//------------------------------// // Chapter 5 // Story: My Little Yamato // by Gideon020 //------------------------------// An ear splitting crack resonating throughout the surrounding countryside as the mountain wall directly beneath Canterlot burst open like a party popper. The heavy stone city above groaned under the sudden absence of its support but the impossibly strong enchantments that helped it stick to the mountain held it in place. A huge plume of ancient dust shot out of the new opening as well as dozens of house-sized boulders that were effortlessly thrown high into the air, their massive weight forcing the to bury themselves into the soil where they landed. All the while the impressive bulk of an ancient alien battleship continued to travel skyward, eager to return to its place amongst the stars. Its graceful curves silhouetted against the late afternoon sunlight giving of an aura of not only power but also beauty that no other machine could achieve. The unmatchable roar of its mighty engines easily dominating the eardrums of any creature within earshot. “Yamato clear of Canterlot mountain. No damage detected,” one of the bridge ponies said aloud. Celestia gave a huge sigh of relief as one of her major worries evaporated, allowing her to concentrate on the next command. “Doctor,” she said calmly through the intercom “We’re we spotted?” “I can’t tell for certain, the perception filters I put on were unbelievably powerful, but it would have been hard to miss that," the Doctor's voice stated. Before the princess-come-captain had time to respond to the snarky comment, a powerfully urgent alarm blared to life within the bridge. It’s obnoxious two tone horn instilling panic into the crew. “Verify alarm!” Celestia commanded powerfully. “Obstruction detected at twelve o'clock!” another pony called, not looking up from his monitor. A quick glance out the forward window confirmed the alarm as the huge snow-capped peak of the mountain opposite Canterlot quickly filled the windows. “Raise elevation angle to thirty-five degrees! Activate primary engine!” Twilight nodded nervously as she turned back to her controls, the mess of levers and switches starting to become a little daunting to the small unicorn. Wrapping her hooves around the large Y-shaped yolk she pulled back hard, forcing the Yamato's bow skyward. As soon as the navigation ball hit the desired angle her left hoof shot down to the large dual lever throttle. This time her efforts were put on the larger bottom throttle control, sliding it forward along its tracks. Instead of the previous kick she had felt this time her efforts were greeted with nothing. “Primary engine not responding!” Apollo called from the left. “Doctor!” Celestia cried. “The engine is fine; it's the thruster!” was the response. The blood drained from Twilight's face as the Yamato continued to approach the foreboding mountain rapidly. “Won’t we just blast through it like we did before?” Rainbow Dash asked frantically. “Not a solid mountain!” a mare called from the back of the room. Twilight paid the conversations behind her no mind as she tried time and time again to force the thruster into life, never once, as Dash noticed, pushing the throttle beyond fifty percent. Like lighting, Rainbow exploded out of her chair over to her purple friend and placed her own blue hoof atop Twilight's. Twilight looked up at the pegasus, fear etched deep in her face. Rainbow simply smiled as she slowly pushed Twilights hoof forward. Together as one, both Rainbow and Twilight pushed the lever until it met its stopper at full throttle. The huge grey thruster at the ship's stern suddenly coughed violently into life as the increased demand from it spurred it into action. The heater rings within warming to a healthy orange glow before the heat and pressure became too much and was forced out the back in a massive tendril of angry orange flame. The temperamental ship suddenly picked up altitude rapidly. Just in time as the bulbous bow cleared the snowy peak with just a few meters clearance. As the impressive bulk fully crossed the peak, the mountain instantly became stripped of its icy covering due to the huge amounts of thrust and heat from the ships business end. A collective sigh escaped the bridge crew, Celestia herself slumping back into her chair. “You can’t be scared of it Twilight,” Rainbow said softly. “You’re in charge of it, not the other way around.” “Deploy wings,” Celestia interrupted from the rear. “Deploying wings,” Twilight responded, eager to end the little heart to heart Dash was trying to give her. Not that she didn’t appreciate her friends advice but more so because she didn’t want to agree with it. The two huge swept wings that the hull had concealed up to this point quickly made their existence known, folding out to their full extension, adding to the majestic profile of the Yamato. Their presence instantly aided the Yamato’s climb, allowing the mighty ship to rely less on its ancient thrusters. “Wings at full span and locked,” Twilight finished, finally allowing herself to slump back into her chair, letting out a huge sigh as the stress of the prior situation left her. The dwindling sunlight cast long shadows over the ships deck. Long lines of dark shadow cast from the imposing cannonry on the upper deck crisscrossed the vessel. The luscious, flat, green landscape wizzed past far below them, having cleared the mountain ranges into a much flatter plain. The shuddering roar of the primary thruster having dimmed to a much