Eclipse

by IncoherentOrange


Chapter Six: Beyond the Sky

Chapter Six: Beyond the Sky

"Eclipse, engage gravity." The Skipper switched channels with a push of a button on his wrist-mounted PDA.

"Whoa, back it up, Skipper," Powell said, shifting in his seat and yawning. "How does any of this make sense?"

"It doesn't!" Kathy said excitedly. "We're certainly going to try and change that, though." Of all the things Kathy had seen so far here, that there was a chunk of the populace' with inherent ability to use magic was most intriguing. What was it really? What could we do with it?

"That will be our job," the Skipper added. "You and Killian will have to get some rest after going through the clinic."

"I feel like I haven't slept for days, Captain." Powell nodded. "But what about the, uh, unicorn?" He gestured toward their guest.

Killian adjusted his towel, trying not to think about what he'd have to go through at the clinic later. I shouldn't have eaten those fritters. "She's going to tell us where we can land. Speaking of landing, when do you plan on sending her back home?"

The unicorn had seated herself in front of one of the Luna's viewports, and the clear visor of her protective gear betrayed a wide-eyed expression to the Skipper. Perhaps the realization that they were really going to space was the cause, or maybe that she hadn't been in a flying machine before. He frowned. Had they discovered flight? What was their real level of technological sophistication? Only time will tell, he thought, and careful observation.

"Whenever she makes it clear that she wants to leave," the Skipper replied absently.

The Skipper had never been one for history, but he had done his share of reading during the journey and had some sense of what major Earth inventions had come around at what times. Their guest's protective garment, for example, appeared to be far more advanced than anything the rest of the populace had displayed. What was the cause? Why was technology like the unicorn's seemingly so rare? He remembered then an excerpt from his protocol documents. Similarity to terrestrial life is unlikely and should not be relied upon for observations, but always considered.

-----

Twilight tore her gaze from the window, and again looked around the cabin of the craft. The aliens had each taken a seat in chairs of sorts, fitted with restraints. A voice, slightly distorted, spoke in a warning tone. Looking around, it became evident that the voice hadn't come from any one of the aliens. One of her hosts, the one who wore the backpack, was gesturing toward the seat next to hers.

The chair was an uncomfortable fit, not only because of its alien contours or the fact that the contents of her saddlebags were being squished up against her back, but also the fact that she was wearing her Danger Suit. The discomfort was merely an afterthought, however: the anxiety and excitement she felt occupied her mind. What was she heading into? The alien beside her locked down the restraints.

Mere moments later, she felt a powerful force, unmistakably acceleration, far stronger than what she had felt in the minutes after she'd entered the craft. She noticed that the windows had become opaque, their clear panes replaced by pitch black ones. She'd begun to wonder why when the spaceship began to shake.

Twilight squirmed, stuck in her restraints. She concentrated her magic on a telekinesis spell, trying to lift the restraints to no avail. The words–some startled, some warning–of the aliens stopped her from trying something else. Was this normal? The turbulence soon dissipated, and she felt an odd sensation, one of weightlessness. The windows became transparent once again.

The sight was paralyzing. Her world–one she'd never expected to leave–was now a sea of green, white and blue, the view of it encompassing all of the window's views on one side. The windows on the other side showed a view of the Sun–seemingly much larger, but far less bright, from up here. The windows, she figured, automatically adjusted how much light came through. But why had the windows darkened completely on their way up?

She began to hyperventilate. Of all the things she'd expected, was prepared for, nothing could have prepared her for this. "You're a long way from home, Twilight," she muttered uneasily, swallowing and taking deep, filtered breaths.

-----

A voice, Marcus', came through the Skipper's helmet speaker. "Hangar bay reports that quarantine procedures are ready to go. Oh, and if you can get back to the bridge anytime soon, there have been some developments that you should really see for yourself."

"We're coming in." He switched channels to the pilot's. "Bring us home."

