It was gone.
I dropped my helmet and ran to the empty space to look for clues. Did a passing ship see it and take it without looking for me? No. No. They would have scanned the area for me. Even if they thought I was already dead.
I should have waited by the ship for a reply.
There were tracks everywhere, but Twilight and the other creatures had been stomping all over the area.
What if the creatures took it?
It was ridiculous that the creatures could have taken it, but they were the only ones who knew about the crash.
I practically ran back to the creature’s room, not caring if the squeaking door woke it up.
I shook it awake and it blinked at me sleepily. “What’s going on?”
“My ship is gone.”
“What? Gone where?” It rubbed its eyes with a hoof. It was not grasping the severity of the situation.
“Where’s Twilight?”
“She’s at the library but it’s really late. You can talk to her in the morning.”
“No, take me to her now.”
“If you-”
“Now!”
It made a squeaking sound and nodded.
We left in the opposite direction of the crash site. The creature had no trouble navigating in the darkness, which was helpful because I couldn’t see very well at all.
The path changed from dirt into flat rocks, and I could make out the shape of darkened rooms on either side of the path. The creature was leading us towards a large tree that had rooms set in the branches.
“I’m sure Twilight knows nothing about this,” the creature said quietly.
I knocked hard on the door in the tree. There was no answer and I tried the knob. It was unlocked.
“You shouldn’t go in-” the creature mumbled, but it was too late for objections.
I was surprised that this room was much bigger than the other creature’s. There were stacks of boxes everywhere and boxes lined up on shelves in the walls.
Twilight was not here. There were stairs, but they looked small and I was unsure if they would support my weight.
“Twilight!” I called out. There was no reply, so I called her again, louder.
She appeared at the top of the stairs.
“What? What is this?”
“My ship is gone.”
“What? How?” She said, surprised. I couldn’t tell if she was faking it.
“Who else knew about it?” I demanded of her.
“I don’t know why-”
“Who else?!”
“No one! Just me and Fluttershy”-she nodded to the winged pony cowering by the door-“and Pinkie and Princess Celestia. And none of them could have taken it.”
There were way too many names on that list. “Who are Pinkie and Celestia?”
“Pinkie was the other pony there when we found you. And Princess Celestia is my teacher.”
“Why would you tell her? Where is she?”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t know. I tell her everything. She’s all the way in Canterlot. She wouldn’t take your ship. No one could have. It was way too big.” Her voice was shaking and I could see she really didn’t know what happened.
This was getting me nowhere. I left the room.
I sat on the steps outside of the door and put my head in my hand. I felt a headache coming on.
There was very expensive, very classified scanning equipment in my ship. The scientists at McLaughlin Mining spent years developing that equipment, and now it was lost. Or worse, some passing ship did take it and knew what it was. I was going to go to prison over this.
It wasn’t just the scanning equipment, either. The idea of the creatures taking apart my ship and trying to figure out how to make it work was horrifying. Advanced technology could change even these small, simple creatures.
There was once a race called the Ohs. An alien ship crashed on their planet, killing the pilot. It took them nearly a century, but they fixed the ship and mimicked the technology. Their entire population took to the stars, searching for other intelligent life.
The once peaceful Ohs were psychics and built their entire civilization on the sharing of knowledge. When other races refused to share their knowledge with the Ohs terms, they took it by force.
Two hundred years from the original crash, they became a big enough threat for the Alliance to declare that there would never be peace, and that the Ohs should be wiped out for the good of us all.
Two hundred and twenty five years from the original crash, and the Ohs were gone.
If I hadn’t screwed up those jump coordinates, none of this would have happened.
I got up and started walking back to the crash site. It was still too dark to look for clues, but I had nowhere else to go.
It was a difficult walk just to the end of the rocky path. I was tired, physically, and mentally I was just tired of being tired and in pain. But getting my ship back was far more important than how I felt.
I took a few moments to breathe before going down the dirt path that would take me to the crash site.
“Wait! Wait!” I heard Twilight call out from behind me as she ran to catch up to me. She walked beside me but stayed much further away than she would have before. She was scared of me.
“I don’t…I don’t know who took your ship,” she panted. “But I’ll help you find it.”
“How are you going to do that?”
“There has to be some evidence left behind. Like tracks. Or hoofprints. And we’ll ask the other ponies in the morning if they saw anything.”
“No! You can’t tell anyone else about the ship. Or about me.”
“If they saw what took your ship then I’m not really telling them anything they don’t already know.”
“No!” She flinched at my anger. I was tired of explaining that she couldn’t let anyone know about me.
She stopped walking. “I’m just trying to help! You’re the first outsider I’ve ever seen and you’re probably the most important thing to ever happen to Equestria. But you won’t tell me anything and you won’t tell me why and all you do is yell at us and demand things and you can find your own stupid ship by yourself!” She turned and ran, leaving me all alone on the path.
I felt a little bad about it, but I knew that in the long run, it was better this way.
I continued down the path to the crash site, stumbling over the uneven dirt that Twilight was no longer leading me around.
I was disappointed all over again to see the empty crash site. Maybe I was hoping that my ship would magically appear with a message from a rescue ship. I picked up my dropped helmet to find that it still had no connection to the ship.
I walked around the site again. Close to the ship it was dirt and tracks showed up, but further out it was plants and I couldn’t find them. My second time around was just as useless. I kicked a rock in frustration and watched as it bounced into the night.
I sat down in the dirt and put my head down on my knees. I couldn’t stop the tears even if I wanted to.
I was so angry at myself and whoever took my ship. If I had just stayed with my ship. If I had just gotten the coordinates right. If I just hadn’t put off the assignment to spend another night on Bethlehem Station. If I had just passed my flight training and become a military pilot like my grandfather.
When I picked my head up to wipe my dry, sticky eyes, I saw the sky getting lighter over the path that led from the crash site. I thought for a moment that my eyes were just getting used to the dark before I realized that I was on a planet.
It was the sun rising.
I’d always heard stories of sunrises. I’ve heard stories of battle-hardened soldiers weeping and of the blind seeing for the first time. Some people say that you can make a wish on a sunrise and it will come true.
I didn’t really believe the stories, but it was hard not thinking about them as the first few rays of sunlight came over the hill. The black sky turned grey. The sun came shortly after, deep red and orange, touching the plants and trees with an eerie light. I could feel the rush of warmth on my face.
The sky turned purple, then blue as the sun rose higher and higher. The world came alive as animals screeched and chirped in the trees.
And then it was over. Quietly, like the sun was embarrassed of the majesty it had just unfolded.
I’d spent the night crying and angry, but I was done now. The sun rose, bringing with it the possibility of finding my ship and leaving this planet.
I got up and brushed the dirt from my flightsuit. I walked around the crash site once again, but even with the sun up I couldn’t tell what was evidence and what was a feature of the crash. There were deep grooves where my ship imbedded itself in the dirt. Were they longer than they were before, suggesting some moving equipment? I could pick out the defined prints of my boots in the dirt and the soft prints of the creatures. Were there more than there should have been?
I just couldn’t tell.
“Heeey!” I heard shouted from the top of the hill. I turned to find a pink creature running down the hill towards me.
“Didn’t’cha hear the horns? C’mon!” It stopped in front of me, shifting its feet and bobbing insistently.
I had no idea what it was trying to say. I wasn’t sure, either, if I wanted to deal with anymore creatures after last night.
“What?”
“The horns.” It emphasized, like I should know what they were. “Princess Celestia is here!”