After days of carefully looking over every single piece of the rocket that we could find, we finally have something of an idea of what happened.
The problem list is long and distinguished. What contributed the most to the disaster was the fact that there had been an air bubble in the propellant grain, which made the entire burn process go haywire. The next runner up in problems is that the thrust-to-weight ratio is way too high, which places a large amount of stress on the airframe.
The final nail in the rocket coffin is that there was a gust of wind that caught the stabilization in just the right way to cause it to start to tip over. This wouldn’t normally be a problem, but with the thrust-to-weight problem already mentioned, the extra pressure on the side of the airframe caused a rupture in the fuel tank.
This isn’t bad news though. Now that we know what went wrong, we can fix it and launch again.
I sit back in my chair, flexing my jaw to work out the writing cramp. This report is supposed to be sent off to the princess once I’m done with it, which should be soon.
I put the finishing touches on the document and take it to Fairweight’s office. After knocking and finding that he is out, I lay the paper on his desk and leave.
I give a relieved sigh as I head for the capsule design lab. I’ve never liked writing reports, although I make exceptions for stuff like the friendship reports, so I’m glad to be done with it.
Once I arrive at the lab, I set right to work on the last few components of the capsule. The disastrous launch and the investigation after left me with little time to finish this, but now it’ll be a breeze.
* * * *
I forgot how much I hated working on this bucking diagram! Seriously, it’s like trying to fit a few kilometers of wiring inside a birdhouse; and some of the wiring can’t touch, and some of it has to touch.
And the best part, even with this diagram done, it’s not over. Once we build the full mockup we'll know if this really works in practice. And if it doesn’t, guess who’s going to be doing the revisions. If you said me, give yourself a bucking cookie.
I stand from my chair and stretch, hearing several pops and feeling some stress melt away. I just need to get some dinner, go for a flight, a nice relaxing shower afterward, and then bed.
With a plan for the evening laid out in my head, I start the walk to the kitchen area to enact it.
Once there I prepare myself a simple meal consisting of two daisy sandwiches and a generous portion of hayfries. I scarf down the food with gusto, only realizing now exactly how hungry I am.
With a now very full belly, I waddle my way off to the showers.
* * * *
“Get your lazy flanks out of that bed!” the voice, unrecognizable in my post-sleep groggy state, shoves me from my comfortable sleep into the waking world.
“Wah, uh, wuz goin’ on?” I mumble out, the world burly and fuzzy as I open my eyes.
“Oh not much, unless you count making history important.” Sequence, who I now recognize, says sardonically.
I glance at the clock that hangs on the wall. “Sequence, it’s eight in morning, which is far too early for beating around the bush…”
The unicorn gives an exasperated huff, and drags me off the bed by grasping my tail with her magic. “Just come with me,” she states, still dragging me by my tail.
“I can walk, you know.” I chastise. Although, I may have trouble walking if she keeps dragging me across the ground like this.
Sequence, now fed up with explaining anything to me, proceeds to flip me right side up and push me through the open door of the conference room.
I grumble as I take stock of the room. About half the chalkboards are filled with tiny writing, unreadable from this distance. The other change, is that there is another holding crystal sitting in the middle of the table.
Once Fairweight sees us enter, he casts the spell to cause the crystal to act like a projector. My breath is taken away.
If anything in this world could be considered indescribable, this would come very close. But my brain tries to come up with words anyway.
On the right side of the projection, smooth oceans of a deep blue spread far out of frame. Taking up the rest of the space, are rolling plains, snowcapped mountains, sprawling forests, and a dessert.
“This can’t be-” I start.
The view changes suddenly, going blurry for a moment before focusing again on a Gryphon inside of a conical room. He is wearing a kind of suit that looks like it would cover him from head to toe. A helmet with a pull down visor sits atop his head. Behind the Gryphon, panels and switches dominate the walls and ceiling.
The Gryphon smiles and waves at the crystal on his end.
“Is this some kind of joke?” I choke out, unsure as to why I feel like I’m about to cry; an urge which I quickly pummel into submission.
“No,” Fairweight answers simply. “That Gryphon is currently in orbit.”
“Oh…” Is all I can muster.
Fairweight gives a wry smirk. “I’ve already received a letter from Celestia, informing me that the royal board of personnel is at our disposal, and to pick whoever we want. We’ll also be getting an influx of practically every occupation you can imagine.” He stops and takes another look at the projection, which has switched to show the view out the window on the other side of the craft.
