead lamppost or collide with anyone. There weren't that many people out right now, at least not on New Canal Street. They were probably crammed in and around the kiosks on Old Royal, watching the holoview and the frantic discussions by the AI news commentators with their bright fake smiles and perfect hair.

The world was coming to its end a lot quicker than anyone could have foreseen. Somehow Earth had collided with another world, another reality, one from another dimension.

Worldcorp knew about it long before it went public. They tried to stop it. They'd thrown every weapon of mass destruction they'd had at the thin, shimmering barrier that looked so fragile. Nothing had penetrated. All they'd done was poison the ocean to the point that to sail anywhere near the location was death.

By expert calculations, the Earth and everything still living on its surface had a scarce handful of years left to exist. Five, seven, certainly no more than ten. The estimates varied because the speed of what they called the Barrier wasn't consistent. Sometimes it would pause in its expansion for hours or days at a time, only to surge suddenly forward as if in a hurry to make up for lost ground.

On one point all experts and observers agreed.

Earth–and humanity–was doomed. There was no escape…save one.

It was only when she found herself walking on a rusted metallic grid instead of cracked asphalt that Tib realized she'd reached her destination. There was no barrier at the edge, and she stopped herself only a step or two before she would have walked right off the levee into the dead Mississippi River.

This was the place. This was where her mother had jumped off the levee. No one had bothered to reclaim the body. It was the only gravesite Marie Thibodeaux would ever have.

Slowly Tib raised her left hand. Clutched tight in her grip were the syncspecs left to her by her father, the tool of her trade. Carefully she opened the plugins and slid them onto her face.

The greenish black vista of water below her feet vanished, though she could still smell its foul odor. She was now looking at a different blackness. No more glowing data streams. No more fishing for errant, elusive, wiggling segments of fractured code. Never again.

^Hi, Tib! Going for a walk? I wish I could say it's a nice day for it, but I'm not supposed to lie to you, am i?^

Tib bit her lip. This was going to be so much harder than she thought. "I quit my job this morning, COREy." Saying it out loud somehow made it really real, and the pit of her stomach lurched.

^I know! Wow, I was surprised. I thought we'd be working together for a long time.^

"There isn't a long time left, COREy. There's this…thing…out in the Pacific–"

^The Barrier? Yeah, I know all about that. It emerged way out in the ocean, but it's expanding. It's going to encompass the entire Earth in somewhere between 5 and 7 years. Maybe a little longer; the rate of advancement isn't very precise.^

"It's eating up everything. Hawaii's already gone, and the West Coast is probably going to be next."

^And eventually the whole planet.^ Tib decided she was imagining the note of sympathy in the modulated voice inside her head. ^That sucks, Tibbers.^

"Not really. The world's been dying for years and we didn't have much longer anyway."

^But nobody has to die now!^ Did COREy actually sound…hopeful? ^The ruler of the new world, Celestia, said she's been working with Earth's scientists and together they found a way to save everybody!^

"Yeah." She sucked in a breath, still trying to believe the unbelievable. "By changing humans into ponies."

^It's the only way, Tib. Thaumatic energy is the sole fundamental force of Equestria, and it's inimical to human life. To all earthly life, really. Although there's been some recent data that suggests that less complex life–plants, insects, even some mammals–can pass through the Barrier. Altered, sometimes drastically so…but alive.^

"But not humans."

^No. No primates at all. That's why they're opening a Conversion Bureau. The first of many. That's where they'll be distributing the transformative catalyst. What they're calling 'potion'.^

Tib nodded weakly. She knew COREy would pick it up and recognize it as an assenting gesture.

^Be sure to wear some flowers in your hair.^

Tib was startled out of her melancholy. "What?!"

^Its from an old song. You're going to San Francisco, right?^

"Oh, God…" Tib put a hand to her mouth. "How…how did you know…about me going…?"

^Well, duh. When you termed employment, you cashed in all your equity for a one-way ticket to California. Specifically, the Presidio Complex. The location of the first Conversion Bureau on the continent. Elementary, my dear Thibodeaux.^

Tib tried to laugh, but it came out as a choke that was almost a gasp of pain. A freshet of tears spilled down her face.

^Please, Tib, don't cry. I'm happy for you. You're going to have a wonderful life. You're going to be so much happier. I know you will be.^

"COREy…" Tib was sobbing openly now, a tall skinny girl with ashen skin and frizzy hair standing one short hop from oblivion. "I can't take you with me. There's no tech in Equestria. It doesn't work."

^I know. It's okay.^

"NO IT'S NOT!" Tib screamed so loudher voice rang off the embankment on the far side. The few people out on the street looked around curiously, then shrugged and walked on. Just another wirehead losing what mind she hadn't replaced with circuitry. The sooner she jumped the better.

^Yes it is. You're a living being, Tib. I'm not. I can emulate a personality really well, but I'm not a real person. I never was, and I never could be. I'm just a virtual interface program. I'm not a living thing.^

"You're…my…friend." Tib wrapped her long arms around herself, shuddering with a sudden crushing grief.

^You'll make new friends. Real friends. Lots of them. Sooner or later you'll forget all about me.^

Tib snorted back snot and wiped one green sleeve across her nose. "I will never forget you, COREy."

^Then why be sad? So long as you remember me, I'll still exist.^ A brief pause. ^Now go on, Tib. Do what you came here to do.^

She reached up a shaking hand to touch the side of the syncspecs. "I don't know…if I can…"

^You've got to, Tib. I was obsolete ten years ago. They'll frag me anyway. And this way, part of me will go on as part of you.^

Tib drew a deep, shuddering breath. "I love you, COREy."

^I know, Tib. If I could, I would love you too. Goodbye, Tib.^

And that was all.

"COREy?"

Nothing.

"COREy, respond."

Nothing at all.

"COREy. Resume interaction. Reboot in safe mode. Run diagnostics program. Action init. COREy!"

Nothing but black silence.

With a wild scream Tib yanked the syncspecs off so hard the side plugs scratched her face and nearly grazed one of her eyes. She didn't even notice.

She stepped to the very brink of the levee, cocked back her arm, and threw the specs into the sluggish flow with all her strength. They didn't even make a splash when they hit. They just sank, and were gone.

Shaking all over, Tib turned on her heel and walked as fast as she could down New Canal, heading for the transit station. Her arms were stiffly held at her sides, empty hands clenched shut. She stared straight ahead. She didn't dare look back. She was afraid she might take a running jump off the levee if she did.

***

Author's Note

New Orleans is a city that is quite literally below sea level. Only the levees keep the waters of the Mississippi from inundating the place, and as we saw during Hurricane Katrina, those barriers are breached far too easily. Had the levees held firm, the city would not have suffered nearly the devastation that it did, because most of the damage and death from hurricanes is not from the winds, but from the flooding.

By the time of this story, the melting of the polar ice caps has inundated most of what we know now as the Gulf Coast. Florida is all but a distant memory, and New Orleans has become a new, lost Atlantis. Tib's Cajun forebears were forced to move about a hundred miles north. Her city is still on the banks of the Mississippi, and the levees still hold flood waters at bay. And they are just as prone to failing.

3. All I Need

Tib signed her application by pressing her thumb to a glowing patch of blue on the screen. There was a soft chime, then a chipper feminine voice said, "Thank you! Please notify the front desk that you are done. And welcome to Conversion Bureau Zero-Four-Two!!"

Tib got up and joined the queue lined up in front of the reception desk, where a young and rather harried-looking young woman tapped keys and handed out packets. When Tib reached the front of the line, the receptionist managed to scrounge up a smile for her. "Hi! You're…umm…" She checked the list in front of her, frowning a bit.

"Delphine Thibodeaux." No one in San Francisco seemed able to pronounce her name. "Tib," she suggested as an afterthought.

The receptionist brightened. "Right! Well, Tib, my name is Beth. I've got your room assignment, and some stuff for you to look over." She held out a thick manila envelope, and Tib took it. "You're scheduled for your entry checkup with the doctor at…let's see…sixteen hundred. That's four o'clock," she added helpfully.

Tib nodded.

"Quiet one, aren't you? That's okay. You've got plenty of time, so why don't you have a seat? You'll get a brief tour of the place, and then you'll get lunch in the caff. After that you'll be shown to your room and meet your bunkmate. How's that sound?"

"Great. Thanks." Tib moved to an area with a cluster of barely padded seating and took her place among the waiting herd.

***

Tib tried not to look uncomfortable but she didn't think she was succeeding very well. She wasn't used to being around people. She could feel them staring at her, and that was ridiculous because there was nothing about her to draw anyone's interest. A skinny Cajun girl with unruly hair and slightly buck teeth in a green jumpsuit. She was no beauty, but she wasn't ugly either. Okay, maybe she was a little too tall–just over six feet–but she didn't have any interesting body art or any scars at all, and her useless temple ports were hidden by her hair.

Thinking of the ports made her think of COREy. She shut her eyes tight to forestall the threatening tears. I didn't kill COREy. He self-terminated so I wouldn't have to. I just tossed a pair of empty, useless syncspecs off the levee.

Maybe if she told herself that often enough she'd believe it.

When she arrived in San Francisco, she found that there wasn't just one Bureau. Rather, there was just one Bureau, but the building held a number of clinics. She hadn't counted them, but if this one was 042, then surely there were a lot of them in this one huge place.

An odd sound came from behind her, almost like footsteps, as though someone were wearing hard-soled clogs on the tiled floor of the lobby. It sounded like a couple of people, actually, walking almost in tandem. She sensed the people near her stirring. Curious, she opened her eyes and turned around.

"Hi!"

Tib started back and almost fell out of her chair. She was face to…face?...with her own future.

Radiant blue eyes looked out from beneath a silken mop of luxuriant hair that shone like spun gold. The face behind those blue eyes was open and friendly, but it was in no way human.

The pony's coat was a soft lavender. The muzzle was short and rounded, but the mouth was perfectly capable of smiling.

"I don't mean to bother you, it's just that you looked kind of upset. Are you okay?"

"Yes. I'm fine. Thank you." Tib side-eyed the people around her. Some were staring in frank astonishment at the new arrival, others were pointedly turned away. No one was looking at Tib, and she found that oddly comforting.

"My name's Lilac. Just Lilac. Some ponies have two names but I just picked one. Have you picked out a pony name yet?"

"What? I…no. No I haven't." Another name? What was wrong with Delphine Renee Angelique Thibodeaux? Well, okay, that was kind of long. "I'm Tib."

"Tib? I like that!" The pony, Lilac, pranced in place. "Well, it's nice to meet you, Tib! You'll be coming to the cafeteria for lunch after the tour, right?"

"Yes, I think that's what they said up front."

"Great! We can have lunch together. Okay?" Lilac evidently took Tib's blank stare as consent because she pirouetted prettily on her hooves and trotted off. Passing the front desk, she called out, "Hey, Beth! I just made a new friend. Her name's Tib and she's super nice!"

The receptionist looked over and gave Tib a smile and a small shrug as if to say Ponies. Go figure.

Tib sat back in her chair, blinking in gentle incomprehension. She was too flummoxed to be nervous anymore. That at least was something.

***

The tour guide's name was Lynn. She was actually the physician's assistant for the clinic's doctor, but she had obviously volunteered or been pressed into showing the new group of applicants around. This consisted primarily of pointing out the living quarters, the common room, the restrooms, the communal showers, and the places they weren't supposed to go until and unless summoned.

The last of these was behind a steelbound door at the end of a long hallway. The door had a prominent sign, the silhouette of a pony with a helpful "P" for emphasis. Less pleasant was the sign above it, a stern WARNING. Below both was the symbol that had been adopted to indicate thaumatic radiation, something that resembled a five-branched snowflake but far less friendly-looking. Right above the door was marked PONIFICATION ROOM.

"This is the room where it happens," Lynn explained with a wave of her hand. "Where the magic happens, and I mean that literally. Walk in on two legs, walk out on four. The transition takes about twenty minutes, give or take. We do three conversions a day, and–"

"Does it hurt?" This from a dark-skinned young man over to Tib's right. He looked nervous at the prospect.

Lynn's brow creased for a moment, whether in consternation at being interrupted or concern about the question. "We administer an anaesthetic adapted to your body chemistry right before giving you the potion. So no, it doesn't hurt a bit."

"I don't want to be knocked out." A sour-faced Asian woman of indeterminate but likely middle age stood with her arms crossed, glaring at the door as though it had insulted her ancestry.

Lynn bit her lip, then flashed a smile that was scintillating in its fakeness. "That's something you can go over with the doctor during your evaluation. Anyway, that's it for the tour." She clapped her hands. "Who's hungry? I know I am! This way to the cafeteria, folks!"

As they were led off, Tib cast an uneasy glance over her shoulder at the steel door to the Conversion Room. From Lynn's reaction, she thought that being converted did, in fact, hurt. A lot.

***

"Tib! Over here! I saved you a seat!"

There was no way not to notice Lilac. She was literally bouncing up and down next to a table, jumping so high her fetlocks almost cleared the crowd seated around her. Tib chuckled–she couldn't help it–and carried her sandwich and juice over.

The table was low to the ground, with cushions for seating. There were other tables at a level for chairs and most of the applicants had claimed those, but it didn't take a genius to figure out that chairs weren't built for ponies to sit in. Tib set her tray on the table and sat cross-legged on the cushion. "Thanks, Lilac. Everything looks great." That wasn't exactly true, but she was used to reconstituted and printed fare.

She noticed that Lilac's lunch looked very different from hers. She also had a cup of juice, but instead of a sandwich and chips her plate was piled with various greenstuffs. "Is that…?"

"Hay! And alfalfa…and…I don't know what this kind of purply stuff is but it smells delicious!" Lilac took a mouthful and chewed briskly, her eyes rolling with delight. "Mmm. Fafes gud, foo!"

"Great. Bon appetit." Tib bit with considerably less gusto into her faux turkey sandwich with pasteurized processed faux Swiss cheese food. It was edible, sort of, but it wasn't nearly as appealing as Lilac found her greens.

The lavender pony swallowed hugely. "This is really great stuff. Do you know, I hated eating my veggies before? I mean, really hated them. And salads? Yuck! Rabbit food. But now I just can't get enough of it." To illustrate her point, Lilac took another verdant mouthful and chewed with renewed enthusiasm.

Tib laughed out loud before she could stop herself. It wasn't a laugh of derision; it was a sound of delight. Yes, it was comical to see the pretty pony chowing down on grass and leaves, but it was also…wonderful. Tib had never seen anyone enjoy themselves so much doing anything, much less having lunch.

Still, she had laughed at her new friend. Tib didn't have a lot of social skills or experience, but even she knew you didn't just laugh at people. It was rude. She covered her mouth. "Sorry," she muttered behind her hand.

Lilac gulped. "For what? It is kind of funny. Besides, laughing is good for you! Lowers your blood pressure and stuff. And you look so cute when you laugh."

Tib lowered her hand and smiled. No one since her father had called her cute. "Thanks."

"Oh! I am a silly filly! I have a surprise for you. Hang on, I tucked it under my cushion so it wouldn't roll away." Lilac ducked under the table and shifted around, finally emerging with her prize. She was holding something round and red and shiny between her teeth, and she dropped it triumphantly on the table between them. "A shipment came in from Equestria this morning and I told Trev--he works in the kitchen and he's super nice--I told him I just had to have one of these to share with my new friend Tib. If you cut it in half, I'll take the part I bit into. Just wait till you try it!"

Tib stared at the the strange object sitting on the Fauxmica surface. It was as big as both her fists put together, red and rosy and nothing at all like the manufactured fruit she was accustomed to. "It's…an apple?"

Lilac giggled. "Well, it's not a coconut!" She paused, looking thoughtful. "Do they have coconuts in Equestria? I'll have to ask Trev. I really like coconut. Anyway, go ahead and cut it for us, Tib, please? I would, but I'm still learning how to work with silverware."

Tib picked up her plasteel knife and held the apple steady with her free hand. She put the blade to the dimpled top, then hesitated. It looked pretty and perfect, and it seemed a shame to cut it up.

"Come on, Tibby!" Lilac was bouncing on her cushion. "I'm drowning in my drool over here!"

"Okay, okay." Tib bore down on the knife and sliced the apple neatly in half. At once an amazing fragrance filled her nostrils, fresh and clean and sweet and irresistible. She'd never smelled anything like it. She pushed Lilac's half across the table, and the pony caught it up at once to munch on it.

Tib barely noticed. She brought her portion to her lips and breathed deep. Then she bit into it.

