Rainbow Dash paused. Looked at her cards. Paused again. Looked up. Saw everypony at the table watching her, expressions blank.
“We need to talk about this.” Rainbow Dash began.
Nopony replied.
“We actually do.” Rainbow Dash rubbed her eyes. “Look, we don’t even know what — ”
“Does that matter?” Rarity snapped. “We can guess.”
“It does matter.” Rainbow pushed. “We aren’t going to make things better if we don’t remember.”
“ ‘Make things better?’ As if there’s likely anything left to make better, darling!” Rarity snapped. “Whatever happened to Equestria put it in the past tense. There are problems that make our home merely worse, and then there are problems that make it cease to be. And, I assure you, we’re not looking at the former!”
“What makes you think that?”
“Well, what shouldn’t make me think that? Unless you’re wrong, of course. And trust me, I’d love to believe you’re wrong. But what you told us when we realized that we couldn’t escape makes sense in hindsight. It made sense when we realized we were being cruel to Fluttershy.”
“And?” Rainbow Dash shot back. “Those could have been coincidences!”
“So where are we, then?” Starlight Glimmer cut in. “If we’re trapped in a place that we can’t escape from by a force that we can’t defeat, and we can’t even remember where we are or how we got here or even why, do you think that us being down here is a good thing? Do you think we wanted to put ourselves in a position of no escape because it was an idea that sounded fun?”
“Why are you asking me?” Rainbow Dash replied. “I thought you were on my side!”
“I’m on the side of wanting to make things better. You think trying to wrack our brains for stuff we’re not allowed to think about is going to help at all? I know how that particular dance works. We’re going to suffer, it’s going to be awful, and we’re not going to get anything out of it but pain. Besides, even if we did know what went wrong, would it really make anything better? Or would it just give us something to feel guilty about? Because I am so done with feeling awful about things that can’t be helped.”
Rainbow Dash raised a hoof, an objection forming on her lips. But instead of rolling off of her tongue, it hung just behind her teeth, unable to clear the distance from emotional impulse to actual assertion. She slumped in her chair again, looking at her cards.
Then she looked at the board again.
Then she looked at her cards again.
“Well, I…” Rainbow Dash trailed off. “...even if Equestria...even if it doesn’t exist anymore, I’m…”
Rainbow Dash took a deep breath.
“Maybe the game is a way of showing what happened. Or is happening.” Rainbow Dash held up her cards. “If what we’re subconsciously saying is making us remember the truth or recognize what’s going on right now, then maybe this game’s just a way of recreating...recreating Equestria. But not the part where everything goes into decline. If this is the future, then maybe we’re just reliving it while our brains catch up from…”
Rainbow Dash paused, aware that all eyes were on her.
“...The present, or something. Look, I’m not the smart pony around here, okay? I’m just guessing. But I figure that if I was some sort of weird force that wanted to show ponies what’s going on but couldn’t directly talk to them and couldn’t let them leave, then this wouldn’t be a bad way of doing it.”
“And you think a force like that exists?” Rarity asked.
Rainbow Dash shrugged. “Do you have a better idea?”
Silence.
“...Right.” Rainbow Dash looked at her cards again. “I guess I might as well go ahead and play.”
*******************************************
Triton was all the rage when it came to plundering mineral wealth. It wasn’t the only pebble on the rocky beach that was the galaxy, but it was certainly one of the most glittery, lustrous pebbles out there.
But Helion didn’t mind. They knew better than to mind that, when there were other pebbles that were just as useful to their purposes. What they chiefly needed were minerals for excavation and minerals to withstand heat, minerals which — while they likely could be found on Triton — were also fiercely guarded by the teeming hordes of Thorgate, Aphrodite and Mars-Equestrian Multinational Enterprise ships, who swarmed around the planet like a throng of wasps.
Ceres, however, was a pebble that had minerals for excavation and minerals that could withstand heat. Ceres was a planet that was significantly less glittery than Triton, and significantly easier to overlook.
Ceres would more than suffice for Helion’s Plans.
Minerals poured out of Ceres at an almost alarming rate. Minerals poured into the Corporates Chasma at a similarly alarming rate: minerals that gouged at the soil, tore through its fragile crust and bandaged the rocks around the hole to Mars’ creamy center.
Moholes had come to Mars. Heat flowed onto the planet’s surface at an almost alarming rate. But, given Mars’ current frosty conditions, it was a most satisfactory source of alarm.
