> Celestial Hulk
>  by Waxworks
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> Chapter 1
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Minuette walked down the wooden halls, passing by room after room of carefully laid out cargo. She took inventory slowly, checking the crates and barrels, and looking for any signs of decay, infestation, or anything else unexpected. It was her job today to double-check all the supplies for problems. She had drawn the short straw, sadly, so here she was, walking the slow walk around the center of the ship. At the very least it was a warm and comfortable job. Lazy, if you will. The grass underhoof was soft and well-trimmed, and the miniature sun was high. This side of the ship was in daylight, so she was better off than Moondancer, who was down at the far end, upside down, in the dark.

The ship was built by Princess Twilight, with the assistance of Celestia and Luna, so they’d managed to fit in a nice pseudo day and night cycle. A tiny ball of light representing the sun and a tiny ball for the moon would float slowly up and down the center of the ship, going to each side in a 24 hour trip. It was honestly rather ingenious. Princess Twilight had grown the ship from a sapling, and given it the gravity so they would walk freely, as well as protections against outer space.

The crew consisted of Caramel, Twinkleshine, Moondancer, and herself, Minuette. The three unicorns were all former students of Celestia’s at the school of gifted unicorns! Alumnus, every one of them. Most with some form of honors, so they were, of course, selected. Caramel was there because he came highly recommended by Applejack, one of Princess Twilight’s friends. His job was to make sure all the plants were growing properly and not showing any signs of decay or disease. He briefed them all on what to look for.

Minuette sighed and tried to spice up her inventory with a little bit of humming, her horn glowing as she checked off the items one by one. They had a hydroponics lab that Caramel was also in charge of to provide them with food. The whole ship was a giant tree, so it would recycle all their oxygen well enough, and most of it was a living, breathing, growing thing, so they could even recycle their waste in rooms dedicated to that, so long as they kept it all under control. Those specific rooms were dark and had fungus growing in them, so they had to be monitored carefully to prevent the fungus from spreading. It was lined with metal and sealed carefully. Ideal for mushrooms, but mushrooms could end up being bad for the tree if left unchecked, which is why regular maintenance checks were necessary.

Minuette finished her checklist, and verified everything looked fine, and made her way to the hatch. She flipped it open and jumped inside, falling for a short distance before the gravity shifted, catching her and allowing her to flip and deftly land on her hooves.

“You know there are steps, right?” Twinkleshine said as Minuette skidded to a stop.

“Of course, but those aren’t nearly as fun, are they?” Minuette responded.

Twinkleshine just rolled her eyes. She went back to writing in the book Princess Twilight had given them to keep in contact with Equestria. It was something the Princess had copied from a separate set of books she’d found, and no matter the distance, what was written in one, was copied to the other, and it had infinite pages, so they’d never run out. Very convenient. She was essentially in charge of communications with home, so her job was to make sure she knew where the book was at all times. She rarely let it leave her side.

“How’s ‘home base’ Twinkleshine?” Minuette asked, grabbing a bite to eat from the eating trays. They had little plots of grass and some of the hardier flowers growing all throughout the ship. A good, constant source of food whenever they needed it, and easy to maintain inside the living shell of the tree.

“Canterlot is doing fine. They want to know what it’s like up here.” Twinkleshine said.

“Well tell them it’s kind of boring. Nothing much happens, and we’ve been up here three days. We’ve watched Celestia and Luna move the sun and nothing seemed out of place. The sun went around, followed by the moon, and that was it. What else were we supposed to find?” Minuette said.

“Princess Twilight said there was an anomalous object she had spotted crossing in front of the sun and moon’s path.” A new voice said.

Moondancer walked in, her mane was tied up in a severe bun at the back of her head. She had lost the little barrette she used to use and instead had opted for hair ties holding everything back, all tightly packed into a neat sphere. Princess Twilight apologizing had helped her out of her funk pretty well, and now here she was heading the first Equestrian space exploration mission! Celestia had been awfully proud of her.

“We are supposed to investigate that object, discover what it is, and, if possible retrieve it for further study.” Moondancer said. “Princess Twilight said it had just appeared, and if the distance of Celestia’s sun and Luna’s moon are any indication, the object could be fairly large. It displayed erratic behavior, so she was unable to identify its dimensions, but it could be as small as a boulder…” Minuette snorted, and Moondancer ignored her. “…or bigger than this ship.”

“So what exactly do we do if it’s bigger than we can fit in the cargo hold?” Twinkleshine asked.

“We take as many measurements as we can, of every type we can think of, and grab a sample if possible off it.” Moondancer said.

“Sounds easy enough.” Minuette said, idly chewing on some grass.

“Well, I want you all to know we are not taking any chances.” Moondancer said. “This is only our second foray into Celestia’s sphere, and any number of things could happen, so if something does go wrong or causes any kind of concern for any one of you, we pull out immediately. Speaking of which, where’s Caramel?”

“Probably in Hydroponics, like usual. You know how earth ponies are.” Twinkleshine said.

“No, I don’t know how earth ponies are, Twinkleshine. Do enlighten me.” Moondancer said, voice dripping with venom.

“Sweet Celestia, Moondancer, it was a joke. Relax.” Twinkleshine said, holding up her hooves in surrender.

“Well watch it. This is a serious expedition, and I won’t have you treating Caramel like a second-class crewmember.” Moondancer said. She trotted stiffly off in the direction of hydroponics, leaving Twinkleshine and Minuette alone in the lounge.

Minuette chewed slowly as Moondancer walked off, while Twinkleshine made faces and pulled her hair back in mockery of Moondancer’s look. Once Minuette was certain Moondancer was out of earshot, she looked at Twinkleshine and shook her head.

“Treading dangerous waters there Twinkle. You know how seriously she takes any job she’s given.” Minuette said.

“Yeah, I know. I guess it was a pretty bad joke. I know Caramel is useful and a definite credit to the crew. Without him, we’d be floating up here living off old hay and mushrooms. I was just trying to lighten the mood.” Twinkleshine said.

“Well, I’d recommend making it up to her somehow. But I’ll leave that up to you. I’m gonna go to the observation deck and see if I can spot our mysterious object. Nothing appears to have passed the detection field, but I can at least try to find out if we’re headed in the right direction.” Minuette said. She grabbed one final mouthful of grass and trotted off down another corridor, hooves tapping lightly on the wooden floor.

Twinkleshine turned back to her book, and scratched into it a new message: “Requesting likely heading for target celestial object.” She finished with a small flourish, then slammed the book shut. Waiting for a response. Her horn lit up and she closed her eyes as she connected to the ship’s navigation magic. Using this, she could direct the ship with minimal magical effort. Most of the magic had been spent creating the field in the first place, allowing any unicorn to drive it if they had been taught the right spells to do so. Being such magical prodigies, any one of the three of them could do so, but Twinkleshine, being the one in charge of communications, was the de facto ‘driver’, since she always received the messages first. The book vibrated and gave off a soft ‘ping’ as she received a message. She opened her eyes and flipped it open to read the response.

The response was a series of mathematical equations relating the object to the current positions of Celestia’s sun, Luna’s moon, and Equestria itself in order to triangulate the position. Twinkleshine sighed and pulled out a spare sheet of paper and a quill. She began the laborious process of trying to interpret Princess Twilight’s math. It was accurate, she had no doubt, but she wasn’t the quickest at it. She’d be damned if she went to Moondancer for help without trying to manage it herself first.

Moondancer, meanwhile, entered the hydroponics lab to find Caramel humming to himself and prancing about the room here and there, happily maintaining the myriad plants growing underneath the softly glowing magical lights. He maintained a very organized and rigid schedule, but he was prone to losing things sometimes. Moondancer didn’t really have much of a problem with that, so long as he was kept in hydroponics and not given anything more important than seeds. At least that way if he did lose anything, it was somewhere in hydroponics.

“Caramel. How are the plants doing?” Moondancer asked gently.

He turned at the sound of her voice and smiled wide. “Ah, good day, Moondancer. They’re all doing quite well. Being out here in Celestia’s sphere doesn’t seem to have affected them too much. The only one that seems injured by it is lil’ mister cucumber here.” Caramel said as he lifted up a sad-looking cucumber plant.

“Well, since the rest are doing fine, that’s great to hear. Be sure to keep notes on which ones do the best. In subsequent voyages we’ll only want to make space for the best plants that ponies can subsist on.” Moondancer said.

Caramel saluted smartly. “Will do, Miss Captain, ma’am!”

She sighed. “Just Moondancer, Caramel.”

“Yes, Captain Moondancer!” Caramel said.

She shook her head with a rueful smile, and left him to his work, hoping that he didn’t lose his notes anywhere. Princess Twilight would want that list for all her research. Moondancer understood the purpose behind the research, but sometimes she wondered if perhaps this wasn’t the best way to go about it. Instead of taking extra time to study the object, the Princess had decided it would be easier to go up to the object and touch it hooves-on. That sounded foolish without fully understanding it. It probably had something to do with the way the Princess said it moved, though.

Moondancer walked about out to the common room to find Twinkleshine with her eyes closed, muttering to herself. She always got like that while flying the ship, so Moondancer just found a clean patch of grass and laid down, waiting for her to finish. She still found it weird to not feel the movement of the ship as it moved through Celestia’s sphere. She’d been on boats before, and that was the closest she could compare this hulk to, and she kept expecting it to shift and sway underneath her hooves, but it never did. It was awfully disconcerting sometimes. It felt like being inside a building, but knowing it was moving gave her a weird kind of chill down her spine.

Twinkleshine eventually opened her eyes and blinked rapidly. “Ugh, that’s a really strange feeling.”

“How goes the flight, Twinkleshine? Are we on course?” Moondancer asked.

Twinkleshine looked over at Moondancer and blinked some more. “Oh hey Moondancer. Didn’t see you there. Yeah, we’re on course, provided it doesn’t move like the last time. I still find it worrying that it does that.”

Moondancer nodded. “I’m wary of getting close, personally. If we can nab it with magic before it shifts, we should be okay, but from all accounts, I personally think the description means the object is teleporting.”

“That would seem to indicate it’s either highly charged with magic, or there’s somepony inside it making it do that.” Twinkleshine said, scratching her chin with a hoof.

“Both of which are dangerous possibilities.” Moondancer said.

Twinkleshine yawned.

Moondancer smiled warmly at her as she closed her mouth. “If you need some rest, I can handle the comms for now. You’ve set us on the right heading, so we should be there within… ten hours or so?”

Twinkleshine nodded. “That would be nice, and yes. If it doesn’t move again, interception will be in ten.”

Moondancer floated the book over to her own lap and opened it up to read the past communications, while Moondancer stood up and stretched.

“You have fun with that, Moondancer. I’ll see you in several hours.” Twinkleshine said.

“Thanks, Twinkleshine. Sleep well.”

Twinkleshine walked off toward the crew quarters, dragging her hooves slowly. Poor mare ran herself ragged double-checking everything, making sure the calculations were all correct and the heading was right. Almost as much as Moondancer herself. Minuette, meanwhile, was rather the opposite of the two. Happy-go-lucky and carefree, but a prodigy at magic. Moondancer figured they brought her along because she had been a friend of theirs while at the school for gifted unicorns. Minuette was essentially going to be their heavy-hitter. If anything went wrong and they needed something large lifted, held in place, or otherwise hit really hard, Minuette was going to be the unicorn for the job.

Moondancer read over the most recent communication, then wrote in a short message letting Twilight know that she was now in charge of the book. She got a quick “Roger, Moondancer.” and shut the book. They’d gotten past that much, and this was business. Once the package was secure, they could maybe have a little chat. Moondancer had a few ideas for what they could improve on the ship. She’d run them by Twilight and they could try to improve on the next one. Maybe they could even create single-pony ships for recreation! They’d have to figure out a way to make them work for non-unicorns sometime as well. These things could revolutionize travel in Equestria if they could figure out how to mass-produce them.

Moondancer was sitting smiling to herself about all the possible applications of this new ship they had built, when the book vibrated in her lap, letting her know she had a message. She flipped it open with her magic to have a look.

“Target has moved closer to you! Check your heading!”

Moondancer immediately closed her eyes and lit up her horn, looking through the ship’s magic lenses. She scanned around the outside, hunting for the familiar shape they’d been following the past few days, and saw it, on the same heading they were on, but much closer. They would reach it in half the time, now. Convenient, but alarming. It seemed like it had figured out they were coming and was helping them arrive sooner.

