Red is the color of Cherry Berry's life. She doesn't mind all that much.

Entry in a Quills and Sofas Speedwriting Contest where it placed first. Done in the span of an hour with the prompt of "gently." Preread during the contest by The Legendary Bill Cipher, Equus, Koren, Manifest Harmony,Vis-a-Viscera, Snow Quill, Atom Smash, Nailah, and RubyDubious. Thanks y'all!

This story is a sequel to Changeling Space Program

Twilight Sparkle's experimental interplanetary drive has malfunctioned, stranding Starlight Glimmer, Spitfire, Cherry Berry, a changeling and a dragon on a hostile planet in another universe. With limited food supplies, very little magic, no communications with home, and no way to leave the planet, they must survive until somepony rescues them.

Fortunately they crashed right next door to another creature with the exact same problem- a creature named Mark Watney.

They're going to science the buck out of everything- and do whatever it takes to survive Mars and get everybody home.

TVTropes page here! Thanks to GymQuirk for making it!

Commissioned art and fan works from the readers! Thanks, everybody!

This experiment in an updates-daily story was made possible by a generous grant from Canary in the Coal Mine and viewers like you.

(Sex tag for crude talk about sex, but no actual sex in the story.)

The weather reports said it was clear and sunny skies all day, ‘A perfect day for flying!’

Yeah right...Well, I guess they weren’t entirely wrong. They just didn’t account for some newbies getting lazy with a storm heading somewhere else. 

Hindsight is 20/20 they say, and boy are they right. I guess I should have picked a better day to fly huh?

CW - Death, some graphic descriptions and pony swearing (and some actual profanity)

Third place tie winner for the Quills and Sofas Background Ponies: Cherry Berry speedwrite with the prompt of ‘New Horizons’. Originally written in an hour and presented here with a bit of editing and expansion. 

Many thanks to everyone who commented and gave suggestions, I think it really helped and you all are amazing!

(Also there is a sequel somewhat started in the works. It’s an outline, but it’s on a google doc so I may actually get it done. Stay tuned folks!)

Cover art by me ((If you are an author looking for cover art, send me a PM!))

In the middle of the sky, in the middle of a storm, Cherry Berry acts like everything is okay. It isn't.

Written for a Sofa and Quills Speedwriting contest, where it placed first! The prompts were 'pretending that everything's okay when it's not' and 'brace for impact.' Written in the span of an hour.

Entry in the 2020 Original Pairings contest.

Thanks to Lofty Withers (Great!), Moonshot, and RubyDubious from the Speedwriting Server for prereading.

Thanks to The Bricklayer for his thoughts, and thanks to my editor EverfreePony.

Great!

-- Lofty Withers

I read brace and now I hate you for it

-- PonyJosiah13

This is a collaboration piece with The Red Parade for the Scifi Contest.

When Strawberry Sunrise was eight years old, she watched as the sun blinked. It vanished for exactly four seconds, and Strawberry knew she had just seen the end of the world. Years pass, and the blinks get longer. Strawberry loses ponies to the blinks – loses ponies she loves. And she knows she cannot let it go on any longer.

Laotyn is tasked with watching the planet down below the great gas-ship Taelo. The primitive lifeforms are unevolved, bestial. But when Laotyn looks closer, when he strains his senses to really listen, he begins to think he can hear something that sounds almost like speech. 

This story is a sequel to Dinkys New Word

After researching all day, Lyra looks forward to telling her wife all about it. Typically, Bon Bon looks forward to it but she had a rough day at work.

Dating a celebrity is hard, for both parties. Rainbow and Cherry aren't the types to shy away from things that're hard.

Written for Emotion Nexus for Jinglemas 2021.