Xenobiologist(s)

A couple of silent minutes later as 99200 relays everything to the other drones through the weak link provided by the wounded drone resting at the node point, Gloom finally walks up a set of stairs through a rectangle of bright light into the world of noise, and takes a deep breath of fresh, sweet, summer air.

“Hello, 838!” 99200 greets someone from her back after a brief hesitation before adding in a much friendlier and happier tone, “Hi guys!”

As it hops down from her back, the bat pony blinks away the day blindness after hours in the underground darkness and takes in her surroundings. She’d seen the greenhouse before while escorting 65536 during its winter visits to the hive, but that was always only as a dot of light in the distance. This is the first time she’s anywhere close, much less directly inside. The design is ingenious to the level that makes it distinctly not drone-made. The small building is a simple, segmented and metal frame with heavy hinges supporting squares of thick but clear glass set into it and screwed in, which includes even the triangular roof. This makes everything see-through and easy to spot any approaching danger plus, just like it’s now, every square of glass can be opened outward and secured with a heavy metal bolt. Gloom isn’t particularly versed in architecture or heavy blacksmithing, but even she can see that while this place looks fragile, it can become a fortress when locked down. One drone is currently busy standing on the roof, balancing itself with its wings, and meticulously layering its resin along the outer frame.

Well, it was busy doing it until Gloom and 99200 arrived. Now it has its face pressed against the glass while staring in amazement.

Did it not see me yesterday or was it one of those who didn’t have the courage to approach?

The inside is as simple and functional as the building itself. The floor is the usual hard, baked ground of the Badlands but it’s beset with stone planters full of wet soil and growing flowers. There are only a couple duplicates, and those are arranged in a C pattern around the trapdoor entrance along with two square tanks almost as tall as Gloom herself which are full of water. Due to having access to castle gardens, Gloom can recognize most of the incredible variety of plants here, but also due to having zero interest in botany, she can barely name one or two. What weirds her out immediately, though, is that there’s a drone on the floor next to one of the tanks which looks, for all intents and purposes, dead. However, she also knows that changelings eat their dead completely to reabsorb the love in their bodies and to hide their presence, so she doesn’t comment on it.

Maybe it’s just some kind of hibernation.

In the back, there’s a second drone sitting and carefully watering a planter with a watering can held in both forelegs that’s clearly made of a single piece of stone and is basically a cup with a small spout. Like everything drone-made, it’s primitive, simple, and functional. Despite Gloom’s arrival, the drone maintains its concentration on its work with only an occasional wide-eyed glance.

The final two changelings are recognizable. 57999 is easy thanks to its carapace full of unnatural dents, soft smile, and metal bracers held together with goop and a wish on its forelegs, and 838 thanks to 99200’s greeting as well as being an actual ranked changeling. Gloom’s best guess is that he’s a warrior, but a very athletic infiltrator could naturally look similar. The presumed warrior notices Gloom’s entrance immediately, although he finishes his report to 57999 first.

“-with my rounds and I didn’t see any tracks. There’s barely any movement at all. It’s shaping up to be a calm day. Do you need anything else?”

“No, thank you. We have enough water to last for today, so why don’t you take a break through sleepy time? We always bolt everything up anyway,” 57999 limps around the warrior who keeps his eyes on it as the drone fiddles with a planter of bright red flowers.

“My schedule is what it is. I can’t avoid my duty just because things look fine at the moment. I’ll do my best to not wake you up when I get back at night,” 838 shakes his head and, as he turns to leave, 57999 walks up to him with a cut off red flower, the bottom of its stalk covered with a dollop of goop. The surprised warrior only tilts his head when the drone unsteadily stands up on its hind legs, steadies itself on his chest to avoid falling over, and sticks the flower into the groove of 838’s carapace.

“There,” it withdraws back and stumbles, its breathing slightly strained but not losing its soft smile.

“What is it for?” asks 838.

“I think it just looks pretty,” is all 57999 says, “And it smells nice too,” it pauses, “Uhh, it’ll be more noticeable down in the tunnels.”

The warrior clearly doesn’t know what to say or do, so he defaults to his function, nods, and leaves with: “I’ll be back in eight to ten hours. Stay safe.”

Passing Gloom, he simply nods and descends the staircase down to the connecting tunnel.

“Meep!” the drone watering the flowers in the back yelps when it realizes it’s been staring at Gloom for too long because it’s now sitting in a pool of water soaking into the ground.

“Miss Gloom!” 57999 limps over too quickly, trips when one of its forelegs folds under itself, and promptly falls on its face. It sits up before Gloom can get close, raises the offending foreleg, and gives it a puzzled shake.

“Are you okay?” Gloom immediately sits down next to it and pulls it into a soft hug, “I’m not sure how to give you as much love as I can, and I’m afraid that if I hug you too hard you’ll pop out of your carapace.”

To her surprise, 57999 simply nuzzles her neck before relaxing in her embrace and pointing its small muzzle right up at her chin.

“I’m fine, Miss Gloom. I’m just a bit tired. What brings you here?”