“It’s funny, in a way. Yesterday, if we asked for what we are being given, we would have been laughed off. Now though, everypony might as well be begging us to take their handouts.” Fairweight shakes his head. “I should be happy, yet I can’t help but feel contempt for being shoved aside and then begged to come back.”
“I know what you mean.” I agree. “I should be doing flips from excitement right now! This is it; we really have a shot at this now. But the circumstances of this chance are, frustrating at best.”
“While I feel the same way, I’m not going to waste time feeling bad about the fact that we didn’t do it first. There is still pride to take in the fact that we can do it at all.” Dusk adds.
A letter materializes on the table, which Fairweight scoops up in an emerald magic field. His eyes widen as he reads.
He puts the letter down and changes the holding crystal’s link to the Royal Broadcast Station. The national anthem plays before Celestia appears from her throne.
“Thank you, my little ponies, for tuning into this broadcast. I contact you now, in a city noted for its knowledge, from a country for progress and strength, and we stand in need of all three. For we are in an hour of change and challenge, in a decade of hope and fear, in an age of both knowledge and ignorance. The greater our knowledge, the greater our ignorance unfolds.
“Despite the striking fact that most of the scientists that our world has ever known are alive and working today, despite the fact that this Nation’s own scientific manpower is doubling every eighteen years, in a rate of growth more than three times our population as a whole. Despite all that, the vast stretches of the unknown and the unanswered and the unfinished still far outstrip our collective comprehension.
“Nopony can fully grasp how far and fast we have come, but condense, if you will, the last three-thousand years of recorded history into a time span of just a year. Stated in these terms, we know very little of the first six months, except that at the end of them the three tribes had finished their long trek to a new land, and found Equestria. Over the next three months, inventions such as the flame rune stove, and the light bulb came to be. The next month, steam power and the steam locomotive. But for the last two months, no major changes in technology have come to pass.
“Barring the last two months that is a breathtaking pace, and such a pace cannot help but create new ills as it dispels old. One such new challenge, is reaching toward the stars.
“It is not surprising that some would have us stay where we are a little longer to rest, to wait. But this country was not built by those who waited, rested, and looked behind them. It was built by those who looked forward, and despite the hardships, push onward to greater things. So shall the same be for space. Previous generations of not floundered when change befell them, and neither shall we.
“As most of you know, we are not the first with these ideals. The Gryphon Empire has successfully put one of their own kind into space, and will be returning him later today.
“So while we may not be the first to accomplished being the first to set a hoof in space, there is one thing that I will promise you. We shall, with absolutely no question, be the first to lay hooves on the Moon without; without the aid of the Elements of Harmony.
“We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go the moon in this decade, and do other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard. Because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are will to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win.
“To be sure, we are behind, and will be behind for some time in manned flight. But we do not intend to stay behind. In this decade, we shall make up and move ahead.
“Thank you everypony for your time.” The broadcast cuts off after that.
“Well that was, unexpected.” Dusk mutters.
After that, the silence rains heavy and palpable in the room.
The following review is brought to you by Zero Punctuation Reviews
For the few pestiferous fucks out there with consistent and reliable sleep schedules, allow me to wallow for a bit by explaining to you that I suffer from 'transient insomnia'. Basically every now and again, my melatonin levels decide that I don't appreciate them enough and that the best way to punish me for my hubris is to only permit me 2-4 hours of sleep a night for about two weeks. I'm on the tail end of it now, and so many fiscal and academic deadlines have piling upon my fragile body that I'm stressed in that special way where you completely stop giving a shit like apathy is the defense mechanism your brain employs to stay thoughts of auto-cannibalistic fits. I try to start off every review with a cute little metaphor that encapsulates my thoughts of the story and the preceding garble is the excuse I give for not coming up with one. Sorry Tarnthelos.
So, to put matters bluntly, "Breaking the Barrier" is alright; It's plot is alright and it's ideas are alright. However, it's sitting in the same pool of mediocrity as "Dream Whisper" and "Wish Upon a Supernova" that makes me sad to my core because I think that it's got wondrous potential that isn't being met. Take that with massive amounts of salt reader, because I think the same of the US government, showing just how credulous and naive I truly am.
