Fallout Equestria: Blue Destiny

by MagnetBolt

Chapter 126: Flesh & Metal

Trapped far behind enemy lines. Surrounded by dark and sinister magic. Enemies at every turn. It was the kind of thing that showed up all the time in wartime stories of heroism, with heroes putting on enemy uniforms and disguises to carry out covert missions. There’d always been something uncomfortable about the descriptions of them painting stripes onto their coats. It seemed sort of tribalist, even more than the descriptions of zebras all living in huts. I knew for a fact that they were just as industrialized as Equestria, but for some reason, cities and factories never showed up unless they’d been built by evil industrialist traitors selling guns to both sides.

“Somepony’s going to recognize me,” I mumbled, starting to sweat.

“Nopony is going to recognize you,” Destiny promised.

“They’re all looking this way!” I hissed. We were walking through some of the side corridors, avoiding the main areas of the ship. Unlike the Exodus Black this ship was still busy enough that we were always passing ponies on their way from one part of the huge airship to another.

“That’s because you’re the only batpony on the ship,” Destiny said.

“I’m not a batpony,” I said. “I’m a temporarily embarrassed pegasus.”

Destiny looked back at me. “With bat wings.”

“Yes.”

“And fangs.”

“Oho! So you noticed them!” I smirked. “They’re extremely cool and you don’t have to be jealous.”

Destiny sighed and shook her head. I must have won the argument because she dropped it and tried changing the subject. “We’re going to need to talk about your escape plan.”

“I don’t have one.”

“Yes, that’s the problem we need to solve,” Destiny agreed. “You don’t have one. We can’t just go down to the shuttlebay and ask for a ride!”

“I wasn’t gonna ask.”

Destiny shook her head. “Do you know why there aren’t guards all over us right now? It’s because they don’t need them.” She stopped and touched a panel set into the wall and the image changed, the black glass revealing itself as a touch-sensitive screen that welcomed her by name. “Everywhere I go on this ship, I’m tracked. If I try and go somewhere I’m not supposed to be, somepony will be there waiting to tell me to go away. I’m sure that they record what I’m saying sometimes. Ponies will show up and they’ll mention things I said when I’m sure I was alone.”

“Fun,” I mumbled.

Destiny nodded glumly and led me into a wide room with a number of large machines. I trotted up to the closest one and tried to figure out what it was. It was shaped something like a big metal table set into the floor and supplied with plumbing and power. A grid of small lines decorated the top surface, and a miniature gantry system and a number of small arms and dangling tools hung from the top, all enclosed in a glass and metal case to keep curious hooves from poking at what they might be working on.

“I think you’ll have about six hours to figure something out,” Destiny said. She stepped up to the machine I was looking at and opened up the side, revealing a keyboard and screen.

“Six hours?” I asked. “Destiny, I don’t care what Cozy Glow says, you don’t have to finish your work shift before we leave.”

She sighed and stopped typing to give me a look. “An incantation lens is one of the most precise and precarious things ponies ever built. I can’t build one out of scraps and expect it to work. However, this ship has something that we can’t find anywhere else in Equestria.”

“SIVA,” I guessed.

“You got it in one,” Destiny agreed. “It can build anything. In fact, using it for something that requires micro-scale precision is pretty much exactly what it’s best at. All the mass reconstruction and moving materials, that’s like…”

“Using calipers as a clamp?” I guessed.

“Exactly. It’s a waste of a precision instrument. I’ll need time to design something, then use SIVA to print it out. I know most of the basics of building the lens, especially after pulling that one apart in Seaquestria. Then we’ll have the key component Star Swirl couldn’t build on his own.”

“That’s pretty smart,” I admitted.

“That’s because I’m pretty smart,” Destiny said, waggling her hoof at me. “Okay. I’ve got this printing out a beryllium-bronze icosahedral frame.” She moved to the next bed and punched in more data. “I’ll have this make the twenty truncated tetrahedral thaumatic charges… and maybe an extra dozen since they’ll fit on the printing bed. No reason not to make extras.”

“What else will you need?” I asked.