Moondancer checked the heading to make sure it was on course, and set the ship to slow down when they got closer, then brought herself back to her body and let Twilight know what had happened. She’d have to prepare the crew for arrival. She lit up her horn again and connected to the ship’s communication field.

“Minuette, please report to the common room. Minuette, please report to the common room.” Moondancer announced.

Twinkleshine would be staying on the ship, she had already decided. No matter what the thing was, Minuette was going to be the one to deal with it when they got there. She needed to be briefed.

“Hey there Moondancer. What’s up?” Minuette said, prancing into the room.

“We’re about five hours out from the target. It moved closer to us. Whether by design or chance, I don’t know, but you’ll need to get prepared for arrival.” Moondancer explained.

Minuette saluted and put on a too-serious face. “Aye-aye, cap’n!”

Moondancer ignored her and continued. “You’ll need to make sure you’re prepared to traverse the luminiferous aether. It’s hostile to unprepared life, so make sure you remember how to do your wards. You’ll need to have a long enough length of cable so we can tow you back immediately if something goes wrong, and enough cable to attach to the package if it’s something we can fit in the hold. Prepare everything for arrival in five hours. Dismissed!”

Minuette grinned and trotted gaily off to the main airlock. She was getting excited! All this planning and careful building and growing of the ship, then adding the spells to make it safe to carry ponies through Celestia’s sphere, it was amazing that she had the chance to come along. Knowing the Princess was finally paying off! She squeed happily and did a little dance. She knew they just wanted her for her brute-force magic skill, but she was okay with that. If being the one to carry things got her up here on the first trip into Celestia’s sphere, so be it.

She reached the airlock and checked the equipment with the checklist Princess Twilight had provided.

“To traverse the luminiferous aether will require several items so that safety will be maximized. To ensure your safety and anypony with you, please make sure you have a unicorn.”

Minuette tapped her horn. “Check.”

“This unicorn will be responsible for keeping up the wards preventing the luminiferous aether from invading your lungs and suffocating you. Please make sure the accompanying unicorn is able to maintain the ward on all ponies involved before opening the airlock.”

Minuette lit up her horn and put up the ward, just as the diagram showed her. “Check.”

“It is difficult navigating a ship of this size, so to avoid unnecessary complications with retrieving errant ponies, please attach a length of cable to yourself so that the unicorn will not need to divide their magic between the wards, and motion through the aether. In the event you get separated from the unicorn, please pull yourself back to the ship using the cable.”

Minuette ran a hoof over the cable, then started playing it out to its maximum length to make sure there was enough of it. It was time consuming, but she knew Moondancer would be upset if she didn’t make sure it was free of any fraying or tears. Once she was satisfied and had checked the full length, she rolled it back up and nodded. “Check.”

“When attempting to retrieve anypony or anything from the luminiferous aether, a secondary length of cable will be needed. This can be a small length which will attach to the retrieving pony, or a longer, separate length that will attach to the ship itself. Please use discretion when making this decision, and take into account both parties fitness when choosing.”

Minuette looked over at the other lengths, then at the shorter length. She really didn’t want this thing attached to her directly, because of all the speculation involved in what it was, and what it might do, and especially because it seemed to be so magically potent. She opted to check a second length of cable attached to the ship. It was more time-consuming, but it might be necessary, and she was a pragmatic pony. Once that second length was done and checked, she realized it might not fit in the airlock, and she’d then have to move it to one of the cargo holds. “Check, but only halfway.”

She climbed up one of the ramps leading to the ‘top’ and ‘bottom’ of the ship. These were the spots where all the cargo was held, and any one of the rooms would do, but since the size of the object was in question, she’d need an empty one. She wandered around the circular room as the mini-sun floated in midair nearby, slowly beginning its descent.

She found one that only had a few crates in it and pulled them out with her magic, then delivered them to another cargo room, cramming them in next to the barrels of pickles. She went to the now empty room and checked the large opening in the tree. It was sealed with magic of course, but she knew the spell to open it and allow objects, and not air, through. It was fine-tuned enough that she could move the branches out of the way entirely and look out into the aether through a rather massive hole in the ship.

Minuette stared out into the luminiferous aether. Even this, the umpteenth time she’d looked out into it, it took her breath away. She could see Equestria far, far below or above them, however directions worked in the aether, and off to the side, moving slowly away from them was Celestia’s sun. Luna’s moon was moving toward them, and would intercept their path in several hours, but the princesses were informed of their position, and would skirt around the ship, so they were in no danger. It was just so… humbling, to be out here and realize the true scope of the objects the princesses moved so effortlessly through the sky. It made her feel so small. That and seeing the true size of Equestria. They were just a tiny blip on the full geography of their little globe. Minuette had been aghast that she couldn’t see Canterlot from up here. Twinkleshine had actually fainted. Moondancer had seemed unfazed, and Caramel had barely left hydroponics since.

Minuette grinned at the sight, and closed the branches. She left one extended so she could find it from the outside, but she was prepared to make the acquisition as soon as they arrived. That is, if it would fit. If it didn’t, well… they’d have to improvise from there.

Minuette returned to the common room, where Moondancer was apparently watching the object through the ship’s magical lenses. Her eyes were closed and her horn was lit, and she was mumbling to herself. Minuette sat down in front of her and smiled, waiting.

She waited.

And waited.

But after fourty-five minutes it didn’t look like Moondancer was coming out of there without some coaxing, so she poked her in the side. Moondancer stopped talking to herself for a moment, but didn’t actually come out of her little trance. Minuette poked her again and cleared her throat. Moondancer’s horn went out and she slowly opened her eyes.

“Welcome back Minuette. Is everything prepared?” Moondancer asked.

Minuette saluted again, quite smartly. “Aye aye! The cables are long enough, and free of damage, a cargo bay has been cleared and marked for the package, and I have practiced the necessary spells!”

Moondancer rolled her eyes. “Well, that’s excellent. We’re on our final hour of approach, and I’ve gotten a pretty good look at the object. Go wake up Twinkleshine and get Caramel out here, will you? We all need to be here for this.”

“Can do, cap’n! …I mean,  aye aye!” Minuette said, and trotted off.

Moondancer went back into her trance and looked out at the object once again. It hadn’t moved, thankfully, which meant their heading was still good, but now that they were so close, she could identify certain parts of it. Contrary to the initial assumption that it was merely a lump of rock or other material and was merely here in Celestia’s sphere by chance would appear to be wrong. It looked like a strange box of some sort. It had seams, first off, which had to be pony-made. They were far too straight and deliberate, and were placed in positions that would indicate moving parts and thought toward design.

The other reasons she thought it was not just a random rock were that despite the worn look of it, it appeared to have some form of design on it. It was too small to make out, but there appeared to be a pattern to what the ship was covered it. Possibly paint, or possibly etchings. Again, they were too small to make out from this distance, even with the zoom capabilities of the ocular spells. Moondancer felt an insistent poking in her side and turned off her horn. Felt like they were back.

She opened her eyes to see Minuette once again really close to her face. “Hello again Minuette. You know I can still hear you if you speak to me, right?”

“I know, but that’s not nearly as fun as poking you. I’ve gathered everypony here. What’s up?” Minuette said.

Caramel and Twinkleshine were standing just behind Minuette, looking confused and tired, respectively. She looked at all three ponies one at a time, then spoke.

“Okay, we’re on final approach to the object, so I need to brief everypony before we arrive.” Moondancer began. “Minuette has prepared the equipment for the away, and has readied her spells for traversing the luminiferous aether. The initial trip will be solo, attached to the ship to investigate the object.”

Moondancer looked at Minuette with a severe eye. “It will be strictly reconnaissance. Take photographs with the camera I’m going to give you, but maintain a respectable distance. I have reason to believe the object is a container of some kind, and possibly made of metal. This would indicate an intelligence created it to hold something, and we do not want to disturb it if it is harboring something dangerous. I’m also having difficulty determining its exact size. When observing it, I seem to be getting some warping, which is also cause for concern.”

“Is that why you slowed down so early?” Twinkleshine asked.

Moondancer nodded. “Exactly. We’ll approach with caution. If this warping is dangerous, we’ll take the ship through as carefully as we can. Minuette prepared a cargo bay for it, but I doubt at this point that it will be able to hold the object. Investigation first, then we’ll contact the Princess with our findings and ask for her advice after. Got it?”

The three ponies nodded in unison, but Caramel raised his hand.

“Um, Miss Moondancer, what should I do? Is there anything I can even do to help?” Caramel asked.

“Well, without a horn you’re unfortunately limited, but if you want to man the cable Minuette is going to be attached to, your strength would be useful in pulling her back in if things get dangerous.” Moondancer said. She still shrugged afterward, knowing that the job was only to placate him.

Caramel nodded in understanding. “I know, I know. I’m really just here to make the food. Thank you, Moondancer. I’ll be there to help out as well as I can.”

Moondancer nodded. “Alright Ponies! It’s time to arrive! Twinkleshine, man communications.” Moondancer said, floating the book back to her. “Keep Twilight appraised of everything as it happens.”

“Yes, ma’am!” Twinkleshine said, opening the book and pulling out a quill.

“I’ll be bringing the ship in close. Minuette, be prepared to back me up.” Moondancer yelled.

“Aye aye, cap’n!” Minuette said, lighting up her horn.

“Caramel, keep yourself and the supplies safe!” Moondancer shouted.

“Uh… got it!” Caramel said.

Moondancer lit her horn and went into her trance, seeing through the ship’s eyes once more. The luminiferous aether was quiet, black, and unwelcoming, but directly ahead she could see the object, floating aimlessly in the darkness. Despite being loose in the aether, It didn’t spin, and there was that ever-present warping surrounding it.

Without opening her eyes, Moondancer spoke to the ponies who were surrounding her. “We may experience some sort of turbulence as we approach. If this strange field surrounding the object is dangerous, we should know almost immediately. Be prepared for anything.”

She heard their affirmations and slowly moved the ship closer, until they entered the shimmering sphere she could see surrounding the object. As she did, her view of the object distorted as first, then ballooned and shifted. There was no shaking in the ship, no impact of any kind, and nothing untoward seemed to happen to their own ship. They had passed through unscathed. However, the one obvious thing that happened was that the object had grown in size exponentially. It was now bigger than their own ship, and Moondancer could plainly see that it was a ship now. Those lines she had seen before were hoof-made indeed, and they marked seams and connections putting it together. It appeared to be made entirely of metal, which was alarming.

“A… train?” Moondancer said in confusion.

“What? Train?” Twinkleshine said.

“It’s like, a train, kind of. Like an engine, but not quite the same.” Moondancer explained to the three ponies inside the ship. “Here, just take a look yourselves. Tell me what you think it is.” She said, and released her vision from the spell.

Twinkleshine went first, horn lighting up and quickly going out as she stepped back in alarm. “What is THAT!” She said.

Minuette went next, and stayed a bit longer, marveling at the hulking pile of metal ahead of them. “How would anypony even get something like that off the ground! You’d need so much magic to lift something of that size off the ground! Or a huge gas bag, and I don’t see one of those at all!”

Twinkleshine was scratching furiously at the notebook, and she tapped Minuette to get her attention. “Let me have another look, I need to send a sketch to Princess Twilight.” Minuette obliged and Twinkleshine popped in and out of the vision spell to send a picture to the Princess far away.

Moondancer, meanwhile, was rubbing her chin with a hoof trying to figure out their next move. “We obviously can’t fit it inside the ship, so that’s out. We should, however, try to figure out what it is exactly.” Moondancer said. “And why it’s here. If it’s a threat to Equestria, we need to make sure. We’re the only ones out here, so that puts us in this… questionable position.”

“Well…” Caramel piped up. “…you said it looks like a train, right? So I’d say it’s meant to carry live cargo. As for how it got up here, well what if they just made it go really fast and built a ramp that pointed straight up? If you can’t lift it directly, why not push it upward?”

Moondancer stared at him, dumbfounded. “Caramel, no offense, but that sounds completely stupid.”

Caramel’s face fell. “Sorry. Just a suggestion.”

Moondancer smiled at him softly. “I appreciate it Caramel. But I just don’t see that working.”

