FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

Brokke

We trotted through many long passageways until I was as bewildered as a newly delivered colt. None of what I was seeing corresponded to my memories, and I realised we were being taken to a part of the city I had never been to before.

Eventually, we reached a room, with many lights glowing from strange things on the walls. There were unfamiliar mares here, and they reacted to my presence with alarm. One of their number, an older mare in dark clothes, stepped forward. One next to her just stared, a young paint mare with an expression of contempt on her muzzle. Both knew the mare though, that much I could tell.

"Valeria, why did you order us here, and why have you brought this...thing with you?"

"All will be revealed Delor. Mel, have you rigged the simulator?"

"Of course...but who is the pilot."

"Him."

The mares fell about with laughter then, their eyes looking on Valeria with unconcealed scorn. I just stood, my face burning with shame as I wondered what this meant.

"Surely you can't be serious?"

"Mel...you know I am a practical mare above all. I wouldn't bring him here unless I thought it was worth it, would I?"

The paint mare just stood for a long moment, eyeing up Valeria, her eyes a mask. Then she dropped her gaze, and looked at me. I could see new things there, resentment but also curiosity. There was also a jealousy I did not understand.

"Very well, it's your funeral. Bring him over here then."

I was taken roughly by the shoulder, the paint mare pulling me towards a low seat made of metal. I was pushed down, not kindly, my hands resting on the arms.

"Do not touch those buttons stallion, if you know what is good for you."

I just looked blankly, so she pointed to the metal devices by my hands, many odd symbols glowing with an inner light.

"So my dear mad Councillor, how are we to do this?"

"Rig him up to the mind link, then run a simulation."

Shaking her head, the older mare nonetheless complied, reaching into a metal box to take out something I had not seen before.

"Hold still stallion."

My nostrils flared, memories of the rings on my body, and the painful grasp of the machine, but this time I felt the metal band placed on my head, resting just behind my ears. They flicked, testing its surface while the mare took a long thin thing and attached it to the band on my head.

Valeria knelt beside me then, her voice soothing. I opened my mind, finding her presence as she found mine.

"Now...take me to the place we went before...when you looked at the sky."

"But...I cannot see it!"

With a snort, the older mare pulled one of the metal boxes around to face me. It flickered, and suddenly I saw a vision of the night, the same one I saw through the window, the bright light chasing the Great Mare across the sky.

"Now...I know you can do it Brokke. Please...for me."

Seeing the need in her mind, and the strange feelings around it, I obeyed. I let my mind wander, seeking out the place far away, Valeria's mind there with me.

"Now...check the nav system Mel."

The paint mare grumbled, but I could barely make her out I was so absorbed in my mind's journey. I did hear her hiss though, the shuddering inhalation with its overtones of amazement.

"It...It's working. The hyperthrust corrections are in the green zone for Venus orbit, and the nav comp has a good solution. How...I...how?"

I could feel the mares all staring at me, as my mind circled the beautiful sphere below like an eagle.

"Now...come back Brokke, and we will try a new journey. Mel, bring Tau Ceti up on the screen..."

Returning to the room, I could feel the suppressed excitement in the mares around me, the nervous nickers and ear flicks that meant something was happening. I did not know what it meant, but I knew that somehow I had become important...and inside that knowledge, came the beginning of a plan.

"Brokke...take me there my stallion..."

I looked at the box in front of me, a bright point of light in the centre that winked in the night. One of the Great Mare's lesser companions, but for some reason it mattered. I reached out with my mind, and the room dissolved.

Valeria held me hand as we sped through the dark. Points of light flashed past, their multi-coloured streaks a blur, but all the time the bright light I sought grew in my view. It was building now, until I saw it as a big circle, like the Great Stallion only slightly different colour. There were smaller spheres around it, and I flew over them one at a time. By the time I came to the fourth, I knew in my heart I had found what they sought. Below me was a land of green, like our plains, and as I soared I caught sight of a river, the water flowing over rocks towards a deep blue expanse.

Reluctantly I returned to a silent room, the mares quiet while the older mare stared at her own light filled box.

"I have never seen hyperthrust corrections like these, but the computer is confirming a solution to seven significant figures and it is like none of the ones we have tried. It...it could be right. If he can do that for a freightliner for real..."

"Yes...I know."

The paint mare ruffled my mane then.

"Well I'll be fucked!"