“About two dozen talismans. One for every charge, a master controller, backup, target, and maybe one as a fuse. There are probably more elegant and clever ways to do this, but this isn’t my field of expertise. The newest designs were all super classified.”

I watched the printing beds start swinging into action. The framework overhead calibrated itself on the tight grid pattern on the work surface, and a thin spray of silver began coating a perfect square. Magnets whined, and a pressure lock popped closed as the space filled what some kind of intert gas.

“Is this going to set off any alarms?” I asked. “You said you were being monitored.”

“These beds are air-gapped for safety,” Destiny said. “No network connection. I know how dangerous your mother could be, I wasn’t going to leave these connected to her. She’d probably print out something to kill everypony on the ship!”

I nodded. “Good.”

“Somepony will check on these later, but my guards aren’t exactly the smartest…” She rummaged around in a drawer and found a stack of neon-colored papers. Destiny grabbed a pencil and jotted something down on them, sticking the papers on the screens and printers.

“Working on an experiment, do not touch,” I read. “This means you! No touch!”

“I’ll come up with a good story later if I need one,” Destiny said. “This way they’ll have to ask me to come down and explain what I’m doing. It’ll buy some extra time.”

“This is a lot better than my plan D,” I said.

“What was your plan D?”

“I was thinking of finding a running arcana reactor from a Stable and operating it very incorrectly.”

“It wouldn’t work as well as you think. That’s like saying you want to turn a kettle into a bomb.”

“I did that once on accident!”

“You know, I picked a bad example, that’s my fault.” Destiny closed the panels she’d opened. “Is there anything else you need? For once, I’m in a position to give you absolutely anything you could want!” She smiled with genuine happiness. I could feel it radiating off her. She was in her element, and even though Destiny was a prisoner, she didn’t feel as lost or hopeless as she had before as a disembodied soul.

“I had to come here unarmed,” I said. “Could you do something about that?”

“Are you trying to turn me into a weapons dealer?” she gasped.

I looked at the megaspell components she was printing out and then back to her. I nodded.

“Let’s talk specifics,” Destiny said, smiling.

---

I carried the new case lightly, hooking the claw of one draconic wing through the handle. Destiny glanced at it a few times while we walked. We were pacing around the deck, essentially doing laps. Staying in the lab was just begging for somepony to pop in and check on Destiny, but we also couldn’t stray too far just in case something went wrong, leaving us with nowhere to go unless we wanted to get lunch, and Destiny had already eaten.

My growling stomach wished I’d cracked open a vending machine and brought the contents with me. More worrying, the ominous crystal teeth I’d spotted were in almost every room and corridor, and even though I couldn’t detect magic from them. Yet. I trusted them as far as I could throw my voice.

“It must have totally rebuilt your body,” Destiny said. “Do you know how caterpillars turn into butterflies?”

“They get turned into soup along the way,” I recalled.

“I’m pretty sure you got turned into soup too. I’d love to run some tests, but I bet your body is a lot like mine!” She motioned to her new, slim form proudly. “SIVA can build the extracellular matrix directly and then takes the place of the cellular material. The end result is almost identical to biological tissue. Superior, in some ways!”

“That’s how Karma came back, isn’t it?” I asked.

Destiny’s expression darkened with a wash of sorrow, and she nodded. “Yeah. It’s where I got the inspiration.”

I nodded and lowered my voice, putting a hoof on her shoulder to offer some gentle support. “He’d be happy to know he was still helping you.”

“More than he did when either of us was alive,” Destiny scoffed. She was just playing it cool. I gave her shoulder another supportive tap. Carefully. I wasn’t sure how fragile she was. Destiny must have caught something in my expression because she rolled her eyes. “Hey, I know that look! I’ll have you know I’m just as tough as you are!”

“You are,” I assured her. “You’re very tough. Very strong. Strong female protagonist.”

“Chamomile if you weren’t my best friend I’d kill you.”

“I’m trying to be cool like Quattro,” I said. “She’s the best at sneaking missions.”

“Be cool like Chamomile instead. I’d rather have a pony who I can trust than one who makes really good one-liners and vague, smug statements.”