more soothing rumble allowing the huge ship to level out at a comfortable cruising altitude. The crews brief respite was of course interrupted by the cheery voice of the Doctor calling up from the ship's intercom. “Ah-ha, That is excellent!” he cried. “I just got a reading indicating that the Perception filters just burnt out at one-hundred percent efficiency!” The ponies of the bridge crew looked to one another with happy smiles at the news. Emoting for possibly the first time since they had entered the bridge. “Thats great Doctor. Care to explain what that means?” asked the princess. “It means that anything that saw the Yamato had its perception successfully altered! We were practically invisible! “That is good news. Twilight ascend to eighty thousand feet and await further instructions. Let’s stretch this thing’s legs.” “Ascending to eighty thousand feet,” Twilight echoed, giving the ship some throttle. The mountain-shattering vessel eagerly complied and almost instantly shot skyward, only being kept calm by the insane amounts of complicated systems aboard to keep it level. “Captain, current flight plan predicts that we will pass by Cloudsdale within just a few hundred metres,” another X.O called. “It matters not, The Doctor said that the Perception filters are working at full efficiency,” Celestia responded proudly. “Were,” The Doctors voice said. “Pardon?” “They were working at full efficiency, until they burnt out. The filters are no longer operational.” “Cloudsdale on approach,” the same pony from before chirped. “Adjust course and recalculate ascent path!” the newbie captain said panickedly. “Not possible. If we adjust right we’ll hit Cloudsdale. If we adjust left the thrusters will obliterate it,” Apollo said firmly. “What if we pitch down?” Twilight added. “This thing doesn’t turn on a dime, we don’t have enough room to change now.” “Uh guys,” Rainbow interjected, Waving of hoof for the others to look, not taking her eyes off the sight before her. “We’ve been spotted.” True to her word, dozens upon dozens of multi-colored blobs flooded up and out of the cloud city like a swarm of angry wasps. Or in this case curious pegasi. The mass of multi-colored winged equines quickly swamped the intruding vessel, Each one equal parts curious and cautious of the strange craft. Despite being known for their impulsive nature not one dared to put any less than a good dozen body lengths between them and the imposing ship. They were however close enough for Rainbow Dash to see their expressions, most of which seemed to convey either, shock, excitement, anger or most commonly just plain confusion. Much how she most likely would have reacted had she not currently been on the object of their concerns. A quick glance down at the city below showed that hundreds if not thousands more pegasi had vacated their homes and flooded the streets looking up at the huge gravity-defying monster, Having not being quite as bold as to fly up and join the other, more courageous pegasi. As the behemoth ship thundered past the sheer amount of air that the massive battleship displaced was enough to shift the even larger but much lighter city into a slightly faster rotation upon the bed of clouds which it sat. In much the same way a pegasus could get a cloud to rotate if they flew around it fast enough. “Increase speed,” Celestia said glumly, showing obvious signs of embarrassment and humiliation and the wildly incompetent slip of her country's greatest secret. Thankfully the pegasi that had swamped the ship had enough sense to stay clear of the huge finned engine, meaning that when the powerful column of flame erupted from within it, they were all well out of harm’s way. The Yamato quickly picked up more speed and altitude, easily leaving the less fit ponies in its wake. The digital airspeed indicator displayed an impressively large number that only continued to climb. Soon only the most devoted and stupid pegasi continued to try and keep level with the ship as it began to ascend into the thinner atmosphere. Finally, realizing that they couldn’t match the Yamato’s growing speed the remaining ponies peeled of. “Approaching Mach one,” Twilight said proudly “Whoa what? Nuh-uh not possible. I can barely get that fast in a dive let alone something this heavy in a climb!” Rainbow accused. “The numbers don’t lie.” Twilight smugly pointed a hoof towards the airspeed which was now displaying numbers well over the sound barrier and still continued to build. “The-they must be faulty! This ship is pretty ol-” “Mach two.” A faint giggling from Dash’s left could be heard, despite Apollos best efforts to muffle himself. “No it can’t, I didn’t even hear the boom!” “You wouldn’t. You're going Mach two as well.” Twilight retorted, her statement making it almost impossible for the pegasus to reply. Rainbow looked between Twilight and the speed once more before slumping back into her chair and crossing her forelegs with an angry huff. “Captain?” Apollo spoke up, looking back towards their ruler. “Don’t worry about it, they all would have found out eventually. Besides we’ve got more important things to worry about,” the stallion said, knowing just what buttons to push to get the Captain back into business mode. “You're right, I will schedule a conference to explain later but right now... Twilight, set a course for the Moon. I wish to see how my sister’s housekeeping skills have changed in her absence.”         Twilight snorted and shook her head at the rapid turnaround of her mentor. “Aye, Aye, Captain.”