Make no mistake that this is Rainbow Dash's story, fixating on her longing to go into space because of science reasons that are apparently too robust and complicated to make apparent to reader. Other characters show up every now and again, sure, but they behave more like plot points to drive the story and don't get to have personalities. Normally I'd pounce all over poor characters, but as established earlier I do not possess the capability to give a shit. The flat characters used for plot points don't bother me within the context of this particular story because it's not about them, it's about Rainbow Dash. She's the star and the only one we're directed to care about, so the other characters having glorified cameos is fine.
What is not fine is that Rainbow Dash is apparently secretly posh and haughty because the narration is articulated and structured in a way that I pictured the speaker as an overeducated Malcolm McDowell type. The way she's presented creates an uncanny cognitive dissonance, for she's well within character in her dialogue and actions but is not in character in her thoughts nor narrations. Maybe Rainbow Dash is a budding Holmesian intellectual underneath her brash veneer, but I'm not buying it because it is not appropriately established. I get that she has to be intelligent to become MLP's first rocket scientist, but she feels like another character has supplanted her and is wearing her face and words. Unless you're plotting a big reveal in which Rainbow Dash pulls off her face to reveal that she's been Old Man Withers all along, the way she narrates and the way she behaves are at odds with each other. This can easily be fixed by scrapping the first person perspective so that the Malcolm McDowell narrator is not Rainbow Dash, or by adjusting the language so that the narrator's tone and voice fits the character.
The second of the glaring issues is engagement. Former events slipped from my memory with lubricated ease and I found myself backtracking more than once to figure out exactly what was happening. Now that may be entirely my bad since I was operating on a sleep schedule that a fucking giraffe suffering from constant night terrors would call less then satisfactory, but I wasn't engaged. I wasn't interested. The experience was a tasteless saltine cracker; edible but unsatisfying and entirely forgettable.
The main obstacle hindering "Breaking the Barrier" from ascension is that the story is kinda boring. It's an acute sufferer of what I will hereby name "Dream-Whisper-Story-Syndrome" in which a story with big ideas is severely crippled by it's own presentation. The two primary symptoms are 'dull-first-person-perspective' and 'tell, don't show'. While Dream-Whisper-Story-Syndrome will hardly prove fatal, it does weigh the story down and reduce the experience to a slog. No feeling that might exist behind the ideas is coming across, leaving the work to feel void of human emotion.
I suppose the first person perspective could be forgiven if Malcolm-McDowell-Dash wasn't so fucking insipid. All the narrator does is flatly and robotically tell you what happens, which seems like a silly complaint. Surely, one needs to be told what happens but I want to be shown what happens. I want to feel like I'm there, like I'm some voyeuristic ghost watching all the action from the safety and comfort of an ethereal realm that looks strangely like my messy dorm room. I want to lose myself in the story, I want the character's emotions to influence mine. But I can't because there's no entrance to this fun space party. The premise has all the appeal of a ball pit full of disembodied breasts and cupcakes baked with mother's love but sadly the ball pit is sealed in a vault made of mythril on the dark side of Mercury.
Immersion is essential and "tell, don't show" shoots immersion in the fucking kneecaps, making the experience crawl around flailing and screaming. Immersion is necessary because it can truly elevate a basically alright experience - like, say, this one - into a fantastic and timeless one. (I'm going to get so much flak for this) Take the Harry Potter series, which was stuffed to the brim with shabbily introduced plot points and weak characters (like Tonks, stop pretending that you care about Tonks) that get established and then entirely forgotten about like they were magically apparated to the no-longer-convenient dimension. (Room of Requirement? Hah, more like room of fucking plot convenience.) But I like Harry Potter because it presents itself so well, and it lets me into it's thought out world and smothers me with wonderful moments, themes and human emotion until I'm crying and begging for more. "Breaking the Barrier" isn't so kind, it won't to let me into it's world like it doesn't want all it's cool friends to find out that it hangs out with me.
Look, here's what I mean:
Every word on the page as two ultimate goals; the conveyance of information and the conveyance of meaning. Information entails things like plot, character interaction and motivation, choices, events etc. Meaning entails themes, emotions, characterization, reasons behind character actions, and most importantly why I should be interested. This story conveys information in a dull manner while all meaning is lost because of "tell, don't show." Whatever thoughts and ideas were in your lovely noggin are not coming across, Tarnthelos, and they need to. The presentation makes the work feel soulless.
These are the kinds of sentences you'll find in "Breaking the Barrier".
