Life continued to spread. Algae and Fungus continued to paint the rusty soil in shades of green. Water, fresh from the Unaging Chairmare Rarity’s everflowing aquifers, continue to enrich the soil and continued to promise a future full of rivers and lakes and oceans and honest-to-goodness rain.
Yet, Aphrodite — and by extension, Rarity — struggled to bring the world the beauty it deserved. Not out of lack of desire, no; there was desire abundant in every worker in the company, from the lowest temp to the highest financial officer. Not out of lack of creativity, no; Mars was the new muse, a constant muse, and it sang to them in the language of memories past and visions of the future. From their memories and what little nostalgia remained, the legacy of Equestria would endure forevermore.
But all of this was brought low by one vexing irritation, and that irritation was money.
Was Aphrodite getting the funding it deserved? Of course it was. It had accomplished much, to enrich the planet and bring beauty in ways both obvious and subtle. It was rewarded with what it deserved, which was to say more than that of any of its competitors.
Was the funding it deserved enough funding?
No. No, it wasn’t. It wasn’t nearly enough.
There were projects to be planned, of course - projects in abundance. Aphrodite had a surfeit of options, all of them glorious, all of them truly beneficial to the ultimate fate of Mars. And almost all of them were far, far too expensive for Aphrodite’s needs.
They needed to secure more funding, any way it could. And the only affordable answer, the only one they could grasp, lay not within Mars at all.
It was Venus that called to Aphrodite, now. Venus, as a potential second home to be planned for some inordinately distant part of the future. Perhaps ambitions were that great, to create two new Equestrias instead of one. Perhaps desperation sang louder than practicality. Perhaps curiosity had simply turned into morbid obsession. Regardless, there was one answer available to Aphrodite, and they took to it with none of the passion Aphrodite was known for and all of the diligence it required.
The unwanted gases, after all, would not disperse themselves. Perhaps they could learn something from all this, in some far stranger future. There was always hope.
And, though the Unaging Chairmare Rarity was wise in many things, she failed to see any mirth in the similarity between the name of her beautiful corporation and the name of its ugly task.
*******************************************
Applejack leaned back in her seat. “Can’t say I was expecting that.”
Rarity tilted her head. “What, that I’d run out of money? I’ve been spending rather extravagantly over the past couple of turns, dear. Besides, I’m going to need quite the surfeit of capital if I’m to see some of my other projects funded.”
“Ain’t talkin’ about that.” Applejack readjusted her hat. “I’m talkin’ about how you went an’ almost criticized yourself back there. I didn’t figure that was possible.”
Rarity arched an eyebrow. “And what’s that supposed to mean?”
“Just that you’ve been talkin’ a lil’ bit full of yourself, that’s all. What with beautiful this an’ perfect that an’ all your whatever.”
“Girls, perhaps we should just calm down?” Starlight interjected, scooting over to the side of her booth and standing up in the aisle. “Maybe we can take a breather from this for a bit. Stretch our legs, apologize to each other — ”
“I am not apologizing to that...to that cad!” Rarity shrieked. “Not for anything! But I do expect your apology in full, Applejack!”
“What, for speakin’ the truth?” Applejack snorted. “That was supposed to be a compliment. You ain’t got to twist it back at me, ‘less you’re itchin’ for a fight.”
“Um.” Fluttershy mumbled. “M-maybe I should, um, take my turn?”
Starlight shrugged as Applejack and Rarity continued to bicker. “Sure, whatever.”
*******************************************
Ecoline, too, had run into its share of troubles with money. They were never as prosperous as Aphrodite, even on their best of days, and Ecoline felt a most uncomfortable contraction even as Martian greenery expanded: the contraction of their budget.
Still, there was always funding to be found in raising plants, even those that barely qualified as sustenance even after heavy treatment. Ecoline had made its pitch to the United National Mars-Equestrian initiative that, with an increase in funding, they would be able to make use of the uniquely fertile conditions inside the depths of the Noctis Labyrinthus to grow their algaes and funguses at an even faster rate. It would have to do, for now, until Ecoline had more money and better plans.
*******************************************
Fluttershy concluded her narrative, saw that Applejack and Rarity were still arguing with each other, and cringed. “Um. A-Applejack? It’s, um, it’s your turn.”
“Whatever.” Applejack snapped, then turned back and launched into a heated monologue about the futility of self-aggrandizement.
“Eep.” Fluttershy mumbled, and hid her face behind her cards again.
“Rarity?” Starlight Glimmer raised her hoof. “Rarity, could we perhaps break up the discussion for a bit, please?”