The lack of gravity on the inside of the Luna was keeping the unicorn busy making sure her various bits of gear remained in place. Occasionally, a small article would make its way into the air, and she would catch it with her power. such a power had so many practical applications, Kathy observed. Perhaps that was what had allowed creatures without opposable thumbs or even fingers to perform tasks requiring fine manipulation, such as toolmaking or other crafts. Another question begged her attention: how had they evolved with this 'magic' in the first place? Where did it come from in the biosphere? In what raw form would it take? What mechanism did organic beings like this one and the cockatrice use to activate and control it?

-----

Twilight couldn't see any sign of a destination, and frantically looked around for a forward view. As far as she knew, they were simply in space, moving into nothingness. This only made her more anxious, but at the same time it awed her, that these aliens had managed to make machines that could travel in the relative emptiness of space. How seven thousand of them had managed to live in this nothingness for who knows how long, she could only speculate.

It occurred to Twilight that the aliens and her fellow ponies would both be heading into the unknown in their dealings with one another; the aliens' technology was astoundingly powerful, and they had no knowledge of magic prior to today. Still, those things weren't the only ones begging explanation. Why had they come here?

The aliens made several more brief exchanges, their tones ranging from casual to questioning, before Twilight noticed that the view out of the windows had changed. On one side, she no longer saw her world, but a grey surface. From what she could tell, they were moving quickly by it, and this object was no small one; it encompassed the entire view.

This was their real ship, their vehicle for traversing the cosmos, the object she'd seen that night through her telescope in front of the moon. Now she wondered how long they'd sat up here, watching them. Where had they been on their journey? How long had it taken them? Where had they started? There was too much to know, too much to ask, and only a limited capacity to do so. A twang of frustration mingled with the mess of thoughts and feelings that was Twilight Sparkle's mind.

It took longer than she'd anticipated to pass by the ship, and now their vehicle turned, with the view now displaying the rear of the vessel, she assumed, or perhaps its front. Twilight's spacial sense couldn't have been more muddled. Which way is down? Is there a down? Large doors were opening on the surface of the ship, and she could feel heavy deceleration. Again, her view was obscured by their own craft's turning.

As more grey walls, these ones marked with doors, and hatches of sorts, came into her field of view, Twilight regained down, as well as up. Their smaller ship lurched as it landed within the colossal one from which it came, and the restraints disengaged.

The aliens stood as a red light lit up on the door she'd entered who knows how many minutes ago activated. She heard a hissing as the door opened, revealing a chamber she had not seen attach to the craft before. Inside were several of the aliens clad in strange garb, not dissimilar to her own. One of them dropped an instrument it was holding upon seeing her, only to receive a hushed reprimand from his (or her) immediately adjacent colleague. Their suits appeared quite heavy, white and bearing a strange green mark of three adjacent circles, with one overlapping them all in the center.

One of the aliens lifted her saddlebag off of her back, but despite her internal protests, she remained still as they went in turn through a curtain at the back of the chamber. Once it was her turn to go, she slowly stepped forward between two of the suited aliens, but was stopped by one of them reaching out to block her path with a hand. Their faceplates betrayed nothing of their features, and she could not help but be intimidated by them. One of them, the one that had dropped his instrument, said something to the other. The inflection, as she could decipher it, was one of wonder.

Twilight couldn't help but wonder why they'd reacted in such a way to her. It was as if they'd never encountered another intelligent species. Could that be so? She certainly hadn't seen any other species indigenous to wherever they were from that she knew of. A quick passing-over of her person with several handheld devices was all they did before waving her into the next chamber.

She walked in at their coaxing to find a shower of sorts, and she stood with the aliens as fine droplets of fluid accumulated the surface of her faceplate. A series of red lights, similar to the one she'd seen moments before, were lit over a doorway. As she watched them, it became evident that it was some sort of timer. Nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one, zero, nine... It was based in tens, the numeral represented on the right representing tens of what she presumed were some equivalent to a second, remarkably similar in duration to an Equestrian Standard second. Was it a bit longer? Shorter?

There was no time to run a comparison; with a tone in accordance with the timer's reaching of the alien 'zero' numeral, the shower stopped. As the aliens filed into the next chamber, she looked around for her saddlebag, to find it missing from the room. Where had they taken it?

