My Little Pony: My Little Pony The Martian

Dear Dr. Shields,

You said you would keep anything I emailed confidential so I could tell you anything. Mark talked to you yesterday and he said you made him feel better. Well, I'm going to give it a try too, because I need someone to talk to, but I can't tell anyone here about these things. And anything I send home will be seen by everyone.

First let me teach you something. Until we are ready to make this public, you must keep this secret, otherwise it will be dangerous to me and other tribesmen who may come to your world in the future.

The name of our race should not be translated as "Chongchongma", but a more appropriate term should be "Changeling". We will change. Our magic allows us to look like ponies and mimic other creatures, even inanimate ones. All pretense is gone.

This is important because until a few years ago, we relied on our ability to disguise ourselves to steal love as our sustenance. As a result, we became targets, hated and feared, and ponies justifiably hated and feared us. We are not their friends. We make a living by squeezing love and other positive emotions out of them—we take away an extremely important part of their lives.

And I have no guilt about it. We have no choice in order to survive. But in those days we were often so hungry that our bestiality took over. Sometimes we lose control. A hungry changeling represents pure danger.

Then our queen came up with this brilliant space race plan. Although ponies may still be suspicious of us now, some can respect us and even like the qualities we possess. We no longer need to steal love to survive. We have enough love to keep us healthy without hurting any ponies.

As a result, now I am on Mars.

The team members knew something could go wrong. So they would regularly give me a little bit of their love three times a day. My emotional reserve was low at first, but it's slowly starting to come back up. The holes in my body were almost back to the way they were when we crashed.

Yet I was hungrier than ever, and I didn't know why. Normally all changelings are always a little hungry, but this is different. I received a lot of love, but still felt like something was missing.

Things are better in the cave. I almost feel at home while working on the farm in the cave. But when I leave the cave I feel fear. I know what happens to us changelings when we go on a feeding frenzy. I was afraid that I would hurt my friends, especially Mark, who didn't know who I really was.

I don't want to hurt my friends. But I don't know how to prevent disaster. And you are the only one I can talk to about this, because if I tell anyone else here, they will be scared too; then I will no longer be able to feed off their emotions, and things will quickly get worse It gets worse.

But there's one thing you can do. Pay attention to messages from other people. If you see any of these characteristics, it probably means I'm eating too much and you need to warn others to be careful.

1) The victim suddenly doesn't want to do anything except stay with someone (the changeling);

2) The victim suddenly becomes very stupid and easily accepts other people's suggestions;

3) The victim's temperament changes drastically - a very obvious change has occurred, subtle changes are not counted;

4) The victim is weak and lacks strength;

5) The victim becomes listless, unable to feel any emotion, and unable to do anything for themselves.

Pay special attention to Mark. He had no idea of ​​this. If I tell him this he won't love me anymore. Everyone else knew and were always monitoring each other to see how I was doing, but Mark was the most delicious and generous source of food. If I lose control, he'll probably be the first victim. If this does happen, let them know what steps can be taken if necessary. I hope this doesn't happen. I don't want that to happen either.

I feel better now because I know you'll be watching and will warn you if something goes wrong. Please don't tell anyone else. Humanity will need to know this one day, but we must be careful about this, or all of humanity will hate the changelings.

Once I send this email, I will delete the record on Mark's computer.

Thank you, Erin.

dragonfly

Dear Dragonfly,

Please read this letter privately or delete it after reading if you wish to keep it confidential.

I did promise to keep your emails confidential, so I will keep that promise. But NASA needs this information. More importantly, Mark also needs to know this information.

I understand that your species is forced to live as a parasite on other species. I also suspect that there are serious issues with mutual trust between you. But understand that trust between crew members is crucial, and Mark is one of yours now. The longer you wait before telling him the truth, the more likely you are to undermine that hard-earned trust, especially if you're concerned that you might lose control.

Your concerns are legitimate, and your behavior in worrying about your friend is completely blameless. In fact, it is your concern for your friends that reflects your true nature. Now the real question is, how do you deal with this fear and its triggers? Here is a little advice I can give you from a hundred million miles away:

You should talk to others in your world about your problems. I'm just a human from a world that knows nothing about magic. We have no creatures here that feed on love, and none that can change form back and forth like you mentioned, so I can't say whether you might suddenly transform into a beast without warning. But in my opinion, the fact that you have now considered this possibility and are actively monitoring yourself to deal with it is a good sign in itself.

I think you underestimate the capabilities of your team members and your own value to your team. Understand that trust will eventually be rewarded. Please do think carefully about relaying what you discussed with me. I think their love for you will only grow and one of them will probably finally figure out a way to solve this problem.

Dr. Erin Shields

Chief Psychologist of the Ares Project