“Never,” Rarity snarled, and launched right back into a tirade about Applejack’s crassness and thoughtlessness and farm-grown priggishness.
Starlight Glimmer winced. “Uh, Rainbow Dash? A little backup, maybe?”
“What, at friendship problems? I’m not the expert at that. Maybe we should…”
Rainbow Dash trailed off, staring at Starlight in silence.
“...Uh.” Rainbow Dash said. “Where’s Twilight?”
“I...dunno?” Starlight Glimmer replied. “Maybe she’s just off in some other compartment, doing princess things.”
“Okay, but that’s still...wait a minute, there should be six of us, right? Not counting you, no offense. And even discounting Twilight…”
Rainbow Dash lapsed into silence.
“Um...girls?” Fluttershy mumbled.
“...An’ if you think that I’m a pot callin’ a kettle black, Rarity, clearly you ain’t looked at some of the kettles you’ve got lyin’ about!” Applejack snapped. “I wouldn’t touch those things with a fifty meter pole!”
“Oh, as if you’ve kept your proverbial pots managed well enough!” Rarity shot back. “You and your bumpkin-ness may be content to simply ignore all the filth you’ve got building in your basin, but the rest of Equestria certainly can’t ignore the rot inside of it!”
“Girls?” Starlight asked, a bit louder.
“You say that like you know what rot actually is!” Applejack pushed onward. “You ain’t got a clue what’s bad an’ what ain’t, ‘cause you’re so firmly in denial about how you don’t stink!”
“I beg your pardon?” Rarity shrieked. “That’s quite the talk, coming from a pony who I’m pretty sure only gets clean when she’s out in the middle of a rainstorm! Do they even have soap in your backwater part of the — ”
“Where’s Pinkie Pie?” Rainbow Dash shouted.
The train car lapsed into stunned silence.
“Look. I dunno if you two have noticed, but we’re down a couple of ponies.” Rainbow Dash waved her hoof at the mostly empty train car. “And Twilight I can understand. Like, she does princess stuff all the time, and we’re not exactly princesses. But there’s no way that Pinkie wouldn’t be hanging out with the rest of us without giving us a good reason, and I can’t remember her saying anything about it. Can you?”
Silence.
“This is...this is getting really weird.” Rainbow Dash mumbled. “Like, really weird.”
“It doesn’t have to be.” Starlight Glimmer shook her head and trotted towards the door. “I’m gonna go find her. Back in a bit.”
A sudden, cold weight settled at the bottom of Rainbow Dash’s stomach. “Starlight, I don’t think that’s a good — ”
Starlight opened the door.
The train car next to them looked exactly the same as the one Rainbow Dash and her friends were sitting in, except that it was empty.
Five voices sighed in unison.
“Okay, that’s less strange.” Starlight Glimmer said. “I’ll be back in a bit, girls.”
With a bit of a spring in her step, Starlight Glimmer trotted over to the next train car, letting the door swing shut behind her.
“...Well, ah.” Applejack scratched the back of her head. “...do y’all figure we should take a break an’ wait for them, or…?”
“I don’t think it’ll hurt anything if we kept playing.” Rainbow Dash shrugged. “At least until Starlight’s turn. And I kind of want to get my mind off of all this weirdness.”
“Can’t argue with that.” Applejack sighed. “Alright, let’s see here…”
*******************************************
Now, funding-wise, the Martian-Equestrian Multinational Establishment weren’t doin’ too great on their fundin’. All the other megacorporations were gettin’ plenty of kickbacks from the United National Mars-Equestria initiative for all the good work they’d been doing in makin’ Mars a nicer place. An’, technically, the Martian-Equestrian Multinational Establishment had been doin’ that sort of thing, too. But they weren’t gettin’ any recognition for it, which was a darned shame.
Still, they may not have been gettin’ as much funding, but they still had plenty of savings they could work with. And, fortunately, there was still plenty of nice minerals on Triton to extract. Gettin’ them off of the planet was an obvious move, but fortunately the...Applejack group...could do one better than’ that.
They were smarter than a bunch of other folks thought. Smart enough to hire smart folks to do smart thinkin’, anyway. And one of the smartest ideas they done did have was investing in cryostasis. Whoo-whee, it was a heck of a word to say! But the short of it was, it’d help ponies go and dig up a bunch of stuff on far-off planets, ‘cause they could just hibernate while they were on their ships an’ stuff. Made supplyin’ ‘em for the task that much easier, which meant that many more trips with that much more cargo on it and plenty more nice materials for Applejack’s company, who were startin’ to get mighty tired of usin’ that big ol’ fancy official name that they had.