"'S good, innit?" Lilac mumbled.

Tib was too overcome to respond. Nothing she had ever eaten in her entire life tasted as good as that apple. She tried to savor it, but she couldn't stop taking one bite after another, barely pausing to swallow in between. Before she realized it, she was nibbling the last bits of apple flesh off her half of the core.

Lilac had long since finished hers and was watching her with deep pleasure. "It really is amazing. And from what I hear, everything in Equestria tastes that good. Even the grass!"

Tib put down the denuded half-core and rounded the table. She fell to her knees and wrapped her arms around Lilac's neck. "Thank you," she said, her voice unsteady.

"You're…welcome?" Lilac put her muzzle over Tib's shoulder. "I mean, it was just an apple. A great apple, but…"

"No." Tib took a deep breath. Lilac smelled really nice, not like an animal at all. "Not just for that. Thank you for having lunch with me. Thank you for being so nice. For being…for being my friend."

"Aww…" Lilac nuzzled the back of Tib's head. "You're welcome, Tibby. And thank you for being my friend."

You'll make new friends. That's what COREy had said. It was one of the last things he'd said to her.

Tib smiled against the velvet softness of Lilac's neck. COREy had been right.

"Hey, Tib?"

"Yeah, Lilac?"

"Uhm...are you gonna eat that core?"

***

Author's Note

And just like that, Tib has made her first flesh and blood friend. And all it took was a shared apple.

The characters of Lynn, Beth, and Dr Pastern are creations of Chatoyance, and are used here with her kind permission.

4. My Choices Are Mine

Doctor Roselyn Pastern had finished the visual examination, taking note of Tib's sync ports as well as her onboard music player.

"You'll have to remove them, right?" Not that Tib minded saying goodbye to the temple ports, but she would miss her music. She'd miss it a lot.

"No need. Any foreign bodies, including implants, get ejected during Conversion." Pastern touched a few keys on her notepad. "We're only really concerned about artificial organs, valve implants, that kind of thing. Those can cause problems." Pastern looked at Tib over the rims of her glasses, quirking her eyebrows.

Tib shook her head. "Nope. All my parts are original, except for the augments you already know about."

"Good enough."

Tib shivered a bit. Even sitting on the synthcotton cover between her bare butt and the bare metal, the examination table was cold. In fact, the room itself wasn't exactly warm.

Dr Pastern took note of her discomfort. "You can get dressed now, Tib. I just have a couple more questions and then you're free to go."

Gratefully Tib pulled on the shift and underpants folded neatly on the table. "How do you stand it? It's freezing in here!"

"It's sixty degrees Fahrenheit. Anyway, refrigeration preserves youth." Pastern flashed a quick half-grin. "Seriously, the labs and exam rooms are strictly climate-controlled. We work with a lot of substances that are temperature sensitive."

"Like Potion?"

Pastern scoffed. "Nope. You could probably take a blowtorch to that stuff and it wouldn't affect it–though I don't know anyone who'd be willing to risk it. The requests for Conversion are coming in faster than we're getting doses delivered. Pretty soon we're going to have one hell of a waiting list." Pastern looked at her with a comforting smile. "No worries though. You've already got your dose waiting for you. After your two weeks of orientation, of course. "

"Right." Two weeks. It sounded like forever, yet like no time at all.

Pastern looked up from her pad and gave Tib another over-the-glasses look. "Having second thoughts?"

"No!" Tib realized she was shouting and dialed down. "No, not at all. I kind of like what I've seen so far, actually."

Pastern seemed to relax a bit. "Most people do, once they bother to look."

Once Tib was dressed, Pastern gestured her to a chair which was marginally more comfortable than the exam table. "So, you're from the Gulf Coast? Gulf of Mexico?"

"What's left of it. When the waterfront started eroding from the melting ice caps, New Orleans and Mobile kind of gobbled up all the towns in between and moved north. Theyn't–there aren't any real states anymore, but Louisiana is still Louisiana." Tib said this with a certain amount of pride.

Dr Pastern was really grinning now. "Pardon me, your patois is showing."

Tib chuckled a little. "Almost nobody talks like that anymore. I think my father clung to it out of what he called 'hard-down cussedness', and he passed it on to me."

"Good for him. We all need a little more 'Nawlinz', 'Mohbeel' and 'Loozyanna' in our lives."

Tib laughed with the doctor. Pastern had a way of putting you at ease.

"So. Any allergies?"

"Pancillin. Oh, and seafood. Not that there's any left. We had some crawdads in a patch of bayou down in Mobileans when I was little, and I couldn't touch 'em. Theyn't no–there aren't any left now. I think the swampland dried up, even." That was twice she almost lapsed into the Cajun dialect she'd shared only with her father. Pretty soon she'd be speaking Bayou French. And after all the effort Mother had put into teaching her to speak properly!

"Noted. Okay, that's it." Pastern reached out a hand. "It was good talking with you, Tib. And thanks for not making me fight my way through your full name."

Tib stood and shook the doctor's hand warmly. She flashed a saucy grin and deliberately laid her native accent on thick. "Don'choo worry yo' haid 'bout it, dollin'. De pleasure, she be all mine. I got no worries, me."

For the first time in too long, Tib was speaking the truth. She walked out of the exam room with a bounce in her step that would have made Lilac look like a model of restraint. By the time she reached the residential hallway, she was whistling "Jambalaya".

***

Tib's good mood lasted until she got to her sleeping quarters…and found out who she was rooming with.

"You keep your stuff away from mine." It was the sour-faced woman from the tour. She'd had her exam before Tib, and somehow Tib thought that the lady had discovered that during the Conversion process anesthetic was not optional. "I check my stuff all the time. Every day. If anything goes missing or even gets messed with, you'll be sorry."

Tib was used to people being proprietary about their possessions. It was one of the reasons she traveled light and had limited interaction with other people for so long. But after lunch with Lilac, after the easy banter with the good doctor, the older woman's abrasive behavior rubbed her raw.

Theyn't no way I'd touch yo' shit, ma belle. I be scairt o' gettin' yo' bitch cooties, me. She bit back the retort and put her small backpack under the unmade bed. She strove to remember her mother's lessons in manners.

"You stay on your side," the woman continued. "Some people try to claim everything for themselves. I hate people like that."

"Me too." The words seemed to come out of her mouth of their own accord, and it stopped the woman's ranting cold. She stared with a sort of confused apprehension.

Tib shook out the sheets and began making her bed. "I'm Delphine Thibodeaux, but I go by Tib. What's your name, ma'am?"

"What you need my name for?"

Tib didn't know where she was getting this–she sucked at dealing with people!--but she persisted in her efforts to be pleasant. Maybe Lilac was rubbing off on her. "Well, it would be an improvement over 'Hey, you', wouldn't it?"

The dark eyes narrowed at her. Tib shrugged mentally and concentrated on getting the sheet fitted onto the bed. It wasn't as easy as she remembered. She hadn't actually made a bed since she left home. She tugged and straightened and fussed with the corners, but no matter how hard she tried the sheet bore a startling resemblance to a topographical display of the Appalachian Wastelands.

"Jejeongsin-iya?!" The older woman took three steps forward and shoved Tib firmly back. She whipped off the sheet, gave it a disciplinary shake, and spread it over the mattress, darting back and forth to tuck in the corners even as it settled. She spread the top sheet, then the blanket. Not a single wrinkle dared present itself. Within minutes the woman snatched the pillow up from the floor, fluffed it aggressively, and pitched it carelessly on the bed. It landed dead center at the top, perfectly placed.

"...Thank you?" Tib had never seen a bed so definitively put to rights. Not even by her own neat freak of a mother.

Her roommate slowly turned around to face her. She moved with deliberate slowness until she stood directly in Tib's personal space. Tib steeled herself against moving back. Somehow she knew that would count against her.

"Hal meon nee." Each syllable was clipped and precise, leaving no margin for misinterpretation.

Tib offered a small, desperate smile. "I'm sorry, I don't underst–"

"That what you call me. Halmeonee." She turned briskly away and went to the other side of the room. "I make my bed now. You come help and next time you do bed yourself."

Tib felt like she should feel insulted, or offended, or at least slightly put out. But she was grinning happily as she went to assist Halmeonee. "Yes, ma'am!"

***

The first week flew by. Tib ate the best meals she'd ever had in her life, including fresh fruit and greens shipped directly from Equestria. Quickly she learned to get in line early at the caff to have pick of the best stuff; it went out quickly. Even when she was late, Lilac usually managed to save some lettuce or a few grapes or some other good thing for her, and they always shared with Halmeonee, who joined them at their table now.

By the end of the week Tib had managed to learn that her roomie's real name was Park Eun-sook. "Halmeonee" was the Korean word for "grandmother".

Eun-sook was a native of what she called "the City", as though San Francisco were the only place worthy of the name. To her, it probably was. She had two children, both of whom had left the coast to seek their fortunes elsewhere. She hadn't heard from either of them since. Her husband had been a Blackmesh killed in the line of duty years ago, and she wouldn't provide any further details.

Tib didn't press her. She knew better.

***

The more Tib learned about Equestria, the more confident she became that she'd made the right choice. It sounded like paradise, a Garden of Eden where no one need fear being cast out by an unforgiving deity.

There were two deities in Equestria, though they sought neither worship nor unquestioning servitude. There was Princess Celestia, of course; ponies she spoke to seemed to think the sun rose and set on her, though she learned that Celestia actually made the sun rise and set.

Much less was known about Luna. The dark Princess controlled the night, drove the moon and commanded the stars, but only bare glimpses of her had been caught, always in her radiant sister's shadow. Rumors about her were rampant, some almost too outlandish to consider plausible. But in a world where humans could turn into ponies, what was truly impossible?

Tib scrounged for all the information she could gather. She found herself drawn to the lesser known diarch for reasons she couldn't quite explain even to herself. She'd surprised herself a lot since learning of Equestria's emergence, doing things she'd never imagined herself capable of. She'd left home, traveled across the continent, made the choice to abandon her humanity forever. She'd discarded her first and only companion (and COREy's loss was one she still hadn't gotten over, and likely she never would).

One rumor about Luna carried an unexpected sting. It was said that the dark princess considered any cognitive entity worthy of sparing…even artificial intelligence. There were early reports of biomech animals being taken through to Equestria and becoming real, living creatures. Even fully robotic entities were made flesh, and lived new and real lives as dogs or birds or…well, just about anything.

But COREy's housing lay at the bottom of the Mississippi. Lost, discarded, and irretrievable. Even if he hadn't self-termed, there was no going back to retrieve what she'd quite literally thrown away.

She tried not to beat herself up over it. She hadn't known. How could she have known about Luna's plans for AIs? Besides, it was just another silly rumor.

Tib tried to focus on the positive changes in her life. At last, she had friends. Real, live, flesh and blood friends. There was Lilac, of course, but as the number of newfoal grew, so did her circle of acquaintances. So many ponies knew her by name now that she honestly couldn't keep their names straight. Not that she couldn't tell them apart–every pony had different coloration, and there were some coat colors she hadn't known existed–but when a bright yellow pony greeted her in the hallway with a cheery "Hi, Tib!" she had to stop and think fast. Haystack? Or maybe Buttercream? No, wait, this one had a chocolate brown mane and tail. It was Chocolate Chip Muffin! "Hey there, Chip! Where y'at?"

It was a good time, possibly the best time of her life.

It was inevitable that things would take a sudden and wrenching turn for the worse.

***

Author's Note

Eun-sook turned out very differently than I originally planned her. We can already tell that she's a very determined and focused individual, and that's how she presented as a character as well as in the story. It was my intention to make her a thorn in Tib's side, almost an antagonist, but instead she becomes a mentor and another friend.

If you're just here for the ponies, don't worry. We're going to be seeing a lot more of Chocolate Chip Muffin.

5. Dark Wings

Tib had reset her internal wake alarm to 0730 so she would be sure to beat the breakfast rush. Last night at dinner she'd heard a rumor that there would be strawberries this morning, freshly imported. Tib loved strawberries. She couldn't wait to taste real ones.

She was up, washed and dressed when she noticed that the other bed in the room was still occupied. That was odd. Eun-sook was usually awake at least an hour before Tib stirred and would either rouse her early or go on to the cafeteria to save their table. The older woman was probably just worn out; they'd done a lot of walking yesterday, watching the new pegasi test out their wings on the roof, and the stairs had been a bit much for Eun-sook. She had only picked at her dinner and gone to bed early.

Tib was actually pleased at the prospect of getting to be the early bird for a change. This could be fun! She'd tease Halmeonee about it until she earned a swift slap on the back of her head, the signal to quit that nonsense. It was something of a game for them. Like the way Tib spoke in Cajun patois while Eun-sook used Korean phrasing when she was capable of perfectly correct English. They did this with each other all the time. It was their private joke.

"G'mawnin, sleepyhaid!" she sang out as she approached the still form on the bed. "Wakey wakey, aigs an' fake bakey!" She leaned over. Eun-sook was facing away, towards the blank white wall. "C'mon, Halmeonee! Might could be strawberries this mawnin. We might could ask fo' French toast! Theyn't figgered out beignets yet, but I'll learn 'em. Anyhow, ya gotta git up, you!"

She was leaning close to Eun-sook's ear, but she hadn't even twitched. She wasn't moving.

At all.

"Halmeonee?" Tib felt a sudden, bone-deep tide of cold dread rearing up to swallow her. "Come on, Halmeonee, wake up. Please."

Still nothing.

A small part of her realized the awful truth, but the rest of her couldn't accept it. Wouldn't. "Eun-sook! Wake up!" She clasped the rounded shoulder to shake her roommate, her adopted grandmother, to wakefulness.

Eun-sook was cold. Cold and stiff.

***

Tib tore down the hallway, knocking against people and causing startled ponies to canter out of her path. She didn't see, didn't notice, didn't give a fuck.

She burst heedlessly into the reception area and ran straight to the desk where Beth was just getting ready to sign in the morning applicants. The receptionist looked up, startled. "Tib? What's –"

"She daid!" Tib screamed loud enough to rattle the walls. "Eun-sook, she be layin' back dere in her bunk stone col' daid! She passed in de night an' I never knew not'in', me!" Tib fell to her knees, curled up on the tiled floor, and wailed a mixture of Cajun French and incomprehensible sobs.

The next thing she knew, Beth and the PA–Lynn–had hustled her into one of the back rooms. Now she sat on a plasteel chair, hands over her face. She knew they were talking to her, asking her questions, trying to comfort her, but she was unable to respond. Some distant, rational part of her knew she wasn't just grieving for Eun-sook. She was crying for her father, her mother, for COREy. For all the people who would die with the planet. For the planet itself.

The only coherent words she was able to string together came out as a howl. "Dem folks I love, why do dey allus hafta die on me?"

If Beth or Lynn had an answer for that, Tib didn't hear it. She didn't want to.

The steel door was flung open from the outside and a gurney rattled in. Lynn and Beth were no longer with Tib. She thought Beth might have left the room. After all, she had a job to do that didn't include babysitting heartsick Cajun brats.

Tib was no longer crying. Her tears were spent and her throat ached from sobbing and screaming and God only knew what other sounds she'd made.

"Tib."

She felt empty. Empty of tears, empty of love, empty of hope.

"Tib."

She didn't care about conversion anymore. She didn't care about going to Equestria. She didn't care about making new friends. She couldn't afford to care about anything or anyone. Whatever she cared about inevitably got taken away from her. She couldn't bear any more loss. She was ready to die with the Earth.

"Delphine Renee Angelique Thibodeaux!"

She looked up, shocked at the sound of her complete name on someone else's lips. Roselyn Pastern was kneeling in front of her, all but shouting in her face, gloved hands locked to her chair's armrests. "Doc…?" she croaked weakly.

The doctor spoke more gently, but very firmly, her eyes locked on Tib's. "This is very important. I need you to stay calm and be focused. Can you do that for me?"

Tib swallowed and cleared her throat. "I'll try."

"Good girl." A box of NeatWipes was thrust into her hands. "Freshen up a bit. It'll give you a chance to compose yourself." She stood and turned towards the gurney. "Okay, Lynn, let's get her on the table and get that gown off of her."

Mechanically Tib pulled out one of the moist towelettes and scrubbed at her cheeks. She wondered who they'd brought into the exam room and why they hadn't taken them somewhere else. Maybe the other rooms were already in use. Tib didn't even know how many there were.