“...Did you just try to do a moral of the story thing?”

“I’ll explain it to you again later,” Destiny said. “We need to focus on an escape plan.”

“Right,” I agreed. “So my original plan is a bust. You’ve been on the inside a lot longer than I have, and you’ve got the run of the place.”

“As long as I stay in my lane,” Destiny reminded me. “Just because my prison doesn’t have physical bars doesn’t mean much in the end when I can’t fight my way out.”

“You couldn’t fight your way out before,” I corrected. “Now you’ve got me.”

“I spent too much time saving the lives of the innocent ponies on this ship to let you kill them just because they get some bad orders from up top.” Destiny quieted down and we waited for two ponies to walk past us. They didn’t even look twice and were having a nice casual conversation about something else.

I could tell by the way they walked that they were security. Cops always moved a certain way. They walked without any concern that they might bump into somepony else because other ponies would get out of the way or else they’d regret not getting out of the way. I tried to ignore them in the same way they were pretending to ignore me.

“We’re attracting attention,” Destiny mumbled. “Somepony must have noticed I was spending time talking to somepony and they’re trying to figure out who and why.”

“It’s hours until those parts finish,” I mumbled. “Should we split up?”

“We might have to. They’re watching me, not you. Not yet. You’re not in the system, and Cozy Glow loves running things with a system. It’s fair and she gets to set all the rules, so it’s the best of both worlds.”

“Okay,” I said. I stopped and glanced at the ponies walking away from us. I could sense more were on the way. They were trying to figure out what was going on without looking like they were doing anything. I stepped over to the wall. “I have an idea.”

“What is it?” Destiny asked.

I looked around the wall panel, figuring out where it was attached. “Help me with this,” I said. We popped it free, exposing the pipes and wires on the other side. There was enough room for a pony to crawl inside and work behind the scenes. I nodded to myself and knelt down. “Okay. Good. This’ll work.”

I filled Destiny in on my idea and she, reluctantly, agreed that it was at least an idea, if not an amazing one, but she lacked anything more solid. I stuck myself halfway into the wall, and by the time the next plainclothes security pony walked past, Destiny was arguing with me loudly.

“This is the third time I’ve had to tell you that electrical work is not like plumbing!” she snapped. “I swear, they assign me the worst technicians just to keep me too busy fixing your mistakes to get anything done myself-- hey, you!”

She pointed at the passing security pony.

“Me?” the stallion asked.

“You’re--” Destiny squinted at his uniform. “Technician first-class? Perfect. Because all I’ve got is a second-class tech with third-rate skills. She’s gotten two live lines crossed already today and if I hadn’t caught them we’d be dealing with an electrical fire.”

“A fire?” the security pony asked.

“I know, right?” Destiny sighed. “Hold on. Technician, get out here!”

I took my cue and slid out of the panel, holding the wrench. “It’s not my fault,” I said automatically. I’d said it a lot as a foal when adults yelled, so it came out as an instinct.

“Wait, I thought you were doing electrical work?” the stallion asked. “Why do you have a pipe wrench?”

“If you look very closely, you’ll see this is actually a blessed tool from the Imaginseers to perform percussive maintenance,” I explained, then demonstrated by swinging it into his skull. Gently. I only wanted to give him a concussion, not a traumatic brain injury. He yelped.

“Ow!” he said. “You hit me! Why did you--”

There was a soft hiss and a small dart lanced into his neck. Behind him, Destiny was holding the weapon she’d made for me. Her aura twinkled around the handle and the hidden trigger there for the air rifle built into the square frame.

“That’s… not right…” he mumbled, the sedative in the dart kicking in. Combined with the head trauma, it was enough to put him down on the ground and keep him there.

“He was tougher than he looked,” I said.

“I think you were actually more gentle than you usually are,” Destiny teased. “It’s a good change. That’s why I built this, remember?” She patted the concealed rifle and gave it back to me. “Remember it can fire while it’s folded up, but the accuracy is terrible. I was aiming for the middle of his back and hit the side of his neck.”

“Point blank only. Got it.”

