At the Star Gazer’s Laboratory for Planetary Studies in the Institute of Sciences of Canterlot, two ponies adjusted the new equipment brought directly from Laburinthos, said equipment was also donated by Marquese Star Gazer, a noble who was always driven to science and technology. Unlike Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns, everypony was able to attend this school even if the grand majority was still unicorns due to that tribe being the most prominent in Canterlot.
“Hey Tracker, are you done calibrating the new telescope? We are way behind schedule and I don’t want to lose track of the asteroids we have been following for moons,” a dark blue coated pegasus with a brighter blue mane said to his colleague.
The blonde freckled earth pony was adjusting the telescope “relax Hunter, we have plenty of time, besides it’s not like the Princess will punish us if we present this late, believe me, I know her, did I ever tell you that time I was on a cruise with her and her family?”
Star Hunter rolled his eyes, “yeah, over twenty times already, I used to live on Ponyville you know? I was her neighbor for years.”
Star Tracker laughed, “doesn’t count, you never talked to her.”
“Yes it does.”
“No it doesn’t.”
“It does too.”
“It does not”
“What is this all about?” came a masculine voice from the door.
“LORD GAZER!” both young stallions said scrambling from their current positions bowing to the Marquese.
Star Gazer smiled and walked to the younger ponies, “come on you two, I said multiple times not to bow to me, we are all the same, we are all made of star-stuff after all, we even have the same first name the three of us.”
Both lifted their heads, “I’m sorry Lord Gazer, force of habit,” said the pegasus Star Hunter.
“Yeah, almost every noble and royalty is pretty snob,” said the earth pony Star Tracker.
Star Gazer gave them a warm smile and walked to a model of their planetary system, softly touching the only planet that showed green and blue on its surface, he said with his soft voice, “look here at this tiny ball. This is here. This is home. This is us. On it everypony you love, everypony you know, everycreature you ever heard of, everycreature who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every Hunter and Tracker,” he rubbed the heads of both the pegasus and earth pony, “every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every royalty and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every superstar, every supreme leader, every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there-on a little ball suspended in a sunbeam,” he then pointed at some graphics that showed theories about where their system was within the entire galaxy, a mere point in the vast of the universe, “It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of pony conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known.”
The interns looked dumbfounded with their mouths open at the words from the Marques, he walked to them and closed their mouths with his hooves, then he went to the giant telescope he donated to the institute.
“Lor… I mean Star Gazed, the telescope is almost ready to go, I was just about finishing with the calibrations.”
“Great,” he checked on the notes on the desk, “I see you already made calculations on the location of those asteroids you have been following Star Tracker, do any of them present a threat to our planet?”
“Not at all sir, the only two that will pass the closest are not big enough to survive atmospheric entry, well unless they are made of pure iron or any other hard metal, with this new telescope we will be able to see them with better quality in a few days when they are close enough to visually identify their composition.”
“Excellent, I have great hopes on you two and I feel it in my bones, somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known.”
~♥~♦~♣~♠~
A few days later, Star Hunter was watching through the telescope and writing on his notepad, “oh crap,” he said while checking his notes twice.
“What’s wrong Hunter?”
“You won’t believe it, by my new calculations, K03GO7T is going to crash into planet Ahgg in a month and a few days, K03BA0L just collided with K03BC5N and the remaining are not big enough for study, all that will be trapped in the gravity of planet Moochick in mere hours, those were my favorite asteroids, how about you?”
“I lost track of one of mine, I guess I’m not as good as I thought with my calculations.”
“Relax dude, it was just one of what? Ten?”
“Six actually,” he said with his face down.
“Hey, that still gives you an eighty three percent rate of success, cheer up newbie.”
“I guess you are right, but from those five left, two are heading to planet Hydia so they are likely to be trapped on its gravity or one of its moons, Reeka or Draggle.”
“What of the other three?”
“There are two that are heading directly here, one is big but hollow, it has a huge hole right in the middle, it appears to be made out of silicate so it’ll burn in entry when it enters in about two moons, the other one is medium size but like I thought is not big enough to survive entry in eight moons, unless is made out of iron and even then its remaining might not be bigger than a hoofball, here this are their coordinates.”
“Yeah, that one looks like a donut, it kinda makes me hungry… wow the other one is amazingly spherical.”
“Yeah gotta love round asteroids.”
“Wait… Tracker you said is going to arrive in eight moons?”
“Yeah, why?”
“Can I see your notes Tracker?” Star Tracker gave his notes to Star Hunter, he ran to his notes, he made some traces and calculations for at least ten minutes, “AW COME ON!”
“What?”
“Like I thought, look at these.”
“Is this correct? Damn, it’s going to collide with one of yours in two moons, ok that’s it.”
“Don’t mind Tracker, still got one left right?”
“Yeah and it’s the biggest one, but as per my calculations it will pass barely close enough to study it and then will head directly to the sun, I was about to check its progress, it should be clear enough now to identify its composition, here check its coordinates.”
Star hunter moved the telescope to the coordinates given and stared at the asteroid, “ok, that’s weird, the telescope can’t focus on your asteroid.”
“What? Let me see...that’s not possible, we should be able to see it clear by now… unless.”
“Unless what?”
“Unless the asteroid had a reflecting surface,” came the voice of Marquese Star Gazer behind them.
The pegasus was confused, “but that’s impossible, something with a smooth surface enough to mess with the lens of the telescope couldn’t have been done naturally.”
Star Tracker had a smile from ear to ear, “maybe it’s ALIENS!”
“HAHAHA yeah right Tracker, even if there is life on other planets there is no way they could travel that far, isn’t that right sir?”
“Oh young stallion, the universe is immense, you should be aware of that and the sky calls to all of us. I bet that if we don’t destroy ourselves, we will one day venture to the stars, who say in the infinite space aren't some creatures that already travel the void.”
“You are probably right, but if they were that smart they would have changed route, they are heading directly to our sun, aren’t they Tracker?”
“Yeah, but who knows, they will be the closest to us in five moons and soon after they will be caught in our sun’s gravity, if they are aliens they should change their course by then, should we report this to Princess Twilight?”
“Let’s hold this up for the moment, we should wait until we can see what it is.”
“Yes sir!” both Star Hunter and Star Tracker said in unison.
“Let’s just hope this is more interesting than a shiny asteroid,” Star Gazer said looking through the telescope.
To be continued