*******************************************
“I’m amazed nopony noticed Ceres,” Rainbow Dash admitted. “Seriously, for it to go untapped for the entire game so far? I’m not exactly an expert on the game, but somepony seriously needed to pop that cherry.”
Rarity frowned. “Don’t be vulgar.”
“At least I’m saying something. Somepony has to break your guys’ tomb-like silence.” Rainbow Dash paused. “About that…”
“Yes”
“Rarity, how come you and Applejack didn’t say anything back there? A little bit ago, I mean. You just kind of took your turns in silence.” Rainbow Dash cocked her head. “Didn’t words come to you?”
“I…” Rarity trailed off.
“I jes’ didn’t feel like talkin’, Dash,” Applejack replied. “I really, really didn’t want t’say anything, so I tried to think about not sayin’ anything so I didn’t sound like a complete featherbrain. Pretty sure that’s what you did too, right, Rarity?”
Rarity nodded.
“I know you’ve been sayin’ that the words jes’ kind of...come to you. The urge t’speak after you do somethin’ in th’ game. I’ve been gettin’ that, too.” Applejack paused. “But I don’t reckon we’ve got t’ do that if we don’t want to. I figure we can keep our traps shut if we want to.”
“Huh.”
Silence.
Starlight Glimmer cleared her throat. “I guess I’m up, then?”
“Hold on.” Rainbow Dash raised a hoof. “I think we should try to talk out our turns if we can.”
“Why?” Applejack arched an eyebrow. “Why d’you figure any of us’d like reminders about how kaput the whole of Equestria is right now?”
“Because if you didn’t want any reminders at all, you’d stop playing. We’d sit here in silence and probably go insane. You can think that your choice is between playing and talking or playing in silence, but if we play in silence then things are gonna end up the exact same way they would if we didn’t talk at all. We’d just take a little longer to realize it before the monotony would kick in and we’d all go out of our minds.”
Applejack, looking a little uncomfortable, didn’t reply.
“We’re basically being held hostage here, girls. We comply or we’re trapped here forever. And I don’t want to be trapped here forever, so I’m gonna keep talking when I can, where I can. If you want to beat me unconscious and gag me with a mouthful of somepony’s mane or something, I guess I’m not sure I can stop you from doing that. Otherwise, I’m gonna start taking your turns for you, and how long it takes us to get through whatever the heck this is basically depends on how long you want all of this to take.”
Starlight squeezed her cards a little tighter. Rarity pulled her mouth into a faint grimace. Applejack took in a deep breath of air.
Then Starlight straightened up, slapped a card on the table and opened her mouth.
*******************************************
In retrospect, it was a bit of a surprise that Thorgate — a megacorporation whose initial initiatives had been geared towards helping the common pony — now mostly tackled work that nopony else wanted to handle.
Mining on Triton, for one thing. Colonies had sprung up all around the moon, hammering away at it for its precious resources, but none of them lead the charge as fervently as Thorgate. Where once the immoral rich had taken up ranks in Thorgate’s cities, now their cities housed legions of the honorable poor; miners, technicians, pilots, medics, whatever ponies could be used to field work that was as dirty as it was useful.
But it wasn’t just Triton that was infected with Thorgate’s fervor. Venus, too, had caught their attention. For while useful labor could be done on Venus, possibly as useful as Thorgate’s Triton enterprises, there simply weren’t any workers who would be able to stomach the long days of labor there. Emphasis on long days; the planet turned the wrong way, unless the idea of 117 Equestria-length day-cycles seemed ‘right’ in some fashion. And if it wasn’t healthy for the blue-collar ponies of Thorgate, it would certainly be nightmarish for the ponies of other Megacorporations, with their far less sturdy stock.
Asteroids, again, were the answer. This time, though, the angle mattered as much as the impact itself. If Venus could rotate the right way, at the right speed, perhaps there would be hope for the planet after all…
*******************************************
Applejack chuckled. “Y’know, Starlight, I ain’t sure that what you’re doin’ ain’t some other form of insubordination or somethin’.”
“Huh?”
“Jes’ admiring your progress on Mars.” Applejack leaned back in her chair, looking a little more relaxed than before — or, rather, on a slightly lower level of alarm than everypony had been set to minutes before.