Twinkleshine finally opened her eyes and slammed the book shut. “There! I hope the Princess appreciates the picture. Should we wait for her to respond before doing anything else?” She asked.

“I don’t think we’ll have to wait long. Twilight is usually pretty good about getting back to us. But we should prepare to go get hooves-on with this thing.” Moondancer said, standing up. “Minuette, get down to the airlock. I’ll be coming with you. Twinkleshine, bring us closer, but slowly. Caramel, come with me so you can haul is back if anything goes wrong. Twinkleshine, let us know via an announcement what Twilight says.”

“Will do, Moondancer.” Twinkleshine said, and settled down in the common room to wait, lighting up her horn.

The other three headed down to the airlock to prep for an expedition to the metal behemoth. Minuette pointed out the two spools of cable she had checked, and they each put on a saddle with a hook on the back they attached the cables to. Moondancer flicked on the required ward a few times to make sure she was ready, and tested putting it on Caramel just in case. She then stood next to the door built into the wood of the ship and slid it open, the magic surrounding the ship providing a barrier against the luminiferous aether. They could see the body of the metal beast looming large in their vision as Twinkleshine brought them up next to it. It was at least three times the size of their tree, and appeared pitted with scars on its shell from some unknown force.

“Moondancer, I’ve found what might be a door. I’m going to bring you up near it. I’m connected fully to the communication spell, so if you speak I’ll hear you.” Twinkleshine said.

“Thanks Twinkleshine. I think I see the door you mentioned. We’re ready to go when you stop, so just let us know when you’ve finished moving.” Moondancer responded.

“Okay, right… about… now.” Twinkleshine said, and sure enough, the ship stopped moving almost directly across from what appeared to be a door in the body of the other ship.

The door didn’t look like it had moved in a very long time, and it was made of solid metal, at least on this side of it. There was a control of some sort, though. Similar to a ship’s wheel, it was flush with the front of the door.

“Okay Minuette. Let’s go.” Moondancer said.

Moondancer pushed herself through the magic shield protecting the tree from the aether and immediately felt the gravity of the ship lose its pull on her. Her ward protected her from suffocation, and the cable, as she looked back to double-check, kept her tethered to the ship. It was still incredibly disconcerting floating like this, without even being able to swim in any direction, but she had mostly gotten over it after the first few aether-walks.

Minuette, meanwhile, enjoyed it far too much. She pushed off from the ship and twirled through the aether as she made a beeline for the opposing metal ship, impacting it before Moondancer could warn her against touching the thing. Moondancer smacked a hoof against her face, but after a few seconds, she saw that nothing had happened quite yet, so no harm had been done, hopefully.

Minuette connected her ward to Moondancer’s to communicate, a thin line of magic between them. “It’s definitely metal, Moonie, and I don’t feel any magic at all.”

Moondancer waited until she had impacted the ship as well, then held her hooves to it with her own magic so she could walk on it. “Well, it’s good that contact didn’t trigger anything. Please take more care in the future, Minuette. Let’s look around quickly at the surface, then contact Twinkleshine and see if she wants us to enter. This wheel looks like it would spin, and I’m willing to say it would open the door.”

Minuette nodded and disconnected from Moondancer to send a message to Twinkleshine. Afterward, the two looked over the immediate area surrounding the door. The metal surface looked like it had been struck repeatedly all over by something. There were dents of varying sizes all over it, though none had managed to rupture the shell.

“What do you think made all these dents in it?” Minuette asked.

“If I had to venture a guess, since it’s been out here in the aether for so long, it’s entirely possible these were caused by shooting stars.” Moondancer answered.

“Shooting stars? You mean like you see in the night sky? Things can get hit by those?” Minuette said in alarm.

“Calm down. They’re rarer than you think, and the chances of us getting hit are even more slim.” Moondancer said. Minuette didn’t look appeased, but she didn’t bring it up again.

 They didn’t range too far from the door. Twinkleshine needed to easily be able to contact them, and that was easier the closer they were. She was in charge of the ship and needed to be able to move it at a moment’s notice. Especially when there was such an unknown element involved. The ship being their lifeline, it was important she easily be able to protect it.

Eventually, a tendril of magic snaked out from the ship and latched onto Moondancer’s ward. Twinkleshine spoke up through it. “Okay, I contacted the Princess letting her know what we suspect it is, how big it is, and how absolutely impossible it is for us to move it. She said she will confer with the other princesses and get back to us about further plans, but we are free to explore it with the utmost caution.” Twinkleshine said.

“Okay then. I’d like to get a look inside at the very least. If anypony is alive in there, we should see if they need help. They may have been trying to get our attention. The way it teleported closer to us would seem to indicate it wanted us to come to it.” Moondancer said.

Minuette seemed a little less enthusiastic. “Are you sure it’s safe to go in there? What if it’s something bad?”

“Then we evacuate immediately. But we have to check.” Moondancer insisted.

“Well, alright.” Minuette agreed.

“Twinkleshine, tell caramel we’re going to try to open the door here. If it works, we’re going inside to the full length of the cables and no more. If we’re not back in fifteen minutes, he is to start pulling, no matter what.” Moondancer said through the communication spell.

“Acknowledged, Moondancer. Celestiaspeed.” Twinkleshine said, and disconnected the spell.

Moondancer looked over at Minuette to make sure she was prepared. The two of them went back to the door and the ship’s wheel embedded in it. Minuette didn’t need any prompting before she grabbed onto it with her magic and began trying to turn it. It was slow going, and at first it didn’t seem like it would move at all, but there was a sudden lurch, and a small piece of metal flew off and the whole thing started to spin easily. Minuette turned it as far as it would go before it stopped, having hit the end of its track.

Minuette gave Moondancer one last look and took a deep breath, then yanked on the door. It opened outward into the aether, swinging up into minuette’s face. She scooted over to the side, and peered inside the ship with Moondancer.

There was nothing but a long hallway. A metal walkway covered what the two ponies assumed must be the floor, since the other three sides of the square tunnel were uneven and covered with designs on the sides, and fixtures that could be assumed to be lanterns on the upper portion. They couldn’t see very far inside, but what little they were looking at wasn’t very inviting.

“Uhhhh… Moondancer, do we really need to go inside? Can’t we just leave it here?” Minuette asked, shying away from the hole behind Moondancer.

“I said we would investigate to the end of the cables, so that’s what we’ll do. It’s safer as a pair, so come on. I’ll lead the way.” Moondancer said.

Moondancer made light with her horn and stepped inside the entrance, carefully touching a hoof to the grating to test it with a small amount of pressure before putting her weight on it. As she moved her whole body inside, she noticed that the ship itself had gravity similar to their own, and carefully released the spell holding her hooves down.

“It has gravity at least. That’s positive. I’m going to scan the air, see if it’s breathable. I didn’t see any wards on the ship, though.” Moondancer said.

Her magic probed out at the surrounding ship, lighting up small pockets here and there as she mentally searched for good, breathable air. She shook her head in frustration and turned to look at the entrance, her magic circling the portal she’d entered through.

“Nothing. I don’t think it’s any good. We’ll have to keep the spell up the entire…”

“Wait, is that a second door?” Minuette said, pointing at the faint outline of something not too far down the entry hall.

Sure enough, there was a second door just ahead at the edge of the light Moondancer’s horn created. Moondancer moved up to it, with Minuette close behind her. VERY close behind her. The door was similar to the one they had already opened, with a wheel that appeared to turn in the same way. Minuette tried to move it, but it wouldn’t budge, no matter how hard she forced it.

“Can you break it?” Moondancer asked.

Minuette shook her head. “It’s not stuck. It’s hitting something inside the door. It’s locked.”

“Hey, move aside a second. There’s something here.” Moondancer said as she gently pushed minuette aside.

Behind Minuette on the wall, there was a faintly glowing red square. It was flashing, and covered in dust, which had muted the colour. There appeared to be words on it, but she couldn’t make them out with all the mess that was covering it.

Moondancer reached out a hoof to clean it, wiping away the dust and grime. It made a heavy click when pressure was applied, and the outer door began to swing shut. Moondancer’s eyes widened in alarm.

“The door! Minuette catch it!” Moondancer yelled.

Minuette turned and looked, and her horn flared. The door lit up and slowed, but didn’t stop. Whatever heavy mechanism was swinging it shut was too much for her.

“I can’t hold it! It’s too strong!” Minuette cried.

Moondancer raced toward it, but by the time she made it, the door was too close to shut. She pushed against it with her hooves, but could not slow its inexorable swing. It hit their safety cables and didn’t even slow as it sliced through them, shutting with a dull clang. They were sealed inside the strange ship.

“Oh no! Oh no no no no!” Minuette cried, frozen in fear.

Moondancer came over and put a hoof on Minuette’s withers to try and help her relax. “Calm down! It’s probably just the door function. I hit something by accident that shut the door. I highly doubt the entryway was built to kill us. That just goes to show that you shouldn’t put your hooves on everything you see. I should have cleaned it off with my magic instead. Let that be a lesson. Now, let’s…”

Moondancer was interrupted by a loud click, then a whirring, and a cloud of dust came spewing into the small chamber from the walls, followed by a gust of air. The two ponies broke into fits of coughing. Once they had recovered enough, there was a scratchy beep, then the red light Moondancer had hit turned green, and the door they had been investigating started turning the wheel on its own. They watched as it spun, and backed away slightly. It spun for a few seconds, then hit the end with a clunk, and the door rolled sideways into the wall, opening up to a larger black room.

The two ponies were silent for a moment, staring into the darkness. Minuette broke the silence first.

“I don’t like this.” She said.

“I don’t either. We need to figure out how to open the door first and foremost. Once I know we can get back outside, then we can explore further.” Moondancer said.

She turned back to the button she had accidentally pressed and looked at it. It was green now, flickering fitfully in the light of her horn. It had words on it, but despite now being clean, she still couldn’t read them. They were strange and blocky, not like any script she’d ever encountered in the library at Canterlot.

“Minuette, can you read this?” Moondancer asked.

Minuette stopped staring at the darkness ahead long enough to look down at the button. “No. I’m not familiar with that writing at all. It looks harsh and angry.”

“Well, if I had to characterize it, that’s a pretty good way to do so.” Moondancer said. “I’m going to push it again, see if it opens the door. Be ready.”

Moondancer pushed the button with her hoof again, and there was a click, but it didn’t change colour, and the door didn’t open.

“Okay, so it’s not the same button for the other direction. Look around, see if you can find any other buttons or switches.” Moondancer said.

Minuette nodded and the two searched the entryway they were in for anything that might indicate it would let them back out. Nothing else was lit, however, and despite finding what might have once been a button, it was damaged, having been smashed to pieces by something. Half of it was still there, with that severe writing on it, but it was non-functional if it had been what they wanted.

“Well this is disturbing.” Moondancer said.

“What’re we gonna do, Moondancer? We’re stuck in here!” Minuette wailed, clinging tightly to Moondancer’s side.

“Okay, first, we’re going to calm down, alright? Deep breaths, Minuette. We need to be clear-headed before we go any further.” Moondancer said firmly.

Moondancer put a hoof on Minuette’s withers and looked her in the eyes. She inhaled slowly, then exhaled. Inhale. Exhale. She kept going until Minuette was breathing with her, nodding as she followed along. She kept it up until Minuette’s eyes weren’t quite as wide, and she was no longer hyperventilating.

“Feel better?” Moondancer asked.

“Yeah. I’m okay. We can manage this.” Minuette said. “What do we do first?”

“Well, with what I would assume is the exit button destroyed, we will have to find a different exit, or some other way of leaving the ship. We tried magic, but this ship was quite solidly built. It’s quite clear we’ll have to go deeper.” Moondancer said.

Minuette looked in the direction of the open door leading further inside the ship. Outside the pool of light cast by their horns, the darkness was absolute. There was the sound of groaning metal every so often echoing through the hallway toward the two ponies, but there wasn’t much else to be seen. Inside was a mystery. A rather frightening mystery.

“I’ll lead, but keep close, and be ready for anything. If anything is alive inside this place, we don’t know if it is dangerous. Our safety is first and foremost. If you feel at all threatened, defend yourself with extreme prejudice. I will forgive you for killing any foreign creatures.” Moondancer said.

