Sol 201
AMICITAS FLIGHT THREE – MISSION DAY 202
ARES III SOL 201
It was about the time that the car chase began that Fireball realized he was dreaming.
There had been little hints. For one thing, although he and Mark were driving a red and white sports car just like Starsky and Hutch, neither of the two main characters had mustaches (unlike a lot of the minor characters), but Mark and Fireball had gigantic ones. Which was doubly weird, because most dragons didn’t have mustaches.
For another, they had been chasing the General Lee, but it had just changed to the Partridge bus without losing any speed or cornering ability.
And, finally, there were dementors, or at least what Fireball imagined dementors to look like- vaguely human shapes hidden under black blankets. On every streetcorner a dementor. There was one carrying groceries home from the corner store. There was another wheeling a baby stroller along. And there was one with a gigantic flat hat with an immense brim lined with fur or something along the edge- solid black, of course, but with a white gold-tipped cane.
Fireball was pretty sure that, in real life, he’d never be able to notice little details like that while driving the mythical California streets at seventy miles per hour. (He knew California was mythical because Mark had told him, repeatedly, that almost all the stuff in the television shows was made-up, couldn’t happen, never would happen. So obviously California, like Hazzard County and Watts and other places, were mythical lands of fable and myth. It threw him off when occasionally the series talked about Houston and Pasadena and Florida, which were real places because Mark’s bosses talked about them all the time.)
But it was when Steve Austin passed the Ford on foot, doing a lot more than seventy, that Fireball realized he was dreaming. Not because it was Steve Austin, or because humans couldn’t run seventy miles per hour. For all Fireball knew, Mark might be some kind of defective human who got sent to Mars because he couldn’t hack it on Earth. It was a thought he’d had several times before.
No, it was the fact that Steve Austin passed the car three times, each time in slower slow motion, without having been passed again by the car in between those times. Fireball had wanted a closer look at Steve, and so the universe had backtracked and let him look again. And then Fireball wanted to see that happen again, and so it had done it a second time.
So. Dreaming. Fair enough. That would explain why Mark had the steering wheel and clutch pedal on the left side of the car, but Fireball had the gas and brake pedals on the right.
But no time to worry about that now. The fact that this was a dream was an unimportant detail. There was no hurry about waking up, but in the meantime the Partridges with their load of moonshine were getting away, and Captain Hogg would have their badges if another run got through to junk and moonshine dealer Fred Sanford.
Fireball gestured to a turnoff. “Hook a right,” he said. “It’s a shortcut.”
“I can’t do that,” Mark protested, “the road’s closed.”
Sure enough, there was a sign: ROAD CLOSED – BRIDGE OUT. The angle was totally wrong, and the speed too fast, for them to be able to read it in any Euclidan universe, but in dreams geometry is optional.
“Trust me,” Fireball said. “We can make it.” One of the things Fireball liked about dreams, he decided, was that he wasn’t stumbling around a jumble of English and Equestrian words trying to figure out how to say things. He just talked, and Mark understood.
The Ford swerved hard right, bashing through the sign and barrier as if they were kindling, and suddenly the crowded city and sidewalks full of dementors going about their quite non-dementorlike daily lives vanished. They were on a dirt road in a forest, still going seventy, and up ahead was the promised broken bridge, with the inevitable sloping dirt ramp in front of it.
The Ford hit the ramp going seventy and took flight.
The dream world slowed to molasses for a moment, as Fireball’s less-than-lucid dreaming took several leaps of logic in quick succession.
The logic chain went like this:
(1) We are cops.
(2) Therefore the car we are in is a cop car.
(3) Forty-nine times out of fifty, when a cop car attempts to jump a broken bridge while in pursuit of noble sympathetic outlaws (and (3a) who could be more sympathetic than a child folk-rock band?), the cop car would end up splashing down and bobbing in the water.
(4) Therefore there is a 98% chance that we are about to get wet and possibly injured.
Given the postulates laid down by 1970s (and early 1980s) television, the logic was faultless.
The far end of the bridge actively shrank away from them. It had been a sleepy pond; now the water below looked more like Manehattan harbor.
No, Fireball thought. We are not going to crash. We’ve got to get the serum through! Fly, you bucket of bolts, fly!
The engine roared.
And then the engine really roared, because it wasn’t a Ford engine anymore; it was a Cherry Berry Rocket Parts and Odd Jobs Mk. 1 Flea, and Fireball was back in his capsule, on his first ill-fated flight, and there was the mountainside dead ahead, barely visible in the tiny, tiny windows.
And, impossibly, sitting beside him in a second seat was Mark, in his EVA suit. The human looked around himself and shouted, “You went to space in THIS??”
And before Fireball could answer, the mountain did.
Fireball sat up, sweating. Dragons can sweat, being magical creatures, but it takes special circumstances. Dying in a dream is one such.
