It wasn't hard for Applejack to find the wreckage of the downed craft, in fact it was quite hard to miss the darn thing. Flaming piles of debris littered Sweet Apple Acres after it had been tore open by the impact of the strange flaming vehicle. A massive ditch was dug deep into the soil with a dozen trees either shattered into smoldering tinder.
"Jus what in the hay caused all this?" Applejack muttered to herself as she stepped around a jagged sheet of metal stuck into the ground. A mixture of feelings swarmed inside the orange mare at that moment; on one hoof she was beside herself with a fiery rage, this thing that had crashed into her home had nearly crushed her whole family and had ruined a large portion of Sweet Apple Acres. Months of hard work from all the Apples had gone into those trees. But then again, none of this seemed to be on purpose. No pony in their right mind would crash such an advanced machine just to cause some wanton destruction.
"Hello!" Applejack called into the oddly quiet night, "Is anypony alive out there?!"
Only the sound of crackling fires met her ears, nothing else could be heard from all around, none of the usual ambient sounds of bugs or nocturnal critters that would normally fill the air on the summer nights.
"This ain't right..."
With a quick survey of the wreckage Applejack found what was most likely the cockpit of the metal construct. Sparks danced around the fuselage and illuminated parts of the craft briefly, but there still wasn't enough light to make anything out in the darkness, least of all the shadowy space within the shattered glass.
Cautiously trotting closer to the glass Applejack found a new sort of feeling take hold of her: Fear
She remembered several campfire stories that Big Mac would tell her when she was still just a filly, one or two had been about little green ponies that came down from outer space to ponynap unsuspecting fillies to conduct awful experiments on them. It had been years since she ever thought those tall tales were real, after all everypony knew there was no such thing as aliens...
Then why was she suddenly remembering those old horror stories?
Applejack swiftly shook herself back to reality, right now whoever was flying this thing needed medical attention at the bare minimum and thinking about useless thoughts at a time like this helped nopony!
"Hello! Anypony alive out there!?" No response.
Moving right up to the glass didn't get Applejack much more of a view of the inside of the cockpit, bust she could confirm that there was definitely something sitting at the controls. Right now all it seemed to the mare was a black blob in among slightly darker blobs... she needed a light.
Within a few minutes of searching Applejack had found a broken tree branch to light on fire as a makeshift touch. The light from the burning branch made the area much easier to navigate, yet the heat from the flames kept licking at the orange farmer's hair a bit too much for her liking as she held it as far away from her as possible.
"Now, where were we?"
The first thing Applejack noticed was that the charred hull had something written on it, it's legibility was far too gone to understand what it once was before fire had swept away at the paint. Perhaps it was the name of the ship, but the only way to know was to ask the owner for certain.
The next big find was very unsettling and drew the air out of Apple Jack's lungs. What she had previously thought was shadows and dirt on the glass now turned a deep crimson as the light of the fire revealed it's true nature.
Applejack wasn't afraid of seeing blood, on the farm it was pretty easy to be injured, especially with some of the sharper farming tools. Not to mention all the crazy adventures Twilight brought them on. But this... This was a gory scene like nothing she had witnessed before... Applejack swallowed a hard lump in her throat and tried to keep her dinner down with all her might.
Whatever was inside that thing was obviously injured, and from the amount of blood was any indication it was in serious trouble... if it was still alive.
*~ Y ~*
Canterlot Castle stood fast in the gloom of the night, many lights shown out along the winding streets and held the shadows at bay. From the right distance Canterlot almost looked like a glowing candle even. One might assume that such a display of combating the darkness of the night would upset Princess Luna, or at least cause her to bring forth unending hellfire for shunning her element. Yet, as the ponies of Equestria's capitol soon realized that to make such an assumption of their Princess was to also make an ass out of themselves.
In the twilight a few ponies strolled along, either heading to one of the late night clubs or merely on an evening stroll. Luna watched her subjects pass along from her balcony, content to just sit there on her favorite cushion and dainty sip at her steaming cup of tea. To her she saw such innovations as electricity to be a blessing, it made it reasonably affordable to stay up late at night as before it could be extremely costly to light up a home with only candles or oil lamps. Even simple magical light stones were only used by the wealthy back then.
Electricity also led to such things as new forms of music, movie theaters, and even this machine called a "Computer". Tia had tried several times to explain the concepts and how such a thing worked, but for now Luna was content to just know that such things allowed her subjects to make use of the night more than before. And for that, she was satisfied.
"If only such things existed before..." Luna sighed in melancholy.
It was wishful thinking of course, and it wouldn't lead anywhere pleasant if she kept saying these "What if's" over and over again. What happened all those years ago happened, and nothing could change that... Much as she would want it too.
"Ughh, I'm still doing it!" The dark mare groaned and rubbed at her temples. She needed something to distract herself and fast.
As luck would have it one of her wishes did come true in the form of something moving at break neck speed across her sky. It was very bright and trailed an orange streak behind it as it burned up in the atmosphere. The object almost immediately caught Luna's attention as she felt the thing entering her night sky than saw it. She followed the alien object's flight path to where it disappeared near Ponyville.
"Hmmm, interesting..."