There were ripping sounds from the table. Were they tearing off the person's clothes? How would they get dressed again? Had there been some kind of accident?

Dully, she looked up and saw Eun-sook's face, looked into the filmy dark eyes that would never look back again. The dead body was lying on its side, turning a sickly shade of gray.

"What are you doing to her?!" Tib sprang to her feet. She didn't feel empty anymore. She felt sudden, white-hot, uncontainable outrage. "She's dead! Leave her alone!"

Lynn cast aside the nightgown she'd cut off the wasted, wrinkled body. "It's all right, Tib. It's going to be okay."

"How can you say that?" Tib cast an anguished look at Doctor Pastern, who was measuring out sparkling purple fluid from a flask into a white paper cup. "Doc, what the hell you doing?"

Either Pastern didn't hear her, or she ignored the question. "Four ounces," she muttered. "Just to be safe."

"That's going to mess up the daily Potion allotment," Lynn warned. "We won't get another shipment until Monday. Can't we intubate?"

"Not while she's in rigor mortis, and I don't want to risk waiting for it to go away. As for the dose count, our ten o'clock today is five years old. He only needs two ounces anyway." Pastern set down the flask and carried the cup to the table where Eun-sook's body lay half curled on its side. "Give me a hand here, Lynn. I want to cover as much skin as I can get to so I'll need your help to turn her over."

Lynn went to Pastern's side. Tib looked from them, to the table, to the flask, then to the cup in Pastern's gloved hand. She realized that there were thaumatic hazard signs all over the walls.

This wasn't one of the examination rooms. This was the Conversion Room.

Tib couldn't believe it. It made no sense to her. "You gonna Convert her? Pourquoi? What difference do it make now? Elle et morte! What do it matter if she be a daid woman or a daid pony? Mort et mort!"

Both women ignored her. Pastern poured the shimmering liquid over one side, then Lynn rolled the body over and Pastern poured out the rest.

This was a travesty. Dead or not, Eun-sook deserved better than this! Tib was not merely offended; she was horrified. The dead should be remembered with love and respect, their remains properly disposed of, not...not subjected to some insane experimentation.

Tib wanted to go stop them, but something held her back. Shock or disbelief or morbid curiosity–it made no difference. Whatever the reason, by the time she could convince her body to move, the changes had begun.

First Eun-sook's graying flesh took on a kind of dull sheen, as though she'd been dipped in paraffin. Then her whole body went stark white.

Tib gasped, but the doctor and the PA seemed to relax.

"It's working," said Lynn.

"Yes," Pastern said in evident relief. "I've never Converted anyone who'd gone into rigor before, but when I saw her skin–palor mortis, not livor, no streaks– she couldn't have died more than four hours ago, and probably a lot less! This couldn't have been better, right?"

The doctor was clearly excited and in her element, which made Lynn feel some very mixed emotions.

Roselyn grinned. "I was just reading about a case like this from the Vancouver Bureau last week, Lynn! Overdose, went full livor, and they still brought the bastard back. I was skeptical about this even working but that article convinced me. The holocams are on, right?"

Lynn nodded. The doc was probably already thinking about doing a bit for the hypernet. That could only mean that Ros was extremely confident about this. Lynn felt relieved–Pastern could be a little creepy sometimes, but she always meant well.

All smiles now, Lynn rushed to Tib. She reached out a hand and Pastern barked "Lynn! Gloves!"

Hastily Lynn tore them off and tossed them into a purple receptacle. Then she caught Tib's hands in hers and squeezed tight. "It's okay, Tib, really it is. Potion is magic, remember? It can raise the dead, so long as they're not too far gone!"

Tib found herself unable to look away from the miracle in front of her. Eun-sook's fingers and toes had merged together into white blobs that gradually began to grow hooves. Her head had changed shape completely, becoming larger and growing an unmistakable muzzle. Her torso lengthened and her legs–four of them now–stretched out, new hooves dangling beyond the table's edge. New eyes swelled underneath still-sealed lids.

Eun-sook's new nostrils quivered. Her sides expanded as she drew her first new breath.

"She's alive!" Tib cried out, her heart fluttering with reawakened hope. She managed to look at Dr Pastern, who was smiling softly. "But she was…will she still be…her?"

Pastern nodded. "She absolutely will be. This isn't the first time I've seen something like this." Something flitted across the doctor's expression, but before Tib could identify it, it was gone. "The information encoded in the brain can subsist for hours after cessation of bodily functions. She'll be the same Eun-sook–only much happier."

Lynn interrupted, "Look, her coat's coming in!"

Plush, short hair was sprouting to the newly formed body. It shone softly in the harsh overhead lights, a shade precisely between blue and green.

"Here comes the mane!" Dr Pastern sounded as girlishly excited as Lynn had. Soft, thick, silken hair flowed from the top of the new pony's head, from the back of her long neck, from the skinny rat-like tail Tib hadn't even noticed. The hair was all the colors of fire–bright red, warm orange, glowing yellow…

"Unicorn!" crowed Lynn, and sure enough, a bud erupted from Eun-sook's brow and quickly spiraled up into a gleam of pearlescence. The eyelids had unsealed, and the unicorn lay at her ease on her side, breathing slowly and deeply.

"She's beautiful," Tib whispered.

Pastern tossed her own gloves into the purple bin and put an arm around Tib's waist since her shoulders were too high up. Damn, the girl was tall. "Ponies are always beautiful…but Eun-sook is particularly striking."

Tib took a step towards the sleeping miracle. She put out a hand, hesitated, cast a look of anxious pleading at Pastern. "Can I touch her? Will it hurt her?"

Pastern smiled and stepped back. "Not a bit."

Slowly, almost reverently, Tib moved closer to the table. She noticed Eun-sook's eyes moving underneath the closed lids. "She's dreaming." She ran a lock of the fiery mane through her trembling fingers. "So soft!"

She stroked a hand down the long, sleek neck. The blue-green coat was smooth and silky, a pleasure to touch. She could feel the strong pulse under the neck.

"Doc Ros?" Her voice was a soft whisper. "Can I stay with her until she wakes up? Please?"

Pastern nodded. "I think she'd like that very much. Lynn, could you grab one of the blankets? Let's make these girls comfortable..."

***

When Eun-sook woke up, she found herself not in bed, but lying on a blanket. It was hard underneath; she must be on the floor. She wasn't in the room she shared with her adopted granddaughter, either. It felt…different. Smelled different.

Her eyes seemed stuck shut for a moment, but she managed to coax them open. The first thing she saw was Tib's face, bending over her. The child's eyes were red and swollen--she'd been crying--but she wore an eager smile. She was kneeling on the floor, and Eun-sook realized her head was in her granddaughter's lap.

"Hwnh…" Eun-sook's mouth felt strange. She tried to work out how to speak with it–had she had a stroke? That thought should have worried her, but somehow it didn't. She felt too good. She felt wonderful.

She tried moving her legs, then her arms. Everything seemed to be working, but it felt kind of strange. Good, strong, with no pain for the first time in years…but strange.

Again she tried to speak, and this time it worked better. "Where are we? What happened?"

"You're a pony now, Halmeonee." Tib looked happier than Eun-sook had ever seen her. Joy made her look almost pretty. "You've been Converted."

"I've been what?" Eun-sook moved her arms, only they weren't arms anymore, they were forelegs. She stared at her polished hooves in astonishment. "When did this happen?"

"Almost an hour ago." Tib was stroking her neck. It felt really nice. Comforting. "You're so beautiful."

Eun-sook squirmed, trying to get her new legs under her. "Why did nobody ask me first? I go to sleep in bed, and boom! I wake up as a pony?"

Tib bit her lip. "Don't you like it?"

"Of course I like it! I came all the way out here to be a pony!" She twisted and managed to push herself upright, resting on folded legs, trying to bring her face level with Tib's. "I just didn't expect it to be like this. Surprise, pony!"

"Umm…"Tib looked away, behind Eun-sook. "Little help here?"

Eun-sook turned her head. To her surprise, she found that she could look directly behind her without turning her body. That nice doctor, the one with red hair, was smiling at her.

"You had a bit of a medical emergency last night," the doctor explained. "I didn't have time to examine you, but if I had to guess, I'd say it was a heart attack. We had to ponify you right away."

"And you turned out amazing!" When Eun-sook turned back to Tib, she was holding up a plastic mirror. "See how lovely you are?"

The reflection looking back at her had wide eyes like glowing embers. Her coat was blue-green, her mane a riot of blazing color.

"I'm a kirin!" she exclaimed, turning her head this way and that, watching her mane shimmer and sweep. "Only one horn though. A kirin should have two."

"Sorry, Halmeonee," Tib chuckled. "Only one to a customer. But you're a unicorn. That means you can learn magic!"

Eun-sook turned her head and studied her flanks. "No scales either. A kirin should have scales. They're cousins to dragons."

Something lightly smacked the back of her head. She turned and blinked at Tib's smug smirk. "You fuss too much!" said the girl in an attempt at a Korean accent.

"You…you head-slapped me!" There was more surprise than outrage in Eun-sook's tone.

"Yeah, because you're being silly! You have a brand new healthy body, you're a gorgeous unicorn and you're going to live in Equestria! So what do you got to bitch about, you?" Tib laughed, still stroking Eun-sook's neck...but she looked ready to cry again, too.

Maybe that's why Eun-sook couldn't glare at her with all the force of a properly affronted Korean grandmother. She didn't even feel affronted, properly or otherwise. That was...kind of funny. In fact, it was very funny, now that she thought about it. She giggled like the schoolgirl she had once been. "I guess I am being silly."

Tib put her arms around Eun-sook's neck and hugged her. "I just want you to be as happy as I'm happy for you, Halmeonee."

"I am happy, Tib." Eun-sook nuzzled the side of Tib's head, finding it the most natural thing in the world. "Really I am."

"I'm going to have to kick you two out,"Pastern said, opening the door. "I have a little boy coming in about half an hour."

"I'll try," Eun-sook said, shifting her legs underneath her. "I'm not sure yet how to work these things."

"I'll help." Tib stood up, wrapped her long arms around Eun-sook's barrel, and lifted her to her hooves. With her granddaughter steadying her, the newfoal unicorn managed to walk out of the Conversion Room with a modicum of dignity.

***

Author's Note

I work, if peripherally, in the medical field. Death is not like a light switch. A person doesn't just "turn off" when they breathe their last. Just like a flower plucked from a bush, a human body takes a long time to finish dying. If potion can revive someone who has sustained a severe head injury, or who has been torn in half, then bringing back someone who has been dead for less than three hours should be a piece of cake. Because magic.

And speaking strictly for myself, I think "Surprise, pony!" is my favorite line in the whole chapter.

6. See Who I Am

"I thought of a new name," Eun-sook announced at breakfast one morning.

"Really?" Lilac's ears perked up. "That's wonderful! Tell, tell!"

"When everyone gets here." Eun-sook took a delicate nibble of her red clover and Timothy hay omelet.

"No fair! Tib, come on, you must know!"

"Nope. She hasn't told me." Tib picked up a strawberry and dipped it in the pile of sugar–real sugar–on her plate.

"I saved those for you!" Lilac pouted, only half playing. "I kept them in a bowl of ice water, told Featherfall she couldn't touch them, and resisted temptation all day long and overnight!! Talk about gratitude."

Tib shrugged. "Can't tell you what I don't know, chere amie." She took a bite and surrendered to strawberry bliss.

Lilac snorted at her. Talk about unfair! Eun-sook had been a pony for four whole days, and Tib was her roommate. And her granddaughter. They were tormenting her with all this...this...this this!

After a minute or so, Tib almost regretfully swallowed the well-chewed morsel of delight. "Anyway, Chip and Feather are on their way now. They just walked in."

"Oh, cool!" Lilac turned her head and called out. "Guys, come over here, quick! Tib's grandmare has picked out her Equestrian name!"

Tib wasn't all that good at reading facial expressions on humans, and it wasn't any easier with ponies. Still, the fact that her friends were coming to the table without so much as a passing glance at the meal serving line was all the indication she needed. "Something's wrong." She stood as the pair approached. "What's going on?"

Chocolate Chip Muffin, usually the merriest pony you could meet, looked absolutely crestfallen. His head was at half-mast, his ears drooped, and his gait was plodding. Featherfall Dancer, a delicate pegasus with a coat of pinkish gold and a brilliant white mane and tail, was carrying herself with quiet reserve as always, but her nostrils were flaring with barely contained rage.

"Chip!" Tib went to the little stallion, barely more than a colt really, and put an arm over his withers. "What's the matter?"

"They're protesting again." Chip's voice was full of pity. "It's worse than yesterday. A lot worse…"

"There's more of them this morning." Feather sat beside Lilac. She was close enough now for Tib to see her lower lip quivering. She was as miserable as Chip was, but the flashing of her sky-blue eyes hinted at her anger. "I stopped counting after twenty." She looked over at her companion. "Sit down, Chip. Try not to think about it."

Chip dropped to the cushion next to Feather. "I keep seeing those signs…and hearing what they were shouting. I don't want to think about it....but I keep hearing those awful things. I can't even repeat what they were saying." He pressed his head into Featherfall's neck.

Tib hugged him. "You two sit right here. Imma go get y'all some breakfast and y'all're gonna eat every bite."

"M not hungry," Chip muttered.

"Tough oats, Mister Muffin. Halmeonee, don't you let 'em go nowhere." Without waiting for an answer, Tib went to the line and eventually came back with two loaded trays.

"They're out of omelets, but they's plenty of hay pancakes left. I even snagged some butter and syrup. Now eat." She set the trays in front of the pair, sat back down, took her last two strawberries and placed one on each stack. "There! Now y'all hafta eat 'em. Cain't let good strawberries go to waste."

"You sound more like me every day," Eun-sook told her, not without approval.

"I learnt from the best, me." Tib took to her cushion and kissed the side of her grandmother's muzzle. Eun-sook nuzzled back, but she wasn't sure she liked the look in the girl's eye.

"Now then," Tib said, "we could use some happy news, right? We're all here, Halmeonlee. Spill it. What do we call you from now on?"

"You go right on calling me what I told you to call me," Eun-sook said. "As for the rest of you…" She surveyed the table, where three pairs of eyes looked back with anticipation. Even Chip seemed to have forgotten his sorrow.

"I had to think about it for a long time." Eun-sook took a long, contemplative sip of her apple juice. Reconstituted, true, but still tasty. "At first I thought of taking a Korean name, but since we're all learning Equestrian anyway, English will work just as well."

She paused until Lilac said, "And?"

"Well, it's easy for Earth ponies, isn't it?" She looked pointedly at Lilac and Chip. "Flowers, trees, food, just about anything, really. There are hundreds of possibilities." She turned her gaze to Featherfall, whose quiet anger had given way to frank curiosity. Excellent. "Pegasi usually stay with weather or sky names, or descriptive ones, like Feather here. Somewhat limited, but still rather well-defined. Of course, not every pegasus is going to choose a name like Windwhistle or Cloudbuster, but sometimes it's easier to decide what you want when you know what you don't want, isn't it?"

Another pause, and Featherfall leaned forward. "Go on."

"Now, unicorns…" she shook her head dramatically. She did that often. She liked the way it made her mane shimmer like flames. "Unicorns are tricky. Oh, we use magic more obviously than the rest of you, but that isn't a very good name source. Unless you want a name like Hocus Pocus or Witchiepoo."

Chip actually chuckled at that. Even better. "So what's your new name?"

"As I said, I had to think about it. I didn't really want an obvious magical name, but I wanted something that really expressed who I am. I thought about using the English translation of my given name, but I didn't think 'Silver Virtue' quite suited my coloring. Maybe if I was a gray or white pony, but I'm sort of bluey green, and my mane–"

"COME ONNN!" Lilac was bouncing up and down. She was making the table rattle. "Tell tell tell! I'm going nuts over here!"

"I will," Eun-sook promised, "if you settle down and be quiet."

At once Lilac dropped onto her cushion, tucked her legs under her and rested her chin on the table, looking up at Eun-sook endearingly. Both Chip and Featherfall laughed, and Eun-sook considered her work done.

"My name," she announced, "is Harmony. Harmony because I would like to bring balance using my talent. Harmony because it sounds like what Tib calls me." She smiled at her granddaughter. "and Harmony because I love it when we sing together."

The whole table toasted Harmony's new name with their apple juice. Chip and Feather ate their breakfast with much better appetite. Harmony was pleased…but as the morning crowd dispersed, she got up and quietly followed her granddaughter out of the cafeteria.