Food poisoning is another, as Fireball noted a few moments later as he began throwing up in the nearby honey tub, which had been resurrected as part of the crash program to save the cave farm. Its contents managed to smell even worse than usual after Fireball's first stomach spasms subsided.
The noise of the dragon bringing up his midnight snack woke Mark, who leaned up from his bunk and asked, “Fireball? What’s wrong?” In a more suspicious tone he added, “Did you eat my leftover turkey?”
“No,” Fireball lied between spasms.
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It would seem that the physical laws governing the 1970's are quite similar to those found in Equestria. Who knew?
Revenge of the leftover turkey.
I've had dreams of things killing me, but I usuaally go on to persist as a "ghost" or something ridiculous-case in point, after watching "the thing" I...basically let a piece of it get into me so that I could talk to it, and I got away with doing so to boot. I've only lucid dreamed a couple of times, but it was awesome when it happened.
When I dream, most of the time I'm aware of it.
Dreams are weird. Last night I dreamed I was playing/in a BotW-esque Zelda game. Except it had Midna. So that was fun.
Turkey II : The Revenge
Now if only Luna was able to see that.
"Steve Austin"
In honor of the Texas Rattlesnake.. can I get a Hell Yeah?!
Attitude Era WWF is the best there is (American Badass needs to make an appearance now)
First, I would watch this show, straight up. Second, if you want to talk about Lucid Dreaming, go on Deviantart and find a guy named Baron-engel. you've not seen pony dreams until you've seen his. Being a professional artist, he can actually record what he sees.(go to the "mlp dreamscape" folder and scroll to the bottom.)
Oh yeah, mildly NSFW in the dreamscape, and very NSFW elsewhere in his profile. he's a marvelous guy and always tasteful, but his muse has her own opinions about what needs to end up on paper...
8884036
I think this Steve Austin is the Six Million Dollar Man, from the 70's TV show.
"like HazzardCounty and Watts and"
"like Hazzard County and Watts and"?
Nicely done dream sequence. :)
I want to see Weird Al Too.
All my dreams are-super realistic and about things I actually do every day in real life. I frequently get confused about whether or not I've actually done something or just dreamed about it. It's both boring and annoying.
Holy crap I remember that Batman... I actually think about that one often because, even at the time, I was like 'uhh... not too sure about that one'. Still, great series.
Also, Fireball is best dreamer. That was awesome.
8883998 The thing is, Fireball survived his crash. He was laid up for a month, and it took even longer for Ember to talk him into another rocket, but he survived in reality. Of course, that was because dragons are tough. A pony or human would have to hope for some government agency with $6,000,000 in pre-inflation currency to spend...
heheheheh let fireball come to CA, and let the left and other weridos show him a great time here in the most homeless state
8884103
Wouldn't a really big diamond work as well, or do diamonds simply not work for resurrections in equestria?
I don't know how common this is, but 99% of my dreams do not directly involve me in any way. I can only recall three distinct dreams that had ME in them, and a few others that were in first person, but clearly not me. The rest of my dreams are like movies; it's like I'm watching from a floating point in space and/or behind the fourth wall.
And there was one with a gigantic flat hat with an immense brim lined with fur or something along the edge- solid black, of course, but with a white gold-tipped cane.
thinking this is a reference but cant remember to what.
I assume:
That I have dreams, but I haven't remembered one after waking up in decades...
Mike
Oh I had one of those dreams where I glanced at a TV set, then my dream became what was on the television screen. Trippy stuff.
Let it be known that leftover turkey gives dragons vivid dreams. And food poisoning.
8884159 I'm not certain Fireball knows either. He's mapping the costume of a certain type of Starsky & Hutch minor character onto a Harry Potter monster, but I rather doubt his subconscious is deliberately conjuring up a pimp dementor.
Can confirm that California is a mythical land of fable and legend. I've lived there.
And that's what you get for stealing leftovers!!
I used to have horrible nightmares as a child as well. The most pressing one that comes to mind is being eaten by the troll from Ernest Scared Stupid.
After I managed to shake the nightmares, however, I just stopped dreaming entirely. Something I'll gladly take over the alternative. Still, I've always been curious about pleasant dreams, and lucid dreaming.
8883995
I think you just explained the 1970s.
Oh yeah, California is a mythical land... a mythical land with a mythical 12% sales tax in some areas, and some the worst roads I've ever had the pleasure of driving (read: the lack of another viable route to reach my destination).
Anyway, if Fireball enjoys not losing his money right away, I recommend he stays away from the Hollywood Walk of Fame; I kid you not when I tell you there are people who will brush your hand with a fake CD and then start a scene about how you owe them an obscene amount of money for "handling" the merchandise...
8884219
me too dude as Hollywood undead say in their song, its the place to party and the girls look so fake but damn there hot.
also i hope that rocket with that usb drive have that song and this
8884295
Ya tell me about it dude, that's why in Hollywood movies jokes about Fresno where the food is cheap at the farmer market and the only city that has a brain.
and fireball would love CA for all its dumb healing gems he can eat!