Minuette didn’t say anything, but Moondancer could hear her gulp as she swallowed. She was scared, but her magic was powerful. She needed to feel free to use it if necessary. They were in strange territory, and safety must come first.
> Chapter 2
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Moondancer stepped out of their small room, her horn light glowing as she focused it around the area. It illuminated a wider room, with small recesses in the walls on either side. She led the way over to one of them and inspected it closer. It looked like something had attached here at one point, but if it had, it had been gone a long time. The dust that covered everything was in here as well, meaning it had not been used for a long time.

That actually made her wonder if there was oxygen in here. “Minuette, watch me for a moment, I’m going to release my ward and see if I can breathe in here. If I pass out, please rescue me.” Moondancer said.

“Uh, okay.” Minuette responded.

Moondancer dropped her ward, then let out her breath. She tried to calm down as she exhaled, and as she inhaled she felt an immense sense of relief. There was oxygen, and she could indeed breathe. It was stale, and musty, and tasted distinctly of dust and metal, but it was breathable. If there were any pathogens in the air, they’d find out, but they needed all their energy to defend themselves in here, and this would be one less thing to worry about.

“It’s safe, Minuette. You can drop your ward. You’ll need your energy for other things.” Moondancer said.

Minuette let out a breath and dropped her own ward, giving a weak smile. “Oh thank goodness. That’s a bit of a weight off my mind.”

Moondancer nodded, and the two slowly moved forward, following the rather linear hallway deeper into the ship. Moondancer kept an eye on the dust on the floor as they moved. So long as the dust remained undisturbed, then that meant nothing was touching it. That either meant something lived here that flew, or nopony lived here.

The hall continued down some distance, turning right once, then taking them down a short way. They passed a couple rooms, but either the doors did not open, or they were empty. Nothing at all inside the first two they could get inside, with a thin coating of dust on the floor. The fact that it was thin dust made Moondancer wonder if that was just all the dust that was available, or whatever happened had happened rather recently. Recently being open to interpretation, of course.

“What are we looking for, Moonie?” Minuette asked, pressed tight up against her.

“I’m not positive, but we need a room that looks important. If it’s like a throne room or captain’s room on a boat, it should have a big fancy chair at the very least.” Moondancer answered.

“All the rooms we’ve found are empty. That’s concerning enough as it is, but none of them even had any chairs in them at all.” Minuette whined.

“I know, but calm down. We’ll find something eventually. The ship isn’t infinite. We just need to keep looking.” Moondancer said.

“I just want to know we have an exit. I’m worried and scared. Do you think Caramel and Twinkleshine have started panicking yet?” Minuette asked.

“I certainly hope not. Twinkleshine is in control of the ship. Caramel literally cannot pilot it home if she loses her head. As the sole remaining unicorn on board, it’s her responsibility to keep the ship safe and deliver it, and the remaining crew home intact. She’ll wait as long as she can before leaving.” Moondancer said.

“Would she really leave without us?” Minuette said, aghast.

“That was part of the job description, Minuette. It was always a risk.” Moondancer said, plodding stoically along, hooves tapping on the metal walkway.

The two mares wandered aimlessly for some time, hearing nothing but the ominous creaking of the ship around them, and the tapping of their hooves on the floor. They went from a grating covering the floor, to what must once have been sterile white-painted metal, but was not peeling and dust-covered metal sheets. They hugged the right wall, only deviating to check out nearby rooms in case any of them were what they were looking for, but none of them were promising, and all were empty. After a good amount of walking, the white-painted walls eventually led them to a set of doors unlike the ones they had previously seen. Where the others were single doors with no windows and no markings on them, these ones had some writing on the front, emblazoned in red, and a set of windows just higher than their heads.

“If my mental map is still correct, this leads into the deeper parts of the ship. I was hoping we’d stay near the outside wall and find another door, but this is the only path from here. We’d either have to go back and choose another hallway, or investigate this one. What do you think, Minuette?” Moondancer asked.

Minuette stood up on her hind hooves and peeked through the bottom of the window. “This area looks important. I think it’s worth a look. My only concern is the red. No matter what species made this ship, ponies typically use red because it’s eye-catching. So this area is either important, or dangerous.”

“Well, let’s see if we can get it open, then. I don’t fancy backtracking too much, and I don’t want to get lost. I’m trying to keep a mental picture of where we are, but it’s swiftly getting tangled. See if you can figure out how to open it.” Moondancer said, looking at the wall next to the door.

Minuette looked at the wall on the opposite side, and searched for something that might open the door. She glanced at the door itself, but as from the first look, there wasn’t anything that looked like a handle or a knob that could be used to open it. Not even a wheel like from the airlock. But, if the airlock doors were any indication, there should be a button or something. Some other way of opening it must be available.

Minuette’s eyes flicked over the wall, and alighted upon something with more of that strange writing. It looked like it had once been painted yellow, with flakes of it coming off, but it looked like it opened. She gingerly tugged at it with her magic, and it snapped off, clattering noisily to the floor. Minuette turned and saw Moondancer glaring at her and grinned ruefully. Behind the panel, though, was what looked like some sort of handle, precisely the kind she had been looking for.

“I think I found it, Moonie. I’m going to try turning this thing and see what happens.” Minuette said.

“Wait, what did you…” Moondancer began, a little too late.

Minuette pulled and twisted the thing until it moved, and there was a hissing noise from the door as it slowly separated and slid open, revealing a second set of doors.

“Well… that’s one door, I guess.” Moondancer said. “Now for the second one.”

“At least we know what to look for. There are little yellow panels that appear to open the doors if you tug on them.” Minuette said, holding up the panel she had broken off the wall.

“That’s good to know.” Moondancer said.

Moondancer stepped inside the first door, and looked on both sides, there was indeed a yellow panel, in much better condition than the first. She pulled it open, and tugged on the handle inside. It slid open the second set of doors, but shut the first set, clipping Minuette’s chin as it slid shut.

Panicked, Moondancer quickly twisted it backward, opening the first set of doors again. Minuette stood there, rubbing her chin.

“Well, now we know that whoever built this thing really likes double sets of doors.” Minuette said.

“I’m just glad it opened again. Stick closer to me, Minuette.” Moondancer said.

Minuette obediently hurried through the doors, standing inside, and Moondancer opened them once more, sealing them in the room. Upon opening the doors, they looked around at the room they were now in. It was fairly wide open, with that white paint peeling off some of the walls. In the center was a tall circular object, again, slightly taller than a pony could see, just above their heads. From the light of their horns they could see that there was a path to the right, and to the left, both heading into separate hallways with more of that writing above each.

“What do you think this room is for?” Minuette asked.

“It’s white, and looks like it was built for no-nonsense business. Either a lab or a medical area. I don’t see any instruments I recognize, though.” Moondancer said.

Minuette shivered. “I don’t know that I would want to do either of those things here.”

They took a couple of steps forward, and as soon as their hooves entered the room proper, there was an electrical pop, and one of the lights in the ceiling came on, flickering fitfully. It was followed by a noise that was filled with static, coming from above them. The two ponies’ ears went flat, and they looked around for the source, horn lights flashing to and fro. Minuette back up to the first door, her flank pressing tightly against it, Moondancer stood just ahead of her, light sweeping the room. Eventually, the noise died down, and the two waited patiently until they were sure nothing more was going to happen.

“What… in Equestria, was that!” Minuette said in alarm.

Moondancer looked shaken. “I don’t know! I came from the roof! Keep your horn ready, but let’s try entering again. Remember, if anypony shows their face and seems threatening, shoot first.”

Minuette nodded, and the two both stuck a hoof out across the threshold. There was some sparking and crackling, but the screaming sound seemed to have stopped. They slowly made their way in, up to the tall thing in the center. Minuette stretched up to look over the top, and saw a flat surface, devoid of any items on top of it. There was a small gate in the side, indicating that somepony could have entered and stood inside, likely to direct ponies to specific places. So, sort of a reception desk?

“I think this was a reception area of sorts, Moondancer.” Minuette said. “This desk would have been where somepony stood to help ponies find specific areas or things they were looking for.”

Moondancer was looking down the hall to the left of where they’d entered, light beam focused on the floor. “I think you’re right Minuette, but I’ve found something else. Hoofprints.”

Minuette felt a chill go down her spine and dropped back down to the floor to scurry nearer to Moondancer. “How new?”

“Not very. They’ve been filled in with dust, but dust had already built up before they were made.” Moondancer said, motioning toward the floor down the hallway.

Minuette leans over Moondancer’s back to have a look at where her light was pointed. There were prints in the dust, and they appeared to go both directions, if her interpretation of their shape was correct. They came first toward the desk, then they went back the way they had come. The hoofprints were oddly shaped, with a form kind of like a peanut, and lines criss-crossing here and there across the print.

“Is… is that a hoof?” Minuette asked.

“No. At least it’s clearly not a natural hoof. Somepony was wearing shoes. The design is unnatural and meant for extra traction, showing intelligence. We were expecting whoever built this ship to be intelligent, though. The question is why so much dust landed before they came through here. Either they avoided this section of the ship for some reason, or somepony arrived much later to investigate, much like us. So we don’t know if they were the original creators of the ship or not.” Moondancer explained.

“Should we follow them?” Minuette said hesitantly.

“I think we should. They came in, then they left back the way they came without hesitation. They knew something we don’t.” Moondancer said.

“Alright, I’m ready, lead the way Moonie.” Minuette said.

Moondancer lead the way down the hall, following the hoofprints in the dust. They travel down the hallways, moving carefully through the ship. All of the doors they come to had been removed from their frames and were entirely gone, leaving only the small slots where they would have slid into to open. That was concerning. They weren’t destroyed, but the doors were missing entirely, and that was cause to worry.

“Be ready for anything, Minuette. We don’t know what we’re going to find.” Moondancer said. “There are clearly doors missing.”

Minuette nodded and kept her horn at the ready. She’d noticed that some of the walls were also missing. Sheets of metal removed entirely, exposing the strange underbelly of what went into the ship. There were small colourful strings running up and down through it, as well as pipes and the supporting beams of metal. A strange mixture of things to put behind walls, that was certain. The main concern was that they were gone, though.

The two ponies kept walking for a short while longer, until they heard a strange noise coming from up ahead. It was similar to the sound that had come from the ceiling in the white room, but it was rising and falling in volume. It sounded like it was coming closer, then going away, then coming closer again, it was slow as well, not like a siren. There was also a light rising and falling in intensity with the sound, slipping through a doorway up ahead. Something was moving around up there. Something, or somepony.

Moondancer stopped and tapped Minuette, inclining her head toward the sound down the hall. Minuette nodded and brought a hoof up to her horn. She was ready for anything. The two moved onward, creeping toward the noise. They moved slowly, so as to avoid making much sound themselves, but their hard hooves made that difficult on metal. It clinked under their steps, and the age of it made it creak as well. Nothing seemed to change about the sound except the volume as they got closer, so that was a small comfort.

Moondancer put out a hoof to signal Minuette to turn off her horn, then the two inched forward until they arrived at the open doorway the light was coming through. Despite her best efforts, it was shaking slightly. The constant white noise was awfully disconcerting. Moondancer waited until the noise and light came around, screeching past the doorway as the two ponies pressed themselves tightly against the wall, then she slowly stuck her muzzle around the doorway to look at what was out there.

In the dim light cast by whatever was making the noise, her eyes were immediately drawn to a huge metal construct in the middle of the room. It was a strange cigar-shaped monstrosity, with a pointed top and four fins on the bottom. The room itself appeared to have been torn into the ship over a long period of time.

The source of the noise, meanwhile, was what really alarmed her. A strange glowing figure was FLOATING around the catwalk they were on! It was bipedal, and its arms were waving in front of it as it moved, grasping at the air. It was emitting that awful white noise they had heard earlier, but now, being this close, she could hear some sort of rhythm to it, as if it were trying to say something. The thing was mostly white, with a large spherical and shiny head. It was covered in strange tubes, with a large white pack on its back. She wasn’t sure if it was wearing a suit or that was its natural form. It went behind the tip of the metal thing in the middle of the room, then turned back to face her direction, and she pulled back.