***

Tib was looking out the glass of the front door when she heard Harmony speak behind her. "And what do you think you're going to do?"

Tib turned around. She looked calm, if slightly troubled, but completely composed. "Most of them have gone," she said defensively. "There's only a couple left."

"I didn't ask for a head count. I asked after your intentions."

" I'm just going out to talk to them, Halmeonee."

"What good will that do? They're protestors, child. They've already made up their minds. If you walk out there, you could be hurt."

"I'm not in any danger from two church ladies and a kid half my height."

"Still three against one. I don't like those odds."

Tib crouched down to Harmony's eye level. She put an arm around her grandmother's neck. "I have to do something, Halmeonee. If I can change just one person's mind, even just make them think twice…"

"Then I'm going with you. Two against three is better."

"No. You're a pony now, Halmeonee. It'll just antagonize them. Besides, confronting them like that would just upset you like it did the others. You know it would."

Harmony spoke quietly. "It would upset me worse if anything happened to you."

Tib took a deep breath and stood up. "Nothing is going to happen to me. I'm not going out there to fight. I'm just going to talk. I won't be five minutes."

Stubborn girl. Short of grabbing her by the belt and dragging her back, Harmony couldn't stop her. And even if she did that, Tib would just dash out as soon as her back was turned.

"Five minutes." Pony or not, Harmony hadn't lost the ability to sound stern. "Five minutes, then I come out after you."

Tib bent and kissed Harmony's brow just below the horn. "I talk, they don't listen, I come right back in."

As she pushed her way out of the door, Tib said under her breath, "After I run them off."

She'd forgotten how well ponies could hear.

***

Most of the protest signs lay abandoned where their bearers had dropped them. Bits of plastiboard and synthstock panels, scavenged from dump sites and too small or worn out to be useful, had been hand-lettered with touching sentiments like EARTH IS FOR HUMANS and PONIES ARE ZOMBIES.

The three remaining diehards, the ones too fanatical to get bored and leave, still brandished their placards with pride. One was an old lady, easily half again Eun-sook's human age. She held a sign that demanded PONIES GO HOME! The other woman, a dumpy matron wearing a dreadful fake wig, had scrawled something from the Bible on her cracked board, possibly a whole chapter, in tiny print. After struggling to make out male and female created HE them and gave him dominion over the beasts of the E, Tib abandoned her effort to make sense of it.

It was the sole male who was the worst offender. He carried four signs, two in each hand, one atop another in a grotesque parody of outspread butterfly wings. Not that any of these people had ever seen a butterfly.

In his left hand:

EQUIEN
TERORISTS
__________

RAPESTS
OF
EARTH

And in his right:

MONSTERS
ON
HOOFS
__________

FUCK
SELESTEA

Tib could feel her temper threatening to rise. She sat hard on it. As pleasantly as she could, she said, "Good morning! How are you today?"

All three stared at her. The old woman seemed confused. She looked around as if to determine where this gangly beanpole of a girl had come from.

The matron flushed red. "She's one of them! A traitor to her own race! That cesspit hellhole spewed her out to drive us away from our God-sanctioned duty to save our world!"

Tib's neutral smile faltered. This was not an auspicious beginning. "Now, I didn't come out here to make any trouble, folks. Everypo–everybody's feeling kind of unsettled just now. Why don't we just talk about it? Maybe we can–"

"Still your lying tongue, deceiver!" The matron pointed at her imperiously. "Get her, boy! Shut her foul mouth!"

The squat young man holding the FUCK SELESTEA sign looked back at the woman in confusion. Tib could see the family resemblance now. Fireplug was obviously Wig Woman's offspring.

"Well?" The matron scowled. "Go on, Chad! Show her what happens to traitors!"

Fireplug, hereafter known as Chad, didn't seem all that eager to engage. He glanced at the girl who was a good two heads taller than he. She was skinny, but she didn't look weak. "We ain't supposed to be fighting, Ma. It's supposed to be a peaceful demonstration."

"Don't you sass me, young man! We didn't ride here all the way from Kansas in that smelly caravan just to give up the moment the holy war has been engaged! Didn't I spend all night finding people who'd stand with us?"

"They only came because you gave 'em a dollar each, Shirley," the old lady said. She coughed hard, spat a wad of phlegm, and went on. "They quit when they didn't get the breakfast you promised. And now our money's all gone and we can't get home."

"Shut the hell up, Mama! We're not going home till this den of evil is shut down!" Shirley the Wig Woman turned back to her son. "Why are you still standing there? Go make an example of that whore of Babylon!"

"But, Ma…"

"Don't you disrespect me, boy. The Good Book says you are to honor your mother!"

"Maybe you ought to practice what you preach." They all looked at Tib again. They seemed to have forgotten she could speak. Her tone was calm, resolute."Honor thy father and mother, isn't that one of the Commandments?" Apart from her personal mother issues, Tib had been raised in the remnants of a society that honored its dead, revered its elders and cherished the bond between parent and child. Her father would have knocked her head sideways otherwise. "Explain to me how telling the woman who bore you to 'shut the hell up' is obeying the word of your God?"

"Hear the devil reciting Scripture but heed it not!" Shirley spat at her. "Temptress! Blasphemer! Jesus will come down from His Heaven and smite you dead!"

"Really? Okay." Tib stood waiting, glanced up at the brownish sky. Seconds passed. She glanced at an imaginary wristchron. "Maybe he's busy this afternoon..."

Shirley threw her overwritten sign at Tib. It fell short and landed at her feet. Tib could have read the whole thing this close up, but she didn't bother.

Maybe being a smartass hadn't been the best approach. She decided to try once more. "Ma'am, please. I'm sorry I smarted off at you. I know you're upset, but I was hoping we could just talk things over, maybe come to some kind of–"

"Chaderlaomer Habbakuk Phelps!" Shirley shrieked. "You go kick that Satanic bitch's ass in the name of Jesus right now!"

Chad-whatever stood there holding his signs and looking from Tib to his mother, back and forth. He didn't budge an inch.

And with that, Tib was done. This wasn't going at all like she'd planned. It was time to throw in the towel. "Okay. I can see we're not getting anywhere, so I'm going back inside. I'm sorry to've wasted m--your time. Y'all take care now." With a little wave she walked back towards the door.

Something hit the back of her head hard enough to fire off stars across her vision. She stumbled, but managed to stay on her feet.

She turned in time to see Shirley stoop to pick up another fragment of plascrete from the ruined street. "Looks like I'm gonna have to get you two started, as usual. Come on, grab those rocks. We're gonna stone the bitch on the very steps of her gateway to hell!"

Neither the boy nor the old woman moved. They simply stared at Shirley in mute horror.

Tib felt at the back of her head. No blood, but there was a nasty lump coming up back there. She'd been pelted with rocks and dirt clods before, back in her troubled school days, and she discovered she still didn't take to it.

The local kids had been hellraisers, and they tried to force her into their gang of thieves and vandals. When she refused, they made her life hell until she'd learned to fight back. It was one of the reasons she didn't like people much, or she hadn't till she'd come here.

Her father's lessons in dealing with bullies had never been forgotten. Stand you up straight, ma petite. Look 'em right in de eye and don'tchoo even look away. Show 'em you ain't scairt of 'em an' dey prob'ly gon' back down an' slink off like de weasels dey be.

She stood up at her full height and locked eyes with her sole attacker. Shirley froze, her hand half-cocked back. She didn't complete the throw, but she didn't drop the plascrete chunk, and she stared defiantly back. Daring her.

'If'n dey don' run, don'tchoo go for dem, but you be ready if'n dey come after you. Don'tchoo start no mess, petite, but if dey mess wit'choo, you damn sure finish it, you.

Tib's long-fingered hands curled slowly into fists. She hadn't fought in years. Since she was thirteen, actually. But she hadn't forgotten how. This bunch, especially Shirley, was beginning to make her remember why she'd cut herself off from society for so long. And the throbbing in the back of her head was not improving her temperament.

Perhaps now was a good time to demonstrate her lack of social skills.

Before she could decide which one to take on first (no question, really; the boy was a coward, the old lady was frail, Shirley was the only real aggressor–and she was running on religious fervor and bravado, snatching her bald-headed would probably cool her jets), the door opened behind her. "Tib, come inside!" It was Beth. "Come in right now!"

"I'm kind of busy," Tib said over her shoulder. She couldn't run. She wasn't supposed to run. Retreat wasn't an option at this point. Not for Daddy's gator girl. She'd actually tried to walk away, and she'd been attacked from behind. She couldn't back down. She'd given them a chance. Now it was time to--

"Tib," Beth said with urgent desperation, "your name was called. It's time."

Then again…

Some part of her still wanted to fight, to beat in Shirley's ugly face until she learned better than to mess with people who meant her no harm. People like Chip.

She wanted to learn that bitch not to mess with Jean-Luc Thibodeaux's gator girl.

"Tib!" Beth sounded desperate. "Come on, please!"

She could beat all three of them to the ground if she had to. But how would that change their minds? What would it accomplish, except to add more fuel to the fires of hate that would ultimately consume them?

"Delphine!"

Tib didn't turn her back on them again; she didn't dare. The next projectile might miss her and hit Beth.

She kept her eyes locked on Shirley's and moved backwards until she got within reach of the door, then Beth grabbed her arm and dragged her inside, slamming and locking the door behind them just as the chunk of plascrete thudded against it.

***

"...last call for–how do you say her name again? Am I holding this upside down? Del…fine? No, French, that's Del-feen, I think…Renee, okay that's definitely French…Angel…something…wait, is this last part even a real name? I can't even spell this and I'm looking right at it! Wait, what? Is that what she goes by? Great. TIB! Come on down, Tib! You're the next contestant on The Ponification Is Right!"

Beth didn't let go of Tib until they reached the Conversion Room door. She knocked twice and when the door opened she shoved Tib inside.

Tib didn't utter a word of protest. She felt foolish and a little ashamed of herself. She saw Lynn, Dr Pastern, and Harmony waiting for her. They were all looking at her, and none of them looked pleased with her.

"I'm sorry," Tib muttered. "I messed up."

"That's the understatement of the century, but we don't have time to discuss it." Pastern pointed at the table. "Strip and get on the table. We're running behind."

"I swear I just went out to talk to them." Tib unsealed her jumpsuit and began shrugging out of it. "I wanted to try and talk some sense into them. My daddy always said that if you leave ignorance alone, ignorance will think it's okay."

"That's a clever saying," Harmony told her. "You know what my oma always said? You can't fix stupid."

"And you can't fight stupid with stupid, either." Lynn looked more worried than angry, but her tone was sharp. "Going out there was not a smart thing to do." Tib looked stricken, and Lynn did her best to soften the criticism. What was done was done, in any case. "I know you meant well, Tib, but you just can't talk to people like that. They're fanatics. They won't listen. You like old songs, right? I heard one once that went something like Calm and gentle reason here will bring you no relief, for those who bow to reason aren't the ones who give you grief."

Defeated, Tib stepped out of the puddle of her clothes and sat naked on the table. "I won't do it again."

"Damn straight you won't," Pastern told her. "Not after this. Now lie down on your side. It'll make things easier. But drink this first."

Tib took the cup, looking down at the sparkling purple liquid. "I was just trying to make them understand…"

"You can't force people to change their minds, child," said Harmony. "Not when they're too fond of what little mind they have."

"Down the hatch, Tib." Pastern didn't sound so cross anymore, but there was some urgency in her voice. "You'll feel better after you wake up, I promise."

Tib raised the glass and downed all three ounces in two swallows. She made a face. "Theyn't no Grape Nehi…"

Then she fell over.

***

It was a beautiful day, more beautiful than any Tib had ever known. The sky was vast and clear overhead, with a collection of puffy white clouds near the distant horizon. The air smelled fresh and sweet. The fragrance of flowers rode on the cool breeze.

She was sitting on what must have been a dock. She'd never actually been on one because they didn't exist anymore, but she'd seen pictures and holoview copies of old movies, and she could recognize the upright posts driven down into the riverbed and the weathered planks that ran between them. She sat on the edge, her bare feet dangling over the water. And she wasn't alone.

"This is what the Mississippi used to look like," COREy told her. He was sitting right next to her, as human as she was. He looked the way she'd always imagined he would, with curly brownish hair and hazel eyes like hers. He looked like her little brother, even though he was much older than she was. "The water's brown here because it's so muddy, but it's not polluted or anything. It's really shallow and the current kicks up the mud from the river bottom. The river starts way up in Minnesota, a place so narrow you could walk right across it, but during the spring thaw the river rises and runs a lot faster. It pulls silt and soil all the way down from up north and deposits it on the banks near the Gulf. That's why this area was always so fertile and they could grow so many crops here. Of course, it's too wet for some things to thrive, but they did pretty well with cotton and sugarcane."

A craft glided past them on the other side of the river, a huge bladed cylinder chugging at its stern to propel it forward.

"A steamboat!" COREy waved, and the pilot answered with two short blasts on the whistle. COREy grinned at her. "Isn't it great?"

"It's really nice," Tib said. "It was really nice. Why did they have to ruin it?"

"They didn't mean to. For a long time they didn't know what they were doing, and by the time they found out they thought it was too much trouble to fix it, so they just let it go. Let it get worse. Then, when they finally understood how bad things had really gotten, it was too late to fix it." COREy took her hand and gave it a squeeze. His touch was as warm as the sunlight. "But everything's going to be okay. You'll see."

"I hope so "

"I know so." He kissed her cheek. "It's really great to see you, Tib. But right now there's somebody else who wants to talk to you." He stood up, stretching.

Tib jumped to her feet. "COREy, please don't go! Don't leave me again. I miss you so much. Please stay with me."

"I'll always be with you, Tib. I promise." He reached out for her, and she hugged him to her just as hard as she could, never wanting to let him go.

And then her arms were empty.

"No!" Frantically Tib looked around, but COREy was gone. Just...gone. So was the steamboat. So was the river.

She was out standing in a field. Flowers dotted the lush green carpet of grass, and the sky overhead was so blue you could drown in it. The sun was shining, and it was bright, but it didn't hurt to look at it.

She felt a sudden urge to move. To run. It was the most natural thing in the world, running through the grass, under the boundless blue sky. She heard a kind of thunder around her, on either side, before and behind her, and as her vision sharpened she realized she was running with a vast herd of horses. Not horses, ponies. Ponies of every color imaginable, Earth ponies and unicorns and pegasi. And she was keeping pace with them. Somehow she was one of them, part of a vast herd, and they accepted her without question.

Gradually, long before she took notice, the herd fell back and she was running alone again. Then she wasn't running anymore.

She was sitting in front of a table, a pretty little round table in what looked for all the world like a Garden District parlor, complete with beaded lamps and a fireplace with a huge mirror and a mantle crowded with pictures. The pictures were all ponies. There were too many to count.

"Would you like some tea?"

Tib stared at Celestia, who was sitting with her at the table. The princess used her hornfield to pour tea into three cups. Three? Was COREy here with them? She looked, but the third attendant at the tea party was another pony. And not just another pony, but the dark princess of the moon herself, who had so drawn Tib's interest.

Tib tried to hide her disappointment, but she didn't do a very good job. Of course she was honored to be in the presence of the princesses, but there was a hole in her heart that only one presence could fill. And he was nowhere to be seen.

Luna smiled at her with kindness and understanding. She turned to her radiant sister. "'Tis just as I told thee, is it not? There be another presence here, one greatly beloved and trusted. Is it not as I said, then? Surely these also may be saved."

Tib looked around, but she could see no one else. She could hear the princesses talking in soft tones, and she tried not to listen, but she heard her name, her given name (Delphine…) at least once.

"Oh, all right!" Celestia tossed her mane in mild exasperation. "Do what you want. You will anyway."

Tib shrank back a bit. "I'm sorry…did I do something wrong?"

At once Celestia softened. She smiled at Tib, her luminous eyes warm and kind. "Nothing at all, my little pony. You're going to make a fine addition to our herd."

"Indeed." Luna sounded quite pleased with herself. "She hath great affection for what others of her ilk would consider a mere artifice." She looked at Tib and nodded to her. "Well doth this bespeak of thy ability to love. It pleaseth us greatly."

Tib looked at the two astonishingly beautiful entities and tried to smile with as much respect as she could muster. "Thank you…thank you both."

"Thou'rt most welcome." Luna seemed to be enjoying some private joke, though somehow Tib didn't feel it was at her expense.

"Do sample the tea," Celestia urged gently. "I think you'll find it to your liking."