The next chamber held what seemed to be a sort of dressing room, stark white with curtained stalls. The aliens each entered a stall, and Twilight heard several noises that seemed to indicate that they were taking off their clothing, more likely putting some on in the case of the naked alien. She decided not to do so, herself; if this whole process was to ensure that it would be safe to enter their ship again as she thought, then it'd be a fairly foolish thing to do.

-----

"What if her suit's not really sealed?" Killian asked, slipping on a pair of pants.

"I don't think we need to worry about that, Killian," Kathy replied. "If she didn't have a suit that worked, she'd have brought one that did. Who has a broken suit lying around that they'd decide to bring to a place they'd need to have one?"

Interesting reasoning, Killian thought. "Well, what if the suit isn't meant to be sealed?"

"As I see it, her outfit is just about as safe as ours were, and ours are made in compliance with interplanetary laws regarding contaminants. Yours, on the other hand..." She snickered a bit. "But, you're right, we don't know for sure."

Kathy had taken part, as had several other department heads, in the design of the crew's general purpose suits. They had 'smart fibers' at key points that made putting them on and taking them off easy, but provided a seal thanks to their nanometer-scale weaves when worn as a full suit. No good in a vacuum environment, but quite effective for atmospheric use over a wide temperature range. On top of that, its dark blue color was rather stylish. Or, she'd thought it so around two decades ago.

Killian huffed. "Maybe we shouldn't use fingerless gloves, then." The reason for the security personnel's lack of protection in that particular spot was for their assault rifles, which required a fingerprint ID to operate; a modification suggested by Killian to reduce the likelihood of mutiny. Stupid, stupid, stupid...

"Skin contact might not be the only way magic can affect our bodies, though," the Skipper said. "It's clearly a possibility, considering the unicorns' abilities."

"Oh, once we've gotten enough time in the labs, I think we can crack this magical nut. Now that we know that this isn't necessarily a biological property belonging to a singular creature, I don't think we were looking in the right place. The physics department is probably where it should be looked at now." Kathy paused briefly, then asked thoughtfully, "Skipper?"

"Yes?"

"I'd like to go back to that forest as soon as possible. There's a wealth of diversity there that we'd only begun to scratch the surface of when things went wrong. I believe that all we have to do is adjust our tactics."

Killian interjected, "What can we do? Send more men? Not split up? Well, of course, but what can we do if we encounter something else that gets us in a tight spot? I have difficulty believing that cockatrices and little blue flowers are our only problems there. Maybe we should wait until we can communicate with the locals before launching another mission. They must have classified at least some of the life in there."

"I agree with the Chief," Powell said.

Sanders spoke up from his stall. "If I may add, Chief Reynolds, it'll be a substantial amount of time before we'll be able to converse with the aliens well enough to communicate advanced concepts. While I am certainly looking forward to looking into the intricacies of their language with our guest, it'll likely be after we land by a fair margin before we can consider sharing records effectively."

Time. Time was a resource the Skipper knew Eclipse had plenty of. Sparing disaster, there was no reason the ship couldn't stay in orbit for several more Earth years. There was time enough for any number of things they could do before landing or before some other thing, but they needed information most of all, and time can never be stored. It is spent or it is wasted, and they were wasting time by being scared to leave the house. But was the risk really worth it? "I'll consider it," he said flatly.

The humans exited their stalls, having discarded their clothing for processing. The unicorn had remained near the entrance of the chamber, her intelligent purple eyes simply watching them from inside that suit of hers. It finally struck the Skipper that he hadn't instructed or otherwise indicated to the unicorn that she was to keep her suit on, or that she wasn't to follow them into the stalls or claim a stall of her own. He issued a mental self-reprimand before indicating for her to follow.

----

In the next chamber was what had been taken of their gear. The aliens watched her as she checked the contents of her saddlebags telekinetically. She noticed that one of the aliens was wearing a helmet: the one they'd cured at the spa, she figured. Did he need a helmet because he was exposed to the outside?

