The Limbo Theorem

by AnchorsAway

Flyby — Part One

It was the engines. That was what she had felt.

Captain Broadline turned over in her bunk, dim moonlight filtering through a crystal porthole. Sleep, having evaded her for the latest of several long nights, would not find her. Broadline rubbed her hooves over her bloodshot eyes, the exhaustion gnawing at her like a wild animal chasing her. "What is it now?" she groaned wearily, her hoof searching above her for the bridge intercom.

It was the engines, she knew, their everpresent hum and vibration absent. The ship, her ship, was silent. It was an unfamiliar sensation, one that felt wrong.

Broadline found the intercom switch, sitting up in her mess of tangled sheets. A deep night sweat glazed the sheets. "Bridge? What's going on?" she spoke, waiting for an answer.

None came.

"Bridge?" she asked again, her voice rising ever so dangerously. "Dipper?" Still nothing. Only the sound of the ship's hull creaking around her.

"Great," the Captain grumbled, sliding her hooves from her warm bed onto the cold deck. She fumbled in the darkness of her messy cabin, snatching a sweater from atop a pile of shipping manifests to fend off the chill that permeated the air. She stumbled for the door, guided only by the wash of moonlight through the porthole. "This had better be good, Dipper."

Captain Broadline stepped into the passageway, the door to her stateroom sliding closed behind her with a loud click. Emergency lights overhead cut through the gloom, no porthole of moonlight to aid them. Their thin beams of yellow cast long shadows through the empty corridor. Not only were the engines offline, but the generators were out as well. That explained the dead intercom. Not good.

Broadline picked up her pace, the mare trotting toward the stairwell. Her silvering mane, untidy with her incessant tossing and turning, swam around her in whispy waves like the air currents. She could practically feel those grey strands growing more numerous with each passing minute. "I swear to Celestia, these young sailors are going to make me throw myself overboard one day," she growled. "Leave them for a few hours and we're dead in the air." The aluminum deck plating clattered beneath her hooves as she ascended the stairs two at a time.

The heavy bridge door swung open with a heave of her strong hooves. Stretching windows featuring empty nighttime air welcomed the airship Captain, though she had no attention for the view tonight. Broadline was hyperfocused on the much younger mare bent over the ship's navigation console in the darkness of the bridge. The young mare's face was awash in the dim glow of the buttons and dials as she studied them, fidgeting with several.

"What did you do to my airship, Dipper?" Broadline hurried over. "What happened?" Her attention was stern, her demeanor as sharp as a knife. "Please, tell me you didn't try anything stupid for star's sake."

"I'm sorry, Captain," the mare fubbed, her voice shaking. She was pouring over the console, trying desperately to trace the problem. "I–I don't know what happened. Honest, I didn't do it." The mare was on the verge of a wreck, her eyes moist, and her hooves shaking.

Broadline, sighed, her stance softening. "Sweet stars," she swore, running a hoof through her greying mane. "Look," she said, grabbing Dipper's addled focus. "I'm not saying it's your fault. I just need you to be very specific on what happened before the drives went out." Broadline allowed a tender hoof to rest on the young sailor. "We trace the problem, find where it originated."

Dipper took a deep breath, quickly rubbing away any moisture on her eyes. "I had just updated our position with the autopilot when I noticed our position was off course. I was reaching for the phone to tell you when the ship went black." Her lip wavered. "I swear, Captain, that's all I know. I followed your standing orders my entire watch: plotting positions, monitoring the radio, watching the navigation console–"

"Alright, alright," Broadline breathed. "I believe you. It wasn't something you did, Dipper." She stepped around to the chart table, sliding pencils and plotting gear aside. "We need to get our power online next, then the drives. If not, were at the mercy of the winds. Have you contacted the Chief in engineering?"

"The lines are down. They should be running off the emergency batteries, but I'm not getting anything," Dipper called out.

"Pop down there and get a hoof on the situation," she ordered, tracing the airship's predestined route on the paper chart. "You're trained for this, Dipper. I'm counting on you to help get us back online," she reiterated. "Understand?"

"Yes, Captain," Dipper nodded dutifully.

"Good girl." Broadline nodded toward the bridge door. "Let's hop to it."

The door to the bridge closed with a whisper, Broadline abandoned to the stillness she was unaccustomed to. Beneath the dim light over her flank, she continued tracing the airship's course. The thin pencil line with marks and plots every few inches led her hoof from Saddle Arabia with its stretching deserts, to the vibrant coast of Mareocco, and into the seemingly boundless area of blue on the chart that was the Celestial Sea. For days they had steamed far above her waters, swimming through the oceans of clouds as they sailed for Canterlot. Their cargo: five hundred eighty tons of highly sought after Arabian crystal tucked safely in the cargo hold, the belly of the Tranquility.

Broadline's hoof reached the end of their plotted route a few hundred miles west of Baltimare. They should be well over Equestria by now, her coastline behind them.

The Captain left the cart table, pressing herself to the bridge window and peering down into the darkness. Her nose left jets of cool condensation on the frosty glass. If they were over Equestria, where were all the lights, she wondered? The land below them should have been filled with lights of cities and towns from Applousa to Manehattan, but all Broadline could make out was black. Even the moonlight with its fullness could not pierce the cover below there ship.

"Where in Tartarus are we," Broadline muttered, reaching for the spotlight controls. "We can't be that far off course."

Massive spotlights erupted to life beneath the bridge of the RES Tranquility, the airship lighting up the night sky. Broadline swung the lights, back and forth, scanning the ground below them for any sign of features.

The spotlights twirled in ever-increasing circles, their beams sweeping the night. But the more Captain Broadline searched, using up their precious battery power, the more she grew concerned. The spotlights weren't picking up any land. Nor were they picking up and water, no waves of the Celestial Sea. In fact, Broadline couldn't see anything below the great airship.

Beneath the beams, she saw nothing but black.

A bottomless empty void of nothing.

A void that looked back at her and asked Captain Broadline, the mare's eyes transfixed on the desolation below them — Do you hear screaming?

Comments

[Love Moth]

See my comment from July 26th 2019

[Ice Star]

Oh gosh, I wish you hadn't left off right there! Talk about a creepy cliffhanger!