“...I really am playing to win.” Starlight huffed. “I know my cards for it haven’t been great, but…”
“I mean, you’re the one with experience.” Applejack paused. “Allegedly. Uh...you’ve played this game before, right?”
“I remember that I played it before, yeah.” Starlight replied.
“Do you remember anythin’ about that game? Who you played it with, when, where…?”
Starlight didn’t reply.
After several seconds, Rarity started moving her tokens around the board.
*******************************************
What good was a study without a place to live?
It was a question that vexed Rarity. Stratopolis may have been the finest university that the galaxy had to offer, as far as Rarity knew, but it was certainly not complete. Constructing habitable conditions on Mars was hard enough, but building a floating city high above a vast, toxic wasteland? It was miraculous that Stratopolis had figuratively gotten off of the ground at all, much less that it hadn’t sunk by now.
Still, there were plans made to counteract this. The plans would have to be put on hold for just a bit while Aphrodite continued to clear toxins from the Venusian atmosphere and fill the Eos Chasma with necessary levels of ice.
But Aphrodite had certainly poured more effort into research than any other megacorporation, and they hadn’t exhausted their brains just yet.
*******************************************
“That said, I’ve exhausted my actions for now.” Rarity tucked some strands of her mane behind one of her ears. “Fluttershy, dear? Your turn.”
*******************************************
There were things to be said for the proliferation of Algae and Fungus across the planet, particularly in light of the ever-increasing magnetic field around Mars. Oxygen was actually beginning to linger in the atmosphere, breathable oxygen, and while merely seven percent of Mars’ atmosphere was comprised of oxygen, that was still seven percent more than at the point where they had begun.
One hundred and fifty years ago. A century and a half. Some things had remained the same since those days, of course, but many more things had changed. It was hard for the Timeless Chairmare Fluttershy to not spend entire days staring out at the stars, thinking about what had once been and what would remain nevermore.
Mars and Venus were truly the homes of ponies now. Not comfortable or pleasant homes, not homes that Ponies wished to live in, but their homes nonetheless. Out here, among an atmosphere only slowly starting to come together, clouds only barely starting to remain in shape and temperature only barely starting to rise; here, trapped in the bubbles that protected them from a still-lethal planet, ponies survived.
They had developed their own markets. Credits still flowed into Mars from what was almost certainly an automated process never quite shut off, of course, and the colonies on Mars had certainly bartered with each other outside of the watchful eyes of the Megacorporations, but it was still strange to imagine a Mars with a private sector. Mars, with a free market, with luxuries traded among commodities and with supply and demand! Almost as much as the carefully focused efforts that the Megacorporations had undertaken, it made Mars feel like home.
And if their Martian home wanted to see a free market used, they would have their free market. If Mars wanted luxuries, they could have luxuries. And if Ecoline wanted to see the free market turned towards their benefit, all they needed was to find luxuries they could not otherwise provide.
There had been plenty of animals in Equestria. Some of them had been seen as glorious and exotic, some of them had been seen as commonplace and mundane, but they were all animals nonetheless. Through carefully kept archives, it was possible to see how those animals had been made; and, though the effort and resources would take tremendous effort, how to remake some of them again in small numbers, maybe even a little better than before.
A vast, sprawling sanctuary was out of the question, given the exorbitant cost of constructing living space on the planet. But if the public was willing to help fund its creation through a sufficiently flashy and glamorous proposal, then a humble and modestly-sized zoo was not entirely out of the question.
The public was willing. The public was willing to pay admission fees, and shuttle fees, and exclusive newsletter fees for “distinguished patrons.” And such was the story of the construction of a mini-dome amidst the fungal fields of Hebes Chasma. Such was the story of how rabbits came to Mars. Rabbits and other strange, exotic Equestrian animals that one could only find at the Intercorporate Flutterport Zoo: dogs, cats, owls, tortoises…
*******************************************
“I hadn’t thought you could exploit Martian sponsorship to enhance the profit of your late-game zoos,” Rarity mused. “That was very cleverly done, Fluttershy.”
Fluttershy beamed. “Th-thank you…”
“I imagine it’d be nice for folks to get t’see common sorts of things like they’d never seem ‘em before.” Applejack sighed. “Good gravy, it’s been a real long time since the game started, hasn’t it? A hundred an’ fifty years…”
“I don’t imagine that there’s anypony left alive who lived in Glimmeropolis after it was first built.” Starlight sighed. “Definitely not anypony who originally started building things up here.”