Twilight stepped out of the last room, and into the vast space in which their vehicle had landed, following the aliens. Only now was she able to appreciate its sheer size. Its ceiling was as high as some of Canterlot's taller apartments, if not taller, and studded with bright white lights. A look in the direction from which they'd came revealed that a massive hatch or door had shut behind them. Swallowed by the beast, she thought. More looking uncovered that the aliens' landing craft was not unique; she managed to spot several identical vehicles, and some others she did not recognize, ones that had several wheels. All were painted the same silver-grey, with some dark blue decals bearing designs not unlike Princess Luna's cutie mark. Similar ones, she'd noticed on the aliens' clothing. Their insignia, she deduced. Did they have a moon where they came from? It couldn't possibly be the same one. Certainly a peculiar coincidence.


She began to walk away from the peculiar multi-chambered wheeled building-esque thing that had attached itself to their craft at the lead of her hosts, and moved through a door into a corridor wide enough to fit about four of the aliens side-by-side. These corridors were lit with similar white lights to those in the previous cavernous room, something she'd deduced that everything in this massive spaceship was lit by. Another thing she noticed was a slight, constant hum that she'd associated with some of the heavier electrical equipment she had worked with. Everything here was powered by electricity.

As they crossed an intersection, the alien leader issued some orders, and all of those that had been on the flying craft with her went separate ways, except for him. He motioned for her to continue following him. Unconstrained by the width of the corridor, she took to walking beside him. Without others around him, he seemed to have relaxed. Tension clearly visible on his bare face while they were on the ground had faded just slightly, until he looked back at her, at which point it crept back. He muttered something before chuckling slightly, a short question that he knew she couldn't answer.

-----

Many of the crew in the corridor stopped what they were doing as he passed, not due to the Skipper's presence, not at all, but that of his companion, and watched. The unicorn would return their gazes uneasily–though it was hard to tell her exact reaction through that visor–and some would mutter some variation of "Wow," "This is what they look like?" or "They have suits?". He hadn't a need to explain her purpose; Marcus must have seen to it that their guest's coming be announced.

The Skipper hadn't had a lot of time to walk the corridors of Eclipse in the recent days and weeks; he had been too busy performing management tasks related to getting everything ready for their arrival. Usually, most of the crew would be doing maintenance tasks or going about their routines; jobs for seven thousand people while traveling the emptiness of space were hard to find, but with preparations for the great unpacking going on there were many roaming the corridors with various agendas. It would be interesting to see what the crew would make of their first impressions of the alien ambassador.

He glanced into the backpack of sorts she'd brought. Obviously custom-made to bear her mark, it seemed to only contain numerous books, paper, and writing implements. Was she a scholar? He supposed he might bring some sort of way to document his findings if he were brought aboard a totally alien vessel, but that wouldn't be all that he brought.

There was no conversation between the pair, only exchanged glances, until they'd reached their destination: Topography A. The man inside the room of significant size seemed startled at the alien's appearance for a moment before speaking. "Skipper," he acknowledged, clearing his throat and straightening out, lest he make a poor impression. "Holomap is ready." He gestured to the device that spanned most of the room; a table of sorts and many projectors.

The topography labs–of which there were two–were equipped for planet-wide observations, with the comparatively large room filled with screens displaying readouts from the various satellites they'd launched to survey it, as well as the ship's precision imaging suite. Though, the highlight of the room was where all this data could be rendered and displayed at once: the Holomap, a dynamic holographic projection device.

The machine flickered to life, and quickly rendered an aerial view centered where their Luna had landed earlier that day, its position clearly indicated. The alien's eyes widened, and the Skipper couldn't suppress a smile.

-----

Twilight circled the table. An overhead image of Ponyville and the surrounding area? How had they done this? She moved a hoof to touch a hill, and drew it back at the lack of touch. It was some sort of projection, a three-dimensional one. And it wasn't even magical? She blinked, and realized something. She could show them where they could land with this map. She had wondered how she would have to do that, but hadn't imagined it going anything like this.

Wherever she put them, they would need to have room to expand, to work and farm. Did they farm? The projection portrayed the area from quite a high point, and while she could clearly make out Ponyville itself–she'd seen it from similar elevations before–she could also make out Ghastly Gorge and the fields nearby to the southwest, mountains to the northwest, and the Everfree Forest, among other things. If she were to observe the aliens on a regular basis, they'd have to be situated nearby Ponyville. However, she'd have to be careful not to place them in too dangerous or too close of an area.

