Lunar 5

by Erstwhile Tail

The Asteroid

0130 hours Cloudsdale time: Cloudsdale

"Cloudsdale to Lunar 5, repeat last transmission over..." Travis stared into the computer, the diagnosis system still trying to find out what was wrong, all they had heard from the space station before the loss of contact was recorded for documentation purposes.

Travis pulled up the file from the last transmission, and played it. Hoping it would give him some idea of why the comms were down again.

"Cloudsdale this is Lunar 5, we have multiple inbound projectiles, radar was down, repeat, radar was down, we had no idea impact imma- SSSHCCHEZZHEHRIOJCKLJE This is a code Red, this is not a dri- *click*"

Travis pondered trying to make out what Pulse had said, he had said radar, but... wait. The radar was down...

He got up and trotted over to one of the other technicians on duty, "Hey, can you show me the status of their radar?"

The mare, who Travis saw on her badge was named Router, nodded and pulled it up on her computer, her yellow brow knitted and she brushed some violet mane out of her eyes, as if she was seeing things and wanted a better look.

"I just checked this not 2 hours ago... it was working fine, says it's been down for about twice as long now... what changed..."

Travis looked at the screen, he might not have understood everything but he observed that the part of the screen that said, Status: Inoperative
Time since last operative: 2h 3m
"Can you fix it?" Travis asked her.
"I can't, and even if I could I couldn't do it from here, it's not a coding error, it's physically damaged, and we don't have contact with them either," She gestured to another red status bar on the screen. "But I do know somepony who can... Let's tell the Colonel , he'll want to hear this."

Both Unicorns stood up and trotted over to the Colonel's office, Travis knocked.

"Enter." Came the reply.
Travis opened the door for Router and both stepped in. The Colonel looked at them, then turned to his monitor.

"I know what's going on." he said, "But I need to know what WE can do..." He looked at them. Who only looked at each other. The Colonel raised an eyebrow. "Well?"

"Sir, we can't... at least not from here. We need to get somepony onto Lunar 5 to make the repairs, and we can't make contact with them. Sir." Travis gulped.

The Colonel nodded, "Alright, if that's what we have to do then..." He stood, and pressed a button, on his control panel, they heard his voice outside as he spoke into the intercom system.

"Attention, This is Colonel Lukowitz, all Flight Engineers apart of Project Celestial Report to debriefing room." He looked to Router. "I hope you know someone who can fix that radar, we don't have those kinds of astronauts..."

Router smiled, "I know a mare who can help us. Won't do you much good without a good ass pilot to get them there, I'll get my pony, you get her."

"Who's her?" Travis and the Colonel asked simultaneously.

"Aileron, the best space craft pilot in Equestria."

Travis knew who Aileron was, the most reckless of all the pilots, but she was the best ever known, trouble was, she'd been kicked out of the program after she used a method used only in small gliders to slow down an experimental reusable craft codenamed Cadenza, which resulted in one of the wings of the craft sheering off and killing an escort pilot when it hit his craft. But to her credit she did land the damn thing, mostly. The scrape on the runway was still there last he had checked, and that was over 7 years ago.

Colonel Lukowitz thought for a minute, then sighed, "Under normal circumstances I'd never consider it. But we are dealing with an emergency... and sooner or later the public will figure out something's gone wrong. Especially when the families of the crew try to call them. I'll notify my superiors and see what they think. I need you to find this engineer of yours and get her back here before noon, got it?"

Router nodded, "I'll give her a call as soon as I can."

"Good, and Travis."

Travis looked up.

"I'll see you in the debriefing room, I need time to prepare." he said starting to tidy up his desk.
Travis turned to leave but a thought struck him, "Sir, what is project Celestial?

"Those ponies only hope." Replied the Colonel

---

0500 Hours Cloudsdale time: Lunar 5

"Comms are dead, not even the short wave radio is working fully... We can't contact the other Lunars." Cpt. Breaker said banging a hoof on the computer that defied him so easily.

They had been in the safe room for a few hours, the smaller rocks had stopped hitting the ship about a half hour earlier, but they to have done their damage. If what the computers were saying about the pressurization was true, almost every room along the hull of the ship that had a window was compromised.

Syringe was trying to help Pulse with his twisted hoof, which he'd gotten when he slid and fell going around the corner.

Butch then stood up, everypony looked at him as he began to put on a space suit.

"Butch, what are you doing?" Asked Cpt. Breaker.

"My job, fixing the ship." Butch simply replied as he put the helmet on and locked it in place. Spanner got up and started to do the same but Butch stopped him.

"I need you here Spanner, I need you to make sure that nothing fails in here, I would like to breathe when I come back." He said to him.