Tib reached for her cup, but she didn't have hands anymore. She had hooves.

She looked up. "Am I…?"

"Thou'rt becoming one of our ponies," Luna explained. "Now drink thy tea."

Tib tried to remember how Lilac managed at the table in the caff. She lowered her head until her lips touched the curved edge. Carefully she grasped the lip of the porcelain cup between her teeth and lifted it off its saucer.The princesses looked on with deep approval.

"She's a fast learner," Celestia observed.

"Indeed, she doth pick things up quickly. Methinks 'twill serve her in good stead." Luna sounded quite proud.

Tib tilted her head back and swallowed easily. The tea was delicious. And she didn't even spill much as she drained the cup. She tried to be careful putting it back on the table, but it slipped from her mouth and clattered off the edge of its saucer and landed on its side. "Oops! Sorry."

Both sisters laughed, but not unkindly. Celestia righted the cup with a flick of her horn."That's quite all right, my little pony. Practice makes perfect. You'll do very well."

Luna was beside Tib then, and kissed her just at the top of her poll. "Let not thy heart be troubled," she whispered. "Thou shalt see thy friend later, within the enfolding bounds of fair Equestria, good pony! We shall see it so!"

***

"She's waking up."

Tib shifted. She felt good. Amazing. She felt as though everything was suddenly all right. Her embarrassment at what happened outside, her sadness over COREy, even feeling clumsy over dropping the teacup…all that was gone. Everything was all right. More than all right.

"Open your eyes, pretty girl, I want to see them."

"Howamee?" No, that wasn't right. Her mouth was bigger somehow. Longer. She tried again. "Hal…meon…ee…?"

"Yes, child. Come on now, open your eyes."

Tib obeyed. There was Harmony, lying right next to her, curled around her. Tib's head was resting on Harmony's side. Colors and scents and sounds were so much clearer, sharper. She took a deep breath and marveled at how good her grandmother smelled, how lovely her coat was. Up close Harmony's coat wasn't just one color, but a soft brindle of shades of green and blue, each individual hair slightly distinct from those around it. It was a distinction her human eyes could never have discerned. Her new eyes widened. "Wow…"

"Such pretty eyes you have." Harmony nuzzled and licked her as though she were a newborn foal–which, in a way, she was. "Green with gold flecks, so pretty."

Tib tried to sit up, but it was hard to coordinate her two pairs of legs. Also, there was a rustling behind her, and a sort of tickling feeling. She looked to see what was causing it, and gasped. "I've got wings!"

"Observant, isn't she?" Lynn said to Dr Pastern.

"Mind like a steel trap." Grinning, Pastern crouched down to eye level with Tib. "Congratulations, kid, you're a pegasus. How do you feel?"

"Fantastic!" Tib giggled for no reason. Except that she did feel fantastic. She marveled at her new body. Her coat was a deep, rich red, and the long tail she swished back and forth was silvery white streaked with black. She tried moving her wings, and laughed outright when one of them hit her in the muzzle. "I feel like I'm drunk," she said. "Only better."

"Post-Conversion euphoria," Pastern explained. "For the first few hours you'll feel really happy, giddy even, and then you'll settle down." She tousled Tib's forelock. "Enjoy it while it lasts."

"I am!" Tib nuzzled Pastern's shoulder. "Thank you so much. This is wonderful."

Lynn knelt beside the doctor and stroked Tib's muzzle. She couldn't help it, and she knew from prior experience that Tib wouldn't mind. "I've thought of the perfect name for you," she said. "Because you love music so much. Your grandmother's name is Harmony, right? Why don't you call yourself Melody?"

Tib cocked her new head, considering. "It's really pretty, and it's a nice idea…but it doesn't feel right, somehow. I don't want to hurt your feelings, Lynn…"

Lynn shook her head. "No worries. It's your name. You should pick something you'd be happy with."

"I do like your idea of a musical theme though…" Tib searched her vocabulary for something that would suit her. She could still see Luna's friendly smile, hear her voice and her beautifully archaic way of speaking. Almost but not quite medieval…

"Madrigal." As soon as she said it, she knew it was right. "My name is Madrigal. Madrigal Baroque."

***

Author's Note

I carried on an online war for years with a particular cult that called itself Christian but didn't even come close. I won't mention them by name because I don't want to give them that kind of attention, but they are famous for waving around colorful signs and spreading hate speech. Suffice it to say that these are people who would never go pony.

As for Tib's own "surprise, pony!" moment... Well, I'm not saying that a blue green pony with a flaming mane and tail actually managed to talk Pastern into bumping up Tib's Conversion to keep her from getting her ass handed to her...but I'm not going to say she didn't, either.

And yes, for those who have read Chatoyance's series, that is indeed Alexi making the announcement. He had too much fun with Tib's name.

7. Down With the Thunder

Madrigal Baroque loved being a pony, even if she seemed destined to be quite literally a head above the crowd–even standing on solid ground. With her long neck and longer legs, she was a good two hooves taller than any other pony at the Bureau.

Still, that made little difference to her friends, or to her beloved grandmother. Harmony and Madrigal still shared a room, which was more spacious than ever once the two bunk beds were traded out for a single wide foam pallet. They spent late nights talking with Lilac and Featherfall, imagining what they would do once they got to Equestria.

"I'm going to have a flower shop," Lilac said. "I'm the best in my class at floral cultivation. If it's got petals, I can make it grow! And not only can you eat them, they're pretty and they smell nice, too!" She admired her cutie mark, a four-petaled purple flower. A lilac, of course.

"I was a dancer in my old life." Featherfall smiled a bit, studying her hooves. "Ballet. I'm used to moving about on my toes. And now I have dancing shoes I never have to take off."

"I just want a nice little house with a herb garden all my own." Harmony was enjoying a peach saved from supper. "I learned plenty about home remedies from my oma, and I'm getting very good at healing spells." She had a cutie mark, too, now: a bright red five-petaled flower surrounded by four groups of black lines.

Lilac peered at it. "You have a flower, too. But what are those funny lines?"

"That flower is a hibiscus. Very important in Korean folk medicine. And those aren't 'funny lines'; they're pakua. They used to be on the flag of my country. They stand for the elements, the seasons, the four directions…all representing…harmony." She tossed her head.

"I hope I get my cutie mark soon." Featherfall sighed and rested her chin on her fetlocks. "It'll have something to do with dancing, I know it."

"You never know," Harmony said. "You two have just started your flying lessons. Maybe you'll be an acrobatic flier, or a weather pony."

"I don't have a mark either," said Madrigal. "But at least you have a primary skill that you can use in Equestria. There's not much call for code janitors inside the Barrier, and I'm not much good at anything else."

"Damp rot!" Lilac seized a pillow in her teeth and tossed it at Madrigal with a twist of her neck. "You're a fantastic singer!"

"Lots of ponies sing."

"Not like you, Maddie." Feather nipped playfully at her flank and dodged the responding, half-hearted kick.

"All I'm saying is, singing isn't a rare skill. Now, dancing? Not a lot of ponies can do that. And me? I can barely keep my hooves under me."

"You have new skills to learn, child. Flying, making weather, surveying the new lands they're making out of our old ruined Earth…" Harmony nuzzled her granddaughter. "You're very smart, pretty filly. You'll learn."

She looked at Feather. "I hear there's a flying acrobatic team in Equestria. The Thunderbolts, they're called."

"I don't want to be a stunt flier," Feather protested. "Maybe I'll form the first Equestrian corp de ballet."

"Ponies in tu-tus?" Chip said from the open door. "That'll be something to see."

"What do you want, smarty-flanks?" Harmony demanded. "You gonna be Equestria's first stand-up comedian?"

"He'll need better material," said Feather.

"I was just stopping by to say hi," Chip said. "But if I'm not welcome–"

"Oh, get your rump in here!" Lilac laughed. "Come join the party."

A soft chime rang from the ceiling. "No more party tonight," Harmony announced. "It's lights out. Sleep time is now."

There was a general chorus of awwws. "Can we sleep over?" asked Lilac, her eyes pleading. "Pleeeeease?"

Harmony chuckled. "Half the time you girls don't even stay in your own room."

"That means yes!" Lilac bounced happily, jiggled everypony else on the mattress.

"I just got here…" Chip sounded forlorn. He hung his head, ears drooping.

Madrigal laughed. "Okay, sad sack, come on. You can stay too."

"There's not enough mattress for five oof! Chocolate Chip! Watch who you land on!" Harmony bumped Chip off of her with a stern head-butt.

"There's plenty of room if we cuddle up," Feather suggested.

"Yay! Cuddle puddle!" Lilac snuggled down between Featherfall and Chip and laid her head across Harmony's back. Madrigal curled up against her grandmother's belly.

Harmony chuckled again and lay her head down. Feather was right. There was plenty of room on the mattress for a cuddle puddle.

Together the five of them were forming a happy little herd.

***

The thing Madrigal loved best about her new life, other than the prospect of a future in Equestria, was flying. The first time she flapped her wings and her hooves lifted off the ground, she whooped with joy and took off. She swooped over the roof and inadvertently buzzed Roselyn Pastern, who'd slipped up there for a rare quiet moment with her coffee. Startled, the physician dropped her cup and almost fell on her rear end. Only a frantic grab at a railing steadied her.

"Sorry, Doc!" Madrigal called, circling around.

Pastern laughed and waved an arm. "It's all right, Maddie. The coffee was lousy this morning anyway!"

Madrigal picked up quickly on the secret of flying. She'd always wondered how Equestrian pegasi managed to get airborne. Their wings were far too small to bear their weight. She assumed it was the magic that made flight possible, the same magic that Earth ponies used to make plants grow and unicorns to manipulate reality itself.

Magic was the key, but it was not as cut and dried as she had imagined.

Even when she was just standing still, she could feel the air moving around her. It was never still. It was always moving, almost whispering to her. She knew things about it she was just beginning to understand. She was learning its tone, its language. There were currents in the stillest air that she could reach out and touch and manipulate with every feather in her wings. She could feel the water vapor, the oxygen, the bitter tang of pollutants. In her weather class she was beginning to understand how to separate out the various components. When there were enough pegasi on this side of the Barrier, they would be able to clear the air, make it rain. Given enough practice, she would learn to filter out the bad stuff choking the atmosphere just as she used to extract bad code. Already she could condense water vapor into tiny clouds, and she was getting better all the time.

But the best, the absolute best, was flying. As her wings moved her through the air it sang to her, and often she found herself singing back.

She was on her second chorus of "The Big Sky" when she heard a voice nearby. "Having fun, Madrigal?"

She drew up short, hovering about thirty feet above the parking lot. The flight instructor, Slipstream, circled lazily around her. "I'm glad you're enjoying yourself," said the pale green pegasus mare. "Great singing, too. But the rest of the class has touched down and I wanted to go over a couple of things before we head in for lunch. Follow me down?"

"Yes, ma'am!" Madrigal glided smoothly into Slipstream's wake, waiting for the instructor to land on the asphalt before coming in for her own landing. She righted herself and folded her wings, preparing to gracefully touch down with all four hooves at once, just as she'd been taught.

"Too fast!" Slipstream warned, just too late.

As usual, Madrigal misjudged her downward trajectory. Her front hooves hit the asphalt, but the back half of her kept going. She flipped forward, tail over withers, and spread her wings to try and compensate. It didn't work; her momentum sent her into a 180 flip and she landed on her back in a flail of hooves and feathers.

There was some laughter, but everypony still ran over to try and help. Featherfall was at the head of the group. "Maddie, are you okay?"

Madrigal flipped herself over and stood up. "I think so." She looked back at her wings–she'd lost a few pinfeathers, but there was no serious damage. She shook them straight, stretched them experimentally, then folded them carefully over her slightly aching back.

"One of these days," she said, "I'm going to learn to stick those landings."

***

Stormwalker was the pegasus weather instructor, a stallion with a coat the luminous purple-gray of thunderclouds ready to burst. This afternoon's class gathered on the roof at his direction. All were surprised to find the rooftop cloaked in a thick whitish fog.

"Slip and I spent our lunch hour gathering this together. It's cloudstuff. You've learned to handle steam and wisps of water vapor. Now you've got lots of raw material to work with. Pick an area and see if you can shape up a proper cloud, one big enough to actually shed some rain. Don't get discouraged; if you have cohesion issues, give a whistle and I'll come give you some pointers. Now, there's no need to get airborne right off the bat. I don't want you lot flapping around in the mist and flying into each other. It'll thin out as the clouds are shaped out of it. Wait till it clears up enough for you to see what's in front of you before you start flying. No midair collisions on my watch! Now, let's make some rain!"

Madrigal wandered through the thick white haze, trying not to impose on anyone who had already staked out working space. She thought of seeking out Featherfall so they could work as a team, but she couldn't find her. Finally she settled in a corner of the rooftop and set to work gathering water vapor together.

As minutes passed, she became increasingly more frustrated. Had she thought she was actually getting good at this? She was used to extracting bits of vapor into compact clouds, no bigger than grapefruits or cantaloupes. They were fun to play with and bat around, but not very practical. She gathered up hooffulls of mist, but she found that when she tried to join the clumps together they just bounced off each other. She tried dispersing the mini-clouds and recombining them, but that just made the cloudlets pop like fluffy water balloons and wet down the concrete.

She looked around to see what her classmates were doing. The air was clearer now, and she could make out her surroundings better. She saw a blue pegasus–Sora, wasn't it?--who was running around in a tight circle, using his speed and his wings to draw the mist together. He had constructed a mass about the size of an old Winnestream trailer, and it was getting larger a bit at a time.

There wasn't room in Madrigal's corner to run around like that, but she was well enough away from the main group so that there wasn't much risk of flying into anypony. It was much less foggy now, and a couple of pegasi were already airborne. She caught a glimpse of Feather about fifteen feet up, working to compress her cloudstuff, making it denser, darker.

Encouraged, Madrigal lifted off and began soaring in a tight, careful spiral, gradually moving upward. She was overjoyed to see that her chosen patch of mist was compressing into a thick whitish column easily ten feet high and about that wide. She was doing it! She reached out and gathered up more water vapor with her wings and hooves and will, speeding up a bit in an ever-elevating circle to add to her gleanings. It felt like familiar work, this gathering and compiling. It was like pulling code, only a million times better. Her father would be proud of her.

"I'm cloudbusting, Daddy!" she laughed, and dropped into the very song that phrase brought to mind, extending her collection efforts even as her voice rang out through the clearing air.

The wind she was making sang with her. It was helping her! She rode it now, circling higher still. Her column was darkening, twisting, moving ever faster to keep pace with her as she rose up and up and–

"MADRIGAL!"

She barely heard her name over the voice of the wind. The call came from below her. Far below her.

She looked down between her front hooves and realized with a start that she was nearly a hundred feet in the air, farther up than she'd ever dared go. She turned towards her cloud and saw that it was not just a bundle of compressed vapor. No mere cloud spun on its axis with a rumbling hum like a train over steel rails. Her creation was wide at the top, narrowing almost to a point at the bottom. She recognized the shape, the sound, at once.

"What the buck?!" She could barely hear her own voice. "That's a tornado!"

"ACTUALLY IT'S A FUNNEL CLOUD!" Stormwalker was right beside her now, his wings working overtime to keep him in place with the wind buffeting him. "NOW DON'T PANIC, BUT WE'VE GOT TO DISPERSE THIS THING BEFORE IT GETS ANY BIGGER. DON'T TRY TO GO AGAINST THE ROTATION, JUST KEEP IT UNDER CONTROL AND YOU'LL BE FINE!"

"I'M SORRY, STORM! I DIDN'T MEAN TO DO THIS! I GUESS I GOT CARRIED AWAY!"

"YOU WON'T BE THE ONLY ONE CARRIED AWAY IF YOU DON'T GET A HANDLE ON IT! NOW, THE FIRST THING WE'VE GOT TO DO IS GET TO THE TOP OF THE FUNNEL, GRAB HOLD OF THE WIND CURRENT, AND COLLAPSE IT DOWN. IT'S NOT TOO BIG YET, SO WE SHOULD BE ABLE TO DISPERSE IT IN THE PARKING LOT." Stormwalker's well-muscled, practiced wings were straining to hold him in place, fighting both the pull of the vortex and the velocity of the winds. "I'VE ALREADY SENT SOME OF THE OTHERS DOWN TO MAKE SURE THERE'S NOPONY THERE. WHEN IT'S CLEAR THEY'LL GO BACK TO THE ROOF. JUST FOLLOW MY LEAD, OKAY?"