Destiny pulled out the duct tape and I went through his pockets, finding an ID card and clipping it onto my uniform. I also made sure to take the radio earpiece he thought he’d been hiding. Once he was securely bound, I closed the panel up with him inside.

“We can use this to get into a shuttlebay,” I said. I adjusted the radio. “We’ll use a frequency they’re not listening in on to stay in contact. You do whatever it is you normally do, I’ll get us a ride. Once the parts are ready, we’ll get out of here.”

“Right,” Destiny agreed. She tapped on the screen set into the wall.

“What are you doing?”

“First, I’m getting you directions to the nearest shuttlebay. Then I’m setting up a maintenance alert to go off in twenty-four hours.”

“Why?”

Destiny gave me a look. “Because I’m not going to leave a pony in here to die tied up with duct tape and sealed in the walls. Somepony will find them in the morning.”

---

An arrow flashed on the screen as I approached it, directing me to the right. I followed it around the corner and into a wider corridor, twice the size of the others. It ended in a heavy bulkhead door. A sign clearly labeled it as the shuttlebay. I tried to act cool. I nodded to one of the ponies in obvious security barding and scanned my ID at the door.

If they’d been more alert, or anypony had actually looked at the card, my cover would be blown instantly. They trusted everything to the machine. A green light blinked, so I must be the right pony. The door slid open and I trotted inside, still thinking.

A VertiBuck was right out. Even if they had one I didn’t know how to pilot it. I needed something simple and foolproof. I needed something that would respond to brute force, and I saw a sky wagon that was calling out to me. No fancy controls. Just something I could pull along.

“Perfect,” I mumbled. A few minutes later I had one panel off and lying on the side along with a few tools in the universal sign of ‘this is undergoing maintenance’. As an even more universal sign, I stuck a piece of paper with ‘out of order’ written on it on the door.

“Hey!” somepony snapped.

I turned to look. A pony in a dirty uniform stomped up to me. “Yeah?” I asked.

“Yeah, sir,” he corrected.

“Yes, sir!” I yelled, snapping a salute. He glared at me for a moment longer as if he could sense the sarcasm pouring out of me. Fortunately, I was subtle about it and managed to keep a straight face.

“Who told you to work on this sky wagon?” he asked.

“I didn’t get a name, sir! I saw gold bars and decided to follow orders! She wanted this ready before nightfall!”

He stopped and glared harder at me. “I don’t recognize you. Are you part of the fresh batch they woke up out of stasis after the orbital bombardment?”

“Yes, sir,” I said, thanking Celestia or whoever else might be listening. The pony was practically making up a story for me.

“That’s what I thought. None of you know anypony or proper military discipline.” He sighed and his voice lost some of its edge. “Look, kid, things aren’t how we wanted them to be when we went under. When I woke up I found out my daughter got woken up twenty years before I did as part of the crew rotation and…”

He trailed off and shook his head.

“Anyway, this is no time for my tragic backstory. We need all hooves on deck getting the Queen ready.”

“The… Queen?”

He sighed. “Come on. I sure hope they woke you up for something other than your conversational skills.”

“Oh, I’m so good with machines sometimes it feels like I’m half metal, sir,” I assured him. The sky wagon wasn’t going to move for a while. If he wanted me to fiddle around with some tools for a couple of hours, it was a good way to kill time. Having an actual member of the crew supervising me meant security likely wouldn’t notice me at all.

“Careful with saying things like that,” he cautioned. “There are too many cases of hibernation psychosis these days.”

“What’s that? Some kinda… bad dreams?” I guessed.

“Like the worst bad dreams,” the engineer confirmed. “Lots of sleep disorders. Ponies walking around and not remembering what they were doing. Acting crazy. Rumors are there were even a few murders. Point is, it’s serious and you don’t want ponies to think you’re one of them. You’ll get shipped off.”

“But there’s nowhere for ponies to get shipped off to.”

“They found some place on the surface to send the ones that need the most help,” he said. “It’s supposed to be some kind of hospital or retreat or lab. I don’t know the details. It’s all top-secret because they don’t want ponies getting panicked about it. It’s some kind of religious thing. Like that old 12-step program where you had to accept that only a higher power like Celestia could help you. I guess they worship some Goddess down there in the wasteland.”