Moondancer ducked back around the wall, pressing herself tightly against the wall as the floating creature made its rounds. She was breathing hard, and Minuette, having not seen what she had seen, was pale, and her eyes were wide. The questions were plain on her face, but Moondancer just shook her head and held her tightly against the wall as the light drew closer. She was shaking as the light drew closer, and she held her breath. She felt her heart race as the light stopped at the doorway, but she dared not move.

The sound stopped as well, and there was a heavy *thump* as something impacted the walkway.

“SQZIPLA*SHHHHHHHHHH*?!”

A bulbous white limb, with something similar to claws moved inside the doorway, touching the hoofprint she had left in the dust. The light grew brighter as a second white paw gripped the edge of the doorway. Moondancer felt tears come to her eyes from fear as she shook against the wall, the thing clearly towering over the two small ponies. Then it stuck its head inside the door, facing them.

“MSHFLAZZTARXM *KZZZZZZZZZZZZT*!”

“AHHHHHH!” The two mares scream in unison, clinging to each other.

Minuette lit up her horn in a panic and blasted a beam directly at the thing’s giant mirror-like eye. The beam deflected off the shiny surface, leaving a small crack from the impact, and melting a hole in the wall above and behind the thing. The creature ignored the attack, and reached out for Moondancer, long bulbous claws groping at the air as it moved closer.

Moondancer screeched in fear and shoved Minuette back down the hall where they’d come from. The two ponies tumbled over each other as they scrabbled at the metal floor, hooves slipping in the dust in their mad haste to escape the one-eyed thing.

“What is it?!” Minuette yelled as they ran.

“I don’t know! I can’t understand it, but it floats, and your magic barely nicked it! It tried to grab us, so don’t stick around to find out! I do NOT feel safe!” Moondancer shouted, sparing glances to look behind.

The thing was slowly stomping after them, each step on the ground seeming to take a large amount of effort. It stopped after a moment and screeched out some more strange noises, then its body jerked weirdly, and it floated slowly off the floor. As slow and lumbering as it had been on the floor, it was fast and agile in the air. It careened down the hall after them, emitting that strange hissing and crackling noise. Its arms flopped strangely as it swung back and forth, hovering after them.

The two ponies lost sight of it as they rounded a corner, but it still glowed with that eerie light, even though Moondancer could not see a light source on it, so they knew it was coming. They tried their best to follow their hoofprints back to where they had come, all the way to that white room.

“If we… can get… to those double doors, we can lock it away… from us… okay?” Moondancer panted as she ran. Physical activity was not her forte.

“Okay, I’ll try to hit it with some magic again. The first time seemed like a glancing blow, so I’ll try to hit the body mass this time.” Minuette called back, slightly ahead of Moondancer.

They raced back to white room, thankfully not getting lost. Minuette led the way with her horn light, pulling ahead of Moondancer. Eventually she saw the desk up ahead after they turned a corner, and she knew they were just about there. She skidded into the room and turned to the dividing doors. The entrance was open, they just needed to get in between and pull the switch!

Minuette slid to a stop right next to the switch in the wall and turned to look behind. The hissing and screeching thing was close on their fetlocks, its sickly light and flailing limbs very close behind. Minuette powered up a shot, and fired it right over Moondancer’s head, striking the thing square in its chest. The beam sizzled through it and struck the wall behind, but the thing didn’t stop, nor did it slow. In fact, the cacophony became even louder and it jerked forward suddenly. It flew through the air, landing with an enormous thud just behind Moondancer. It crumpled to the ground, hitting its giant eye against the floor, but despite not seeing ahead of itself, a claw reached out and grabbed her by the hoof, pulling her away from Minuette.

“Minuette, help me!” Moondancer cried in panic.

Minuette fired another beam, which once again pierced right through the creature, who didn’t care at all. She tried to crush it with force, but despite its skin buckling, it didn’t drop Moondancer. She tried to pull Moondancer away, but its grip was far too strong.

Moondancer was panicking, and her horn was lighting up, but she couldn’t figure out which spell she was trying to cast. The thing had her by the leg, and it was hurting her with its grip. She didn’t think it had broken her leg, but much more and it surely would. Moondancer watched Minuette try everything she could think of, and the thing didn’t care at all. She grunted as Minuette tried to just pull her, but the creature wasn’t letting go.

The creature slowly pulled itself up off the floor, far less mobile and much more weighty now that it was not flying. It lifted Moondancer up off the floor, letting her dangle by her leg. It looked over at Minuette, who flinched as its massive eye focused on her. It plodded slowly forward, dragging its feet as its free claw pointed at Minuette.

“KSHAAAABSFFFFFFFNST!”

The light around it flickered weirdly, and seemed to shift, throwing strange shadows that seemed to clutch at Minuette. She looked down at Moondancer, who’s horn was sparking in the creature’s grip as she tried to figure out what spell to cast in a blind panic. Minuette felt tears come to her eyes as the creature moved closer, each step bring that iron grip nearer toward her. Her horn lit up and she caught Moondancer’s eye, sobbing.

“Minuette, help me please! I can’t get loose!” Moondancer pleaded.

Minuette shook her head.

“Minuette no! Don’t leave me! PLEASE!” Moondancer cried.

Minuette felt her legs shake as her horn lit up and she turned the handle.

“Minuette, noooo!” Moondancer was cut off as the door slid shut, locking her voice away from Minuette.

As soon as the door behind her opened, Minuette galloped down the empty hall, alone in the dark, with the muted hiss of static disappearing behind her.

Minuette ran. She ran as hard as she could through the twisting tunnels, stumbling into walls as she tried to turn around corners, sliding over small patches of dust. She ran until she couldn’t run any longer and had to stop and catch her breath. She stopped and sobbed, crying tears that streaked down the dust coating her cheeks, leaving filthy trails. Her horn flickered in between shuddering breaths and she stamped a hoof against the floor weakly. She was angry at Moondancer for making her go deeper into this stupid ship, angry at Twilight for finding the thing in the first place, but mostly she was angry at herself for not being able to fulfill the one job she’d been brought for.

“They only wanted me here so I could hit things really hard with magic, and I failed at that! That thing didn’t even care!” Minuette yelled into the darkness.

Minuette sniffled and continued down the hall, dragging her hooves across the floor. She walked for a while longer until she reached a set of doors that barred her path. She punched them with a hoof in frustration and looked up at the doors themselves: Large, imposing, with more of that lettering on them, but this time in green. There was also a symbol emblazoned across the entire thing that she was sure must be important, but damned if she knew how important.

“Moon… Moondancer would have wanted to investigate this.” Minuette mumbled to herself, sniffling. “This looks… important.”

Minuette searched around for the yellow marker that hid the switch to manually open the door. She pulled off the cover with her magic, tossing it to the side, then turned the switch. The door hissed open, revealing what looked to her eyes like a very important room indeed.

“Moonie… I think I found it.” Minuette said.
> Chapter 3
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

She entered the room, wide-eyed. The first thing she saw was a window looking out into the luminiferous aether. It covered an entire wall, and despite the occasional small scuff or scratch on it, it was clear as Celestia’s day. She looked around the rest of the room, and it did indeed look like it was important to the ship. There were buttons everywhere, and more of those smooth, flat panels she wasn’t sure about. A few of the buttons and panels were even glowing, which, if that first button was any indication, meant they should function. In the middle of the room, though, was a very large, very important-looking chair. If Minuette were to venture a guess, that was the captain’s chair. If the creatures who made this ship were anything like ponies, they would give the captain of their ship the biggest and most important-looking chair possible.

Minuette trotted into the room and went straight for the large seat. If there was going to be a button to open doors to the aether, she would have put it there. It was too tall for her to see the arms of the chair, so she hopped up into it and looked from there. On both sides were a series of buttons, some switches, dials, and some glass panel with a picture of something she didn’t recognize, but could possibly have been a map of the ship. There were words and lights on it, but none of them helped her understand.

Unable to make heads or tails of most of the words attached to them, Minuette looked first at the ones that were lit up or flickering. The lights were incredibly dim, but some looked rather promising. She started manipulating them one at a time, listening and looking for some indication that something had happened.

She went through almost all of them, and most seemed to serve no function in the state the ship was currently in, but she got to one with a weird picture of what looked like a circle with a line through the top of it, and flipped it. The whole ship shuddered, and Minuette looked around in a panic, it stopped after a couple seconds, but then all the lights came on in the room, accompanied by a cacophony of noises. Alarms, klaxons, screeches, whistles, beeps, and red flashing lights abounded, and Minuette dove from the chair and hid under a nearby desk, covering her ears.

“Oh Moonie, what did I do? I just wanted out!” Minuette cried. “I keep bucking up!”

She cowered as the sounds continued, but over the cacophonous alarms, she heard the doors hiss as they opened, then shut. She was worried it was the creature at first, but all she saw was a floating light. Her first thought was that a will o’ the wisp was on board, but that didn’t make sense, since they lived in swamps. Mind you, nothing about the ship made sense to her, so she supposed that wasn’t out of the realm of possibility. It floated about the room, for all intents and purposes seeming to look at the panels and buttons. It came to the captain’s chair, and settled into into it, glowing that sickly yellow glow.

“…what?” Minuette whispered to herself in confusion.

Minuette wasn’t as well-read as Princess Twilight or Moondancer, but she’d heard tales of will o’ the wisps. If she remembered, they led ponies to their dooms in forests and swamps. What was this one doing pretending to captain a ship?

The wisp sat in the chair for a while longer, and Minuette stayed hidden, not wanting to expose herself to it. Some time later, as she was starting to cramp up from remaining motionless, she heard that hissing and crackling noise over the constant alarms, and the doors hissed open once more.

The creature lurched into the room, arms limp at its sides and its back hunched over as it slowly and heavily plodded through the door and up to the chair. Once it arrived it collapsed into the seat on top of the wisp, and the two seemed to merge together, and unnatural light suffusing the creature’s single mirror-like eye. Some of the light even poured out of the wholes Minuette had put into it, which didn’t seem to actually be injuries at all. More like simple cosmetic inconveniences.

Once in the seat, it started pushing buttons on the arms of the chair, and the ship made strange noises and vibrated. The creature stood up and stumped over to another panel and looked at it, making those horrible hissing and screeching noises, then it moved to another next to it. It pressed some buttons there and began moving along the panels one at a time around the room, looking at them and fiddling with the display in one way or another.

Minuette couldn’t understand what it was trying to accomplish, but it was moving closer and closer to her hiding spot, and she didn’t want to be close to it at all. Not only was it unnerving to be around, it was huge, and seemed incredibly strong. It could take a blast from her magic, and its grip on Moondancer was like iron.

Moondancer! What had it done with her? It didn’t bring her with it, so it either had her locked up somewhere, or it had… had… killed her.

Minuette swallowed a lump in her throat at the thought. If it had, why would it try to capture her alive and not simply smash her while it had her in its grip? Minuette had to believe it wanted to do something specific with her. And if it was here instead of wherever it had kept Moondancer, then she might still be alive! It had been patrolling that room with the statue in the middle, so that was the best place to look. Minuette just had to find her way there.

First she had to get out of this room, though, and that thing was liable to see her if she bolted. She didn’t want to try to outrun it again, either. She only won because she had run faster than Moondancer. She needed to outsmart it, and be sneakier than it was observant.

It seemed to consist of two entities, that wisp that moved faster but couldn’t actually interact with anything that wasn’t the creature, and the creature itself, which was slow but brutal without the wisp. She didn’t quite understand how they worked, but if the wisp was inside the creature, then it likely couldn’t see beyond the creature’s single eye. With it focused on the panels, she could sneak behind it.

Minuette waited until the creature moved and focused on a panel, then crept out from under the desk and scuttled toward the captain’s seat, crawling up into it. She peeked carefully around the side, watching it as it worked, then quickly pulled back around to hide when she saw it begin to straighten up. Her heart pounded in her ears as she listened to the heavy hoofsteps of the creature as it clumped from one panel to the next. It had just passed by the door, onto the next set of panels. The next time it moved, that was her chance to bolt.

The creature worked, and Minuette waited, but even though she was listening for it to finish and move on, it never did. It hissed, and crackled, and it had successfully turned off a lot of the alarms, thankfully, but this time it seemed to be stuck on something.

“SHOOOMSTAZYX!”

There was a resounding crash, and some fizzing sounds and Minuette flinched. She risked a peek and saw that it had struck the panels. Its fist had dented the metal it was made of and sparks were flying out. It was mad, and that was frightening. It had a temper it could not control at all.

