20.471 light-years from the Far Star, give or take five miles:
Purple Point and Sunrise Flight sat across from each other at a table on the mess decks, demolishing one of Kale’s better creations between them. Ever since Flix created Sunrise at the Halfway Happening, the two were almost inseparable. Flix refused to banish her at the end of twelve hours, so she remained alive and alert, a pegasus mare that not only had Point’s experiences, but also had her own perspective on what had happened. She was very much her own pony, as the crew came to find out.
The crew were still getting used to Purple Point’s changes, not only the red and white stripe in his mane and the green stripe in his tail, but how his whole demeanor had changed. No longer needing to maintain his rigid will to prevent a hostile takeover, he was much more relaxed, affable and friendly. There were other side effects, one of which was taking to swearing in public, no longer using almost incomprehensible euphemisms to express his feelings.
Sunrise shared her brother’s expressiveness, but taking it in a completely different direction. She was much easier to talk to and with, Point slowly unlearning his reticence. She also shared his technical knowledge, but, being a pegasus instead of a unicorn, there was a lot she could not do. Didn’t stop her from thinking, though.
“Point, I know a way to improve your pegasus training simulator in the garden. I’m surprised you didn’t think of it first.” Sunrise told her brother.
“Oh? Just how do you propose a solution, sister dearest?” Point said after a mouthful of Kale’s best.
“With a force field, one dialed down almost to nonexistence.” Sunrise told her twin. Holding up a forehoof to stall an interruption, she went on. “All you need to do is decrease the field intensity. You don’t need to keep objects or ponies from passing through the field, just the water molecules. Pegasi can go through it with ease, but the water vapor will stay in the upper half of the garden. True, over time, the temperature in the lower half will increase, but a lot slower than the way it is now.”
Point downed some coffee while he thought, his eyes focused on nothing. That was one difference between them, while he subsisted on coffee, she would not touch the stuff, preferring tea. “I never thought of that. Problem being, the fields will be so low-intensity, they won’t have much range. We will have to place emitter gems all along the length of the Park, and even then, I’m not sure if it would reach across.”
Sunrise sighed a little. While Point was extremely versatile in thought and deed, especially when it comes to repairing equipment, sometimes he can be maddeningly blind to the obvious. To get his thoughts going in the right direction, she shifted to what they called Twinspeak, a language that bore little relation to anything on Equestria, but fully understood by each other. “<Start the field at high intensity, then dial down the power from there. Once initiation is made and the field established, then it can be thinned down to almost nothing without losing coverage, you thoughtless nitwit!>” she snapped out.
Point snorted. “<Thoughtless nitwit? I’m no nitwit! You ought to know, being in my head for however so long! What you describe is good on small scale, but I don’t think it’s able to be ramped up to the scale we need for the park, brainless slut!>”
“<Brainless slut! Me? I at least know what to do in bed, which is more than you could ever do! Now, let’s get to the lab and test this out!>” Sunrise snapped back, her wings and nostrils flaring some.
“<You know damn well I know what to do in bed, because I was watching when you were doing it! Q7X field do it?>”
“<You enjoyed every minute of it, Point! I ought to know! Q series, yes, but not a 7X. A 10E would do it.>”
“<10E? A 10E will be too thin! Enjoyed it, my dying ass! It was disgusting!>”
“<Tordenkakkenlak!>” Sunrise shouted. Immediately, both brother and sister calmed down, looking like someone took the wind out of their sails, anger dissipating. The crowd watching them argue went back to their meals, knowing the show was over. The Purple Point Profanity Pool had been replaced by the Twinspeak Tirade, monitoring how many times, from midnight to midnight, the two will lapse into Twinspeak, and the Angry Birds pool, monitoring how many times they raised their voices to each other. This was the third time today for both.
The two made their way to the magic research lab, where they started small scale testing of the idea. Six hours, eight arguments, three Twinspeak lapses and one smoke crisis later, they had tried enough variations to move up to moderate-scale testing next. For that, they needed a larger space, and they had one- Cargo Bay One.