“That sounds really ominous.”

“No, it sounds like something that’s a problem for somepony else to solve,” he corrected. “We got plenty of problems of our own, and we can solve them with hard work, elbow grease, regular grease, and some duct tape.”

He led me to one of the mostly caged-in bays around the edge of the bay. I felt a chill run down my spine even before we turned the corner. Something terribly familiar. It was a boxy shape that made me think of an old steam train had been broken apart and the pieces were put together in the shape of a giant armored pony.

I was standing in the shadow of the Grandus. The light shifted, ponies moving around its boxy form and connecting wires and fuel hoses. It took me a moment to realize it wasn’t the Grandus I remembered. Somepony had decided the original design just wasn’t dangerous enough and they’d strapped more weapons onto it and given it a red-and-gold paint job.

“Is the Heaven’s Sword cannon working yet?” the engineer yelled over. The tone he used told me he already knew the answer he wanted to hear.

“We’ve got the weapons pods loaded and working, sir,” replied one of the ponies running cables and looking at long lists of scrolling numbers on terminal screens on wheeled maintenance trolleys. “We’re running stability tests on the thaumoframe and the Feathers.”

“The Heaven’s Sword,” I said. “That’s why those big missile pods looked familiar.” Rain Shadow had used it to try and kill me. It seemed like ages ago at this point. The Assault Armor he’d used had been almost like a sky wagon designed by a madman - they strapped him into the front of a frame carrying enough weapons to fight off an entire fleet and with rocket thrusters to let it patrol a wide area and deny entry into its sky.

“What was that?” he asked

“I was asking why we were getting this thing ready. Are we going to fight somepony?”

“The Juniper went silent and stopped replying to comms. Then some kind of attack hit us. Not a big one, it just broke a window and started some fires, so you don’t have to worry about it. I’ve got money on an attack from that rogue state calling itself the Enclave.”

“Sounds bad.”

“The Queen is more than enough to defend us,” he promised. “Until you get your hooves under you, it’s better if you stick to something simple. Go move those empty fuel barrels out of here and stack them in the next bay.”

I saluted and trotted away to start pushing a cart. I tapped my ear, sending a burst of static down the line.

“Was that you?” Destiny asked. “I think I’m on the right frequency. Chamomile? Are we supposed to use code names? I feel like we should have decided on code names.”

“Code names would have been a good idea,” I agreed. “I found something we can use as a ride. How are things on your end?”

“I’m working on a to-do list from my actual job. Security is leaving me alone for now, but they’re checking up on me. I think that missing stallion might be a problem soon.”

A group of ponies walked into the shuttlebay, checking radios and looking around with the obvious attitude of ponies who didn’t care if they were in the way and inconveniencing everypony. I’d used the stolen ID card to enter the bay, there was a good chance they were tracking it.

I stepped behind an innocent-looking mare and silently apologized to her before bumping her with my cart and knocking her over. We made various kinds of apologies, I brushed her off and acted like the bumbling idiot I was, and when she wasn’t looking I switched our ID cards so she had the one that was marked as stolen. She gave me an angry lecture about watching where I was going, I made more apologies, and then I rolled the cart and the empty barrels on it to the door, looking ashamed.

Predictably, the ponies from security stopped me wordlessly, not even bothering to conceal their weapons. They looked at my ID and dismissed me when they saw the name wasn’t the one they were looking for. I apologized to them, too, for good measure, and rolled the cargo cart right out of the shuttlebay and into the hallway.

“We’ve probably got an hour or two tops,” I said quietly into the radio. “They’ll eventually line everypony up and check them one at a time.”

“Go back to the lab and wait for me there. It’s off the network for security reasons, it might take them a little longer to spot you.”

“Will do.”

---

I was pacing when the door popped open and Destiny walked in. Or, more accurately, was shoved in. She looked annoyed.

“Sorry,” she mumbled. Her glasses were crooked. I was guessing the armed ponies behind her were the reason why.