Spanner looked a bit upset at this order. But he nodded, and put the suit back in the locker. Butch, to everypony's surprise looked to Rudder, "Come on Rudds, I'll need you for this one." Rudder, nodded and quickly put on his suit. Once their oxygen tanks were locked in place and helmets screwed tight, they left the safe room via it's airlock.
"Com check, come in Rudds," Butch said into the mic, "you hear me?"
"I hate it when you call me that..." Rudder said into his own mic, the 2 walked down the depressurized hallway, the gravity talisman still working, somehow.
The 2 continued down the hallways, making their way to the outer ring of the ship, the airtight doors had activated, however only a few had fully closed in time. Thus many were open slightly or completely, though many had power, some had to be pried open.

"Anything yet?" Harmony's voice crackled over the com.

"Nothing, besides a few jammed doors and broken windows. Oh and your coffee is frozen." Butch said, as he glanced into her work space and noted the frozen coffee by the control panel.

"Oh the horror," Said Harmony sarcastically, "We're doomed. Celestia help us all."
Some laughs were heard over the coms, Butch and Rudder rounded a corner, and found the main hull breach, at first, Butch thought it was an airlock that had been torn open, until he noted the floor and ceiling were both torn and caved in. Looking down the hole into the ship, through the flickering lights, he saw the big ass rock.

"Safe room, we have located the hull breach, no way we can patch this up with what parts we have on board. We're going to need help from Equestria. But by the looks of the smashed dish and control panels, it seems that our main coms are down, we only seem to have interior. Which I remind you only reach the ship and a few hundred meters around it, no way in hell it will reach our closest neighbor, Lunar 3. Let alone Equestria. Over"

While Butch was radioing a status report, Rudder was floating through the hole, which could easily have passed for a castle hall way. Rudder guessed that the diameter could easily fit several ponies side by side. Floating to a stop by the Asteroid, he began to examine it. he noted how it seemed to be oddly shiny for something that has been floating in space, he gave it a buck. Which sent him flying into the wall. The sound that resulted was hollow, and metallic. Being mainly a pilot, he didn't know much about these rocks. But he did know that they weren't usually this kind of metal.

"Butch," he said turning away to radio his friend, "This isn't a 'normal' asteroid, it's met-" But he never finished his sentence as something slammed into him. Hard. Throwing him back the way he had come and right into Butch.

Both ponies slammed against the wall, and back into the gravity talesman's influence, both falling to the floor.

"What the hell Rudds!" Butch snapped as he shoved Rudder off him.

"It wasn't me! Something shoved me." Rudder explained pointing a hoof down the cavity, "I swear on my life, that that is no asteroid."

Butch looked to him, then down the hole, then back to Rudder. He sighed, pulled out his powerful flashlight, and lit up the tunnel. Nothing. Just the rock, hanging cables, lights broken, a pony like creature, a smashed computer, wait... Butch trained the light on the figure, but it didn't light up, it only seemed to be like the night sky. Butch and Rudder looked to each other, then back at the thing. But it had vanished.

"Safe room, we have a situation, en route back to you now."

Both ponies turned to leave, but suddenly, it appeared right in front of them, they both got a good look at the thing. It wasn't solid, not exactly, it seemed to flow, like a river of clouds. Then it reached out, as if to examine Rudder. Rudder, just as curious reached out himself. As their limbs were about to touch, it suddenly wrapped it self around Rudder. Butch leapt towards him, desperate to stop whatever was going on. Rudder screamed, and both he and the creature vanished in a cloud of smoke.

Butch just stood there. Dumfounded.

"Safe room, I'm going to fix those coms, Rudder was just abducted by a mist." He said into the mic.

"Wait what the fuck." Came a reply from Harmony

---

1050 Hours Cloudsdale time: Manehatton

A unicorn cracked open her eyes, to the sound of the apartment door being knocked on. She groaned, pulling the covers over her head. Go away... she thought to herself, I want to sleep damn it., Eventually her husband, named Prop Wash, got up, also a bit annoyed at the disturbance at such a early hour. Wondering what time it actually was, she looked at her clock, and was surprised to see she'd slept in far longer than she had thought, it was now 10:30 am. She got out of bed stretched, and went to the dresser, and grabbed her brush and started taming the beast that was her mane in the morning.

Prop Wash reentered the room as the unicorn was just brushing her mane and tale with her magic, getting ready for the day.

"Aileron, babe, there's um... some pony here to see you..." Aileron turned to look at her husband, but her jaw and brush dropped at the same time when she saw who he was talking about.

"Flight commander Aileron, we have a situation, that requires your expertise." said Spike, the dragon standing just taller than her husband, "Princess Twilight herself, requests it."

Comments

[Bicyclette]

well, i do like these aerospace-themed pony names! and things are definitely serious when Princess Twilight is getting involved