//------------------------------//
// A Fleet From Disney 
// Story: Equus' Unexpected Future 
// by Robert Emerald Fountain 
//------------------------------//

Once Thorax had patched the signal through to Twilight, she was able to speak directly to the crew on this new ship.

“My name is Twilight Sparkle. What is your emergency?”, she asked.

“My name is Mickey Mouse. Our ship is called the Disney Cruiser. We were passing through here on an exploration when a solar flare shorted out our systems. Our radio and camera are hooked to an auxiliary generator, which allowed us to contact you for assistance.”, replied one of the ship’s crew members. 

“Can you bail out?”, asked Twilight.

“That’s a negative, Twilight. With only the radio and the camera working, our escape pods are locked in place. What’s worse is that our heat shield is damaged. It’s not damaged to the point that the ship will burn up, but we’d still be vaporized by the intense heat. If you can get up here and get us extracted, we can get a safe ride to the ground. We do not know how we can save our ship though.”, replied Mickey.

“How many of you are there?”, asked Twilight.

Mickey expanded the camera view so that Twilight could see the rest of his crew. The bridge crew consisted of himself, his girlfriend Minnie, her twin nieces, Millie and Melody, Goofy, Professor Ludwig Von Drake, and Donald and Daisy Duck.

“I have an idea on how to get you out. We will send our ship, the Harmony, into orbit and you will use transporters to beam over. After that, we will surround the Disney Cruiser with an energy bubble that resists gravity, in order to prevent a crash. Once it has passed through reentry, we will use tractor beams to move the ship to a safe landing area and set her down.”, she explained.

“That sounds like a plan.”, replied Minnie.

Twilight sent word to Flurry Heart that she and the Young Six had a rescue mission to carry out. Flurry quickly replied and they started boarding the shuttle to the Harmony. They were in space in less than twelve minutes.

After boarding the Harmony and undocking, Flurry Heart and the Young Six got in range to beam the Disney Cruiser’s crew over to safety. 

“Harmony to Disney Cruiser. We’re in range. Energizing transporters in five seconds.”, said Smolder.

“Acknowledged.”, replied Mickey.

“Five, four, three, two, one, ENERGIZE!”, cried Silverstream.

Beams of energy appeared around the crew members and they vanished from the Disney Cruiser. Seconds later, they reappeared on-board the Harmony. After doing a head-count to make sure everyone was evacuated, Flurry called out to Twilight. 

“Aunt Twilight, this is Flurry Heart. All of the crew members are accounted for. Deploying anti-gravity bubble.”, she said.

Yona locked a target reticle on the Disney Cruiser and released the bubble, which wrapped itself around the ship. Twilight’s friends had come up on personal ships and fired their tractor beams once the bubble was sealed. As Flurry turned the Harmony back towards Equus, she called out to the Disney Fleet over the intercom.

“Strap yourselves in. This is going to be a rough ride.”

Mickey quickly responded, saying they had gone through much worse.

As the Harmony passed through the atmosphere, everyone was shaken violently in their seats, but they were alright. Millie ended up with a headache, and Melody got motion sickness and threw up once they had cleared the atmosphere. After beaming everyone down to the ground, Flurry and the Young Six flew back into space and then came down on the shuttle. 

**

Once everyone had introduced themselves, Flurry took to the air with signal wands to guide the Disney Cruiser to the ground once she found a clear spot in the San Palomino Desert. Mickey had also given her a remote-control for the landing-gear. Moving her signal wands carefully, she led her aunt and her friends gently to the ground. Once they were close to touching down, Flurry dropped the landing-gear and slowly disengaged the anti-gravity bubble so the ship settled on the ground. After the crew had been brought to the ship, Twilight and her friends teamed up to help assess the damage.

When the Disney Fleet looked at the damage assessment, they were relieved that it was minor. The heat shield’s damage was only a single panel that had come off. Mickey suspected that the panel was not fastened correctly and had come loose as they were flying. The solar flare had caused it to fall off and the radiation had shorted out the main reactor. 

Fixing this panel was simple, but Twilight became suspicious when she looked at the wiring diagrams. For some reason, the camera and the radio were the ONLY things with their breakers set to backup. Out of confusion, she asked Mickey about it.

“We didn’t know it until it was too late. We thought we had calibrated the generator to power everything. Unfortunately, when we ran a simulation, we realized it was not strong enough to withstand all of the energy. Had we tried to switch all of the breakers over, the generator would’ve been overloaded. We had planned to correct that issue when we got home.”, he explained.

“Well, there’s no time like the present.”, Twilight replied.

Mickey agreed and they recalibrated the generator so it could handle more power. After adding stronger protection against radiation and running tests to check that everything was working well again, Twilight said that the Disney Cruiser was ready to go back into space. Mickey and his crew began packing at once and prepping their systems. Once they were airborne, they would continue their exploration. 

They took some time to visit Canterlot and meet Celestia and Luna as well. They enjoyed learning about Equus’ history and were intrigued when they heard how Twilight helped to spread the knowledge of friendship beyond Equestria’s borders. 

Three hours later, Mickey and his crew were ready to go home and were getting ready to take off. Suddenly, Goofy yelled to stop. Ryder was running towards their ship and waving his arms as if to warn them about something.

“What’s going on?”, Minnie asked Ryder over the radio.

“Twilight and her friends started tracking a meteor shower approaching here four months ago. It should be arriving at any time, which means it is too dangerous for you to launch.”, Ryder explained.

Mickey acknowledged and his crew disembarked. Two hours later, Celestia and Luna contacted Flurry Heart, who then contacted Twilight.

“Thorax says the meteor shower will be arriving TONIGHT!”, she crowed.

Twilight and her friends grew excited and started getting everything ready. They set out chairs and snacks, put up telescopes, and began counting the minutes until the light show would start. Once the meteors came into view, everyone was impressed. Some of the meteors broke others apart, which was part of Thorax’s simulation, and was very exciting to see. When the show was ending, Thorax picked up a call from a starship that he’d waited on for the past four years.

“Inkstar to E S S. We’re on approach.”, said Callie.

“I hear you. Be careful though. A meteor shower has just passed through and there may be debris lingering in the vicinity.”, he replied.

“Acknowledged.”, said Marie.

“We are getting readouts on the debris. Plotting safe route to Equus.”, said Agent 8 as she and Agents 3 and 4 looked at their screens.

Taylor and Lizzie kept an eye on the readouts as they made minor maneuvers to avoid the meteor shards and navigate safely to their destination. None of them knew that four shards had not been picked up, due to their composition. Their landing was about to be compromised.