“You probably think you’re pretty clever,” one of the security ponies said. “I don’t know who you are or how you got onboard, but the Great Leader is going to love discussing it with you.”

“He’s mad because we’ve been wandering around a highly secure area for hours,” Destiny said. “Cozy Glow will probably fire him and throw him back into stasis until she needs a new bathroom janitor.”

The small security team stepped inside. I caught Destiny’s look.

“This room isn’t monitored,” I said.

“Faraday cage,” Destiny confirmed. “That’s why I couldn’t radio you a warning. When I airgap a system, I do it properly.”

“What are you two talking about?” the lead pony asked.

I smiled at him. “You’re going to feel so silly when you find out.”

Thirty seconds later, the armed, trained guards were stacked in a heap in one corner of the room. I was pretty sure none of them were dead. Destiny lightly kicked one of them.

“The ponies here aren’t stupid,” I said. “If they don’t report in soon, somepony will come looking for them.”

“We’ll be gone before then, if you told the truth about finding a way out. These prints are more or less done.” Destiny opened one of the large bays, using her magic to carefully extract an almost-spherical frame with triangular faces. “They could use some cleanup, but I can do that by hoof.”

“You can’t leave now, you haven’t even stopped in to say hello!” moaned one of the unconscious ponies, speaking in his sleep. I saw something in the corner of the room that I hadn’t noticed before. One of those twisted crystal sculptures. A spark of light burned inside it.

“That’s impossible,” Destiny said. “There’s an airgap! A faraday cage! You can’t even get radio in this room!”

“And you used me to build your cage,” the pony on the floor said breathlessly. The unconscious pony was dragged to their hooves, his body forced into motion by something that went beyond just mind control. He was being used like a puppet. “Did you really think I wouldn’t leave a way in?”

Worse, I knew whose talons were inside that puppet and making it twitch.

“Mom,” I said.

“You’re a very naughty girl, Chamomile,” the stallion said, his eyes rolling in his head. “You’re planning something wicked, aren’t you? I think you need a spanking after what you did to me in Gator Land.”

“Destiny,” I hissed.

She nodded wordlessly and started shoving things into a crate. The sleeping and unconscious ponies stood up, lurching like they were undead and ignoring the bruises and broken bones they’d gotten in the process of being knocked out.

I stayed between them and Destiny, watching the ponies closely. They didn’t make a move on us.

“You can’t escape, Chamomile,” my mother said through the ponies. They all spoke at once, mumbling in a chorus.

I backed up to the cart and pushed against it. Destiny got the door. Both of us were so busy keeping our eyes on the gaggle of possessed ponies that we didn’t look at where we were going until we got outside the print lab.

“Oh,” Destiny said quietly.

There were more ponies in the hallway. All of them stood on unsteady hooves.

“I knew it was going too well,” I said. I unfolded the tranquilizer rifle. The grip was just right to trigger with my wing-talon. It fired a burst of darts, hitting one of the controlled ponies. They didn’t flinch, even with needles sticking out of their chest.

The screens on the walls flickered to life, showing a glaring draconic eye. The air filled with whispering and the sound of static, a command in binary blasting through the speakers. The rifle I was holding vibrated and sprung to life, the frame warping. I swore and threw it aside. The magazine exploded like a grenade.

“Bucking scrap code,” I said.

“Chamomile, I--” Destiny gasped. She fell to her knees. Her skin rippled like ants were crawling under it. She screamed in pain.

“Hold on, we can, uh…” I didn’t know. There had to be something. I couldn’t lose her like this, not when I’d only just gotten her back. I reached for her. She reached for me. She growled. She lunged. She was under my Mom’s control.

Her teeth latched onto my neck and… the results weren’t very impressive. She gnawed. Nothing really happened, since my skin was tougher than some flak jackets.

This close, I felt something. Not just the nibbling. I could feel the SIVA inside her, buzzing like a nest of angry hornets. I followed my instincts and grabbed her, holding on and whispering calming words. That angry feeling inside her quieted, and Destiny stopped biting and started sobbing.