“Except for us,” Rainbow Dash added.
“I guess.” Starlight paused. Then she blinked a little bit harder than before and chewed on her lip, brow furrowing ever so slightly in deep thought.
“...Something on your mind, Starlight?” Rainbow Dash probed.
“Nothing. Nothing I want to jump to a conclusion about before I think about it a little more.” Starlight shook her head. “I’m not saying ignore me, I’m just saying give me a bit of time.”
Rainbow Dash sighed. “I...okay. If you say so.”
“I do.”
“Right.” Rainbow Dash scratched her neck. “So, uh. I guess it’s Applejack’s turn, then?”
*******************************************
The drive for animals didn’t just stop at zoos. The private sector was an insatiable critter, just as it had been all them years back. When ponies found a thing they wanted, they’d go lengths and lengths just t’find it. And now that they knew they wanted animals…
It wouldn’t be an easy process. Heck, as far as processes went, it was basically a break-even task for Applejack’s group to get everythin’ set up, which meant that what they did would be more of an...al-true-is-tick...affair than anythin’ else.
But was the process worth it? Heck yeah, it was worth it. Sure, maybe only th’ very, very rich ponies on Mars could afford pets, but at least some pets could be had at all. Havin’ a half dozen dogs in homes around the planet was still better’n no dogs at all, an’ if the dog-makin’ process could be made cheaper, than...who knows? Mebbe there’d be as many folks with pooches as those who wanted ‘em.
It weren’t a dream for makin’ the planet Mars better, but it couldn’t hurt to start dreamin’ for somethin’ better’n just fungus an’ ice.
*******************************************
Rarity smirked. “I can’t tell if that’s a jab at me or not, dear.”
“Nah, it weren’t.” Applejack grinned. “Fungus is better’n dirt if you can’t use dirt to breathe, an’ ice is better’n no ice if you ain’t about to drown or get the chills. But don’t tell me you wouldn’t like to have a pet with you if you were livin’ on Mars.”
Rarity paused. “I...I guess it wouldn’t be bad to have Opal with me. There, or... or here.”
Silence settled.
“I.” Fluttershy’s voice took on a hard edge. “I think I want to keep playing instead of thinking about what might have happened to all my animal friends.”
Rainbow Dash nodded and looked back at her cards.
*******************************************
The free market had come back to Mars. With it, of course, came Competition.
Helion was no stranger to competition. None of the megacorporations were; by definition, they were born into an economic war, fought for all their lives to get every last bit that they could, and would not and could not rest until every last one of their rivals had been crushed under hoof.
It had been strange to think of the other megacorporations almost as friends while they tended to Mars together. It was not the truth, truly, and their actions had not entirely been peaceful toward each other. But something about the last thirty years seemed to have awoken the powerful beast of commerce inside the hearts of Martian ponies, and it spread ever upward into the very hearts of the five core Chairponies of the new world.
Helion would not be left out of that battlefield. Helion would not let itself fall by the wayside. And so Helion began to boost its trade fleets drastically, in numbers and in security, and made a move on intercolonial trade. The kickbacks to Flutterport would be worth having the space necessary to get delivery after delivery sent to New Manehattan and the city in Noctis Labyrinthus — now colloquially referred to as Noctis City — in precedence over the fleets of the other megacorporations. And with the uptick in trade came all sorts of wonders: minerals, independent contracts, precious, precious ice…
*******************************************
Rarity arched an eyebrow “Are you deliberately cutting in on my aquatic operations, Rainbow Dash? Should I take this as a declaration of economic war?”
“It’s a declaration of me wanting to have some money,” Rainbow Dash huffed. “Look, since apparently our ‘donations’ are just meaningless numbers artificially being pumped into our companies by some kind of super-old program somewhere in Equestria, it wouldn’t hurt to actually get ahead in the part of economics where money actually means something. You’ve got your whole cloud college and all its tuitions, Fluttershy’s got her zoo, Applejack’s got her designer pets and Starlight is being Starlight. I need a piece of the action too, y’know?”
“Oh, I’m sure you’ll be getting pieces of the action soon enough, Rainbow Dash.” Rarity sniffed. “There are still all sorts of asteroids practically begging to be crashed into Mars, and I suppose that if one of them were to be crashed too close to a colony, it couldn’t be helped…”
“You wouldn’t dare.” Rainbow Dash sat up in her seat a little. “Are you declaring actual war?”