The ship had been planned and provisioned for a forty-two-year flight. With dilation reducing trip time to about ten years, that meant they had more than enough supplies on hand for just about any conceivable occurrence. Cargo Bay One had been designed to be emptied first, and the large empty space was available for use. Skipping dinner, they headed straight there, taking their equipment and field crystals with them.
There, it took both to set up their field emitter crystals about halfway up the walls of the empty space. Once set, Point initiated the field, then started dialing it back. At his signal, Sunrise attempted to fly through the field, bouncing off it. “<A little lower, brother dearest.>” she said a little sourly. Bumping into a Q10E field is a bit uncomfortable.
“<Try it now, sister.>” Point said after a few adjustments. She managed to penetrate the field, but not without effort.
“Bring it down a bit more, Point. We want the field to be just barely there, holding moisture back, but allowing penetration.” Sunrise called down.
Point brought the field down even lower. “<Something you know all about, sister dear.>” he said snidely in Twinspeak, referring to her desire to having sex with anyone who wanted it who were awake and moving. So far, she has had six bed partners, something that annoyed Point.
“<Not now, brother.>” she snapped as she dropped a smoke bomb from the top of the cargo hold to the bottom, the bomb easily penetrating the field, but the billowing smoke did not.
Point shut off the force field, dialing the ventilation up to high speed, coughing at the acrid scent of the smoke. “I’m going to get you for that, you know,” he managed to say through the thinning smoke.
Sunrise landed, her wings blowing the smoke away from her. “Promises, promises. Ready to bring this up with the Captain?”
“It definitely shows promise. I just wonder why I never thought of this before.” Point said, putting the testing gear away, pulling the crystals off the walls.
“Because, brother of mine, YOU are not a pegasus. You don’t know what it is like to make weather. I know the requirements, you don’t.”
“And YOU are not a unicorn, so you can’t set up the experiments like I can.”
“We work together well, brother.”
Point paused in the stowing to hug his sister, who returned the hug warmly. “That we do, sister, despite the arguing. Now, shall we find the Captain?”
“Sounds like an idea to me. CONN, where is Captain Path?” Sunrise asked the ship’s maneframe, which is always listening to everything on the ship.
“Captain Path is currently in the mess hall, Sunrise Flight,” came the reply in CONN’s pleasantly modulated voice.
“Please let the Captain know we are coming to pitch an idea to him. Do not let him know the subject matter.” Point amplified.
“Will do, sir.” Quickly, the testing equipment and field crystals were put away, and the pair made their way to the mess decks and the patiently waiting alicorn.
“I take it you have something interesting to propose, Engineer?” Captain Path asked the approaching pair.
“Yes, we do, Captain.” Point said as he started outlining the tests they had run and the idea they had to improve the pegasus training area in the Park.
After listening to Point, with only the occasional amplification from Sunrise, Wandering Path nodded in agreement. “Okay, you have my permission to set up full scale testing. If this works, you can pick what sort of entertainment you would like to see Willow do Saturday after next. If it fails, one of you will be ship’s janitor for a month. If it fails spectacularly, BOTH of you will be janitors. Got it?”
The pair stood in front of the Captain and saluted, one with a hoof, the other with her wing. “Yes, we got it, Captain!” they chorused before making their way out of the mess decks.
“I don’t know what I did to deserve those two,” Wandering muttered under his breath. “But I’m not sure if I ever want to find out.”
The twins worked throughout the night setting up their force field array, not stopping for anything more than a cup of coffee (or tea) while they put the crystals in place, moving any plant that was in the plane of fire out of the way first. Such consideration was appreciated by both Emerald Green and Skye Path.
Once the array was complete, Point started programming in the spells that would control the field, while Sunrise went around and carefully shut off the misters that were located below the force field. It was not until breakfast that all was in readiness.
“Brother, let’s get something to eat, shall we? I can’t go three days without food.” Sunrise complained.
Point looked like he was going to refuse, but a look at his sister’s face convinced him otherwise. It also could have been her one forehoof and both wings prepared to clock him a good three having something to do with his decision. “Sure, sister. Let’s do that before we do our testing,” he said quietly. Point had learned that his sister was much faster than he was before deciding to fight. He may be the better fighter, technically, but she was also very, very fast. A couple trips to Medical in the first month attested to that.
