The Story of Dr Sine

The Story of Dr Sine: 3

5 years pass

Dr Sine sat in the requests office of Equestria Laboratories. Despite being one of the most well respected and accomplished scientists Equestria Labs had ever seen, he still dreaded having to request funding. He sat on one side of a desk, and the three councillors walked in and sat at the other side of the desk. There was the Chancellor, in charge of Equestria’s money and taxation, and the minister for health, who was in charge of the Equestrian Health Service. Lastly, there was princess Celestia herself, who made the overall decision. Despite Equestria Labs being under Luna’s control, Celestia was in charge of pledges for funding. Dr Sine silently loathed to have to present to her, but kept himself in check. He couldn’t ruin everything based of one rash emotion.

“My deepest thanks for choosing to hear my proposal, councillors, and your majesty” Sine stood, and gave a small bow to Celestia, who didn’t really care for such formalities

“Thank you Doctor, you may continue”

“I would like to quote some numbers. 38% of Equestria’s residents attended our various hospitals and clinics last year. Over 61% of these were for heart related illnesses. The weakened heart cannot deal with the intense strain it endures here on Equestria and is difficult to treat. However, my team and I have devised a solution. I am asking for 100,000 bits to construct this”

With a flash of his magic, Sine removed the cloth covering a small model of a building. It was not dissimilar to the Equestria Laboratories they were in at that moment

“The Equestria Laboratories Moon Branch. A research facility based on the moon, containing a hospital for heart and other muscle related diseases. The chance of suffering a heart failure from one of the many diseases here on Equestria in 1.0 gravity is 78%, but on the moon in 0.4 gravity it decreases to 12%.”

“The bits I requested are for construction of infrastructure, recruitment of staff and rocket propulsion to get to the moon. Not only that, but the modular construction from the cost efficient materials we have built this facility from, means we can mine the resources from the moon, and with our recent breakthrough in nuclear fusion, the moon branch can be self-sufficient, requiring no more money to be used on the project, and the mining rigs will actually generate an income. Given, say, 15 years and it will have generated more than it cost to build. Do you have any questions?”

The chancellor raised his hoof “How long will it take, from this point, to have the base operational, should we decide to fund it?”

“Construction of materials  here, a shuttle fight and assembly on the moon should take between 3 weeks and a month”

The short timescale and relatively low cost had gone down very well. Dr Sine left the room to get a drink of water whilst the three talked over the pros and cons of the idea. He sat outside and wiped his brow. After what seemed like forever, Sine was called to return to the room.

Celestia stood, voicing the unanimous decision of the three.

“We have decided to allow funding for the project. We also request that you include additional features in the design, such as an education centre and some of our prior planned royal guard training facilities. To compensate for your having to revise the design, we will be happy to increase your budget from 100,000 bits to 500,000 bits. We will also assign any manual labourers you need for speedy construction of your infrastructure. It has been noted also, that the number of heart related deaths is on the rise, so we ask you also research preventative medicine, not just treatments. The rest of the facility may function as you choose.”

“Thank you, thank you all!” Dr Sine was barely able to hide his happiness “I’ll begin design revision immediately”

Celestia beamed brightly, shook his hoof and then the three left the room. Sine sat down to work on his laptop. 500,000 bits! He could expand the whole facility, and add all the aesthetics and extras he had wanted. He mailed all of the other staff to give them the green light for production, and sat down to get started. “Hang in there father” he muttered quietly.

1 Month and 2 weeks later

Dr Sine looked through the window of the space shuttle as he and Luna visited the completed Equestria Laboratories facility.

“Hopefully this will not be necessary soon, if our work on Portal technology is a success” He told her

“Quiet so. It would make the trip far more efficient” she agreed. It always surprised Sine how clever and well-spoken Luna was, considering in Alicorn terms she was only a teenager.

The small shuttle lowered onto an aperture in the roof, which opened revealing a sliver mesh landing pad bellow. The small ship descended into the facility. The interior of the facility matched with that of Equestria Labs back on the planet, white washed panels and square tiled floors. The two of them walked through the expanse of corridors, surveying everything for Celestia back home. When they were satisfied that the facility was operating correctly, they returned to the ship.

“We’re ready for the first batch of patients and scientists to come up now” said Sine opening the door of the shuttle for Luna. She sighed.

“The moon is so beautiful. I wish I never had to go back to Equestria”