Valeria

I buried myself in the archives after that, trying not to think about the decisions to come, as well as what would be happening in the breeding suite. I had been too successful for my own good, now I had to endure the thought of my four friends all enjoying a turn with Brokke in the flesh. All had liked what they saw, even Klarinda, notoriously conservative mare though she was. They were scheduled for individual sessions over the next days.

Part of me wanted to be there, reluctant to let 'my stallion' be used without me there to help him through, but I knew that was a bad idea. I would not be able to watch it without it hurting, that much I knew now. I was falling for him, not just the ghost of my sister he had represented at first.

Thoerdek could look after him for me in the meantime.

As I searched the archives, the answers began to trickle out, though a lot of the data had been corrupted or lost or destroyed with time. There was enough there to give an answer though, or at least suggest the outlines of one. I had consulted with Delor and Mel on the technical aspects. They were still finding it hard to believe, but I could tell both of them wanted to. It was enough to see the First Consul with.

I waited in the audience chamber for what seemed like hours, becoming increasingly impatient at the deliberate insult. The First Consul and I had never got along, and as she got older she became increasingly cranky and unpredictable. Unless my fellow Councillors got enough spunk in them to kick her out though we were stuck with her.

Eventually I was ushered in, sitting in front of a wide desk bereft of any furnishings. The psychologists would have a field day with that.

"What can I do for you my fellow Councillor?"

"First Consul...we may have a solution to our current problems."

Her eyes focussed then, regarding me quizzically, while her assistant perked up her ears, forgetting her note tablet for a moment.

"Tell me..."

And I did my best to convince her.

"You will see the evidence provided by the interstellar flight research centre, but the results look promising. It appears that the talents this stallion possesses enable him to remote view even at an interstellar distance, and provide appropriate course corrections to the hyperthrust nav computer. This could be the missing link."

"And how do you think this...thing, is able to do it?"

I was on shakier ground now, but I plunged in regardless.

"I have searched the archives First Consul, going back to the period well before the Great War. There are only fragments, but they are significant. From what I can tell, all equines had at least a part of this gift, a basic Telepathic sense that kept all of us part of one giant herd. Any equine could join with another in their minds, it was a way of keeping connection between our herd as we expanded."

"Some had an extra talent though, a form of Telepathy where they could not just enter other minds, but see distant places even without another equine there. Before the development of our technology, it was the way that distant parts of the herd stayed in touch and explored."

"So what happened?"

"It seems that with the development of technology, the talent slowly died out. Not many felt the loss at the time, preferring privacy over that connection. There was a price though; with that loss of connection, conflict grew until...well..."

"Yes I see what you are driving at, but I think you overstep the bounds there. The Great War was the fault of the stallions, plain and simple Valeria. Not the loss of this mystical gift."

"It is not mystical though Consul, and I have had an analysis of the subject's genotype and epigenetic markers. There are markers there, unique ones, a mix of inherited traits and epigenetic modifications that may come from the stallion's environment...but some of the basic patterns match fragments in samples from mares of the city. It seems...well, it seems this talent may lie dormant in us now, but has been awoken by the unique pressures the stallions are under, and with the proper breeding partners for a gifted stallion...we could breed the telepathic skills we need back into our population."

"Tell me...the mares who won the auction to breed with this individual...are they potential candidates?"

"Yes...though we won't know until..."

The Consul remained silent for a long time, her fingers rapping on the desktop while her eyes stared into space.

"What do you want to do then Valeria?"

"I would like to keep this specimen for study, without gelding him because..."

"Ha! Something tells me there is more to this than scientific curiosity Councillor. I have heard some whispers from...shall we say other quarters, about your unorthodox behaviour with this stallion. I don't know what is going on, but I will be keeping a wary eye on you. I don't like the idea of keeping him around, something is definitely not right here if he is as skilled as you say. I will take my decision under advisement, but for the moment, he is expelled when his time is up, unless one of his brood mares decide to keep him...of course."

"Consul!...I..."

"Enough Valeria. I have run out of time for you...and out of patience. If as you say his brood mares are candidates, then we will have four foals to work with who we can mould to our needs. No need to keep a dangerous creature like an intact wild stallion in our midst."

She dropped her muzzle to her screen, dismissing me as effectively as if she had ordered me hauled from the room. I could only stand and stalk out, my mind whirring. It could have been worse...but now I had to face losing him, or the worse thought of him staying...and all it would entail.