After breakfast, the two made their way back to the Park and the screen controller. Breaking out his testing gear and hooking it up, Point said, “Here’s hoping I got the spells right,” before activating the screen.
A bright golden glow erupted from the crystal array, cutting the Park in half before dimming to a barely detectable shimmer in the air. Sunrise activated the water vapor system, admitting vapor to the upper half of the cylinder. “How long before I can try it out?” she asked.
Point got a thoughtful look, tapping his hoof on the floor as he pondered the question. “Ten minutes before there will be any possibility of doing anything. Half an hour would be better,” he said.
“Enough time for a shower before starting. You should take one too, brother.”
“I think I should monitor the force screen stabiliGACK!” Point squawked as Sunrise grabbed him around the collar of his uniform and started dragging the unicorn towards the pond he had set up years before.
“The shield will take care of itself. You need to get yourself presentable before we show this to the rest of the crew!” Sunrise snarled before letting Point go. There was a shower stall rigged up near the pond, for those who did not want to track bits of leaves or any other stuff picked up from the pond back through the ship. “You first, so you can get back to the shield!”
“Okay, sis.” Point said quietly, not wanting to raise her wrath any more. Quietly, he went to the stall, shed his uniform, and took a refreshing shower. After a few minutes, he could admit to himself she was right.
When he came out, Sunrise had already shed her uniform and nosed past the still dripping Point. “My turn!” she squealed happily. Point could hear her sigh of joy when the water came on. Feeling impish, he went to the water controls and shut the cold water down to the merest trickle before heading back to the screen control, using a spell to dry himself.
Point had just made it back to the controller before a high-pitched scream came from the shower. “RADIANCE GLOW, I’M GOING TO POUND THE SHIT OUT OF YOU!” Sunrise bellowed as she came out of the stall and took flight, passing through the screen easily.
“You’re going to have to catch me first, Sunrise Flight!” Point laughed as he dialed up the screen power.
Sunrise headed for Point, but splatted against the screen, sliding to, over and past him on the slick impenetrable surface of the Q10E shield before smashing into a tree’s planter. “You are so going to get it, big brother!” she snorted, clouds gathering around her, white at first, but darkening by the second.
Point stepped away from the controller, eyes on his sister and the clouds. “You wouldn’t…” he said in a whisper. There was a flash, a crack and a sinister snicker. When the smoke cleared, Point was standing there, his mane and tail all frizzed out.
“I would. Shut down the systems, Point. I think it works.”
“Shutdown is not called for. Let’s keep the field up at minimum level until the atmosphere mix top and bottom match, then secure the field.” Point said as his glow turned the field down and shut off the vapor system. Once that was done, he looked at his sister. “Ground me, please?”
Sunrise flipped a piece of wire at him, grounding out his charge without too much pain. “Don’t even think about playing a prank like that on me again, Radiance!”
“Okay, Sunrise. Let’s come back in an hour or so and see how things are, okay? I think I need a cup of coffee, okay?” Point said with a twitch or two.
“I think you need a nap, brother mine. Go now or I’ll give you another dose of what I already gave you.” Sunrise said firmly, pointing a wing at the door to the park.
“Okay, Sunrise.” Point plodded out, twitching a little as he went back to their cabin. Sunrise headed back to the shower stall to shut off the water, reset the cold-water valve, and dry off. When she came out, Skye was waiting for her.
“He at it again?” Skye asked.
“We are.” Sunrise said before explaining their invention to her.
“Good for you both. If this works, we will have many happy pegasi.”
“Of which I will be one.” Sunrise said. At that second, the force screen shut off, releasing a blast of warm, moist air, as well as a layer of water that had condensed on the force screen. Due to irregularities in laying out the crystals for the field, a slight slope had formed, causing the water to pool at the aft end, where they were standing, soaking them both.
“I think you have some more work to do, Sunrise.” Skye said before shaking off the water.