-Rainbow Dash drank some milk because she really likes milk.-
All this sentence does convey conclusive information. Readers become disinterested in works that arrive at conclusions for them. It causes our higher cognitive functions to switch off because there's nothing presented for us to think about. Instead of telling me that Rainbow Dash likes milk, show me that Rainbow Dash likes milk. Give me the evidence and allow me to reach the conclusion myself. Then you get to employ connotative and emotionally charged works that paint the scent and evoke feeling in the heart of the reader.
-Rainbow Dash drained the glass of milk then released a quick, satisfied sigh and a quipped smile.-
I'm not a great writer - go talk to flutterdash1 if you'd like evidence - but with this sentence you can reach the conclusion that Rainbow Dash likes milk rather then sit there and have me tell you about it. By showing the audience what is happening you will improve your work immensely. What will really stick with the reader is how the story made them feel, not what happened. All emotion caused by participating in stories stems from how you choose to convey information - what words you pick, how you structure it, etc. Give us emotional charged events, show us what is happening and we will actively search for meaning and conclusions.
At the end of the day, "Breaking the Barrier" is by no means bad. It's competent, fairly unique and has a few neat-o ideas in it's head, but it needs to trim the fat and learn how to present itself. It's got a lovely personality buried behind all the boredom, but I'm not going to bed with it. It's like a walk thru the park being decimated by heat, humidity and a robbery where the mugger isn't even enthusiastic enough to beat the shit out of you. It's like sitting in a decent history class when you've gone without sleep for 30 hours. It's like eating food from Dragacane's Mystery Chinese Food Restaurant; It's not going to give you explosive diarrhea but you'll forget all about it in about 30 minutes.
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First off, thank you for typing up such an insanely long review. I can't imagine that it took a short amount of time; so again, thank you.
With that said, let's dive right into this, shall we?
Don't sweat it. I've had a fucked up sleep schedule for the past two years, so I know a bit of what that's like.
It's funny, I actually had some delusions that this might be one of the first stories to get a favorable review.
But hey, for my first pony story I'll certainly take "alright" over "Dear sweet Jesus what the hell is this".
Hmm, I tried to make it apparent that the dream that she originally had pushed her to learn more about aerodynamics, in addition to practising more, and from there she decided to go to space since a lack of atmosphere makes things easier when you're trying to go fast.
Of course, this was all told in roughly four and a half pages, so I should probably expound on her motivations a bit.
OC development has always been a weak spot of mine, and I see that it shines through in this story. It's good to know that it isn't too much of a detriment here though.
Want to know the sad part? The nariation is very similar to how I "speak" in my head.
I was a bit worried that this might be the case, but I didn't know the extent of the issue until now.
Well shit. There goes my idea for chapter 10....
I will be doing the latter, at some point. When I write third-person, It tends to devolve into a bunch of floating, faceless, uncharacterized talking heads.
If you can, do you think you could give me any specific instances where you had to backtrack? It would make it easier to pinpoint what to change if I knew.
Alrighty then. Note to self: work on spicing up the perspective and 'showing'.
Like I said somewhere above, for my first pony fic I think I did a tolerable job, and think I'm getting the same vibe from this review. Not great, not terrible, and with plenty of room for improvment.
At some point, I'm going to slowly go through each chapter and rework quite a few things. Namely how the narration is structured and worded. Probably between the end of next month and when I actually finish writing it.
Once again, I can't thank you enough for taking the time to write out that review. It highlighted quite a few areas that I didn't know I was lacking in, and was also a joy to read.
Wait, why didn't you tell me you uploaded this already? I might have sent some views your way.
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you're quite welcome for the review, friend. i enjoy making them.
the part i backtracked on that really sticks out in memory is Rainbow Dash's transition from merely being interested in aerodynamics to building a rocket prototype. it's all about finding a sweet spot between going not-so-slow as to bore the reader and not-so-fast as to confuse them.
as for OC character development, i'd say have a firm grip on who that character is and why they need to be in the story. if it's just to move the plot forward, then they're a plot device. if they're trying to reach a goal, they're a character. every character that wasn't Rainbow Dash felt like a plot device. flesh out the ones that you think are important and that the audience should care about and leave the others alone.
here's some helpful videos:
happy writing!
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I could have sworn I let you know...
Well, either it slipped my mind or was never sent. Sorry about that.