//------------------------------//
// Emergency and the Finding 
// Story: SHIFT 
// by A_guy_from_Earth 
//------------------------------//

   Sealed door slid aside, and captain stood on the bridge.

"Well, reprot to ou…" - he suddenly paused, - "Wait a sec, where is Zhao?"
“No idea.” – came the answer.
“Augusto, Josiah, Max, he didn’t say anything to you?”
"As always, Mahmoud." – Josiah sighed, - "Neither to me, the socspec*, nor to you, the captain."
“It wouldn’t be our Zhao if he warned.” – Augusto said.
"And it’s true." – captain murmured, - "Well, to pulsar with him! Report to our state!"
“Well, we already have passed the center of AZ and will leave it in five hours. And in eight, as it should be, we’ll arrive at staging post.” – Augusto reported, looking time by time on holoscreen of navicomputer.
“And how is the flight?”
"Quiet calm, and it is well." – Max answered, - "The anomaly doesn’t show itself."
“Well, in that case, gentlemen, you may start to prepare for your rest!”
"Aw yeah!" – Josiah exclaimed, stretching himself, - "Finally, after these ten weeks on the ship!"
"Million and five hundred thousand parsecs without any emerging, again…" - Max spelled, keep looking othrough windows, - "It’s madness! Especially if you never before haven’t been outside of the Local."
“You don’t say…”
"Yup, this part of the space with rare emptiness." – Mahmoud said, - "But it was order of the Corps: fly to the 2403th** and deliver the cargo… But, on the other hand, four hundred years ago we were happy that we had reached the Moon, two hundred and fifty – that we had found the subspace, and now we are organizing expeditions to the Whirlpool Galaxy!"
“Yeah…”
“But enough of that! In the end of the shift we’ll be at the base and have rest!”
“Good old “Triangle 42th”…” – Augusto sighed with light smile.
“By the way, remind me, please, what exactly we are delivering?” – Max asked.
"How such leaky head as you managed to become a pilot?" – captain exclaimed, - "Well, I’ll reply again: we are taking the diplomatic cargo – almost two thousand things what our guys were lucky to bargain."
“Forgive me and my memory…” – pilot said quietly.
"It was rather good mission." – Josiah admitted, - "For the first time we, civilization of tenth level, made contact with twelve-leveled! Twelve-leveled!"
"Yes, these Kniyrhe are awesome guys!" – Augusto said, - "They gave us so much stuff… New ansible models, nanite immunity complexes, shift-suites, transmutation reactors…"
“To us before as to the Virgo Cluster!” – socspec exclaimed.
“I think that these lads have even more hypertrophied curiosity than we, but it manifest itself in other field.” – Mahmoud said.
“I like this idea!”

In a second after this a little motor noise came, and the last member of the crew stood up on the bridge.

“Zhao, damn your tritium, where have you been???” – captain shouted.
“You can feel the Saratov school student…” – Max spelled with smile.
“I was busy with repairs!” – mechanic answered.
“You said that you had finished all works long ago yourself!” – Mahmoud continued in raised voice.
“There was final finishing! I was busy with it!”
"You and your perfectionism…" – captain sighed and placed his palm on the face, - "Okay than, sit. We’ll finish the flight soon."

Mechanic fell down in vacant chair.

“Hey, Max, why you mentioned the school?” – Augusto wondered.
"This phrase about tritium is widespread there." – pilot answered, - "After all, its specialisation is fuel masters."
“Stop, you studied in Saratov too?” – Mahmoud surprised.
“So exactly, mon capitane!”
“Max, you are German! It would be much easier to you to enter the Dresden school!”
“The same stuff is studied in both schools, but costs are different. And, yes, I’m from Germany, but I’m not from German people. I am Sorb!”
“But it’s the same state.” – Josiah said.
“Pal, it’s the the same thing for me as difference between Lozi and Zambian to you.”
“Excuse me.”
“Forget it. Let’s relax a little.”
“We support this idea!” – Zhao and Augusto exclaimed.

But only the crew sat down again and sighed with relief when the alarm sounded.

“Is it a wave?” – captain asked discompostedly.
“It is.” – navigator confirmed.
“How powerful it is?”
“Oh God… More than twelve thousand yottawatts!”
“What??? Twelve thousand?”
“Yes!”
“Oh Allah…”
“Blessed Flatterers…” – spelled the rest of crew.
“When it will reach us?”
“In fifty minutes.”
“Dammit, dammit!”
“What shall we do, captain?” – Augusto asked quietly.