“Oh, goodness, no.” Rarity waved a dismissive hoof in the air. “Just considering my options. I wouldn’t want to do anything that might result in somepony getting hurt, after all!”
Starlight’s brow furrowed again as she leaned over the table.
*******************************************
All the wealth in the world could not make ponies moral. Wealth did not beget morality. Try as the megacorporations might to make sure that everypony was happy, there would always be ponies who would not be happy unless they brought misery to others.
This wasn’t just true of the “free” colonists who lived on Mars, no; it was true of all the ponies who worked directly for the megacorporations in some capacity, from the lowest lows to nearly the highest highs. Punishment was always a question: fees seemed not to deter some folks who could easily recoup their losses, while capital punishment was viewed as cruel and totalitarian. Many ponies espoused that imprisonment was sufficient punishment for the lowest of ponies, but where was there space for prisons? On Mars? Surely not - that space was needed for spreading greenery, water and noble ponies, not crooks.
But the answer was never on Mars. Callisto, though — that was a rock in the endless black sky with plenty of space to go around. That was a rock with ice and minerals that could be put to use; perhaps not in the quantities that places like Triton or Ceres had, but enough to keep hooves busy. Hooves, guided to the point of near collapse, watched over by wardens with sufficient numbers and weapons to deter any sort of insurrection. Hooves which other Megacorporations would be more than happy to contribute their criminal element to, and who would likely be willing to pay heavy fines to see their problems put to work, far, far away from where they’d ever have to see said problems again.
Of course, this wasn’t a matter of the bottom line. Insofar as public relations went, anyway, it wasn’t a matter of the bottom line. But if it was possible to turn a substantial profit while drastically curtailing crime among the colonies on Mars, then wouldn’t that be for the best for everypony?
*******************************************
Applejack snorted. “I reiterate: I admire your progress on Mars.”
“Are you telling me that the planet’s problems with crime are just going to go away if I don’t do anything?” Starlight shrugged. “I’m trying to be a good pony here. Crime isn’t good.”
“An’ that hefty income per turn bonus you just trawled in is?” Applejack smirked.
Starlight rolled her eyes. “Shush. Stop trying to make me feel bad about doing good things that happen to benefit me.”
“An’ that whole thing about back-breakin’ labor that you hinted at?”
“A fitting punishment for terrible deeds and part of the price of progress.” Starlight pointed a hoof at Rarity. “Is this because you decided to stop making fun of what Rarity does? You had to go and find yourself another target for your disingenuous assertions?”
“Calls ‘em like I sees ‘em. Rarity was bein’ Rarity-like...no offense, Rarity.”
“None taken.”
“And now you’re goin’ and bein’ all Starlight-like.” Applejack concluded. “No offense.”
“No offense to what?” Starlight fired back. “I don’t even know what that means!”
Applejack smirked. “You don’t think settin’ up conditions for a group of poor ponies t’work themselves half to death for the sake of an overlord and heavily punishin’ dissenters don’t sound mighty familiar to you at all, Starlight?”
Starlight blinked, looked down at her cards and went slightly pale.
“Relax, Starlight.” Applejack chuckled. “I think if you were goin’ the full nine yards on that whole regression thing, you’d prolly go an’ change your mane back to th’ way it used to be. So if you’re plannin’ on gettin’ a manecut out of nowhere, give us a bit of a heads up, okay? But other than that…” Applejack reclined back. “Rarity? Wanna show Starlight how to not be an evil villain?”
Rarity chuckled and redistributed her funds. “With pleasure, dear.”
*******************************************
The University of Aphrodite-Stratopolis needed more room. It needed more room for its teachers to take up even tiny residences by its classrooms, it needed more room in its classrooms to properly conduct studies and experiments, it needed more room to collect and host all of its notes in huge private databanks and vast public libraries alike, it needed more room for its students to come and go from classes, it needed more room for maintenance and maintenance supplies and equipment and administrators and resources…
It needed more room for everything. It needed to figure out how to outsource some of that insatiable demand for more and more room.