They had a few other plans down the line, of course, but that could wait for a bit.
*******************************************
“A few other plans?” Rainbow Dash asked.
“Can’t do all th’ things I want to do on my turn right now. Got to let you other folks take your turns first, y’know?” Applejack replied.
“Uh, sure. So do you want me to take my turn, then?”
“Sure thing, sugarcube.”
*******************************************
With every generation, Mars looked more and more tempting to the ponies of Equestria. Not that Mars was habitable, not by a long shot. But...it was getting better and better every year.
There were more immigrants. Desperate ponies. Poor ponies. Ponies more than willing to be laborers for the affluent ponies of Glimmeropolis, full as that city was, unable to accept more ponies as it was.
There would have to be a way, expensive as it was, to do the right thing. The tired, poor, huddled mass of ponies yearning to breathe free would need accomodations elsewhere. And, were they to prove useful, they’d need to make their way over to Glimmeropolis somehow.
And Rainbow Dash, she wanted to do the right thing. Not the affluent thing, not the fiscally clever thing, but the moral thing nonetheless. And so Helion set up a courier network, to give the huddled masses a way to go from one place to another in as much safety as could be afforded on a planet still too toxic to host ponykind. And, with the hope of the water and ice and algae and lichens surrounding Tithonium Chasma, a dome was built for these immigrants. Not an affluent dome, not a clever dome, but a moral dome. It would have to do.
*******************************************
“Not a great play, I guess.” Rainbow Dash sighed. “But if Mars ever gets more ponies on it, hopefully the cheap labor for the rest of you ponies will pay off.”
“If we build more cities,” Rarity added. “That’s a bit of a gamble, don’t you think?”
“Starlight seemed kinda enthusiastic about it. And she’s played before, so she probably knows what’s a good idea and what isn’t. If she does more of this, then...I guess it was a clever thing? I dunno. It’s a risk, but…”
“I guess it ain’t a terrible risk, no.” Applejack shrugged. “None of us really know what’s for the best and what ain’t, so none of us got any rights to say what’s good and what ain’t.”
“It’s a moot point until Starlight returns, anyway — ”
The rear door of the train car banged open.
“Pinkie! I’ve found you!” Starlight stumbled into the car, breathing a sigh of relief. “I was worried that — ”
Starlight froze.
“Wait.” Starlight pointed a hoof at the group, wide-eyed. “None of you are Pinkie.”
“Didn’t…” Applejack gulped. “Didn’t you just leave through the door on the other side, sugarcube?”
“I...I did, I must have, but…”
Without another word, Starlight spun around and barged through the back door. Save for the squeaking of door hinges as the door settled back in place, the train car fell back into silence.
The front of the train car banged open. Starlight stood in the doorway, panting, mane askew.
“No. No, no, no, no, no.” Starlight mumbled. “This isn’t right. This isn’t right at all.”
“You think?” Rainbow Dash replied, sitting up. “Okay, look. Did you see anything magical happening? Like, did anything flash? Did you get a tingly feeling in your feathers or anything like that?”
“No!” Starlight replied. “I just ran, and it wasn’t far at all, and...and now I’m here.”
“Okay, everypony. Don’t panic. This ain’t a good time for panicking.” Appledash turned around in her seat to look at Starlight, either deliberately or accidentally not acknowledging that Fluttershy had started to hyperventilate. “Starlight, runnin’ ain’t the only way you can get around. Twilight can do magical teleportin’ things, right? Do you figure that you can do the same?”
“Oh, right! Right! Yeah!” Starlight chirped. “Just give me a second, I’ll try to teleport to where she is.”
Starlight’s head drooped a little as she closed her eyes. Her horn glowed a brilliant turquoise as her lips curled in a triumphant smile.
Then Starlight shrieked, face contorting in an agonized rictus as blood spurted out of her nose.
“Starlight!” Rainbow Dash gasped, pushing herself out of her seat, spreading her wings and barreling over to Starlight in record time. Gasping, the unicorn shook her head as blood dribbled from her nostrils and the glow around her horn dissipated as quickly as it came.
“R-right.” Starlight gasped. “Don’t...don’t touch me. It’s...I-I think I can be okay.”
“Okay? You, like, sneezed blood all over the wall!” Rainbow Dash landed, but didn’t step back. “How is that okay?”
“No, like...okay, I’m not gonna lie. That hurt. It hurt a lot.” Starlight wiped her nose with the back of her forehoof, wincing as she looked at the large smear of red painted all over her fur. “But just for a bit. It’s...I think if I tried it again, that’d be worse. But I’m pretty sure I’m...did the bleeding go away?”