Mahmoud took a deep sigh and said:

“Prepare for the emergency exit.”
"What?" – Josiah exclimed, - "In the middle of the greatest AZ in whole Cluster?"
“If we won’t leave the subspace, this wave will split our ship and us into quarks. It would be better to have seven hours of troubles with entering, but stay alive. So, Max, get ready to escape at the nearest star.”

Pilot nodded and began the preparations. Shield was raised immediately, and in a minute, when hyperscan detected the nearest star, Max gave the command to detonate nuclear capsule before bow. Powerful narrowly localized perturbation caused the recollapse effect, and in a moment ship appeared in convective zone of the star. Shield was stable. Crew breathed freely, and pilot steered ship to surface. Driven by mighty streams, the vessel should came out from photosphere in four minutes, but before it happened, anomaly decided to show itself…

Ship’s speed rapidly increased in times. All electronics acted up. Guys got scared, but they didn’t panic. Brought together into a fist, they began to try all available methods to restore the systems. But terminals didn’t respond.

In half of a minute the ship was thrown into space. Tens of short circuits swepped through the vessel at that moment, but soon systems got reloaded.

“Zhao, Max what happened to the ship?” – Mahmoud said, having recoverd his wind.
“We moving only four times slower than light!” – pilot shouted.
“What???”
“How the heck we are still safe?” – Josiah exclaimed.
“I don’t know! It’s damned anomaly!”
“What with the systems?”
"Only hyperscan, life support and navigation are functioning as they should be." – mechanic reported, - "The rest are damaged to varying degrees. Communications are off, and main reactor is shut down."
“What? Reactor is down?” – Max shouted.

Zhao silently nodded.

“Crap! Then main engines are dead too!”
“What about auxillary ones?” – socspec offered.
“They are too weak. I can launch them, but it would take hours to stop.”
“Max, activate them now!” – Augusto said loudly.
“What the problem?” – wondered others.
"There are palnets in this system." – navigator said, - "And we are moving stright to the third one!"
“Can we get around?”
“If our speed was two hundred and fiftieth of light speed, then it would be possible. Otherwise there would be no use for them.”
“When we’ll reach it?” – captain asked.
“According to my estimates, in eleven-twelve hours, if we start to slow down right now.”
“Got it.” – pilot said and launched the auxillary engines.
“How long the repair will last?”
“Fourteen hours at least.” – Zhao answered, continuing the scanning.
“Okay then. Let’s start to work!”
“Wait! – navigator suddenly shouted, - There is one more thing.”
“What thing?”
“I made some calculations and… Well, we will approach this planet too closely, but in spite of our high speed our mass would be big enough to get sucked into gravity well.” 
“And we’ll be lucky if we reach two hundredth…” – Max spelled with shudder.
“Do we have any chances?” – Josiah quietly said.
"Yes, we have." – Augusto answered after short pause, - "But we have to dump the cargo if we want to implement it."
“Dump the cargo?”
“Mass reduction is our only chance.”
“It seems that we have no choice…” – captain sighed.
"Whoa!" – Max suddenly exclaimed, - "The upper limit of speed at which it’s possible to dump the cargo is two hundredth of light speed!"
“Well then we should to dump it near the planet.”
“Can containers withstand this?” – socspec asked.
“They will remain safe after emergency dropping, which was executed at planet with twice greater gravity and sevenfold denser atmosphere than on Earth.” – Zhao answered.
“But will conditions on this planet be within these limits?”
"Hyperscan shows that it incredibly similar to Earth, almost all basic parameters are equal." – Augusto said, looking on holoscreen, - "And if so, they will withstand."
"Hence, it’s determined." – captain declared, - "Zhao, Josiah with me will do the repair, Augusto – you’ll execute computer support and rate correction, Max – get ready…"

The rest of crew nodded and began the work. Long fixing and the most difficult maneuver laid ahead – they have to get around the planet.





“It was the last time when I believed Twilight’s words about her busyness…” – Spike thought, looking how heap of things slowly but surely grew before him, and was getting readry to become twice higher than little dragon. The smartest pony in Ponyville have been preparing another great research, and because of this she send her assistant to different places to get necessary stuff. And now he was sent to deliver the last “order” to Zecora.