“Huh? 99200 didn’t mind-beam the information to you while we were on the way?”

“I wanted to make it a surprise,” says the explorer, currently sitting in the open doorway and watching the outside world, namely the forest’s edge in the not-so-far distance.

“You did,” 57999 chuckles, “99774 and 99551 definitely weren’t ready for you,” it turns its head away from Gloom as much as the hug allows, and calls out, “No need to be afraid, guys. Miss Gloom is a pony, and she’s very huggy.”

Both the watering drone and the one re-gooping the outer frame carefully approach. One pokes her side and when Gloom smiles, showing her teeth, the drone eeps and darts backwards.

“Right, the teeth,” Gloom mutters.

“She won’t bite you,” says 99200 in what, for the first- no, second time today and possibly ever, seems to Gloom like a tone that’s disappointed in another drone.

99158 sounded like that when it talked about new drones being too used to the new, good times.

Then it hits her, and it hits her hard. After all, an underground explorer willingly going into the deadly depths in its off time and a basically a SWAT team drone would both have different views on courage than a normal worker, similar to a Nightguard who sees ponies daily at their worst. The normal, daily fears just fade into irrelevance. The cute little critters are learning the lessons that make them calloused. Thankfully, unlike with ponies, their first and primary goal still is cooperation instead of individualism, so it doesn’t matter as much.

What she also notices, however, is that none of that hint of disappointment is present in 57999 who simply keeps up its soft, encouraging smile when it adds-

“Her hair is soft and her squishy skin makes it so that she’s way warmer than we are. Try it.”

-and nuzzles her neck again. In response, Gloom begins stroking its head.

The old ones have had the time to go through horrors not even 99158 and 99200 can imagine, and emerge on the other side wanting nothing more than for others to have a better life. That’s why 9999’s statue was so important.

I need to ask about the other two when I have the chance.

The hard chitin of 57999’s muzzle nudges the bruise on her chest, reminding her why she’s here in the first place. It notices her pained hiss and looks up.

“Sorry?” it peeps.

“Not your fault,” she lets the drone go, “I sparred a little with 99158 and it landed a lucky hit on me,” she taps the bruised spot on her chest, “It told me about the greenhouse and your healing powers, so I decided to do something that’s both helpful and educational and visit this beautiful place. 99200 led me here and, in return, I’ll help it make a proper armor for -shoot, I forgot the number- the guy who blows stuff up including itself.”

“99856. What a fantastic idea!” 57999 nods, “I can make you some healing goop. Do you want the strong or the weak version?”

“What’s the difference?”

“The strong one is what I usually make for the drones who need to recover at node points. It helps them sleep when everything hurts,” explains 57999.

“The weak version then, please. It’s just a big bruise for me, and I have too much stuff to learn about you guys to waste time sleeping.”

“Hmm, then we gotta go visit the poppy patch,” 57999 looks outside, “I made a couple strong batches recently, so I gotta drink some water and-” it pats its belly, “-reset.”

As Gloom stands up, a smell she almost forgot after reentering the world of flowers and fresh air returns - herself.

“Say, you have fresh water,” she points to the two tanks by the tunnel entrance, “Is there a stream or a river nearby? I could use a quick bath.”

“Yup,” 57999 nods, “It’s a bit out of the way, but we can visit it on the way back. The healing goop will need some time to prepare anyway after I eat the poppies. We always spend most of the first few worky time hours refilling the tanks,” it heads to the door, “99200, can you take one of the buckets with you, please?”

“Mhm,” the explorer disappears behind the tanks and returns with a square, stone bucket securely gooped to its back shortly after.

Several instructions given to the two drones remaining in the greenhouse later, the trio leave towards the forest’s edge in the distance. What quickly becomes clear, though, is that limping 57999 is slowing the pace by a lot, so Gloom offers it a ride on her back. It falls asleep in only a few minutes, which makes Gloom whispers:

“99200, is 57999 really okay? If a pony acted like this, I’d rush them to a doctor for a check-up immediately. I don’t really know how your feeding on love works in practicality, but if there’s a way I can squeeze more out of myself, I’ll do it.”

The drone explorer shakes its head.

“57999 is all good on love. 10k, after its own experience with surgery that 65536 performed on it, did its best to examine 57999, but no one has any idea why it’s so tired. Even 65536 itself did a full-body, no-carapace check last freezy time and while there were tons of scars and weird seemingly permanent damage, it didn’t find any major reason why 57999 would be getting… worse. 10k even ordered a long rest, baths in healing goop, and gave 57999 two assistants, but it didn’t change anything.”

Gloom sighs, and a thought she had many times before, although in regard to 65536, returns:

The drones veterans would be around twelve years old, the changelings who escaped the hive before the invasion and live among ponies to this day are decades old without signs of aging, Chrysalis is supposedly centuries old, and 65536 is livelier than ever but, come to think of it, I’ve never even heard about a drone who didn’t die violently. So, how long do changelings actually live?

Scratch that. How long do drones live?