“It really hurts,” she sobbed.

“I know,” I said. “Sorry.”

“What did you do?” Destiny asked. “I couldn’t control myself.”

“I’m not sure. I’ve got a ton of access codes and junk.”

“You must have stopped the hacking,” she said. She was still panting. “Or paused it, maybe. I feel--”

“Broken inside? Like you’re ripped up?”

She nodded quickly.

“Yeah. I know the feeling.” I picked her up and deposited her on the cart. She wasn’t in any shape to walk on her own. “Hang on!”

I shoved the cart, half-riding it and kicking off to build up speed.

The cart skidded down the corridor, bowling ponies over. The sleepwalkers groaned and cried out when they were flung aside, the ocean of bodies parting in the face of dumb brute force.

“You know, the zombies were less scary when I didn’t have a body!” Destiny yelped, weakly kicking one of them off the cart when they managed to grab on instead of being thrown aside.

“You’ve really expanded your horizons!” I steered the cart carefully, riding it like a surfboard, leaning from one side to another and guiding it through turns. The megaspell components rattled in their crates. I really hoped none of it was fragile or explosive. “Get the door!”

“What door-- oh no!”

The door to the shuttlebay loomed ahead of us. We were approaching way too quickly to stop. Destiny cast a spell, firing a bolt of red flame at the control panel. It streaked past the crowd of ponies and exploded against the wall. The door slid open at glacial speed.

“We’re going to crash!” Destiny yelped.

The hatch loomed. I aimed right for the middle. If I calculated it just right, we’d pass through by the skin of our--

The cart slammed into the door, because I had not calculated it right. Destiny and the crates full of stuff fell into the shuttlebay, screaming. Destiny was screaming, I mean. The crates weren’t. It would be weird if they were.

“Sorry!” I yelled, catching Destiny before she could hit the ground. She caught the crates with her magic. “Are you okay?”

She gave me a look.

“Stupid question,” I admitted. I put her down. “Over here!” I pointed to the skywagon. She cracked the crates open to check on the contents and followed me to the vehicle. Around us, ponies were running around in confusion. About half of them were lurching in a puppeted trance, the rest were just confused.

Destiny stopped short and stared at the sky wagon. None of the conscious ponies in the shuttlebay were in any condition to stop us.

“This isn’t going to work,” Destiny said. “Chamomile, we’re in trouble!”

“Trouble how? Is the battery dead?” I looked back at her while I worked to get myself strapped in, using what limited telekinesis I’d mastered to adjust the straps. “It only has to last long enough for us to get out of here! They’re not going to be in any condition to launch a mission after us!”

“I don’t know! It’s broken! Somepony put up an ‘out of order’ sign!”

She shoved the sign at me, her face a mask of terror and panic.

“I did that.”

“You broke the sky wagon?!”

“No, I made the sign! I-- it’s fine! Just get inside!”

I shook my head and started pulling the second she put the cargo down. The confusion in the hangar increased. Alarms blared.

“Make a hole!” I screamed. Ponies threw themselves aside. I got up to speed and we left the deck, soaring over the crew scrambling and trying to figure out what was going on. We streaked out into the air.

I half-expected to be blasted out of the sky the second we cleared the hangar. Instead, we kept going, the sound dying into the distance behind us.

“Did we actually make it?” I asked. I took us around a cloudbank, trying to break line of sight in case somepony was looking.

“We caused enough chaos they probably don’t know what’s happening yet,” Destiny replied over the radio. I heard her sigh. “Maybe we should thank your mother.”

“I’ll come back with a nice present for her,” I promised.

Comments

[Thought Prism]

The hype train keeps on rolling!

[Reese]

"filled what some kind of intert gas"
"filled with some kind of inert gas"?

"from them. Yet. I trusted them"
"from them, yet, I trusted them"?

"It was a boxy shape that made me think of an old"
"It was a boxy shape that looked as if an old"?

"I really hoped none of it was fragile or"
"I really hoped none of them were fragile or"?

Thanks for writing!

[FridayPie]

Chamomile gets more technical and creative. SIVA-based learning.