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Seggas programs in Amy's details and then gives everyone a small piece of electronic paper with her details on it. "Feel free to add me! I'd love to keep in contact. Also let me know if there were any adverse side-effects from my experiments."
She gives a hissing smile at Amy's protoplasm joke, before countering in a fake serious voice, "Meh, I'd never! Protoplasm are sooooo boring. I prefer eukaryotes."
She does give a small spurt at the unexpected joke from Thenither. "That's terrible! And as punishment you get to drag the sled."
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903's head tilts from side to side slowly and repeatedly as the humanoids share some sort of social interaction she doesn't understand.
She continues to contemplate the preceding seconds of conversation as she helps push the sled back to the village.
Were she more familiar with customs on other worlds, she might comment on how this is a strange reversal of roles. It is usually the equines pulling the sled.
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((I think the GM put a roleplaying post in the discussion thread - here it is))
[[On the way back you meet up with the pony you rescued from under the rubble. He uses a spell gem of share language that he found that. When you explain what’s going on, he replies that every pony magically receives a ‘mark’ that lets them know what they are good at and what would make a good career option for them. The pony you found has the mark of protecting the village which she interpreted as destroying the whelp. The rest of the village tried to let her know that she didn’t have to go that far, but she wouldn’t be dissuaded.]]
Presumably, if it is Amy, she'd make a few enquiries on those 'marks' which she then christens 'Marks of Destiny'.
I guess I understand her reasoning. Do you have a choice of what Mark you get? And once you get one .. are you able to go against it? Or is it sort of some ... compulsion to do what it says. I suppose if I had a Mark it would be something to do with the stars .... or a telescope and stars ... something like that. Or it might be the Desnian Butterfly. Besides, I'm trying to figure out a way that we can help her. OK .. we did blow up that whelp .. and she's a bit upset at us for that ... but ... if there's a way we can work together.
I have to admit, there are a wide diversity of Marks. So far I've seen an hourglass, a lyre, three of what looks like wrapped candies, a flower, three balloons, a carrot, and your two trees separated by a river.
”It’s more of a thing ponies like doing and are good at. It doesn’t prevent you from doing something else. It doesn’t choose your career for you, though some do make a career out of it. Like the one with three balloons is good at throwing parties, but she’s a baker by trade.”. He turns to his mark which is the trees separated by a river. ”Mine is for being outdoors because I love hiking and such.”
”My name’s Timber Spruce. It’s. . . Odd. There are legends about weird two-legged creatures meeting our ancestors us long ago, but, uh, well I never thought I’d get to meet one. No offense but those noodle things at the ends of your hooves are freaky. But, I mean, you saved me so, I can’t complain, right?”
Everyone carries on a good conversation as you head back to the village. The village is overjoyed to have the unicorn back, who wakes up and begins crying apologizing for her actions both to the PCs and to the town. They, of course, immediately forgive her and she breaks down in thankful tears. There’s also another spontaneous song and dance number.
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"The marks are cute," 903 says.
Then, once she finds out the reasoning behind it, she sends a message to Amy, assuming she can't communicate directly with the unicorn telepathically.
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Amy passes on 903's message. She also attempts to join in the song and dance number before going up to the vanquished unicorn to ask her how she intended to use the base for defending against space whelps.
She also goes looking for the village library - and the librarian, intending to take advantage of the Share Language spell while she has it.
((Yes thank you ..... and I'm tempted to do my own take on it))
You eventually figure out that the unicorn in the base really hadn’t thought that far ahead. She was still learning about the base and its capabilities. I mean, it could summon tiny elves, what else could it do?! She assumed that there would be a way to defeat the whelp somewhere locked in its doors.
Sure, sure. Eventually a purple winged unicorn comes down and casts share language on all of you (evidentially she lives in another town) and the six of you can enjoy a night of partying and fun, talking about magic theory, or just having quiet conversations.
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Even with the share language spell, Thenither remains thoughtfully withdrawn throughout the opening stages of the celebration. Eventually a determined pony plies him with a gut-rotting, breath-choking, homemade hooch. Thenither takes its consumption as a personal challenge, and drains a quarter of the jug.
He leaps up to join the dance, twisting, shakin' shakin' shakin' shakin baby. Here he goes loop de loop. Shakin' it baby. C'mon.