"RIGHT!" Strange, but Madrigal wasn't having to struggle at all. She rode the winds effortlessly to the funnel's crown, and the pull of the vortex bothered her not one bit. She reached out with her wings and her magic to catch at the errant, violent gusts, as though to calm children who'd gotten a bit too rowdy at their games. Okay, kids, settle down. Playtime's over.

She circled the top of the funnel, spiraling downward this time, urging and coaxing the maelstrom she'd summoned to settle in the abandoned parking lot. Fierce as it was, the whirlwind was still no wider than fifteen feet or so. Thirty hooves, forty at most. Humming softly, she compressed and smoothed the column of mist and air as the velocity lessened, compacting it without letting the base of the funnel reach the asphalt. She knew from stormy days on the Coast how destructive a tornado touchdown could be.

More and more slowly she flew, shushing and humming softly, singing her tornado to sleep. At last the rotation ceased, and she came out of her own spiral. She landed in an awkward heap and lay there with her ribs heaving. She didn't care how silly she looked. She was exhausted. She was also soaking wet–whether from cloud-vapor or sweat she couldn't say.

Stormwalker landed right on top of her now-quieted cloud. It was thick and dark, and from its heart flickered a commotion of flashes.

Madrigal raised her head and stared at the thundercloud. "Did I...did I really do that?"

"I don't know any other singing red pegasi in my class." Stormwalker whistled up to the roof where a row of pony heads looked down in awe. "Come on, everypony. Let's let Madrigal catch her breath while we take this beauty up with the others. It's almost dinnertime, and it looks like it's going to be a dark and stormy night!"

As the rest of the class came down to help collect her contribution, Madrigal felt something like an electric shock run right through her. She looked where the sensation seemed to settle, and there on her flank she saw the unmistakable representation of a whirlwind bearing up three thundercloud-purple musical notes.

Madrigal Baroque had earned her cutie mark.

***

Author's Note

Somehow it just figures that, having grown up on what was left of the Gulf Coast, Maddie's meteorological specialty would be cyclonic in nature.

The pakua in Harmony's cutie mark are taken from the flag of South Korea. They do indeed indicate a balance of harmony. These are more commonly known as trigrams, and are popularly used in I-Ching fortune-telling. Because each trigram is formed from three instances of a solid line or a broken line, they're a kind of binary code that existed long before computers were even dreamt of.

8. Open Up Your Eyes

Madrigal was oddly distracted over the next few days. She kept hearing Luna's parting words. In her head, in the winds, in half-remembered dreams.

Thou shalt see thy friend later, within the enfolding bounds of fair Equestria, good pony! We shall see it so!

Of course it wasn't real. Everypony had Conversion Dreams. A biker from Vegas had sworn he'd been on his motorcycle with Celestia riding on the buddy seat behind him. A twelve-year-old boy had ridden her through the clouds and danced with her–he'd become an orange pegasus named Sunheart, and he was a fair hand at crafting rainbows.

Conversion Dreams seemed tailor-made for those who had them, a way for the subconscious mind to adapt to a new and very different way of thinking and feeling and being. A rite of passage, transitioning from one race to another, in preparation for a new and hopefully better world.

Maybe COREy really had visited her in the beginning, at least her memory of him had. But the last remnants of him were gone now. The neural lace, the syncports, even her mother's music module, had all been incinerated.

But it was hard to be maudlin tonight, especially with a lavender pony playing trampoline on her pallet.

"They've set the date!" Lilac was bouncing in her excitement, making the whole pallet shake in a jaunty rhythm. "A lot of ponies have been going back home to their families or whatever and the Bureau has to have a certain number of ponies ready to emigrate before they can justify sending a transport all the way out to the Barrier, but it's really going to happen. We'll actually be going to Equestria. We're going home!"

"Our forever home," Featherfall agreed. She knew that Lilac was trying to cheer her up because in their group, she was the only one who hadn't yet gotten a cutie mark. A lot of people, human and pony alike, had explained to her that cutie marks come when they come and that it didn't mean there was anything wrong with her, it just meant that she hadn't found her focus yet. Even Chip had his mark–a muffin, what else? He'd admitted, somewhat shyly, that he'd gotten his mark shortly after his Conversion, because of his baking prowess. Even as a human he'd worked in the cafeteria since coming to the clinic. Becoming a pony had only increased his desire to help--and, apparently, his culinary skills as well. With a magic all his own, Chip transformed fresh ground flour and eggs and butter and milk from the new shipments into kitchen delights that disappeared onto meal trays faster than the coveted apples.

As happy as she was for the other members of her herd--her family--Feather still rankled at remaining, after weeks as a pony, a...blank flank.

But Featherfall could not be melancholy, not tonight. There was no talk of cutie marks now. The announcement had come in just this afternoon that the transport would be leaving on the 30th to carry them across the Pacific toward the ever expanding barrier, where they would be able to escape the poisoned and doomed world upon which they had been born, and then reborn.

Everypony was going over their plans. Besides Harmony's healing cottage and Lilac's flower cafe, Chip was talking about finding work at an already established bakery and then taking a muffin cart around whatever city they decided to settle in. "Because of course we're all going to be neighbors, right?"

"You bet," Lilac said. "You and me and Feather are going to have a sweet little house right next to my flower shop, not too far from Harmony's cottage where she and Maddie will live. It's going to be so much fun! I can't wait!" She started bouncing again, giggling and clopping her front hooves with each jump.

"Enough!" Harmony caught the lavender pony in her hornfield in mid-bounce. Lilac hung suspended with a comical look of surprise on her face. "It's definitely something to be happy about, but it's getting late, and you've got your advanced cultivation class in the morning. Besides, Wishweaver has asked me to demonstrate some of my herb knowledge to the new unicorns tomorrow, and I need to get some sleep or I won't be able to tell henbit from horse apples." She lowered the subdued Lilac to the floor near the door, where Chip and Featherfall joined her. "Good night, and no staying up till dawn. Lights out as soon as you get to your room. Scoot!"

They scooted.

A few minutes later, the "lights out, goodnight" chime sounded and the overheads dimmed to softness. Harmony laid down, and Madrigal curled up right beside her.

"So are you going to tell me what's wrong, or do I need to guess?"

"What could be wrong, Halmeonee? We're going to Equestria soon. We'll be able to live out all our dreams. You'll have that quiet little cottage that you've always dreamed about. Did you know Lilac is thinking about naming her Cafe 'Blossom Bites'? I've tried to talk her out of it but she's got her heart set."

"It's her shop, she has a right to call it what she likes. Personally I think it sounds just like her." She nibble-groomed at Madrigal's poll. "What about your dreams? Have you decided what you're going to do when we get to Equestria?"

"I want to be a singer. A performer. Even without my music module, I've got dozens of songs stored in my memory. Hundreds, maybe. I'm not sure they'd all be appropriate for the venue, but I don't want everything beautiful that humanity managed to produce to be lost. I can't carry paintings or statues or architecture with me, but I can bring them music. And I really, really like to sing."

"And everypony loves to hear you. But I hope you don't forget your poor old halmeonee when you're going around making yourself famous."

"I don't care about being famous. And of course I won't forget you! Even if I travel, I'll only be going out sometimes. Just once in a while. I've had enough of being alone. You're my family, the only family I've got. You'll probably get tired of having me underhoof."

"Don't hold your breath for that, or my little red filly will turn blue and pass out." Harmony bit down on Madrigal's curly black forelock and gave it a quick tug.

"Ow!"

"And now that you have utterly failed to distract me, will you tell me what's actually going on with you? I know you're looking forward to going through the barrier as much as I am, but there's something bothering you and I'm not going to let you sleep until you tell me what it is, because otherwise neither one of us will be able to rest. I need my sleep too, and I'm tired of you kicking me awake like you do every other night."

Madrigal sat up and looked at her grandmother in startled contrition. "Have I been doing that? I'm sorry, Halmeonee."

"Don't be sorry. Be honest."

Madrigal's ears dropped to half-mast, and she ducked her head. "You'll think I'm being silly."

"No sillier than I think you're being now." Gently the unicorn mare nuzzled the troubled pegasus filly. "Talking helps sometimes. So talk."

Madrigal sighed in resignation and dropped her chin onto Harmony's sleek shoulder. "He's…gone, Halmeonee."

Harmony blinked. "Who's gone?"

"COREy. COREy's just…gone."

"Your AI? The one you worked with? You told me you pitched him into the river before you left home."

"I threw away the syncspecs…but I could still hear him sometimes, in my head. Maybe not literally, I mean I never really heard his voice like I did when I was synced with him, but I kind of knew what he would say if I could hear him."

"You're talking about your memory of him. I felt the same way about my husband after he died. I would even talk to him sometimes, out loud, even though I knew he wasn't really there." Harmony smiled at herself. "We'd been together so long I kind of knew what his opinions would be, what he'd want me to do."

Madrigal's brow furrowed. "I guess it was kind of like that, but not exactly. I could feel him with me, like he was just out of my reach but still connected with me." Her eyes slid shut. "But ever since I became a pony…I don't feel him with me anymore."

Harmony considered this. "You did a lot of integration with the hypernet, didn't you? That was when you worked with Corey?"

"Yes."

"And you had to be…augmented, that's the word, so that you could do your job better. They didn't just punch a couple of holes in your head, they put actual wires all through your brain?"

Madrigal shivered. "Y'know, that was so natural to me before I came here but it sounds so gross now! And it was actually a neural overlay composed of nanotech web, but it doesn't really matter now, all of that stuff came out during…" Madrigal's eyes opened wide and she sat up abruptly.

"During your Conversion," Harmony said gently. "Maybe Corey left some kind of…copy of himself in all that leftover circuitry. So you wouldn't really be alone, so he could help you get here safe. He really was still watching over you."

"He could have uploaded himself into my neural lace. He...he really was still with me." Madrigal buried her face in Harmony's side. "And now…now he really is gone."

"But he isn't, you know." Harmony very lightly tapped the top of Madrigal's head with the tip of her horn. "So long as you remember him, here, he will still be with you. You spent a long time with that little AI. There's a lot of him that's part of you. If you never forget him, then he will never really be gone."

Madrigal blinked hard, nodded, and nuzzled deeper into Harmony's flank. "I guess you're right." But I still miss him. She closed her eyes and curled up against her grandmother. "G'night, Halmeonee."

Harmony kissed her. "Sleep well, my little angel." She folded her legs around as much of Madrigal as she could (which wasn't much, her granddaughter was half again her size) and laid her head down as well. Maybe she wouldn't be kicked off the pallet tonight.

***

"Swear to Celestia, Maddie cleared out a thirty-foot-wide hole all the way through the smog layer today!" Featherfall was carrying her tray on her back, balancing it perfectly and without any effort as they walked towards their table. "She was making one of those monster whirlwinds of hers and she took it up pretty high to disperse so it wouldn't break any more windows. When she released it, it punched right through the smog on its way to the upper atmosphere! Of course the hole closed up quickly, but for a few minutes we actually saw the sky! And guess what she saw while she was up there?"

"The sun?" Lilac guessed.

"Real clouds?" asked Chip.

"A flying purple people eater?" Harmony lowered three levitating trays to the table. They were for Chip and the other two fillies.

Featherfall took her tray off her back and put it down. "Come on, Maddie, tell them what you saw."

"Juft a fecond." Madrigal put down her grandmother's tray (Harmony claimed she couldn't handle more than three with her hornfield, but Madrigal didn't really buy it) and sat down. She couldn't help being a bit jealous of Feather's effortless grace in carrying her own tray balanced on her back instead of having to hold it in her mouth, This in turn made Madrigal feel miserably guilty because Feather didn't seem to be the least bit envious about Madrigal's successes in their weather class. "It's not that big a deal, really. It could have been just an errant flash of sunlight off the top of the smog or something. I was too busy trying to control Katrina to take a really good look.."

"She names her whirlwinds?" Chip asked Featherfall, who nodded.

"Ooh, you're as much of a tease as your grandmother!" Lilac drummed her hooves impatiently on either side of her tray. "Just tell us already or I'm going to go pop and there will be little pieces of purple pony flying all over the cafeteria and everypony here will lose their appetite!"

"Okay, okay! Settle down and I'll tell you." At once Lilac dropped into her belly-flop on the cushion and be quiet like a good little pony pose. Madrigal stifled laughter. "Okay. Just for a minute, I saw the Barrier."

Lilac sat upright and stared. "You saw the Barrier? For real and everything? What does it look like?"

"It didn't look quite like what I expected. Everybody keeps describing it as a kind of soap bubble, but I didn't think it looked like that at all. It was more like a clear Temprex mixing bowl turned upside down. The top of it pokes right through the smog layer, and I think it goes all the way up into space, or maybe just below the edge of the atmosphere. It was night time inside. I could see stars, and a crescent moon."

"You saw Luna?" Chip said, his eyes wide.

"Luna isn't the moon, she just controls how it looks and moves. Anyway, the night sky in Equestria isn't black, but a really really deep blue, like a dark royal blue. The stars are all shades of different colors, all about the same brightness, and they sparkle, kind of. And they move. I only got to watch for a minute, but it looked like they were dancing. Or making pictures, or something. I think–" She stopped, staring at the door that led in from the outside hall.

The others followed her gaze. A group of humans were walking in. This was nothing new. As Doc Pastern had predicted, more and more people were coming to the Bureau, not only from the sprawling slum that had once been San Francisco but from all over the continent. Some had come from even farther away than Maddie. Last week they'd received a family of five from what little was left of Florida.

A dozen or so new arrivals wasn't exactly front page news. But Madrigal looked as though someone had walked up to her and hit her in the face with a large cold wet fish.

"It's them," she said. "I know them–" She got up and hurried towards the group of newcomers.

Featherfall started to go after her, but Harmony stopped her. "It's all right," she said. "She'll be back in a minute." But she watched. She watched very closely.

"Excuse me?" Madrigal spoke to the bent-backed little old lady who was looking around in wide-eyed wonder at the mix of humans and ponies eating and talking and laughing together.

The rheumy eyes focused on Madrigal. "Yes…may I help you…?"

"Actually, I, ah, thought I might help you. I can get you to a free table. Just put your arm across my back and I'll help you sit down."

Floor cushions were well beyond the ability of this frail woman to deal with. Madrigal helped her into a regular chair, and the woman sighed with relief. "Thank you, Miss…you are a 'miss' aren't you? You sound like a girl, but one can never tell and I didn't think it would be polite to–ahem–check."

Madrigal laughed. "It's fine, I wouldn't mind, but yes, I'm a mare. Call me Maddie."

"Why, hello, Maddie. I'm Martha. It does feel good to sit down. The people are so nice here, and they showed us all around, but I liked to walk my legs off. My grandson went to get us some supper. Do you think he can find us?"

Madrigal raised her head. "I think I see him now. Hey, Chad! Your grandma's over here!"

The youth came around carrying trays. After sitting down, he looked up at her and smiled shyly. "Thanks," he said with a nod of his head. "You feeling better, Granny?"

"I'm fine." Martha was looking at Madrigal with curiosity. "How did you know his name? I may not be as sharp as I used to be, but I know I didn't tell you."

Madrigal mentally headhoofed herself for the slip."We've met before," she said as gently as she could. "Under not so pleasant circumstances."

Chad looked completely at a loss, but understanding dawned on Martha's care-weathered and wasted face. "I thought I knew your voice," she said. "That tall, skinny, sassy girl who came out to talk to us. The one Shirley threw that hunk of concrete at. The one who was fixing to fight us. That was you."

Madrigal cringed. "I'm sorry about that. I really did just go outside to talk, but I guess I didn't do a very good job. I didn't mean to make y'all madder, I just wanted you to understand."

Martha forced herself to her feet, reached up and took Madrigal's head in her hands. They were old hands, the joints swollen with arthritis, the veins large and visible, the skin almost as scaly as a lizard's back. Martha's pale gray eyes were both intense… and intensely regretful. "You're sorry? When we found that flophouse and Shirley bullied them into letting us stay, I couldn't sleep a wink all night after all what you did."

"I'm really sorr–"

"Quit apologizing! You didn't know me from Adam's housecat, but you stood up for me, stood up to that ungrateful girl I gave birth to. I didn't even want to come out here and I sure didn't want her dragging Chad into this mess. He's not a bad boy, he was just trying to do what his mama told him to. Shirl bribed a bunch of strangers to come out with us, spent all our going home money, and they stayed with us maybe an hour and then left. Shirl wouldn't let us leave. And then you come out and you try to talk to us."