What if the Princess disapproved of her choice? She wasn't well-versed in property rights, and how would the aliens consider the land she gave them? Would they consider it not under Celestia's jurisdiction? She had no way of sending a letter, and couldn't voice an opinion to the aliens. The choice had to be made now, or so it appeared.

The lead alien said something to the other, and portions of the map gained a bright green tinge, and others red tinges. Were these locations they'd deemed safe to land in and those they had not? Which indicated which? A rough circle around Ponyville, as well as the Everfree Forest and the several mountains and hills in the area, were highlighted in red. Unsuitable? Not flat? Full of trees? Those spots that remained were those in green, and the amount of map covered by them was significantly smaller. Suitable, flat.

But of these sites, which would she select? She walked slowly around the table, and noted a spot most accommodating: The Ghastly Gorge vicinity. It had wide fields and mountains to the north, a river to the east, the gorge itself to the south. It was less than an hour's trot from Ponyville to there, and the majority of the area was documented as safe and flat to her knowledge with the exception of the gorge itself, as well as highlighted on their map as away from unsuitable spots.

She placed a hoof above the area and shook it. The lead alien looked at it, then back at her. She nodded in confirmation. Somehow, the projection zoomed in on the area.

-----

The unicorn again indicated the zone. There was their landing site. "Mark it," the Skipper ordered, to which the topographer replied with an acknowledgment. The unicorn telekinetically produced a piece of paper and writing implement from her bags, and jotted something down and put it away. The Skipper led the unicorn out of the room, and headed for the bridge.

*****

Killian stepped out of the clinic and sighed deeply. That was unpleasant. He turned a corner and bumped straight into Kathy.

"I was looking for you. How was your check-up?" Her face wore a smile, which Killian countered with a frown.

"Just fine. Why were you looking for me?"

She straightened out, and gestured toward him. "The good doctor sent me your biometrics and tissue sample data, and I've got good news: There's no traces of alien DNA or anything of the sort in your system; you look like you're one hundred percent human again, surprisingly enough." She was still smiling.

Killian's frown faded. "Alright, thanks for letting me know. You have something else to say, don't you?"

"I do. About that mission I've been trying to get past the Skipper..."

The frown returned. "That old man probably won't let you go through with that. If it were in my hands, I wouldn't either. What is it?"

"I have a list of modifications to our strategies and equipment we might be able to make use of." She handed him an electronic clipboard. "Based on observations I've made, that is."

Killian examined the display. It showed designs as well as text detailing weapons and munitions modifications, of all things. It was clear that she had been looking into this extensively. How she'd gotten the time to spend on these ideas, he had no idea. The woman kept herself busy when there was something to be busy about, that was for sure. He sighed. "I'll take a look at them."

"Great! Now go get some rest; total transformation sounds really quite tiring." Kathy departed down the corridor. She was right; he could use a nap.

*****

"Welcome home, Skipper," Marcus said as the commander entered the bridge with his companion. "There's been several reports sent in that require your attention. Has our new friend, uh, told us anything?"

Marcus had been alone on the bridge. The ship's various departments were separate and rarely required management from a control center, and it was rare for messages to be relayed to the commanding officer unless they were of importance or could not be resolved by managers, depending on the message. The last few days, however, had been anything but normal; rare and impossible occurrences were happening hourly, and any number of important issues were raised.

"We now know where we're going to land. She was surprisingly decisive," he replied. "You should have received a message from Topography A containing the positional data. Oh, I'd like those reports on a clipboard."

Several key presses later, the communications officer handed him the requested clipboard, sparing a glance at the suited unicorn. A few more key presses later, Marcus spoke again. "Ah, we're putting down there. I should contact the Geo Team, then?"

"Yes. Also, there's something everybody needs to know about this place."

"I'm listening."

"We've found out what's causing all of these physical impossibilities: this world has real magic about it; some sort of new physical force that is the cause of a lot of the things we cannot explain with what we do know."