Meanwhile zebra herself walked from shelving to shelving, holding list with her hoof, and looking for the necesary potions and drugs.

“Is that all?” – Spike asked in trembling, but full of hope voice.
“One more bottle according to sheet – and the package will be complete.” – Zecora answered with smile.
"Finally!" – dragon exclaimed, - "At least this mess will end!"

Zebra put the bottle at the top of heap and turned to him with a bit surprised look.

"It took me hours to do all the requests!" – Spike explained, - "I could run over the Ponyville for half of day, looking for instruments, books, stationery what Twilight needs. I asked, begged her to send other one or just come with me, but she always said that she can’t because she’s busy. But every time when I returned to the library, she was finishing her work or she wasn’t home at all!"
“What should you do – I cannot tell, but what you feel – I know it well.” – Zecora said after short pause.

Spike sighed.

“Well then… Thanks for the stuff and for consolation! I think I’ll go already. It’s evening, after all…”

Healer nodded and opened the door. Dragon took the heap and moved to exit.

He made only few steps, when sudden roar echoed through the house. Awful sound came from Spike’s stomach. Zecora looked at dragon, he lowered his head and quietly spelled:

“Excuse me…”
“Then I advice you to move your feet, if before night you want to eat!” – Zecora said to him with light grin.
“Thank you! Good bye!” – Spike smiled back and, having bowed a little – his burden didn’t allow more – rushed out.

Zecora waved him and watched him till junior librarian disappeared around the bend of forest track.

There were a lot of things in that package, but it wasn’t hard for Spike – when he helped Rarity, he sometimes had to move much heavier stuff. He became to get used to it, but his back after such acts of help still ached for day or two.

Dragon imagined how he, after returning, tightly dined and would read his favorite comics, lying in basket bed, when sudden bright light, which moved even faster than lightning, crossed the sky and left huge trace. Amazed, he almost dropped the package, but when muffled, like a distant thunder, sound wave came, the load slipped from his paws.

"Wow!" – Spike exclaimed, recovering after surprise, - "It was real bolide! Just like from these astronomy books! Awesome!… I wonder, did anypony else see it? I should tell Twilight and others about it!"

Little dragon enliveded, lifted dropped things and continued to walk, gradually accelerating his pace. In Equestria you would be luckly person if you see meteor twice during whole your life – bolids were detected only few times in a century. So now all Spike’s thought were about the meteor.

But approximately in a hour, when he was already leaving spooky forest, he felt something oppressive, even horrendous. Little dragon shuddered – he never before felt like this, – put the package on ground and looked around. Having turned back in direction from which (probably) the meteor came, he saw the reason of such sensations: there were more bolids in the sky. But these ones seemed to move much closer to surface than first one. Spike got scared and instinctively ducked. Fireballs with deafening sound wave swept over him and in half of minute later with loud crash fell to the ground about a mile away.

Still shivering, little dragon got up. It was quiet now. That noise surely was heard further than in Ponyville, but as meteors fell in Everfree forest, ponies, who saw the bolids, were afraid to approach. But Spike, when he calmed down, got interested. He decided to look at these meteorits. There was no smoke over forest, so there was no fire. Dragon hid the load under leaf litter and went to the crash site.

At secomd minute of wading he started to notice damaged trees. Bit by bit damages began more serious and hard: at first just plucked leaves, then broked treetops, after it – riven trunks. At last there was only deadwood, which ended at swamp. Rigth in the middle of this area were the meteorits – but not all of them: there were only five on the ground, other fell in bog and at the moment slowly submerged in quagmire. Spike took a deep breath and approached.

He looked closely and got very surprised: all meteorits were deformed, but in spite of this it was noticeable that all of them have similar shape – parallelepipeds with rounded edges, about 2,5 meters high, 2,5 meters wide and 4 meters long. They were quiet safe and with just a little traces of melting. Because of this it was possible to see narrow grooves, which formed closed loops.

Usual meteorits doesn’t have such features – Spike remembered this well since excursion to the Canterlot museum of natural history. If these rocks aren’t meteorits, then what are they? Little dragon, guessing and startingg to shudder because of fear of unknown, slowly walked from one object to other. Firth, second, third, fourth… All looked the same.