Weird Als next album. Dragon Dreams. Including the tracks, Oh Petunia. Oh No, not again, Turkey Wars, Revenge Of The Turkey, The Last Turkey, and Oh God I Cant Beleive I just Ate That?
Or a cover and video remake of Peter Gabriels, Sledgehammer.
i wonder that rover bot made it half way there to theme already?
8884471
Uh... dude? You might have read into that the wrong way... I'm not mad about the potential spoiler, just doubtful that it actually works that way and expressing that I'm choosing to wait until the official release to actually watch the leaked episodes.
As far as Discovery Family's ads go, I don't really see them. Side effect of not having cable, and watching the episodes online the day after they air...
8884295
Hey, I live in Ontario, Canada and we have 13% HST (Harmonized Sales Tax) province-wide.
"Harmonized" as in, while we had our more corrupt party in power, they combined the 7% federal GST (Goods and Services Tax) and the 8% PST (Provincial Sales Tax into a single tax, knocked the total down from 15% to 13%, removed the exemptions where you only pay one of those taxes for some products (I can't remember which one), and claimed it would be revenue-neutral.
8884521
Dude... 13% is ridiculous. Those funds better be getting put to good use
Turkey? I dribbled coffee on my t-shirt. Now I have a randomly induced image of Fireball upchucking while being aggressively hugged by Garble.
Considering Mark's reaction at the end of the dream, part of me wonders if it was a shared dream of some kind.
8884620
Could be...
8884562
We do have quite a few taxpayer-funded things I appreciate. Some examples include:
(Let me know if you try any of the YouTube videos and they're region-restricted and I'll give you some alternative links.)
8884562
8884521
I live in belgium, and here its 12% on essentials(Food, heating, electricity...) and 21% on everything else.
But, i personally don't mind paying it because i know it's spent reasonably well.
8884025
While it'd be nice if Luna could also bridge the dimensional gap like the Equestrian environmental suit crystals, it could end up a two-edged sword that would drive her insane; going from one planet of ponies to an infinite pool of dreams to shepard while at the same time dealing with a countless amount of other Luna's also dreamwalking who may or may not be as "kind" as this one we know. And if she could simplify it to making the jump to a specific universe, like the probes, it still leaves open the possibility that other Luna's can and will do the same to her universe. We also don't know if there's some metaverse conversion process that would scramble her mind if she tried the jump (recall that the suit gem spell only works with simple molecules). The only example we have is the mirror portal and that sequence looked like a bad acid trip. Trying to hold open that pathway while getting anything done sounds... challenging. But who knows? Maybe it's not so dangerous and doesn't risk your sanity?
For all the probes sent out, Twilight may have wanted to install a fail-safe or self-destruct (on the spell or crystals, not explode it violently) should someone on the other end try reverse-engineering the things to pay them a visit. I mean, friendship is all nice and good until you find the Mirror Universe trope and all the nasty shenanigans involved.
Seriously, it's bad enough Sci-Twi got her hands on probe number eight. (At least the precious stone debris will pay for college, home, car, and several more for all her friends)
8884688
8884707
I'd love to get into the finer details of how much the taxes are on various things around here, but we'd be sitting here all day if I did... it's a different amount for each thing, and that would be ridiculously specific to the exact county I live in
8884707
Aren't stores in EU countries also supposed to list prices with VAT already added in?
I wish they'd do that here. Given my experience with Canadian vs. US Dollar prices in online stores, I'm quite certain that I'd find sales taxes less offensive if the first and only price I saw in Canadian dollars already had the tax factored in.
8884236 Watney mentions his childhood twice that I can recall in the book- his D&D days and shoveling snow.
8884796 Which is exactly the reason American conservatives made it law most places that tax MUST be calculated separately and NOT included with the price.
8884804
Well that and sales taxes change with the state, county, city and even neighborhood. When crossing the street can change your sales tax having it factored in can create some interesting issues.
The magical land of california
8884796
As with any rule there are exceptions, but yes, stores display prices including VAT.
8884804
Which leads to another problem I've encountered, and seeing as you travel more than I do I can guarantee you've experienced this: having to ask the clerk what the local sales tax rate is when you're budgeting out short term expenses on the road. I shit you not, just driving 8 miles from Pullman, WA to Moscow, ID will change the sales tax rate from 7.6% to 6%...
8884011
I specifically remember a lucid dream where i drove a van up to a space station to deliver groceries, to my grandparents who lived there. They told me it wasn't safe to do that and that i needed to use a space shuttle next time. (This was about 15-20 years ago.)
8883766
My estimation of flow rate was at least 100l/min. Now, that is maximum capacity, i can't say for sure they used it all. But considering it was still cold in the cave i guess they did.
8885128 No, not really. My margins aren't so tight that the difference between 6% and 11% sales tax would make or break a trip. I only need to find out how to comply with local sales tax regulations where I set up shop.