Equestrian Space Age

by UtopiaPony

1 - The Long Road Ahead

Princess Twilight Sparkle leaned over a railing in the Vehicle Assembly Building, in her white lab coat. With it being so peaceful in Equestria, she jumped at Luna’s offer to be the mission planner for Equestria’s space program. Luna had been an ever growing proponent of space exploration with the growing interest in space among ponies, they no longer look at her night in fear but awe.

Twilight looked down over the railing, technicians in white lab coats were working on a rocket. From Twilight’s perspective they looked like white ants. Occasional the odd pegasus and griffin few close enough for Twilight to make them out in detail. Twilight sighed, she was happy how everyone was working together but things were changing so fast. Magic was being overshadowed by science & technology. The Manehattan Institute of Technology had become the most prestigious academic institute.

Some ponies called it the space age, we had already sent satellites up and planned to send more up but the big upcoming mission was sending a pony into orbit and bringing them back in one peace.

Twilight flew out of the VAB to check out how everything else was going, in Research and Development. It was a maze of corridors with engineers walking around, none took any notice of Twilight. Behind the many doors were engineers tirelessly working away on the various aspects of space travel. Twilight decided to check up on Rarity, she was working on the space suit. Rarity was not thrilled with the utilitarian design philosophy of the space agency but Rarity couldn’t refuse Luna’s request or the gems that came with it. Besides nobody else in the agency cared much about aesthetics and the thought of the monstrosity they would come up without her, gave Rarity the shivers.

Twilight walked to Rarity’s drafting table where she engrossed in her work. “Sorry Twilight, I am much too busy to talk, they keep changing the requirements of the suit,” Rarity said without stopping her work.

Twilight noticed Moondancer, she was the chief designer at the space program. Moondancer walked to the desk to the right of Rarity.

“Sorry Rarity we have more design changes,” Moondancer set down papers on a growing stack of paperwork. Rarity stared at Moondancer with a murderous look, causing Moondancer to nervously back away before walking away. Rarity turned to her desk, going over the paperwork Moondancer dropped off.

“I can see you are busy, Rarity,” Twilight nervously backed away, getting no response from Rarity.

“Moondancer, how are things?” Twilight ran up to Moondancer.

“Despite still not having a working rocket for the capsule, the rocket engineers want to entirely scrap the existing engine for a totally untested and far more complex closed cycle design,” Moondancer remained engrossed with her clipboard.

“So basically normal,” Moondancer looked up, giving Twilight a smile. “Anyway I got much work to do, see you later Twilight,” with that Twilight went into her office closing the door behind her.

Twilight’s office was filled with things that reminded Twilight of her days as Celestia’s faithful student, along with pictures of her friends. She kept in touch with her friends outside the agency but the work just kept mounting up.

Before Twilight got to her desk Rainbow Dash busted into her office.

“Twilight, I want to be a ponynaut!” Rainbow Dash said in excitement.

“Dash, one does not just become a ponynaut. It requires tons of rigorous training,” Twilight turned to look at Rainbow Dash.

“Fine, if you pass training, I’ll see about getting you on a mission,” Twilight let out a sigh.

“Thanks Twilight, you won’t regret it,” Rainbow Dash hugged Twilight and with that Rainbow Dash walked out of Twilight’s office. Twilight knew it was futile trying to talk Rainbow Dash out of it, besides she thought Dash might make a good ponynaut. Twilight went to her desk and got back to her work.

---

Rainbow Dash trained hard and there was still more training ahead of her but Moondancer wanted to try a new training method. Rarity was putting Dash in the space suit and Moondancer had to admit the suit was far much more practical then what she was planning. Moondancer’s concept was based on the bulky tin can designs she saw in science fiction magazines, while in contrast Rarity’s design provided the ponynaut with as much movement as possible given the requirements for space. Thought it was still too bulky for Rainbow Dash’s taste.

“I can hardly move in this thing,” Rainbow Dash looked down at the suit while trying to move.