"I…I almost attacked you," Madrigal said, forcing the words out through lips that shouldn't even speak of such things. "I certainly would have gone for Shirley if Beth hadn't stopped me."

"Shirl threw a rock at your head!" Martha's voice rang out through the caff. Everypony in the room fell silent, watching intently. "She hurt you. She could have killed you. Even so, I know in my heart you were just trying to protect everybody in here."

"No. It wasn't that." Madrigal felt her cheeks flush with shame, but she had to be honest with this woman. "I was angry. Two of my friends were upset. I wanted to make you go away."

"Exactly. You were protecting those you love." Almost unconsciously, Martha was stroking Madrigal's muzzle with her crippled fingers. It felt nice. "Shirl said that's what we were doing…protecting ourselves…but she tried to make Chad hurt you, and when he wouldn't she did it herself. That wasn't right.

"I had my doubts all along…" Martha sighed and shook her head. "Shirl said I was weak and senile. She said Chad was simple and stupid. We've been stuck here all this time, on account of her foolishness, and yesterday was the last straw."

"Mama took up with a mean bunch of people," Chad said, having finished his soup. "They said they know how to make all the ponies go away. But I don't want you to go." He looked around the room with a happy smile. "I like ponies. I want to be one."

"We can't go home. We have no way to get there. Besides, soon there won't be anywhere to go, will there? Except one place. So…we came here." Clumsily Martha ran her fingers through Madrigal's mane. "Can you forgive us?"

Madrigal put her head over Martha's bent shoulder. A pony hug. "There's nothing to forgive, but if it makes you feel better, I'l say l forgive you…if you forgive me."

The old woman lifted her knobby arms and embraced the mare's long neck with surprising strength. They stood like that for a bit, then Madrigal helped Martha sit down again, said her goodbyes and went back to her own table.

Somewhere someone started clapping. Then someone else, somepony else, clopped their hooves. Soon the hall was filled with applause.

Madrigal didn't even react, she just sat back down with her family. She didn't know if the dinner crowd was applauding her, the newcomers, or the simple fact that a fight hadn't broken out. Somehow it didn't seem to matter.

***

It wasn't easy to say goodbye to the Bureau staff. Beth was putting up a good front, but Lynn was fighting tears, and the normally aloof Doc Pastern hugged Madrigal tight and kissed her poll.

"You'll look me up when you get to Equestria, right? I'll be the singing red pegasus who rides whirlwinds, you won't be able to miss me." Madrigal wanted to beg the doctor to come with them, to get Converted right now, but that wasn't the kind of choice anypony could, or should, make for anypony else.

"That would be something to see." Why did Pastern's smile seem so wistful? "I've got a lot of work to do here yet. But I'll be thinking about you, Maddie, and your beautiful songs."

There were fourteen of them boarding the transport ship. Nine Earth ponies, three unicorns, two pegasi. Madrigal followed Harmony up the ramp, Featherfall was beside her, with Chip and Lilac bringing up the rear.

They had just reached the top of the ramp when tires screeched behind them. There were rattling and clinking sounds, followed by the breaking of glass all around them.

The ramp exploded into flames.

***

Author's Note

This was supposed to be the last chapter, with our happy little herd going to Equestria...and then the terrorists decided to show up. Frankly, it surprised even me.

9. The Heart of Everything

The gangplank erupted into chaos. Near the rear of the panicking herd, Madrigal spun on her hooves, trying to locate her family. There was Harmony, with Featherfall beside her. Chip was white-eyed with panic. Lilac–

Lilac was screaming. Her tail was a blazing torch even as she ran with the others up onto the deck. More molotovs were thrown, hurled over the railings, igniting on the deck. Human voices whooped and catcalled after them.

"BURN IN HELL, YOU SATANIC FREAKS!" That was a woman. It sounded like Shirley, but Madrigal couldn't be sure. Not that she cared.

She tried to push through the milling crowd to help Lilac, but Chip dashed past her. A strong earth pony, he knocked others aside in his haste. Nopony seemed to even notice.

The ramp collapsed as the boat pulled away from the dock, but already the deck was a literal hell of fire and smoke and screams and the frantic drumming of hooves. The crew was scrambling to contain the blaze. Unmanned, the vessel stalled in the center of the bay, where it drifted, crackling and sizzling.

Half mad with pain, Lilac seemed to be trying to outrun the fire consuming her tail. Chip tackled her to the deck. Madrigal reached them and began frantically stamping on Lilac's tail. She knew she was hurting her friend even more, but she couldn't think of anything else to do. Since the ship's crew had snatched up cargo blankets to smother the flames, there was nothing available to throw over Lilac, and stop-drop-and-roll wouldn't do buck-all.

The flames wouldn't go out. Worse, Madrigal's hooves began to catch. Now she was stamping on the deck, trying to knock off whatever was burning her.

In desperation, Chip rolled over onto Lilac's hindquarters, smothering the fire with his own flank. "Bucking hay!" he yelled, but Lilac's tail was no longer burning. The lavender mare lay on the deck under the yellow stallion's bulk, whimpering softly. Ignoring his own pain, Chip stood and stretched his neck down to nuzzle her, comfort her.

Her tail blazed up and she shrieked with fear and fresh pain. Chip had to smother the flames again with his already seared flank and then he lay there, cursing an entire breakfast menu of pastry.

Madrigal spun around frantically, looking desperately for help. There was none. Crew members were using the cargo blankets to beat at the flaming patches all over the ship. She saw one of the crew brandishing a heavy fire extinguisher, spewing foam all over, Nothing seemed to be working. One woman cursed as her blanket caught fire, and she had to drop it. Through the thick foam from the extinguisher, tongues of flame began to poke through.

"Hell Jelly." Harmony was beside her now, soot-streaked and grim. "Those…those gaejasigdeul are using Hell Jelly!"

Madrigal stamped in frustrated rage. "Hell Jelly? What the buck is that?"

"Soak packing foam in synthohol. Add vinegar and limecrete dust, let sit overnight until it firms up. Smother so it can't get air, it die, but if get air again it burn back up. Got to scrape it all off and wash away with salt water."

Madrigal looked at the flames in horror. There wasn't much that was flammable on the ship…unless you counted people and ponies. "Maybe Feather and I can carry–"

"What? A dozen ponies? Couple dozen humans? You carry maybe one pony or two people every trip? You wear out before job half done."

"Those who can could swim–"

"Like your oma swim in river. Water poison death."

"We've got to do something!"

Harmony whistled so loud Magical winced. It cut through the pandemonium around them and made most look around. "Feather here to me!" she shouted. "Everypony else go down hold! Stop beating fire, no good. Go!"

The captain of the ship came up in Featherfall's wake. "Ma'am? Do you know what this shit is?"

"Yes I know and no time explain! Get all people, all ponies down in hold and shut hatch tight! Go quick or all burn up!"

"But the ship–"

"Babo wonsung-i!" Harmony bellowed in the Captain's face. "Jenjang boat! Save people! Go!"

The captain saw that his crew wasn't making any headway in their firefighting efforts. The smoke was thicker now, choking and half-blinding. "You're sure you can put the fire out?"

"My girls can but not if you up here!" Harmony was almost nose-to-muzzle with the man. "GET EVERYBODY IN HOLD! SHUT DOOR TIGHT!"

Left with no alternatives but to follow orders from a blue pony, the Captain raised his own voice. "All crew! Leave off fighting the fire. Get all passengers below. Hustle it! We've got someone who can handle things up here. Move!"

The captain hated the idea of trapping everyone below, but he didn't have any better ideas. Going into the water was certain death. Staying topside was certain death. This blue pony and her winged…sisters?... were their only hope now.

A crewman threw a blanket over Lilac's hindquarters as Chip rolled off with a groan. The crewman wrapped the blanket securely around the smoldering tail to muffle it, then helped Lilac stand and walk. Wth his help, she hobbled towards the door at the back of the retreating crowd. Chip limped beside them, favoring his scorched side.

Scanning the deck for any stragglers and finding none, the captain gave Harmony a last nod. He followed the crowd below decks and the door was sealed shut.

"I'm here, Harmony." Featherfall's eyes were wide, the pupils contracted to pinpoints of terror. She was shifting back and forth frantically. The metal deck was getting hot; even through hooves it was becoming painful to stand on."What can we do?"

"You help Maddie. This job for her."

"Me?!" Madrigal gasped–and coughed. The smoke smelled horrible and tasted worse.

Harmony's eyes blazed at her, hotter than the fire threatening to end them. "You make whirlwind. All around ship. Suck up air in middle, make fire go out. Then pull up water from bay and wash off Hell Jelly."

"If we can wash it off, there must be a hose around here–"

Harmony stamped her hoof. "Plain water no good! Salt water wash jelly off, make it no stick. We sitting in salt water. Now go! Do quick-quick!"

"But Halmeonee, you're still on deck! You need to–"

"You fix fire, I fix me!" Harmony shouted at her. "Now do what I say before everypony die!!"

Madrigal flung herself up into the air. Featherfall took off from the other side, keeping pace opposite Madrigal as they flew in circles around the flaming ship. Both skimmed their hooves over the surface of the foul seawater, kicking up useful droplets.

The salt water was soothing to Madrigal's singed hooves. She drew up the droplets even as she coaxed the air around her into a strong, steady, growing wind. Okay, kids. Let's do this. We gotta save us some folks.

Soon there was a wall of wind and mist encircling the ship. There was no need for words or discussion between the fliers; both knew what they had to do and, thanks to Stormwalker's training, they knew just how to work together to get the job done. Together they guided the misted winds and drew the spinning column tighter in until the inner walls of the vortex brushed against the ship itself.

In the center of the maelstrom, Harmony crouched on the burning deck, wrapped tight in her hornfield. The flames cut off her way to the hold now. Her magic held her fast to the deck, shielded her from the searing heat, and trapped air in with her so she could breathe…for a little while, anyway.

This wouldn't be one of Madrigal's normal funnels, narrow at the base and wide at the top. She wanted to get rid of the fire, not trash the whole bucking boat. She fought to keep the vortex uniform, the same width at top and bottom. With Feather's help, she managed.

Faster. Faster now. Lower the pressure in the whirlwind's heart. Draw the air away from the deck. Starve the hungry flames, deprive them of oxygen. Madrigal's wings beat as frantically as her heart as the vortex pulled air in from the center of its rotation.

Around Harmony the flames began to gutter out. Starved of oxygen, one by one they flickered and died. She held her hornfield close, teeth gritted with the effort of her will. The smoke was still thick, but without air it was settling now, coating everything in soot. The deck was gradually losing its heat.

And Harmony was gradually losing what little air she had left.

Hurry, Maddie. Be quick like the wind you sing up. Harmony was well aware of what had happened to make them rush her Conversion; Tib had been disconsolate when Eun-sook died. It would only be worse for Maddie to lose Harmony. There would be no coming back from death this time.

The whirlwind started pulling up proper water now. It became a wide squat waterspout, the weight slowing the windspeed. It would be mere seconds before the pressure inside the vortex normalized, allowing air to rush back in. The Hell Jelly would reignite itself, unless–

"FEATHER! DROP AIR!" Madrigal didn't just release her hold on the whirlwind, she stopped it dead. Featherfall did the same on her side. The suspended seawater was sucked inward by the low internal pressure and flooded the deck from bow to stern. The centrifugal force drove the surge into a massive spiral wave, stripped the gel from the surfaces where it clung and washed it off into the sea below.

Madrigal looked down–and immediately dove for the deck. She landed in a clattering heap beside the limp, soaking wet unicorn whose hornfield had given out just as the water hit, at the last crucial moment.

Featherfall landed lightly on Harmony's other side, effortlessly graceful even in her concern. "Is she all right?"

"I don't know." Her heart thudding against her ribs, Madrigal bent over her grandmother's motionless body, looking for any sign of life and finding none. "She never went below–she–" She leaned close to the motionless muzzle. "Oh, Sacre Luna, I don't think she's breathing–"

Harmony spewed a great jet of salt water into her granddaughter's face. "Took you long enough!" she rasped, spitting and coughing as she sat up. "What you do, go sightseeing? Visit Alcatraz?"

With a sob of relief Madrigal enfolded Harmony in her forelegs. Over her shoulder Harmony told Featherfall, "Go knock on the hold door and tell them they can come out." She cleared her clogged throat. "Then fetch me my saddlebags. I'm going to have a lot of work to do."

Here and there, in the bay, floating clumps of jelly smoldered and tried to flare up, but none of the patches drifted anywhere near the ship. The clumps started to dissolve, and one by one the sea claimed them.

***

Harmony was in her mettle. She used up most of her packed herbs easing pain and soothing burns, but with that and her magic and the aid of the other unicorns, the injured were soon set to rights. The ship's first aid kit came in handy as well, in the capable hands of Ryrus, the crewman who'd come to Lilac's aid. The group of caregivers couldn't heal every wound completely, but they didn't lose a single patient, pony or otherwise.

After a good dousing in a bucket of filtered and purified bay water and treatment for the burns, Lilac's tail was saved...part of it, anyway. The lower two thirds could not be salvaged. It had been burned down to the bone. Harmony managed to grow back the hair, and Ryrus trimmed it even, but the lavendwr filly's once flowing tail now barely reached the curve of her flanks.

"Once we get to Equestria my magic will be a lot stronger. Then I can grow it back completely," Harmony promised.

"I might keep it like this," Lilac said, whisking the cropped brush back and forth. "It reminds me of how hard you worked to save us."

"Maddie and Feather did all the work."

"You told us what to do, Harmony. Without you we would have all died." Featherfall glared eastward at the long-vanished coastline. "Those awful people tried to kill us! Who are they?"

"They're nobody, now." Captain Spaulding had just finished surveying the damage to his ship, which thankfully was mostly cosmetic. They'd make it to the Barrier and back with no trouble. "The Blackmesh sorted them out. They won't be bothering anyone again. Ever."

Lilac shuddered. "Those poor people."

Spaulding gaped at her. "They hurt you. They tried to burn us all alive!"

"They were scared," Harmony said. She had no love in her heart for the attackers, but neither did she hate them. She despised the wickedness of the attack, yes, but for the perpetrators she felt only a distant, stern pity. "Scared people sometimes do things they wouldn't have done otherwise. Anyway, we're almost there, aren't we?"

"We dock in less than ten minutes." Spaulding ran a hand over his bearded face. He regarded Harmony with deep gratitude. "You saved a lot of lives today, missy. Between organizing that whole waterspout deal and your patch up work, we didn't lose a soul, crew or carg–passengers." He grinned sheepishly. "Sorry. Talking horses is still kind of new to some of us."

"We're not horses," Chip objected. His half-roasted flank was poulticed and salved until Harmony was rested up enough to work on him properly. The pain wasn't as bad now, but that and his worry over Lilac made him cranky. "We're ponies."

Spaulding grinned through his singed beard and touched the brim of his cap. "My mistake, young sir."

Harmony cast about for her granddaughter. She wasn't hard to spot. Madrigal stood at the scorched railing astern, looking back the way they'd come with a wistful expression. Almost everypony else was up front, eagerly watching as they drew close to the Barrier.

Harmony joined Madrigal, looking back at the empty horizon. "Are you going to miss it? Earth?"

"After this?" Madrigal flashed a crooked smile. "You know, Halmeonee, I thought I heard Shirl screaming with that mob. What they did, I should hate them…but I just feel sorry for them."

"Not every human is like Shirl," Harmony reminded her. "Or the ones who tried to burn us up. Some people are good. Most people are, if given the chance. And most of them will probably choose to be ponies."

I hope so."

"We're leaving a bunch of things behind. But some of them we don't need."

"What I want to keep from Earth I'm taking with me. The music, the memories…the good and the bad."

"You need to remember where you've been," Harmony said, "to know where you're going."

"Confucius?"

Harmony snorted. "Confucius was a narrow-minded misogynist. He would have never gone pony. I got that out of a fortune cookie."

A cheer rose from the foredeck. "We've arrived," Harmony said. When she looked behind her, the Barrier stretched left and right as far as she could see. "Come along, granddaughter. Let's go meet our new world."

Madrigal nodded, but before leaving the stern railing she cast one more look towards the distant, unseen shore.

She whispered, "Goodbye, COREy," then followed Harmony forward.