He laughed loudly. "Skipper, are you alright?"

The Skipper didn't respond, but instead motioned 'magic' at the unicorn–a tap on his forehead, indicating a horn–then held the clipboard in her direction. Her horn, despite having been covered by the suit, still glowed a light purple as she activated her spells.

The electronic clipboard soared through the air, and the unicorn began to rotate and examine it with her telekinesis. He held out his hand, and she moved it back to him, and signed to him her confusion, in the same way she'd done before, making an exaggerated motion with her front legs and cocking her head. "Trust me," he said.

The man sitting in front of his console's mouth was agape. He shook his head before saying, "That was unexpected, but I'll take your word for it, and I think I can trust my eyes. I'll do it, but if everyone goes around calling me insane, it's your fault."

The Skipper left the bridge, clipboard in hand and unicorn beside him. She didn't appear to have any knowledge of what was going on, and watched as he flipped through some of the reports. Most departments were ready. Fabrication, Agriculture A through G, Security, pretty much all of them. Department statuses were meeting quotas. What had the communications officer meant by things he had to see?

His question was answered by Topography A's report. It detailed the confirmed sighting of a floating city, with images. The report also detailed how much it didn't make sense, but it had been explained by now. This planet wouldn't run out of surprises anytime soon, and a city made out of and on clouds wasn't overly surprising. Already this place had tempered him against surprise. He'd been told to 'expect everything and the worst, and be prepared for it' in his mission briefing, but the higher-ups, along with just about everyone including himself, hadn't been cautious–or insane–enough to bother trying to prepare for such an extensive array of physical anomalies such as those they'd found here in the form of actual magic; only observation of the star had been explicitly prepared for.

"Attention all crew members." Marcus' voice rang out over the public announcement system. "The Captain's team reports that some unknown physical force is at work in this star system, and is responsible for many of the anomalies within it. A detailed report will be published within the day. Additionally, a landing site has been chosen, and information about it has been relayed to all standard terminals. Please make it a priority to keep yourselves informed."

*****

The Skipper found himself on the bridge again, listening and watching the progress of the geography team on the surface by satellite–cameras on Eclipse couldn't be used as efficiently when gravitational spin was in effect. The unicorn had just been guided to the bridge a few minutes ago. There was little to do until they had more information, so he'd sent her down to talk to Sanders almost two hours before. Her papers were now laden with notes, from what he could see, and Sanders had reported it to have been a very productive session.

The spot she had chosen was, according to their people on the ground, suitable for landing; the ground was solid and relatively flat. It had to be if it were to support the weight of Eclipse's colony modules for a long period of time. Observations had also revealed a nearby connection to what was now known to be the alien rail network. It was roughly three kilometers from the town the Luna landed in.

At that moment, the team called in. "There's something headed our way. Flying... uh, it's some sort of flying vehicle. There's a very large alien riding it and a number of flying ones... pulling it."

"They're friendly; don't raise any weapons. Are they landing?"

"Yes, sir. She's... talking to us, I think."

"Put her through exterior microphone and switch your communications mode to exterior; we have their ambassador on the bridge, she can communicate."

"Alright."

-----

"...Here?" Who was that? Princess Celestia?

"Hello?"

"Twilight! Where are you? How are you speaking to me?" Celestia certainly sounded different over whatever communication method this was.

"I'm in space, far above you, on their ship. I don't know exactly how, but... I think the alien you're in front of has some sort of microphone."

"Remarkable! What have you learned?"

"Well, I've learned a bit about their language, and their ship is just... huge, it's amazing."

"Is this where you've told them that they can land?" There was the question she'd been waiting for.

"Yes. I didn't have any way to contact you, so-"

"Don't worry, Twilight. This site is adequate. I trust your judgments. What are you doing up there?"

The aliens were watching her intently. "They needed to know where they could land, and they were about to leave, so I put on my Danger Suit and went up with them. I found out that there are seven thousand of them up here, and it's so big on the inside, it takes awhile to get anywhere. They've been treating me well so far. I think I'll be able to go home soon."

"That may be a good idea. The diplomatic situation has become... interesting. We can talk about it face-to-face."