One solution was initially expensive, yet fittingly simple: public transportation. Not free public transportation, of course, but more than enough public transportation to ferry ponies from the docking bays of Stratopolis throughout its city and all over the University of Aphrodite-Stratopolis campus and back again. With this, traffic of all sorts would ease up, encouraging ponies in the city proper to not loiter around campus while waiting for private ways to return home. And, once proper facilities were established to increase the campus size, it would help carry all of the University of Aphrodite-Stratopolis’ most important resource — ponies — where they needed to go, and help the lifeblood of the university and city flow properly again.
*******************************************
“And that,” Rarity concluded, “is how you defy expectations.”
“Except for the bit where you charged a buncha money for somethin’ that coulda been free.” Applejack pointed a hoof at Rarity. “An’ don’t tell me you can’t afford things like that.”
“Well, I can afford them now.” Rarity huffed. “But that doesn’t mean I have enough money for all of my good intentions. Or would you rather I not set up public projects that would better everypony simply so that I could make a few institutions a little cheaper? Are you willing to cover all the transportation fees for me, right now, out of your personal accounts?”
Applejack fell silent.
“Thought so.” Rarity turned to Fluttershy. “Fluttershy, dear — your turn.”
*******************************************
The ponies of Equestria might have said that building a city in a volcano was a silly idea.
But if they did, they were probably thinking of active volcanoes. Inactive ones were an entirely different matter. And besides, it wasn’t as if Ecoline’s ponies were actually living inside-inside a volcano.
Lava tubes were an entirely different manner. Assuming there wasn’t any more runoff to be worried about — and Ecoline’s researchers made very, very sure that it wasn’t the case — building inside pre-carved areas with very stable surroundings and a surprising amount of protection from fluctuating temperatures and cosmic radiation wasn’t just a passable idea, it was a good idea.
Admittedly, the issue among Ecoline’s exploration and terraforming crews wasn’t realizing that lava tubes were good places to live in. The problem was finding them in the first place, and Ecoline hadn’t wanted to poke around the volcanoes that Aphrodite had claimed were part of a natural preserve.
But Ecoline’s legal team came to the swift and well-backed conclusion, shortly after lava tubes were discovered near where the natural preserve was, that the subterranean territory of Arisa Mons bore no legally significant relationship to the surface territory of Pavonis Mons.
Ponies, like mosses and lichens, needed to grow. Fluttersborough gave them a perfect place to do it.
*******************************************
“...and I’ll be spreading some greenery over by Flutterport, too.” Fluttershy looked up at Rarity. “I-I mean, is...if you don’t want me to do that, um…”
“Shush. Nothing of the sort.” Rarity chuckled “I wasn’t exactly using that land, anyway. Getting upset over somepony else using it would be rather gauche.”
“Just wanted to make sure.” Fluttershy looked down at the board, smiling. “I...I like to imagine ponies living there, anyway. All snuggled up in their dens like sleepy animals during winter…”
Fluttershy paused, then looked up at Rarity.
“Um...do you think anypony might be, um, in burrows of their own? In Equestria? I mean, i-if it can happen here…”
“Floating cities can happen on Venus, dear. Colonies can exist on far-off planets. But…” Rarity sighed. “I’m sure that the ponies on Mars would have found any ponies in Equestria that were in their burrows that could be helped.”
“Oh.” Fluttershy looked down at her cards again and fell silent.
And, at that moment, something sparked in the back of Rainbow Dash’s mind. An idea, like a flickering ember; but the ember grew hotter with every second, glowing brighter and brighter until it rekindled itself into a roaring flame.
Rainbow Dash raised her hoof “...Y’know, this is gonna be a dumb question, but, uh…”
“There ain’t any dumb questions,” Applejack fired back. “Just dumb question-askers.”
Rainbow Dash snorted. “Okay, no, but seriously, uh...what’s Mars?”
Starlight Glimmer blinked. “Uh, Rainbow Dash, have you been tuning out this entire game? We’ve been playing on — ”
“Yeah, I know, the name of the game has Mars in it. We’ve been playing on a board representing Mars, doing stuff involving Mars. But, like, can anypony here remember a planet called Mars that you learned about while you were in Equestria?”
Silence.
“Well, I…”
“Yeah. I mean, I’m not an astronomy expert, but seriously — Mars? Venus? Triton? Those don’t sound like the sort of names we’d use, guys. Those aren’t pony names.”
“I…” Starlight Glimmer raised a hoof; it hung in the air, waiting to be accompanied by a question that never came. “...You do realize that language changes over time, right? That the names for things don’t always stay the same or mean the same thing?”
