//------------------------------// // There and Back Again // Story: Perilune // by DashEight //------------------------------// Many Years Later... "Are we there yet??" A singsongy voice called out from the back seat. The little girl knew perfectly well that 'we' were not, in fact, there yet, but she was wide awake and needed something to pass the time. Pestering her father was as good a something as any. "Not yet, sweetheart," Starswirl replied. As much as she and her sister tried, they could never get a rise out of their dad. He never raised his voice, never showed frustration or annoyance with their antics. Their mother was different, her current favorite saying was 'I created you, and if you don't knock that off RIGHT NOW, I will end you'. Starswirl was the family's designated peacekeeper. He simply smiled at his daughters through the rearview mirror and flicked on the sedan's turn signal for the upcoming left into the Appleoosa suburbs. "How 'bout now?" "Almost, dear. Just five more minutes. Please keep your voice down, your sister is sleeping." "Fiiiiiine," she sighed at the grave injustice, opting instead to roll the rental's rear window up and down. Hot, dry Texas air washed through the car at regular intervals. At least it's warm here, Starswirl thought as he clicked off the now-useless AC and lowered his own window. The District of Canterlot was currently in the last throes of an absolutely brutal winter. The girls had been ecstatic to see snow for the first time, but it was mid-March and there was still a foot of the stuff on the ground. Starswirl had never been happier to get out of town for the weekend, even if it meant braving an international airport during Spring Break with two excitable children in tow. Starswirl slowed in front of a ranch house and began to pull into the driveway. "Now are we th--" "We're here sweetie, see? Can you wake your sis for me while I grab the bags?" Starswirl put the car in park and walked around to the trunk. As he pulled out three overnight bags, a mop of blue hair in the backseat scooted over to the sherbert-swirl across from her and began agressively poking her. "Hey. Hey. Hey dummy. We're here. Wake up. Wa--" "Okay, I'm up! I'm up!" He rolled his eyes as he walked toward the house, waving at the pink-haired woman sitting on the porch swing. "Starswirl!" She called out, jumping up from her seat and embracing him. "Good to see you again! How are you?" "Fine, fine, just happy to be out of DC for a bit," Starswirl replied as he returned the hug. "It's good to see you too, Sunny. It's been too long. How's everyth--" "AUNT SUNNY!!!" Twin shrieks split the air as two chest-high blurs dove into Sunny Skies' abdomen. She stumbled back, letting out an exaggerated 'oof!' and wrapping her arms around the two girls now clutched to her like barnacles. "Celestia! Luna! Wow, you two got HUGE! I don't think I can carry you both anymore! Starswirl, what are you feeding them!?" She carefully set them both down on the porch. "How old are you girls now?" "Six!" "Seven!" "Six and seven? No way!! I swear, the last time I saw you, you were both in diapers!" Celestia giggled. "It hasn't been that long, Aunt Sunny." "Hmm, maybe I'm just getting old and forgetful," Sunny made a face at the girls, eliciting more giggles from Celestia. Even Luna, always the grump, let a smile slip. "CADANCE!!" Sunny called her daughter through the screen door, "THE GIRLS ARE HERE!" Sunny and Starswirl sat peacefully on the porch furniture, enjoying a pitcher of sweet tea and the East Texas weather as their various children ran to the backyard to plot yet another round of mischief and property destruction. The District of Canterlot teaching staff and PTA already coined a nickname for Starswirl's two girls: the Twin Terrors of Canterlot Elementary. They were now surely working thier dark magic to corrupt sweet little Cadance, who was such an absolute angel and Sunny refused to hear any words to the contrary, thank you very much. Never mind that the second the girls saw each other Sunny suggested they all go play in the back. She leaned back and sipped her tea. "These are truly the best times." "When the girls get to see each other?" "When I get a minute to myself." She grabbed a handful of her pink locks. "This used to be less 'salmon' and more 'bubblegum'. Cadie's the best thing that's ever happened to me, but that girl has some serious energy." Starswirl chuckled. "Try two of them. I thought it'd be easier, that they'd even each other out or at least keep them occupied, right? You know, competition for limited resources; the best toys, the top bunk, their parents' approval and all that?" "Not so much?" "Hell no. They make each other worse. I just got a note sent home from their school. Some boy wouldn't share a soccer ball or something with Luna, I don't know. So Celestia chats him up, and when he's distracted, Luna sneaks up behind him, knocks him down, and they both steal it from him. It's not just misbehaving, Sunny. They're organized." "That's... actually pretty impressive," Sunny admitted. "You should be proud of them. I think." "Oh, I am. You try explaining that at a parent-teacher conference, though." "Touché." She tipped her glass to him, then slumped back into her chair, lost in thought. After a few treasured moments of silence, she spoke again. "So, Celestia and Luna, huh? I don't think I've ever asked before, but why those names?" Starswirl grinned sheepishly. "Well, Celestia was originally going to be Selene, but when she was born, she just looked so much like you we had to name her after you. And then since we already used your callsign, when Luna was born Laur asked what Selene's callsign was, and, well..." "And does Lauren know how my sister got that nickname?" Sunny asked with a mocking grin. Starswirl's blood ran cold. "No. And she never will. I'm not sure I believe that story myself. I flew the T-33 in training too, and there's just not enough room in the cockpit of that jet to pull off something like that." Sunny let out a barking laugh. "Wait a second," she said, walking inside. She returned a moment