“You’re still dribbling blood, if that’s what you — ”
“That could just be from the first bit. Like, try to ignore the residual stuff. Uh…” Starlight Glimmer looked around, then up, squinting as if noticing the fluorescent lights at the top of the train car for the first time.
“...Dash?” Starlight started again. “Could you...could you lift me up near the lights and try to take a look in there? I know I’m not supposed to tip my head...in some direction or another, I don’t remember which one it is. But I don’t want to magic up a little flashlight under there and try to look for myself.”
Rainbow Dash nodded, trotted closer to Starlight — taking care not to step in any of the blood on the floor — and grabbed Starlight under her forehooves. Spreading her wings again, Rainbow Dash flapped upward, hoisted Starlight’s head near the lights and tried to take a good look.
“...No.” Rainbow Dash shook her head. “I don’t think I see anything, like, opened up or anything.”
“Right.” Starlight took a deep breath and tilted her head forward again. “So. No getting out of here, and no magic. I’m pretty sure those are a couple of rules of this place. And when I say ‘no magic,’ I mean that it felt like somepony was shooting a rivet into my brain when I was preparing that spell, so please don’t ask me to try again.”
“After that nosebleed? I’d certainly rather not, dear.” Rarity sighed. “So, trapped it is, then.”
“Just the four of us.” Applejack added.
“Five.” Fluttershy mumbled.
“Yeah, that. So, uh...What...what do we do now?”
Rainbow Dash flapped down, gently set Starlight back down on the floor and took a deep breath.
“...I think we should keep playing the game.”
Starlight shook her head. “What? No! That’s, like, the last thing I want to — ”
“Listen.” Rainbow Dash raised a hoof. “We can’t go anywhere. We can’t do much of anything. But, like, we didn’t notice these things until we started playing, right? We — I mean, I didn’t notice anything in particular or tried to think of anything in particular until we started playing. And if we keep playing, maybe we’ll think about more stuff that’s weird. Maybe we’ll even remember what happened, you know? And maybe we’ll be able to deal with what’s happened and what’s happening if we do.”
Silence.
“Well, uh…” Starlight faltered. “I...I don’t have a better idea, I guess.”
“...Neither do I,” Rarity admitted.
“Same here,” Applejack agreed.
Fluttershy’s breathing gradually began to slow down, and — after a few seconds — she nodded.
“Then, uh...it’s your turn, Starlight.” Dash turned, trotted back over to her seat and sat down.
Starlight sat in her seat, looked back at her cards and began. The words that poured out of her mouth were smooth and melodious as ever; but, for the first time, they seemed utterly unbidden.
*******************************************
The ponies would spread. They always did. Not just from Equestria, but from their own wombs as well.
The planet’s surface could not sustain life. There was a need for another bubble, another cupola. This was not such a tragic thing, though - if anything, it was another siren song, triumphantly exultant, promising freedom for only the mandatory price of living under Thorgate’s rule, under the Unaging Chairmare Starlight Glimmer’s guidance. And so, next to the finally fertile valleys of Argyle Planitia, Glimmersburg came into being.
But the city was not enshrouded in the darkness of energy throttled for every last drop. Thorgate, in its cleverness and forethought, tapped one of the great sources of energy in the universe - fission.
Nuclear power had come to Mars, radiant in its own fashion. And there was light. And the ponies of Glimmeropolis saw the light, and declared that it was good.
*******************************************
“And...and that’s me.” Starlight exhaled, blinked and looked at her cards again. “Did...did anypony else have anything they wanted to do?”
“Jes’ me,” Applejack replied.
*******************************************
Mars was cold. Perhaps not cold forever, but cold nonetheless. Perhaps that would change in the near future; perhaps only hundreds of years later. But, for now, it was cold, and the algae and fungus struggled.
And that was where the...Psy-chro-phile-s...came in. Bacteria helpin’ bacteria, just as the other livin’ things on the planet had to help each other to survive. Finally, things were startin’ to come jes’ a little more together than they had been.
And green spread from the waters into the Juventae Chasma. An’, finally, Applejack an’ her crew started to get the recognition they deserved, for all the helpin’ hooves they provided.
*******************************************
“That’s me.” Applejack set her cards down. “I’m done.”
“...Remember anything?” Rainbow Dash probed.
“Can’t say I do. Do you?”
Rainbow Dash shook her head.
“...couldn’t hurt to do a lil’ more, though. I think.” Applejack added.
Rainbow Dash nodded. Silently, the quintet drew cards and readjusted their income.
The starting player token was passed clockwise. The game continued.