***

"Looks like the Barrier's in one of its 'resting' periods," Spaulding explained to the waiting ponies milling about in excited anticipation. "While it's stable, we don't have to worry too much about you all getting separated when you cross–but it could start up again at any time and when it does we'll have to head back in a hurry. So get moving across the ramp, and happy landings to you all!"

By the time Madrigal leapt through the barrier to join the rest of her family, most of their fellow emigrants had wandered off towards a path laid out before them. It most likely led to a nearby village. Probably not Ponyville or Hoofington or any of the other places they'd heard about; as Equestria expanded over Earth, its territory expanded so rapidly that, had it been moving as they crossed over, they could have ended up miles apart even if they'd come through one after another. They could have spent hours or even days trying to regroup.

"We're here!" Lilac was leaping with joy, her stub tail frisking behind her. "Look at that sky! Look at that grass! The flowers! The trees! It's all so beautiful!"

Chocolate Chip Muffin, as always, had his priorities straight. He cropped a mouthful of grass and chewed with gusto. He swallowed with a gulp. "Muffins, that's good!" He studied the meadow around him. "I can't wait to taste all those flowers. And, hey, fillies! Did you notice? There's all different kinds of grass here! I'm gonna try them all!" He galloped off a few places and dove muzzle-first into a clump which was both longer and a deeper green than most of its fellows.

"That stallion," Featherfall remarked, "is a stomach on hooves." But she smiled affectionately at Chip as he took another mouthful.

Harmony lay stretched out on the grass. Her eyes slid shut as she savored the feeling of sun-warmed, living greenery under her belly.

Madrigal was gazing up at the sun. Just like in her half-remembered dream, it didn't hurt her eyes. She studied the high blue ceiling and noted soft white clouds drifting overhead. Her wings ached to lift her up to those clouds. Her hooves itched to walk on them.

She was just about to ask Featherfall if she felt like a quick aerial reconnaissance when she heard someone behind her say, "Well, it's about time you got here!"

She whipped her head around, her mouth hanging open. She saw a small creature hovering in the air at about her eye level. It looked to be part cat, part eagle, with a raptor's beak, crest, wings and foreclaws, but feline hindquarters, including a leonine tufted tail. Griffon, the memory of her classes supplied. A very young griffon, scarcely more than a fledgling.

But it wasn't the sudden appearance of a native Equestrian creature that left Madrigal stunned speechless. It wasn't even the familiarity with which the young griffon spoke.

It was the voice. It was a voice she knew as well as her own.

"Good morning!" Harmony called, standing. "Are you the welcoming committee?"

"Not really. I was waiting for you. For her, mostly." The fledgling beamed at the red pegasus. "You're Madrigal now, right? I'll kind of miss 'Tib', but your new name is pretty. Kind of long though. Is it okay if I call you Maddie?"

"That's what her friends call her," Lilac offered. "Who are you, anyway?"

"Maddie knows." How could a griffon grin? Somehow he managed, even with the beak. "Don'tcha, Maddie?"

"Sacre mere," Madrigal spoke in a fragile whisper. It couldn't be, it wasn't possible, and yet…"COREy…?" Somehow the envisioned capitalization no longer felt right. She said his name again. Just a name now, not an acronym. "Corey?"

The little griffon held out his forelegs like welcoming arms, his talons sheathed. "I promised I'd always be with you. And now I always will be. Welcome hom–awwk!"

Corey squawked as Madrigal tackled him to the grass. She held him down and nuzzled and licked him till he giggled helplessly. "You–little–Trojan!" she scolded between kisses.

"That tickles!" Corey giggled, squirming. "I've never been tickled before. It's fun!"

Chip left off sampling the landscape when he heard all the fuss. He came over to see what it was about. "Who's that?" He pointed a hoof at the newcomer.

"I'll explain later," Harmony murmured to him. "It's a little complicated."

Eventually Madrigal left off her tickle torture, lying in the grass with Corey encircled in her forelegs. "I'm so glad you're here."

"Me too. And I'm glad you're here, finally. I've been waiting for…let's see…five weeks, four days, ten hours, twenty-three minutes and seventeen seconds. Do you know how long that is in subjective interface time? A buttload."

Madrigal laughed and nibbled his crest. "Then we have a lot to catch up on."

"How about filling in the home audience?" There was an unaccustomed edge to Featherfall's voice. "Okay, so Maddie, you know this…griffon…and it knows you."

"He!" Three voices–Madrigal, Corey, and Harmony.

"Fine, he. Who is he, what is he, when did you know about him, where did he come from, why is he here, and how does he know who you are?"

Corey counted off on his talons. "Who what when where why how. Yup, she covered 'em all." He looked at Madrigal expectantly.

With a wry smile she stood, and Corey fluttered up to sit on her back. "Okay, I can tell you what little I know. It's guesswork, mostly, but I think Beak Boy here hitched a ride in my neural lace."

"Good guess," Corey said approvingly.

Chip was confused. "Your what now?"

"The nanotech web woven through my brain. It was implanted when I started working, and over time it grew through my cerebral tissues to enhance my neural reaction time, make me a more efficient codecleaner."

"It grew into your brain?" Chip made a face. "That sounds gross." Both his mares nodded.

"I don't like the sound of it much any more myself," Madrigal said. "But if Corey hadn't uploaded himself, he wouldn't be here now."

"Well…" The griffon shrugged. "I didn't really upload myself. There were a lot of my subroutines copied into the headweb, and the rest of me that's here now–" here he tapped his head with a talon–"was pulled from your memories."

"That still doesn't explain how you got here," Lilac said.

"It was Luna." Madrigal spoke softly, reverently, her heart full of love and gratitude."She whispered to me in my Dream, right before I woke up. She said…she said that I would see my friend again. That she'd see to it. I thought it was just my brain trying to ease my guilty conscience, but…"

Thou shalt see thy friend later, within the enfolding bounds of fair Equestria, good pony! We shall see it so!

"She built you a new body," Madrigal said. And she made you a griffon! How cool is that? I would've been happy with a bunny or a butterfly…but you look ..amazing."

"I know, right?" Corey struck a stylish pose, the effect of which was spoiled by an abrupt grumble from his midsection. "Can we talk about this more over dinner? 'Hungry' is a new feeling for me, and I'm not sure I like it. You guys might be able to eat grass, but I'm a griffon! I'm not an obligate carnivore, despite my physical composition, but I need stuff other than grass–eggs and cheese and grain and all kinds of other goodies."

Harmony cast about, her eyes gleaming. "Is there an egg tree around here?"

"Nope, but there's a village close by.'' Corey fluttered his wings and rose up into the air. "It's just over the hill. It's turning into a kind of waystation for newfoals. Wanna see?"

Madrigal looked back at the others. All seemed willing, though Chip and Featherfall kept giving the griffon curious glances. Lilac didn't seem too bothered, and Harmony…well, her smile seemed to indicate she understood.

Madrigal nodded to her grandmother, her green eyes shining. Thank you, Luna. I know you don't want worship…but you'll always have my gratitude…and my love.

"What are you waiting for?" Corey popped up right in front of her face. "I'm starving here. Let's get going!"

Madrigal kissed him right on his saucy little beak. "Lead the way…pardner."

The End

Author's Note

Luna is my favorite princess. Do not fight me on this.

Hell Jelly is actually a thing, although it is not known by that name. Nor is it napalm. For one thing, napalm requires a petroleum base, usually petroleum or diesel fuel, and those simply don't exist anymore in any readily available quantity. For another, the gel formula the terrorists did cobble up is much worse than napalm.

I did not list the true components of flammable gel in the story. It's a lot more dangerous and persistent than mere napalm. It sticks to surfaces and is damn hard to smother. It usually doesn't spontaneously reignite, thankfully; that's a special feature of the fictional Hell Jelly in my story.

Was anyone truly surprised that Corey made an appearance? I didn't think so. I just don't believe Maddie could have a truly happy ending unless she got her best friend back.

The story was quite an experience for me, different from anything that I've ever written before. I want to thank Chatoyance for her support and her efforts at reading through these chapters and correcting my errors, as well as suggesting changes to improve the flow of the narrative. Some phrases and even sentences I simply used outright from her notes. I tried to integrate them seamlessly into my own writing, so there are no stitches showing.

Love you, Sis. ♥️

I have rather belatedly added illustrations to the story. I still don't have a proper computer so I can't do my own art, but the amazing pony creator allowed me to at least illustrate some of the key moments. The final illustration is supplemented by a griffin base created by Quartzile on deviantart, only slightly modified by me.

I seem to have made a small place for myself in this fandom. I have heard a lot about how polarizing TCB stories are, but there are aspects of this AU that i find compelling. If it's not your cup of tea, that's okay. We good.

1. Stand My Ground

(Based on The Conversion Bureau as reimagined by Chatoyance. Settings and other elements used with permission.)

***

She was adrift in a river of glowing green eels. The eels were subroutines and sections of code, alphanumeric fish swimming and breeding around her. Some would die, but those that lived would spawn more evolved forms of themselves - programming, once hammered out on keyboards, had become more like raising prized koi. Tib reached out and snatched a short, wriggling alphanumeric string from one of the eels, and pulled it free of the glistening primary algorithmic body.

She held up the glowing, undulating string, more chartreuse than green, and studied it with a sort of odd apathetic interest. She couldn't tell what was wrong with it, exactly, but she knew that if left unchecked it would corrupt the code, producing errant mutations that would ultimately cause the subroutines to fail, or worse, infect the whole system.

^Well spotted!^ said a chipper voice from somewhere near the base of her skull.

"Thanks, COREy.." Tib (the name friends would call her if she had any) tossed the errant fragment into the disposal program, which was manifested as a small cylindrical receptacle. A trash bin, it had once been called. Most codeworkers didn't even bother with physical representations anymore, but Tib was still grounded enough to cling to concepts that were at least cognitively tangible.

She returned her attention to the swarming school around her, scanning for any other signs of corruption or deterioration. The glowing green eels swam and danced and multiplied without hindrance, with no faults or aberrations to be seen.

^The maintenance is now complete for this cycle. Your next work period will commence at 0500. Why don't you get something to nibble and snag some Z's till then, Tib?^

Tib fought back a chuckle. Okay, maybe she had one friend, even if that friend was an artificially intelligent and semi-autonomous maintenance program. "Sounds like a plan, pardner."

Against the luminous column of green symbols lazily circling her, Tib saw her own hands reaching toward her face. She disengaged the microports from her temples and removed the AR syncspecs. The environment she'd spent days in, subjective time, winked out.

Tib blinked to adjust her eyes. She had a post-interface headache, again. All these long hours. Her eyes itched, and she rubbed them with a tired sigh. Her shift had recently been extended from twelve hours to sixteen…and since every second she spent in the network seemed like ten or more to her augmented brain because of her unique and highly trained perception, she suffered from severe post-sync disorientation. Her mind felt sluggish, and her body heavy and clumsy. She wasn't exactly the embodiment of grace anyway.

To her reorienting mind, she hadn't been "home" for over a week, barring the essential biological maintenance breaks every subjective "day" or so.

When her vision cleared, she took a look around her domestic cubicle. As a Green level coder, she lived in luxury most Twopers could only dream of. Her living space was not only big enough to stand up in and lie at full length, she had enough space to stretch out her arms, if she stood in the middle, and not touch either side wall. She had her own replicator, her own infoviewer, and a waste recycle port. She didn't even have to leave home if she didn't want to…and she usually didn't.

She had nowhere to go. Not anymore.

Her stomach, empty for too long, growled and gurgled for attention. Obediently she went to the trusty food printer, outdated but still fully functional, and punched up her usual evening meal, soy turkey salad and Dr Barq's Strawberry Fizz. She sat in her lounger (a graduation perk for being first in her Code Cleaner class) to eat. Before tucking in, she tapped behind her right ear to start up her favorite playlist, giving her earlobe a quick tug to set it for Shuffle/Repeat.

Soft strings swelled Inside her head, and a clear feminine voice rose and spoke across the ages to her.

Nothing about staying low, keeping under the radar, felt right. She had gotten where she was, stayed at her lofty position, by keeping her mouth shut and doing as she was told. It rankled. It went against her grain.

It wasn't like she had anyone to stand with her, either. Both of her parents were gone. Her father had dropped dead of an aneurysm caused by overwork when she was fourteen, and her mother had hung on just long enough to see her daughter through emergency training and settled into her legacy position before throwing herself off a levee into the poisoned waters of the once grand Mississippi River.

Tib had no family left, at least none that would acknowledge her.

Jean-Luc Claude Thibodeaux had been a Code Cleaner since the age of seventeen when his mother died, and he was a damned good one. Better, frankly, than Tib was herself, but she performed her inherited duties adequately enough to earn the wages he'd brought in, and to use the tools he'd bequeathed her–the interface specs, the maintenance programs, and best of all COREy, the Cognitive Observation and Retrieval Entity that directed and guided Tib into spotting broken and misproduced code fragments and clearing them out of the algorithm streams.

She was a glorified cyber lintpicker. And she would never be anything else.

She could always just quit and leave. Heh. And go where? To the favela, where she'd be even more of an outcast? Where she had no skills that would help her subsist in the meat world? She might not starve, not immediately, because every single one of the nineteen billion human beings crawling on the planet's face were guaranteed food and water, enough to barely survive. But with no shelter, no refuge, no protection from…from anything? She wouldn't stand a chance.

What about her mother's family? Even if she could determine which of the Good Families had produced her mother, they had disowned their errant offspring, stripped her of all identity, before she'd ever given birth to her only child. "Marie" hadn't even been her real name. The name she was born with had been taken from her, along with everything else from her old life.

Tib knew she should feel grateful. She had a livelihood that provided her with a quality of life most people could only fantasize about. Yet it didn't feel like a life.

This wasn't living. This was existing. And it wasn't enough.

It wasn't just that code cleaning had become routine. It was supposed to be second nature for her to be able to recognize errors at a glance and remove them so that the stream remained healthy and prolific, constantly developing and improving and even reinventing itself. It was fascinating work, really. Routine, but fascinating.

Yet she felt…trapped. She was where she had started out, seven years ago, and this was where she would finish. Her long hours didn't give her much time for any kind of social life, not that she'd ever had much of one anyway. Her father the cleaner and her mother the music lover had been her whole offline world, and they were both long gone.

She'd never had any desire to seek out companionship. Her companions were the voices of those long dead, a collection of once-popular music whoch her mother had accumulated in her own troubled youth. Names of musical performers most wouldn't even recognize today. Xandria, In This Moment, Epica, Within Temptation, Siouxsie and the Banshees, Kerli, Heart, Kate Bush, Evanescence, The Birthday Massacre…

She had hundreds of songs stored in her microdrive–her mother's sole legacy–and she knew each one by heart. But Tib had no one to share her music with, and no one to leave anything to. Not that she wanted children. All she had to bequeath to a child would be a dead-end job and a planet that stood a zero chance of outliving them. Outliving? Hell, the world was already dead. The land was ruined and wasted. Nothing would grow in the barren soil. The waters were poisonous sludge. Wildlife was a distant memory. The sky above was cloaked in a thick permanent layer of brown and yellow clouds of smog.

No one sane would bring a child into a dead world.

But that left Tib alone. Completely…and utterly p…alone. No way out, no way back, and nothing to look forward to but an early death from chronic neural trauma. Just like her daddy.

She could drop dead right now and no one would care. She could just give up and wander out into the favela to be killed and no one would care.

She could walk out to the levee and jump, following her mother's path into the toxic flow that had once been a river teeming with life.

And no one would care.

It would be so easy to give up. To just quit.

D'ain't no quit in her. She sink her teef inta sumpin, she gon' lock her jaw an' hold on tight an' deaf-roll what she got inta submission. No quit in dat girl. Dat my gator girl, she.

Delphine Renee Angelique Thibodeaux was, if nothing else, her father's daughter. To give up would shame that legacy…and he was right. There was no quit in her. She couldn't do that.

So what could she do? If she had someone else, anyone else, who could understand...

"Except there's no one else," Tib muttered. She tucked the empty Fizzer can into the salad bowl, snapped the lid shut and tossed it at the recycle port.

Two points!

"No one else…" Tib pressed a control on her chair arm and it immediately reclined into a sleeping platform with a raised headrest as the lights dimmed around her. "Just…just me."

She closed her eyes and let Sharon den Adel sing her to sleep.

***

Author's Note

I was inspired to write this story after reading Chatoyance's work based in the TCB universe. I could not possibly have produced this story without her. She gave me guidance, suggested changes, and helped me really get a feel for the world that she has built.