He does the twist, Does the fly. Does the swim. And does the bird. He does the duck Aaah, and does the monkey. Hey hey, the watusi And a what about the food? Does the mashed potato And the boogaloo .
And his robot is impeccable.
Even with the share language spell, Thenither remains thoughtfully withdrawn throughout the opening stages of the celebration. Eventually a determined pony plies him with a gut-rotting, breath-choking, homemade hooch. Thenither takes its consumption as a personal challenge, and drains a quarter of the jug.
He leaps up to join the dance, twisting, shakin' shakin' shakin' shakin baby. Here he goes loop de loop. Shakin' it baby. C'mon.
He does the twist, Does the fly. Does the swim. And does the bird. He does the duck Aaah, and does the monkey. Hey hey, the watusi And a what about the food? Does the mashed potato And the boogaloo .
And his robot is impeccable.
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((I'm betting that was either Rainbow Dash, Applejack or maybe Cherry Punch ... or it might have been Vinyl Scratch))
Amy has to tell the unicorn ((Sunset Shimmer?)) that, unfortunately the base wasn't really designed for such things but ... maybe with you, and other magical unicorn ponies combined indicating the purple(lavender?) unicorn, a cyan unicorn and a lilac unicorn ((Twilight Sparkle, Trixie Lulamoon, and Starlight Glimmer)) ... that with your magic and mind power combined, you might be able to smack any marauding whelp out of the sky Of course, between her and those four ((and maybe Moondancer and Sunburst)) a lot of magical theory was discussed.
When night falls, she wanders out to look at the local night sky ... and ends up having a rather odd conversation with a very knowledgeable dark blue winged pegasus ((Luna)) about astronomy and astrophysics as it relates to this system. Some of it seemed very odd though.
Suddenly she woke up, obviously having fallen asleep while stargazing. Had she dreamt that entire conversation? The dream had been so vivid, and left her with even more questions - like how much magic is required to move an object the size of the moon and, how big must P0n-3, or Equis's sun be if it's going around the planet? Or is it? And what do other points on the globe see when the sun and moon goes up and down like that .... heck ... is it only this bit of Equis that's inhabited, the rest being ... well ... barren? She resolved to do a few orbits of the planet and run some scans, then scan the sun and moon. And if the captain objects, she'll tell him it's for science.
But yes, she'd have to come back here sometime - this was the most fascinating world she had ever come across, and she wanted to know a lot more about it.
Suddenly she bursts into song in the pony language. ((https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o4_cYVR6DGY - but not with those words)) One of the verses might have referred to Seggas.
Dax spends the night trying to figure out what these horsefolk do for fun. I mean, it can't be just dancing, right? Or singing? Have you played...no, no tech. Ooo, or what about...nope still no tech. Hmmm, is there some sort of primitive way to play Autochess without a computer...
After spending however many days prancing with ponies, and then scanning the star system thoroughly before you leave, you manage to return to Absolom station in days. You finally get debriefed by Guidance
“Welcome back, Starfinders. The contracting organization is eager to review the data you have recovered. I’ve prepared a list of subsequent missions that might appeal to you, once you’re properly debriefed. There are a multitude of other lost outposts in Near Space, and with your experience, we hope you will take these assignments into consideration. Now, what have you to report?”
After this you hand in your report and are done for the mission.
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In the time that they remain with the ponies, 903 finds out that friendship truly is magical. Not particularly outgoing, herself, she finds a group of a half dozen of them that she stays around and talks to most often.
Though she tells no one else this, she refers to them in her head as the Main Six.
Back at Absalom station, she gives her report in her native tongue, as it is much easier for her to speak in than common.
Amy: The Desnans have not decided yet. They are going to go over the report and figure out what to do after careful considerati-ooh! Shiny!
903: Understood. I'll keep your secret. My favorite pony is Thorax anyway. Or maybe autumn Blaze :P
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On the journey home, Thenither tries to make himself a less intrusive hulk of arrogance. He even does the dishes and thanks the party members for their advice, which he has been seriously considering. He says that he looks forward to working with them in the future and hopes that he'll be a more likeable comrade to them and his future audience.
Station-side, Thenither's report is short. "If Amy's scanning reveals resources of any value, P-0n3 can be taken with a modicum of force. The natives have little in the way of organized defenses."