It turned toward the captain’s chair and Minuette pulled herself back around. She was starting to hyperventilate. It was going to see her! She had not planned for this! Minuette looked around for anything to use, or anywhere she could go. There was nothing, except for the chair itself. She heard the stomping about on top of her, and she tried the only idea she could think of; Minuette dove off the chair and slipped underneath it just as the hoofsteps got close, praying to Celestia it wouldn’t spot her.

She cowered underneath the chair, shivering as she watched the creature’s misshapen hooves stomp up to it. It walked to the chair and sat down, the seat sinking slightly as the creature’s weight settled into it. She heard it pressing buttons and flipping switches, then a tapping sound. She wasn’t sure what that meant, but it seemed like the creature was busy. She decided to chance it and slipped out from under the chair and headed for the door.

Minuette flinched again as she heard it pound on the chair, but hurried toward the door. She arrived at it without the creature getting up, but when she approached, it opened automatically with a hiss. The tapping behind her at the chair stopped.

“KNSHNYTZL?”

Minuette didn’t look back, but she heard the volume of the static hissing noise increase behind her as she bolted out the door. It hissed shut behind her, but she heard a hissing come from behind and she knew it was in pursuit. She had completely forgotten she’d fixed the door! Stupid! Stupid! Stupid!

She ran, but she wasn’t sure where she was going. She needed to find that room they’d found the creature in until they had interrupted it. It seemed focused on that room, so that was likely where Moondancer was if she was still alive. Minuette’s thoughts raced as she galloped down the halls, trying to find some way to lose the creature that was hot on her fetlocks.

Minuette found herself once again galloping through the halls of the ship. They were no longer as dark as they had been, but many of the lights were non-functional, leaving patches of darkness that did nothing to help her run. She passed through rooms, all of which were empty, and some torn apart. She went down stairs that led her to more hallways, and always the creature followed her. In one brief glance behind, she had seen it was once again floating. Likely because it was faster that way.

Eventually, Minuette passed through a set of doors at the bottom of a staircase that opened into a room filled with noise and smoke. The entire room vibrated and shook, and something at one end of the room was flashing red. She didn’t want to get any closer to it, but the creature behind her was a far more obvious threat to her than this thing, so she ran in. The klaxon was incredibly loud, and the room was very warm. Minuette could feel herself starting to lather. She was really starting to worry this room was as unsafe as she had first surmised, and now she was stuck in between a rock and a hard place.

She felt more than heard the thud of the creature’s hooves landing behind her, and she didn’t stop to look, she dashed inside, into the burning heat, and around the massive construction in the center. She looked for anything or anywhere she could hide, and found a small set of pipes going into the walls, with just enough space for a pony on top of them. The creature certainly wouldn’t fit. There wasn’t anywhere else she could immediately find to go, just a wall of dials, switches, and pipes.

Minuette reached out and tried to crawl in, but found the pipes were exceedingly hot! She assumed they must be boiler pipes or something, transporting hot water somewhere. Probably away from the steaming hot room she was in. She looked at the pipes and the tiny hole, and looked over at the creature, stomping its way closer to her with every heavy step. Its single eye was focused directly on her, and the wisp was floating around it wildly, illuminating switches, dials, and everything else in the room one after the other.

In a panic, Minuette lit up her horn and yanked one of the machines off the wall, dropping it in the creature’s way. The creature barely slowed, just lifted it effortlessly up and crammed it back into the place she’d pulled it from, then continued its inexorable advance. Minuette’s horn glowed again, and she ripped some of the pipes above down onto its head. She probably should have been concerned about what was in them, but it was either the surety of the creature getting her, or the mere possibility of the pipes holding dangerous substances. She decided to take her chances.

The pipes were apparently holding some strange liquid, which poured down onto the thing, covering it in some vile-looking greenish fluid. The creature didn’t seem to be hurt by it, despite the steam rising from the substance, and it just kept coming. The wisp darted every which way around it, and flew closer to Minuette’s face, causing her to shrink back. It didn’t seem to be able to hurt her though.

The creature was almost on her, and she was quickly running out of space and ideas, so her eyes once more went back to the tiny hole in the wall. Minuette swallowed, cast a ward against heat as strong as she could manage, and dove in.

“GNCHOMNWTLK! *BZZZZZZZT*”

Her hips got stuck at first, and she tugged at the pipes, their heat burning her slowly but surely as she struggled to fit. She could feel the hoofsteps of the creature approaching, faster than it usually moved, and she knew she had to get in, or she’d never get out of the thing’s grip. She let go of her ward for a brief second, gritting her teeth against the pain, and gave her own flank a hefty boost from behind. One of the corners ripped a small gash in her thigh, but she scooted forward, the rest of her legs fitting inside the tiny hole. She exhulted silently in her escape, but then she felt something tug on her tail! It had her by the tail! Without thinking, Minuette slashed her tail off right at the dock, nicking it, but separating  her tail from the rest of her.

“BNBNBNBNBNNNNNN!”

She couldn’t tell what the creature was saying, but she hoped it was angry. Minuette grimaced as she smelt sizzling flesh, her flesh. She put up her ward again, and scooted forward, leaving the hopefully pissed off creature behind her. She didn’t have far to go, and when she finally reached a more open area with a small drop-off, she rolled off the pipes, into open area, and hissed in pain. She had more space, so she sat up and looked down at her chest.

It was very red, and the fur was singed off in places. Despite her ward, it had gotten through. She just hoped it wouldn’t leave too bad a scar. She poked at it gingerly and grimaced in pain. Nothing to be done about it now. She had to keep moving. She turned her horn light to the tunnels nearby. That was when she noticed she still had light around her that wasn’t focused in her horn-beam.

Minuette shut off her horn temporarily and glanced around. She found the source easily as it angrily floated about her in the small space. The wisp had followed her into the tunnel and was orbiting her head, glowing that sickly yellow-green. There was a loud clang and an angry crackling sound coming from the outside of the small tunnel she’d escaped into. The creature was pounding hard at the walls trying to get in. Minuette doubted it could manage it without pulling the entire ship apart, but then she remembered the walls from earlier that had been missing panels, and she decided she should probably get moving.

Minuette stood up and glanced at her tail. She’d cut it off as high up as possible to make sure the thing had nothing to grip, but she’d nicked her dock. It stung, but it wasn’t serious like the burns. She sighed and looked away down the two tunnels. One had the pipes from before going down it, and the other didn’t. It wasn’t much of a choice, so she crouched low and continued down the empty path with the wisp following her.

It was a tight fit, but less so than when she was crawling on top of the pipes. Unfortunately it was very slow going. She scooted along, crawling with the annoying light on top of her, until she finally came to a more open section. She was able to stand up fully, and when she looked up, there was a grate on top. She reached up a hoof and pushed on it, and it didn’t move, but it looked like the grating on the floor from earlier. She was under the floor of the hallway! She still didn’t know where she was, but this was positive! She could probably break it with her magic, but she decided against it for now.

She trotted along, gingerly stepping to avoid aggravating her burns, but she was making better time now that she could stand up, and this path underneath seemed to be for maintenance purposes, like a sewer in space. It was full of all sorts of weirdly coloured strings in the walls, and paths criss-crossed all over it leading underneath rooms that branched off from the main halls.

Minuette stayed under the main hallway and followed it throughout the ship, the wisp doggedly remaining at her fetlocks. She didn’t know why it was following her, but it wasn’t making her very comfortable. At least she didn’t have to keep her horn light on with it nearby. Small things.

She eventually reached a point where the maintenance path ended, and dropped off to her left and right, and the hall went through a doorway into a room. She couldn’t see what was in it from here, as the door was closed and there was no window. She wouldn’t have been able to look through it from down where she was, but she had to make a choice, and she wasn’t comfortable with any of them. If she went back into the hallway, she’d leave a distinct path for the creature to follow, or make a noise when the door opened which might alert it, or she could drop down the holes nearby. It looked like they had ladders, but it was still straight down, and she had no idea where it might lead.

Minuette sighed and cast her horn light down the left ladder, then the right. The bottom was some distance away on both sides, and she didn’t know if she wanted to go that deep. She thought she had already come down some, and she hadn’t yet gone back upward, which is where she imagined Moondancer was, if her mental picture was correct. She wished Moondancer were here to tell her where to go.

Minuette decided to stay up, and try to get back to where she thought that large room was, so she lit up her horn and as carefully as she could, ripped the grate directly above her out of the floor. The sound of squealing metal filled the air as she tore it out, and she winced. With one final tug, it came free, and she stopped, listening for any stomping or hissing noises. Not hearing any, Minuette hopped up out of the tunnel and replaced the grate. She moved closer to the door and it hissed open, revealing a wide-open room.

The wisp didn’t illuminate enough for this area, so she turned on her horn light and cast it about. The room was large, with a catwalk up above… and that weird tube-like thing in the middle! She had found it!  The room was multiple levels, so she had just come down to the bottom of it! She did a happy little dance and trotted into the room. There was still no hissing noise, so she figured she was safe for the moment. If the creature ever stopped making that noise, then she’d be in trouble.

Minuette moved up to the thing in the center which had apparently been a source of fascination for the creature. She wanted to get a closer look and understand why it had been so intent on it that it would stay in this room. When she got to one of the fins, she noticed that it wasn’t a flat and uniform piece of metal. It was constructed of scrap metal which was welded, bolted, or simply folded together to make the fin. As she followed her horn light over it and up to the higher portions, the whole thing was made of scrap. This was probably where everything in the ship had disappeared to. Everything metal, anyway.

Minuette cast her horn light up the side of the object, looking at it carefully, seeing the myriad seams, colours, and insignia covering it. It was made of utensils, seats, pieces of the walls, doors, and everything else. It hadn’t been melted down and recast either, it had literally all been hammered and forced into place. It must have taken a long time to build, and a monumental amount of strength to cobble it all together. There were no tools scattered about, so she assumed the creature, if it was the one that built it, had put the tools into the construct, and merely hammered it together with its fists. Yet another reason to be terrified of its unnatural strength.

Minuette started walking around the construct, casting her light away from it, checking the corners of the room for anything that might lead her to Moondancer… or what was left of her if it came to that. Minuette was hoping to find a sign of fur or even blood, but there wasn’t much on the floor around the structure.

She looked up at the catwalk above where the creature had first been spotted patrolling around. If she could get up there, since that was the floor they had been on when Moondancer had been caught, she could maybe find something more useful. Maybe signs of a struggle. Unfortunately, it looked like there were no ladders or stairs nearby. They had probably been ripped down to add to the structure. The creature could fly, so it really didn’t need any stairs, did it?

With a grunt of frustration, Minuette prowled about for something else she could use to get up to the catwalk. If there were any of those little tunnels with ladders in them she could use those. She kept her horn-light focused on the walls and traveled in a circle around the room, looking for holes.

She found one hidden in one of the corners, but it didn’t have a ladder, and it had a small grate in front of it. She had to rip it off the wall with her magic to get inside. The walls were smooth metal, which lead Minuette to believe this one wasn’t meant for the same function as the other tunnels she had found. A tunnel that you couldn’t climb up or into wasn’t much use to her. But, she figured she could probably climb it with magic, which would be a lot easier and safer than potentially getting lost trying to find a way up.

Minuette turned off her horn-light and prepared to make some steps in the sides, but when her horn-light went out, it went pitch-black. That was when she realized the wisp had abandoned her. She wasn’t sure why it might have decided to do that, or why it had been following her in the first place, but she was fairly certain it and the creature were working together somehow, and that didn’t make her feel any better about its absence.

Minuette pricked her ears up, trying to pick up the telltale static of the creature, but she heard nothing. She still figured it would be best to speed up her search, though, so she lit her horn, gave herself a small bubble of light, and began making hoof-sized holes in the side of the tunnel. She made sure the edges weren’t too sharp, and began to climb.

At the top, a little bit tired, but otherwise fine, Minuette once again pricked her ears, swiveling them back and forth listening for static or stomping. Hearing nothing, she walked around the catwalk, looking at the walkway itself for signs of Moondancer, and casting her light down nearby halls.