“You are going to need it to survive space,” Twilight put a helmet on Dash.

Rarity and Moondancer made sure everything was airtight. After that Moondancer pressurized the suit then added weights to the suit.

“What are those for,” Dash said over her headset while looking at the weights.

“Neutral buoyancy, to roughly simulate a low gravity. It will keep you level under the water. Don’t try to swim, just pull and push yourself with your hooves. You will have vastly more resistance then you would in space but like I said it is a rough simulation.” Moondancer pressurized the suit.

“Okay Twilight drop her in,” Moondancer gestured to Twilight. Twilight levitated Dash with her magic and lowered her gently into the pool. Once submerged Dash floated under the water in front of a full sized model of the capsule. It was yellow and cone shaped, there was a square hole on the side where the hatch would be and inside room for only one pony.

Dash practiced moving around the outside the capsule. She thought it was silly given the pool and capsule were small. Dash pulled herself around the capsule with her hooves, practicing reorienting herself retaliative to where the hatch door would be. Dash finally pulled herself into the capsule, her life support hoses flowing out the hatch to the surface. The inside of the capsule was bare except the seat, it was just a model after all. Dash was not use to relying so heavily on her hooves and was becoming exhausted. She sat in the capsule for a minute while imagining flying it in space before pulling herself out.

“What do you think? This could help ponynauts train when we get to missions with space walks, I already got rough designs of a two pony capsule with an airlock,” Moondancer turned to Twilight.

“Promising but first we need to get a pony into orbit and back safely,” Twilight levitated Dash out of the pool. Once she was back on dry ground, Rarity and Moondancer helped Dash out of the space suit.

“I better get back to my normal training,” Rainbow Dash raced off.

“It worked better than expected,” Moondancer hugged Rarity after closely inspecting the space suit. “We will need to do more tests and will need more space suits but I don’t see any reason for you to mope around here anymore. You could probably complete your contract from Ponyville.”

“Thank you, nothing against this place other then it being horribly drab and soul crushing.”
Rarity pranced with glee.

“We’ll throw you a going away party, Rarity. It can also celebrate the success of the space suit,” said Twilight.

The next day Twilight was resting in the cafeteria when ponies started yelling fire. Twilight darted out into the hallway, following the other ponies. The commotion was coming from where they working on the capsule. Firefighter ponies were telling everyone to keep back since Twilight was a princess they let her in. As Twilight made her way in, she saw the test capsule burned out surrounded by firefighters. Twilight walked to the other side of the room where Moon Dance was throwing down her clipboard in frustration.

“What happened!” Twilight said with a raised concerned voice.

“When we did a pressurization test, a short ignited the oxygen. Lucky there were only minor injuries. We need to take better safety precautions, plus troubleshoot the electrics. Sometimes this feels like a Sisyphean task, every problem we solve more crop up,” Moondancer threw her clipboard on the ground in frustration.

Moondancer’s words resonated with Twilight, they have worked so hard for so long yet they were still so far from their goal of getting a pony safely into orbit. Twilight wondered if they’d ever get a pony safely into orbit at this rate.

"Everyone probably should go home early, don't think we'd get any more work done today," Twilight addressed the room.

Word of the accident got out to the press. In response Luna addressed Equestria over a live radio broadcast. Everyone in the space agency stopped work to listen.

“We all know our space program has had its setbacks but already satellites shows us our planet, pushing back the unknown. Ponykind is now living in a wonderful time. It is a time when science and technology are flourishing. I don’t need my ability to see into dreams to know a growing number of ponies are dreaming of space. How many fantastic novels have recently been written about flights to the moon and beyond.

We have had setbacks, we will have even more setbacks but we can’t stop dreaming of a better tomorrow. I implore you, don’t let these setbacks hold us back from those dreams.”

With that everyone at the space agency let out a cheer before returning to work with renewed vigor. They took Luna’s message to heart, they were paving the way to a glorious future.