“I do.” Rainbow Dash grinned. “So that probably means that this Mars, this Venus, this Triton stuff — that probably means it’s not from right now, right. And by now, I mean the present day.”
Applejack rubbed her forehead. “That ain’t exactly surprisin’, y’know. If we’re supposed to be thinkin’ that what happened to Equestria, y’know, already happened, then…”
“Then this is all way, way in the future. So unless something really weird is going on, we’re basically...we’ve been here for a while, huh?”
“Or we aren’t in Equestria,” Fluttershy mumbled.
Four heads swiveled to look at her. Fluttershy, in turn, was peeking over her cards to stare at Starlight Glimmer.
“I mean, um. S-starlight, you’ve...you went to a different world with Sunset Shimmer, right? So maybe this is, um...this is an entirely…”
“Somewhere entirely outside of the Equestria that we know?” Starlight shrugged. “Maybe, but that doesn’t explain why this other place has places like Equestria with names like Equestria, then, since Equestria doesn’t really sound anything like Triton or Ceres or whatever. Unless this place is just a jumbled mishmash of here and there and elsewhere all smashed together…”
Rainbow Dash groaned. “At this point, I almost want to stick with the future idea. If it’s true, it means that figuring this out should be a lot more coherent. We’d actually be able to finish learning what we need to learn before this game ends.”
“Um.” Fluttershy’s voice dropped to just a hair above a whisper. “...what happens if we don’t, um, figure everything out before that...it…”
The table fell silent.
Four seconds passed. Seven. Ten.
Rainbow Dash took a deep breath. “We need to keep playing.”
“Are you insane?” Starlight snapped. “Did you not hear what Fluttershy just said?”
“What, that possibly something bad happens if we don’t get out of here before the game ends? Yeah. So what do we have to lose if we keep playing until we’re almost done? We’ll probably learn more than we do right now once we get closer, and maybe we’ll get a better idea about which idea is correct, on top of everything else we don’t know.”
Applejack arched an eyebrow. “And you think everything’ll be alright if we get close to finishin’ an’ then just stop?”
“Do you have any reason to believe it won’t?” Rainbow Dash fired back.
Applejack fell silent.
“Right.” Rainbow Dash took another deep breath. “We should keep going. At least until we’re closer to the end. Then we can stop. Okay?”
Applejack sucked in a mouthful of air between her teeth. “I don’t like it, Dash. I don’t got a reason to agree with you.”
“So, what, we’re just gonna wait?”
“No. ‘Cause I want to know how this all ends, too. But I ain’t doin’ it ‘cause I think you got a bright idea. You wanna convince somepony that you’re doin’ the smart thing, convince yourself that you got an actual idea outside of ‘maybe we’ll think of somethin’ else’ first. Then I’ll be all ears. Until then…” Applejack trailed off, stared down at her cards, moved a few of her tokens around the board and set her cards down. “I’m done.”
Rainbow Dash blinked. “You aren’t gonna say anything?”
“Why should I? All I did was develop my microbe structures an’ end my turn. There ain’t no point in talkin’ when you ain’t got nothin’ to figure out from it, ‘less you want to learn about how all the little squirmy critters in your body an’ on the land can make different things happen.”
Rainbow Dash gritted her teeth. “That’s not helpful.”
“It gets us closer to the end. That’s what you want, isn’t it? ‘We have to keep goin’ ’ an’ all that. Well, I’m goin. You best be goin’ too. Let’s go until we can’t no more.”
Rainbow Dash looked down at her board. “But all I can do is manage my heat production. I’m not gonna get anything useful out of that.”
“Then do it.” Applejack stood up and waved a hoof at the pitch-black train windows. “Everypony, get all the useless junk stuff you gotta do before your turns end, then we’ll start another one. I don’t wanna waste my time listenin’ to ponies prattle on about heat production or psychrophile generation or anythin’ else that’s useless. We talk about the important stuff on our turns, an’ we think when we’re not doin’ anything, okay? I don’t wanna waste time on improv theater junk.”
Rainbow Dash glared at Applejack. Applejack glared back.
“...Fine,” Rainbow Dash replied. Without another word, she finished moving tokens around on her board and set her cards down. Starlight Glimmer, Rarity and Fluttershy followed in silent, somber procession.
The starting player token was passed clockwise, and the game continued.