The first few halls had nothing. They didn’t look like they had been disturbed, but she eventually came to one that must have been where they had hidden the first time, as it had hoofprints of all sizes disturbing the dust. It also had a long line in it, which Minuette figured must be Moondancer being dragged. She felt a little bit giddy that she’d found something, and since there were no fluids on the floor, Moondancer might still be alive!

Minuette looked back at the room with the structure in the middle. The creature had brought Moondancer here for some reason, and if none of the other halls were disturbed, that meant it must have something to do with this ugly thing in the middle.

“Does it open?” Minuette said to herself.

She cast her light over the top of the structure. It was made of similar scraps as the bottom, though the top appeared to be mostly made of the metal ripped off the walls. She saw bits of the grating she was currently standing on in there, and she was fairly certain those must be the stairs that were missing. She did, however, notice that there was a deliberate seam, larger than the rest of the lines criss-crossing the structure.

Minuette leaned on the railing and focused her light, making it a bit brighter. She looked closely at the line, and saw what must be a makeshift hinge. It really must open right there. She grabbed it in her magic and pulled. It didn’t give at first, but eventually it started to creak.

That was when she heard the static begin. Minuette’s ears went straight up and focused on the source. It was getting louder! The creature was coming, and he was going to be here very soon!

Minuette looked around, and started to move toward the tiny tunnel she had used to climb up, but decided against it. She didn’t want to get lost again. Running down one of the hallways wasn’t going to be useful for the same reason. The creature had spent so much time guarding this cigar-shaped thing, and it hadn’t destroyed it yet, so what better place to hide? Minuette finally yanked open the top, revealing the dark insides of it. She had no idea what might be in there, but she was tired of running around the ship in confusion and fear, so she took a running leap off the catwalk, and slammed into the side of the structure with a loose grip on the lip of the hole. Her hind hooves scrabbled at the lumpy side until she managed to pull herself up and slip inside, tumbling into the dark interior.

She only fell a short distance before coming to a stop, and she lit up her horn as soon as she halted. She quickly looked back up and shut the small hatch she had entered by, muting the hiss of the creature. She sat still, waiting to hear if the creature had heard her. She could hear it muttering and hissing, but it didn’t seem interested in the structure itself, and the hatch didn’t open, so she hoped she was safe for now. Once she was certain, she turned her attention to the interior of the structure, lighting up the inside.

It was bigger than she had assumed. Minuette had expected it to be mostly solid metal cobbled together, with a small space inside to work on shaping it and making sure it held its shape, but it was rather spacious. As she climbed through the interior, it appeared to have a seat, likely for the creature to sit in, and what looked like a poorly assembled, and completely nonfunctional, series of shaped panels and buttons.

As she looked, she realized this was a much smaller recreation of the helm she had located earlier. Was the creature trying to make a smaller ship? For what purpose? It wouldn’t even function! These buttons and switches weren’t attached to anything, and she had her doubts the ship itself would even hold together if it were moving.

Minuette continued climbing down the interior of the small-scale ship to see what else was in here. She very quickly came to a small cylinder with a tiny door attached to it. There was a suspicious sickly glow coming from behind it, like the wisp that had been following her. She was wary of it at first, but after a quick circle around it, this was the end of the interior of the model ship. It was about as big as she’d expected from the outside. The wisp couldn’t do anything to her, or if it could, it hadn’t tried to, so she figured she was fairly safe. The door was solidly latched shut, but there was nothing else down here but this, so Minuette yanked on it with her magic, bending the latch until it popped open.

Inside was a cream-coloured figure curled up amidst a pile of blackened bones and ash. She had a pair of bent glasses on and a red-and-purple mane. She was shivering, pulled up against one wall of the tiny hole.

“Moondancer!?” Minuette said in disbelief.

Moondancer looked up, soot smudges covering her face and hooves, and streaks going down her cheeks where she must have been crying. “Minuette?”

Once Moondancer realized who it was that had opened the door, she dove out, tackling Minuette in a tight hug. “Oh Minuette! I thought I was done for!” She cried.

“It brought me here, and I couldn’t do anything. It didn’t care what spells I threw at it! It shoved me in that tiny furnace, and was trying to start a fire when that little light that follows it disappeared and it lost interest. The whole ship shook and it locked me in and went away! What about you? Oh sweet Celestia, your chest! Are you okay?” Moondancer said, speaking a mile a minute.

Minuette felt tears welling up behind her eyes, and she cried a little as she held Moondancer, the pain from the hug not enough to make her let go of her friend. “I’m okay, Moondancer. I think I might have started the ship, but I’m not sure. I don’t know what any of this stuff is, so I was just pushing buttons, trying to open the exit doors.” Minuette said. “My chest is… burned, but I’ll live.”

“The ship is running?” Moondancer said, her face deadly serious.

“I think so? I found the engines, which is where I got the burns. They’re firing a lot of coal down there.” Minuette said.

“I don’t think it’s coal, Minuette. This ship is big, and dangerous, and it’s running on something much worse than coal.” Moondancer said. “See these bones?”

Minuette nodded.

“I think the creature was trying to make a smaller version of the ship we’re in, albeit poorly. If this is the fuel it was trying to use, that’s where all the creatures in the ship went. This is meant to be the engine. You’ll notice we’re at the bottom?” Moondancer said.

“That’s… quite the leap of logic, Moonie.” Minuette said.

“It runs on ponies, or whatever the creatures were.” Moondancer said.

Minuette made a face. “I’m not sure I believe that.”

“No, really! Look at the bones in there!” Moondancer said, pointing at the little furnace. “Whether it was successful or not, it was trying to power its ship with bodies!”

Minuette stepped closer and leaned her head inside, looking at the pile of ash. Sure, there were bones, which did suggest that the creature had at least burned them, and this felt like the bottom of the model ship, which would make it the ideal place to put an engine, but burning ponies for fuel? Is that why she hadn’t encountered any other creatures at all? Was this creature the last of the crew, and had turned on its mates? It seemed absolutely insane, but then, the creature didn’t exactly come across as a bastion of mental stability. That was just her view, though. This might be completely normal for where the creature came from.

“I think maybe the creature is just unstable, Moonie. I mean, it floats, hisses constantly, and even hitting it with magic blasts doesn’t faze it at all. It’s unnatural, so it does unnatural things. I think we should just focus on getting out of here and report to the Princess, okay?” Minuette said.

Moondancer adjusted her bent glasses and sighed, but nodded. “You’re right. You got the doors working, so let’s get out of here. We can worry about it later.”

“Now, the creature is just outside, or it was the last time I checked, so we’re going to have to figure out some way to get past it. It doesn’t have the best sense of sight. I was able to hide underneath a chair and it walked right past, so the creature isn’t too big a problem.” Minuette explained as they slowly climbed back up to the top of the little ship.

“That’s good to know. It’s seemingly unstoppable, but has poor eyesight, even with an eye that huge.” Moondancer acknowledged.

“The real problem is the thing following it around. The light it gives off is actually a will o’ the wisp that’s separate from it. I think it’s what helps it fly, actually, but I haven’t seen it do much other than annoy me. It definitely directs the creature, though. Tells it where to go, so we need to avoid that thing more than the creature.” Minuette said.

“Okay, got it.” Moondancer said.

Minuette looked back at her friend, and noticed she was still giving off that faint sickly-green glow.

“Uh… by the way Moonie. Why are you glowing?” Minuette asked.

Moondancer looked down at herself, lifting a hoof to inspect it and turning to examine her flank.

“Oh? Oh, I am. I don’t know why I’m glowing. Must be some sort of residue from the furnace or this little ship itself.” Moondancer said. “I seem to be okay. We’ll get Twinkleshine to have a look at me when we get back, so that I’m not diagnosing myself.”

“Okay. Now, the creature patrols along the catwalk up above this little ship. On the floor below, which we’ll have to fall to, there are tiny tunnels going throughout the ship. We can fit, but the creature can’t, so we need to head for those, okay? There’s one close by, but you’ll have to climb up it before we’re really to safety. Just follow my lead, okay?” Minuette said.

“Wait! What will we do if it sees us?” Moondancer asked, her voice trembling. “I don’t want to get caught again.”

Minuette turned toward Moondancer and hugged her tightly. “I won’t let it get you. I’ve got some ideas for if we need to fight it, okay?”

“O-okay. I’m ready.” Moondancer said, squaring her shoulders.
> Chapter 4
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Minuette let go of Moondancer and climbed up the little ship to the hatch she’d entered by. She put her ear to it and listened carefully. The static noise was still going on, but as she listened it didn’t seem to be moving. It was, well, static. Remaining at the same volume and the same intensity. Moondancer shuffled nervously below her, trying to fix her bent glasses, and Minuette remained with her ear next to the hatch, trying to hear anything that might give away the creature’s movements.

Frustrated, she shook her head and pulled her ear away. There probably wasn’t going to be anything for it but to take a peek and hope. Waiting would be entirely on the creature’s side. If it had survived this long without food and water, it could probably survive much longer still.

“Alright, I’m going to open the hatch. Be ready to cushion your fall with magic when we need to jump out, it’s a pretty long way down.” Minuette said.

“Wait! He hurt my horn when he was dragging me around here. It hurts to do magic. You’ll need to help me!” Moondancer said.

“Okay, okay. I’ll catch you. Quiet down. We can’t let it know we’re here.” Minuette said.

Moondancer pulled herself closer to Minuette, and Minuette put a hoof on the hatch. She pushed up gently, hoping the metal wouldn’t creak at all. She was greeted by a sickly green glow outlining the single mirror-like eye of the creature. It knew they were in the ship and was just waiting for them to come back out!

“JHNGTMLMYZTAGLOT! BAHBAHWHZZZZZSSSSST!”

It reached out a claw and grabbed the hatch. Minuette yelped and released it, and dropped back into the model ship, landing on top of Moondancer. There was only one exit, and the creature was now occupying it!

“Back down! Back down! It’s here!” Minuette shouted, hooves tangled with Moondancer’s.

“Ahhh! AHHH!” Moondancer screamed, as the two struggled with each other.

They got their hooves untangled, and hurried back down the short passage to the bottom of the model ship, but the creature wasn’t sitting still. It had floated up and inserted itself into the hatch, squeezing its bulk down into the entrance as its glow slowly began to fill the tiny nook. Minuette and Moondancer made it back down to the furnace area, but that was as far as they could go. The sickly glow of the creature was getting slowly brighter as it came down toward them, increasing their panic.

“We need to get out!” Moondancer yelled.

“How!? There’s no exit!” Minuette shouted back, her head swiveling left and right looking for anything they could use as a weapon. She picked up a bone with her magic, but it crumbled, too burnt to be of any use.

“Can’t you melt a hole in the wall or floor?” Moondancer suggested, shaking Minuette in a panic.

“Maybe? That would take so much time, though!” Minuette said.

“Well do it! We don’t have any other choice!” Moondancer shouted back at her.

Minuette glanced at the one small entrance to the furnace room, then looked at the patchwork metal walls, then lit up her horn, and focused. A beam of orange heat came out and struck the wall, causing sparks to fly and the metal itself to turn red. One of the objects, which looked like a chair, actually heated up faster than the others, and she grinned. This might be quicker than she had expected if she could make it weak enough to bend instead of melt. The problem would be keeping the creature busy until then.

“Keep it busy, Moondancer! I think we can do this!” Minuette called.

“What?! How!” Moondancer said incredulously.

“I don’t know! Think of something!” Minuette said in exasperation. “If you don’t, we’re both literally toast!”

Moondancer made a noise, but her hoofsteps faded away. There was a whack, followed by that awful voice the creature had. Then came a heavy thud that shook the entire ship they were in. Minuette wanted to look, but she had to get this open. The sparks were getting brighter, and she used a hoof to block some of the light. She should really be blocking her eyes with magic, but all of it was spent on making the beam as powerful as possible. There was another whack from behind her, then a crunch and the sound of breaking glass followed by the static getting louder, then panicked yelling.

“We need to go! Now! Now! Now! Now!” Moondancer shouted.

Minuette didn’t want to stop, but Moondancer had gotten even more frightened. She wanted to look, but instead she focused her magic on the red-hot section of the model and pushed outward with all her might. With an ominous creak, the metal bent outward and discrete sections of metal separated from each other. With a spray of sparks, some molten metal, and a loud bang, a hole burst open in the side of the ship. Minuette didn’t look, back, grabbed Moondancer, and jumped. She felt something touch her flank as she leaped, and she was grateful she had sliced off her tail earlier.