He have been nearing the fifth and was ready to bypass it, when he noticed a thing which almost made his heart stop: this one hit a rock when it fell down and because of this crackled. A hole formed – not so big, but enough wide to let few small containers fell down from it.

Wait! Containers in meteorite? It can’t be! Then the meteorite itself is a container too, but big and durable. This thing is artificial!

At that moment Spike got really scared: who or what made it? How? Why?

But curiosity didn’t leave him. Soon want to look closer overcame his fear, and little dragon came closer to the damaged container.

Little boxes appeared to be as simple as big ones, but there were inscriptions on them, and they weren’t so durable – a lot of containers got dents, and three ones remained without covers (and it was noticeable that those small grooves determined forms of covers). Without knowing why, little dragon decided to look inside. Two damaged boxes contained difficult machines, similar to ones what are used in hospitals, but they were broken – now it was only heap of plastic and metal components and some crystals. Texts on these containers were hard to see. Third one got big letters “SHIFT-” which weren’t covered with mud, and inside it was something very strange – dense, but jelly-like substance, what distantly reminiscet… fabric? Yep, fabric. Furthermore – it was clothing. Spike wanted to touch it. He slowly bowed to the box, reached out, but the substacnce suddenly moved and…

When little dragon came to his senses, first stars began to appear in the sky. Alarmed, he jumped up. He was on this deadwood at swamp’s end near damaged containers. That strange substance, which was inside one box, disappeared. But Spike was bothered not because of this:

"It’s night already???" – exclaimed he, - "No, no, nooooooo!!! I don’t want to spend night here! Run! Run!!!"

And he at full speed rushed back to the track.

Spike ran to the cache in seven minutes or so. With one move he flicked leaves off, took the package and ran to Ponyville.

But nights in Equestia come quickly. Last bright patches on the sky got lost among huge trees, dark shadows slowly crawled on the track.

Little dragon’s heart pounded. “I don’t want to stay here! – he thought, almost crying, - I don’t want to be in such dark place! I want to Ponyville! Please, let Ponyville be near!” He squinted and in a moment – as it seemed to him – something flashed right before.

When he opened his eyes, he saw outskirts of the town. Spike dropped the load. How? HOW??? It’s still late evening, and he’s in Ponyville! Little dragon got alarmed even more than then, at the swamp, but he started to look for explanation – only because this might help him to calm down. So, he’s running through the forest, and now with no reason he appears almost home! He couldn’t run so fast, he has no wings. Only possible variant is teleportation. Then how did it happen? There were only wild animals in forest near him at the moment, surely. So it seems that he executed teleporattion himself. But how?… Spike tried to look through versions, and one episode flashed in his memory – bog, containers, strange substance. That’s it! That weird thing helped him! There is no other posible explanation – at least now. Well than, this problem is solved. Then how did that substance made him tele… oooooh!

Disturbance and mad thoughts caused Spike headache. He sighed and forced himself to stop think about this – it’s enough for today: Twilight, who still is worrying for him, will provide new portion of experiences and will keelhaul him for such tardiness.

Spike lifted the package and slowly mover to the library. He decided to deal with that mystery tomorrow…




People, as other cultures, which reached interstellar flights level, have already known that there are not four fundamental physical forces, but twelve – seven “nornal” and five “anomalous” ones; the last group named so becausse these forces show themselves very differently in different parts of the Universe. Except already known electomagmetism, gravitation, strong and weak interactions there are informational, string and transmutational interactions – other “normal” forces – and reversing, differentiating, hyperchannel interactions and, the most wonderful, magic and irrealization – “anomalous” forces. Places, where these five interactions are active, were declared as AZes and closed for everyone – only rare expeditions are allowed to enter. Kniyrhe civilization, inventors of shift-suites, surely knew it too, so because of this they during the creation of these incredibly difficult devices (which, in fact, are nanite colonies, what act like parasites) made a lot of improvements to make them work properly in AZes. But they didn’t even imagine that their invention can get to place with so high level of magic activity as Equestria. There their creation, made to add strength and new possibilities to its owner, can give much better results. And now such powerful device got in paws of ordinary little dragon Spike…


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* – SOCial SPECialist, crew’s medic, psychologist and captain assiatant;

** – it’s NGC 2403 Galaxy;

AZ – anomalous zone.