later, handing Starswirl an old instant photograph. "What's this?" He looked at her quizzically. "Proof." The colors on the picture were fading, but it clearly depicted a silver fighter aircraft in flight, obviously taken from another plane in formation. Starswirl's eyes wandered to the machine's bubble canopy, which had two round pale-blue cheeks pressed firmly against it. "No..." "Yes," Sunny chuckled. "That poor tanker crew..." "They called it 'the Nightmare Moon incident.' It's still an urban legend at the base." "Luna can never know about this. Ever." Starswirl pleaded. "This secret is buried with us." "If she found out her namesake pulled off something like that, she'd never wear pants again," Sunny mused. "She'll be trouble, that one." "You don't say. I'm not looking foward to her teen years." Another silence as they both sat, enjoying each other's company. Eventually, Sunny spoke up, poking at the elephant in the room that had gone unmolested their last few visits. "So... How's work?" She asked. An innocent enough question. "We're making some progress. NASA still can't get the budget to launch a parade float, but we've got the Air Force on board to fit most of the bill." She raised her eyebrows at that, suprised. "Really? Why would they care about a few pieces of wrecked ten-year-old tech? It's not like the PR would be worth the expense of a launch." "Sunny, I know this is important to you, but do you really want to know this? I mean, after the mission it took you so long to--" "I'm a big girl, Baby-Face." Sunny chided. Starswirl's hand subconciously went to his chin, as if to reassure himself that his luxurious dark beard was still there. "I love my sister, and with her gone I'll always feel like a part of me is missing, but its been a long time. I mourned her, and I learned to live with it. So tell me why the Pentagon is so interested in her corpse." "Well, that's the thing... I didn't want to say anything until we were absolutely sure, and there's so much uncertianty at this stage--" "Just tell me. I can take it." Sunny's patience was wearing thin. "Okay, let's take this from the beginning," Starswirl said as he withdrew a few photographs from his shirt pocket. While he had wanted to avoid this conversation, he still came prepared. "You remember the anomalies around the landing? The things we couldn't explain?" "That EM spike that caused Sel's crash?" "Well, that and a few other things. First, why would there even be any radiation like that on the Moon in the first place? It's a barren rock, it doesn't have a magnetosphere. Also, you made contact with Sel on her spacesuit's short-range radio, but when you came back from the Moon's far side, she was just gone. It only took fifteen minutes for your orbit to bring you back around. Even if she ran out of air in that time, her suit still had plenty of power. We should've gotten a flatline signal or something." "Star," Sunny asked softly. "Isn't this kind of grasping here?" "That's what I thought at first. Conspiracy-nut porn. Then, an old Air Force friend showed me this." He slid her the first photo, a satellite view of the Sea of Tranquility. Sunny frowned. She recognized the landing site, but it was zoomed too far to make out any details of the lander. Then, she jerked in suprise as she noticed the lunar dust around the area was discolored, making it appear that the entire site was sitting inside a giant six-pointed star. "That's new." "You don't say. Its only visible at certian levels of zoom, and the Air Force has a lot more discretion with what they release to the public than NASA," Starswirl stated. "I met with them, showed them what I had, and it whipped enough interest for a probe." "I get it. Listen, I asked for this, but you don't have to show me pictures of her body." "No, that's not it." Starswirl's mouth worked soundlessly for a second as he tried to find the words. "You have to understand that nobody has any idea what this means yet, but we didn't find a body." "...What?" "There's no body at the crash site. Look," he spread the rest of the pictures in front of her. They were all taken from a roving probe. Sunny saw pictures of the tipped-over lander, then footprints in the dust as the probe had followed Selene's final steps. Then she saw the last two pictures, and her jaw dropped. In the center of the second-to-last picture, a giant, glowing crystal sat protruding out of the lunar surface. It gave the barren ground around it an odd teal tint. Sunny spotted her sister's bootprints leading up to the alien rock and an American flag planted into the dust next to the thing. She grabbed the other one. The rover had rolled right up to the crystal. Its claw arm was visible in the picture frame, reaching out and touching the same six-pointed starburst shape indented into the facet. The crystal looked wrong, somehow. Sunny's eyebrows furrowed as she realized she was looking at a ripple effect in what should've been a glassy, solid surface. "What... what is this?" "I don't know. Nobody knows," Starswirl admitted. "But we're going to find out. NASA and the DoD are in the process of finalizing the budget for a manned mission. They'll announce the Orion Program to the public next year. Leaving out the real reason, of course." "We're going back?" "We're going back." "Starswirl, I..." Sunny blinked tears out of her eyes. "I can't thank you enough for trusting me with this. But I can't get involved. It took me so long to finally move past her... I have a family now, I can't put all my hopes on this only to find out... I can't go through that again. I barely survived the first time, I won't make it a second." "I know. And you won't have to. That's why I'm here." Starswirl put his hand on her shoulder. "Besides, we're both too old for space anyways," he said, smiling. Sunny gave a weak chuckle. "Speak for yourself, I could still hack it. But I could never leave Cadance." "I wouldn't have it any other way." He stood up suddenly, hearing Luna's distant wail about somebody 'cheating'. "I'd better go check on them." "Please do. And Starswirl?" "Yes?" "If she is out there... bring her home."