The two ponies landed in a heap, Minuette too weak to soften their fall, but she pulled Moondancer up and began galloping away toward the smaller tunnels, still not looking back. She was rewarded for her expediency when there was a massive thud behind her, and she knew the creature had simply jumped or fallen out of the hole after them. It was simply a race to the exit now.

“Moonie I think *huff* you just made it angry!” Minuette said, beginning to feel the strain of all the magic she’d been using.

“I... I kicked it in the eye.” Moondancer replied as they ran. “That’s not an eye.”

Minuette was confused, but further questions would have to wait, they needed to get somewhere safe. Preferably out of here and back to their own ship. The princesses could do what they wanted with this thing after. Maybe THEY could come out here and deal with the creature. Minuette wanted to be back on land where she could sleep without having worry about that awful noise.

Speaking of the noise, it was louder than before, and she couldn’t hear the creature’s hoofsteps, which meant it was probably flying again. She cursed inwardly and lowered her head, pulling Moondancer along toward the duct. They dashed toward it, Minuette’s dim light leading the way, and she magically shoved Moondancer in and up the duct, then slid in afterward and started climbing, straining to push Moondancer along. Moondancer thankfully caught on fairly quickly and grabbed onto the sides herself, climbing up the duct and giving Minuette a break.

“NUMAGUBSHTOOOOOF! *BZZZT!*”

The creature yelled and a claw burst through the metal wall, grasping at the air above Minuette’s head. It pulled back out, then ripped into the metal below her. It was unable to see them, but it was trying nonetheless. Their hooves were not exactly stealthy, clattering against the metal as they did. The claw stopped after the third try, and instead, it seemed to be waiting for them to move and betray their position. The ponies obliged and climbed up further, eliciting more violent punches through the wall at them, until they pulled away from the wall and slipped under the upper floors where they could easily run thanks to their size.

The two ponies dashed pell-mell down the maintenance tunnel. Minuette wasn’t sure where they were going, but she knew they couldn’t stop moving, so she just ran, this time making sure to keep pace with Moondancer. Thankfully, she could see Moondancer out of the corner of her eye, and she seemed to be keeping up well enough this time. Fear and adrenaline probably had a lot to do with that.

“Where *huff* are we going?” Moondancer asked.

“I honestly *haaah* don’t know. But we can’t stop.” Minuette answered.

“We need *puff* a door. I remember ours. Follow me.” Moondancer said, and took the lead.

“Wait!” Minuette gasped. “That door doesn’t work!”

“I can make it work!” Moondancer puffed back.

Minuette had no choice but to follow as Moondancer dashed ahead of her down the tunnel. Minuette could see the glow of the creature following them. It was floating along behind them, but it didn’t seem to be catching up. Thankfully it was no longer destroying the ship to get at them, maybe that would work in their favor. She doubted it, especially once they had to get out of the tunnel at the airlock. That glow meant something. The WISP meant something, but damned if she knew what. It was very concerning, and that wisp made the creature that much more dangerous to deal with. It would never have caught Moondancer if it hadn’t been for that thing.

There was a crash and part of the grate ahead of Minuette buckled. Moondancer ducked and almost fell, but get her hoofing. Minuette had to duck underneath the bent fleer as a claw ripped through the floor and grabbed at her. Once again she was glad her tail had been cut off, as she felt it’s nasty, but thankfully blunt, claws brush her flank. The creature squawked and hissed above them in what she hoped was frustration as they raced past it hopefully toward a door.

Minuette followed Moondancer as the latter pony glanced left and right as she reached crossroads. Knowing Moondancer, she was probably keeping a mental tally of exactly where they were in the ship. She wouldn’t put it past her being able to do so. Minuette had no such talent at all. She was just here for brute force. Eventually Moondancer stopped and pointed at the grating above them.

“Here! Quickly!” Moondancer said.

Minuette didn’t hesitate, and grunted as her horn lit up, she pushed up with all her might and the floor ripped out of its moorings and flew off to the side. Moondancer jumped out of the tunnel and Minuette followed. She glanced around back to where they had come from and she saw the glow of the creature swiftly advancing toward them. She was completely disoriented, but Moondancer grabbed her by the hoof and pulled her down a hallway, then turned a corner. Minuette found herself at the door they had entered by. The inner door still wide open, and the outer door, the one that blocked their path, still shut tightly.

“Moondancer, this isn’t going to help, it’s broken! Why did we come here? We should be looking for different one!” Minuette cried, glancing back down the hall.

“No no! Quickly, hit the button with lightning!” Moondancer said.

Minuette gave her a strange look. “What? Why…?”

“Just do it! And be ready to protect us from space!” Moondancer yelled.

“Space… what?” Minuette said in confusion.

She didn’t get a chance to ask, because Moondancer grabbed her by the head and put her horn against the broken button. Minuette was confused and surprised, but out of reflex because her friend was so insistent, she lit up her horn and fired lightning like she had been told.

The room lit up briefly, and sparks flew out of the broken button, singeing her fur. She pulled away and saw Moondancer smiling wide. The whole airlock lit up for a moment, and the inner door started sliding erratically shut. The creature was down the hall and racing toward them through the air, carried by that unseen force of the wisp. Minuette could see what Moondancer was so concerned about now. She had damaged the creature’s ‘eye’, and it certainly was not an eye at all.

The glossy surface of the helmet, because that’s what it must have been, had been shattered, leaving only jagged pieces behind. Inside it was the remains of some creature that had long since died. A strange skull sat nestled inside the helmet, with wires attached to its bones and stray hair that must have been sitting in there undisturbed for who-knows how long. The constant hissing noise was coming from the creature’s jaw, which was slack, but illuminated by the unholy light emanating from the skull’s empty eyes. The same sickly-green glow the wisp gave off.

Minuette could only stare as the limp corpse of the creature sailed toward them, but her view was cut off as the inner door finally slid shut. She felt a hoof on her withers as Moondancer hugged her tightly, the creature pounding on the door in front of them.

“Minuette, put up the protection spell.” Moondancer said.

“Oh… yeah.” Minuette answered, her horn lighting up to ward both her and Moondancer.

They turned to the outer door as it opened up, and they were pulled out by the pressure, spat into the luminiferous aether unceremoniously as the inner door buckled under the creature’s assault behind them.

Minuette and Moondancer floated in the luminiferous aether, untethered to anything or anypony. Minuette kept the wards on both of them and clung to Moondancer tightly, holding on for dear life as they twisted and spun away from the alien ship. Minuette looked around for their ship, but couldn’t get a good bead on anything as the two ponies kept spinning. It wasn’t making her sick, but it was far too disorienting for her to get a good read on anything. She was getting exhausted, but she knew she had to try to contact the ship, even if she couldn’t see it. She spared a little bit of magic to try to reach out to the ship for communication, but found nothing. She pulled it back in and focused instead on protecting herself and Moondancer, hoping against hope that they would be rescued soon.

“Minuette, I can’t see the ship!” Moondancer said. Their shared ward allowed them to communicate from such close proximity.

“I can’t either. Everything is spinning too fast.” Minuette said.

“What do we do? You can’t hold the ward forever.” Moondancer said.

“I tried to contact the ship, but found nothing. Can you try?” Minuette asked.

“I… I don’t know. I’m still a little hurt from earlier.” Moondancer said.

“Please, Moonie, I’m exhausted. I can’t keep this up for much longer. I’m trying, but I’m thoroughly spent.” Minuette said. “You’re the only one who can save us now.”

Moondancer looks hesitant, but closes her eyes and concentrates. Minuette closes her own eyes and concentrates on keeping the ward going. Her friend will pull them through. She was smart, and a good unicorn. She could manage it. Minuette concentrated hard on just making sure the ward was going, and nothing else.
> Chapter 5
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Some amount of time later, Minuette opened her eyes to find herself laying on a soft bed of grass, the smell of green and growing things filling her nostrils. She attempted to lift her head, but a splitting pain prompted her to just relax and stay laying back. She put a hoof to her chest and felt the burns on her chest, finding them covered with gauze and bandages. She opened her mouth and croaked out a weak sound that should have been hello, but was merely a squeak.

“Minuette? Are you awake?” A male voice said.

“Caramel?” Minuette rasped.

“MInuette, oh thank Celestia. Your burns and tail, and all the magical exhaustion combined with mild dehydration, I was worried you’d need more intensive care than I could provide. Here, have some water.” Caramel said, holding a small water pouch up to her lips.

Minuette drank greedily until she could stomach no more, and tried once again to sit up. Her head hurt, but she managed it. She looked around at the familiar green and growing ship they’d traveled off of Equestria in. A familiar sight compared to the dead and lifeless hulk they had just been on. She smiled at Caramel, his eyes with dark circles under them and worry plain on his face.

“We… didn’t know what to do when you got caught inside the ship, so we waited two hours, then pulled away and contacted the princess to ask about the situation. She told us to trust in our friends and patrol the outside of the ship. If you didn’t come out in three day’s time, we were to head back to Equestria and the princesses would deal with the ship in an extreme manner.” Caramel explained.

“Extreme” Minuette asked.

“I think they were prepared to destroy it. If it was a trap and ponies died to it, it was not worth examining further.” Caramel said.

Minuette nodded. “A fair assessment. It definitely isn’t a safe object, that’s for sure. Did Moondancer explain what was in there?”

“She did. It’s dangerous, and not something we can allow to run loose above Equestria. Who knows if it could survive coming down to land, but we’re not willing to take that chance. The princesses will destroy it and that will be that.” Caramel said.

Minuette sighed happily. That would be the best course of action, and nopony would have to see that horrible face, or hear that horrible noise again. She was so glad to be free of that place and away from that creature. It was probably a tragic tale, but it had long ago reached its end. Nopony needed to hear an epilogue like this.

“Where’s Moonie? I want to see her.” Minuette asked.

“She’s on the moonlit side of the ship. We’re coming down to Equestria soon, so if you want one last look at the aether, now’s the time. Think you can walk?” Caramel asked, helping her to her hooves.

“Yeah, I’ll manage, thanks.” Minuette said.

She slid off the bed and walked gingerly out of the medical bay, her burns making it painful to move. She made her way to the tunnel leading up to moonside, and floated up the ladder to the garden area, the moon, and Moondancer, glowing in the dark, staying out of one of the cargo bays at the starry aether.

“Hey Moonie. Thanks for saving our flanks back there.” Minuette said as she walked closer.

Moondancer looked at her briefly before staring back up at the opening. “Hey Minuette. Feeling better?”

“Much. The burns sting, but they’ll go away in time. I suspect I’ll have some scarring, though. Better than being dead I guess.” Minuette said as candidly as she could.

“Yeah, I’m glad you’re okay. I’m sorry I was so useless.” Moondancer said.

“Oh it happens to everypony. You got caught by something neither of us could stop, who could have expected it would cause so much trouble with your magic?” Minuette said, brushing it off.

“I guess so. I’m just sad I couldn’t stop it or fight back at all. Then when it caught me… I couldn’t do anything. I just panicked, and then it stuck me in that furnace and it… it…” Moondancer stopped before she finished, and almost seemed in tears.

Minuette hugged her tight, letting her shake a little in her hooves as Moondancer held back sobs. “It’s alright. You’re safe now. There’s nothing wrong, okay?”

“Okay. Okay. I believe you.” Moondancer said. She pulled away and looked at the night sky once again.

“I’m going to go talk to Twinkleshine okay? And get these bandages changed. They’ve gone all yellow, and keeping burns clean is important.” Minuette said. “We’ll be back on the ground soon.”

Moondancer nodded and Minuette slowly walked away, leaving her alone once more.

Moondancer looked back up at the aether, watching as the distant object in the sky suddenly flashed brightly, then was gone, evaporated in celestial fury. Moondancer looked back at the ship around her and her eyes filled with fire. Her flesh cracked and blackened and a quiet, static, hissing noise emanated from her black, open mouth. Her eyes melted in their sockets, leaving only a sickly green flame burning inside them.

“Hey Twinkleshine, how did you find us, by the way. Moondancer seemed upset, so I didn’t want to bother her too much.” Minuette asked.

“Oh, I saw what looked like a flame in the middle of the aether…”



~The End.