An Astronomer's Light

Chapter Five: Lost and Found

A white pegasus was standing at the gates to the Frontier Service's 14th outpost. "But I saw an explosion!"

"Listen Cloudbolt," A brown earth pony said. "You're not stationed here. Let my ponies do their work. Go back to your post."

"But there was an airship! I saw it crash! Ponies could have been hurt!" Cloudbolt said.

"Listen, kid. I know you're new here, so I'll cut you some slack. If there was an airship, and if it had crashed, I'd know about it. Guarantee it," The brown stallion said sternly. Cloudbolt glared at him. He wasn't green anymore! He knew what he was doing, and he hated it when people treated him like he didn't! This guy was an idiot, he'd have to get some other pony to help him. The brown pony went back inside. Cloud sat there for a minute, wondering how he could get past these ponies.

"Oh! I know! There's an observatory not far from here. The pony that lives there has an airship. Oh, what was his name? B-bar something?" He couldn't remember, but regardless, he took off for Mount Silver. When he arrived at the observatory, he found it deserted. Cloudbolt knocked on the door. "Hello?" He pushed the door open. Unlocked. All the lights were off, nopony was here. "Hello?" He said again. I guess I can just leave him a note, saying that I needed his airship for an emergency. Cloudbolt found a staircase maked "Constellation Skyship." This must be it, Cloud thought as he walked up the stairs. To his surprise, he found an empty dockyard. "Huh? Odd," Cloudbolt said to himself. "Wait a second, what if this airship was the one to crash?" Cloudbolt facehoofed. "I'm an idiot." As he turned to run back down the stairs, his eyes spotted a small, one-pony, little skyrider. It was about 11 feet long and 5 feet wide. Cloudbolt looked inside and saw it had a full tank, still, past experiences haunting him, he grabbed an extra fuel tank and hopped on board. "Ok, this looks fairly similar to the ones we flew at flight camp," He told himself, "Should be easy." He unclipped the docking locks and headed off in the direction of the southern forests as fast as the little skyship would allow.

Flarania sat on the top of the cave looking into the sky. Her little fire was burning bright, and smoke was rising steadily into the sky. Why wasn't anypony coming? She had no idea. Her fellow pioneers should have left long ago! They had to see the smoke! Why was nopony here? She sighed and went back down into the cave. Barzano was still lying there. He was breathing, but very slowly. Flarania began to cry as she looked at him. "If only you had known," she sobbed. It was late noon, but she wasn't hungry. Flara just wanted somepony to show up already. She never wanted to see this place again.

Cloudbolt glanced at the shipboard clock. It was 3:18. He wanted to find the crash before nightfall, but things weren't looking very good. "Wait a second," he said to himself as he looked at the horizon. "Is that smoke?" Indeed it was. A great pillar of smoke was rising high into the sky. "Signal fire!" he exclaimed, and steered the little skyrider towards the black pillar. As he got closer, a large cave came into view, and then a pony jumping up and down. “Hello down there!” Cloudbolt shouted. He couldn’t hear the other pony, but he was pretty sure he recognized her. “Flarania! Is that you?”

“Yeah, how do you know me?” Flarania shouted back up. Cloudbolt started the skyrider on a slow descent, eventually landing a few feet from the mare. “Cloud!” She said. “B-but why are you here? You’re supposed to be stationed at 77th! Oh, why am I complaining? Thank you for coming,” Flarania said. She had lost her usual upbeat attitude.

“Hey, what’s wrong?” Cloud asked her.

“D-d, It’s all my fault!” Flarania yelled as she broke down in tears.

“Woah-ho-ho there! What’s going on Flara? Hey, hey look at me.” Flara picked her head up, her face full of tears. “Now, what happened?”

She spoke so fast that Cloudbolt couldn’t possibly make out what she was saying. “We were up in his zepplin and it was so fun and he was such a great host and then one of the engines exploded and it crashed and IT’S ALL MY FAULT!” Flarania wailed.

“Hey, slow down. Why is it your fault?”

“He’s….he’s dead,” She sobbed.

“Oh man….how?”

“Well, not exactly dead, he’s in a coma. He’s lost too much blood,”

“Wait, we might still be able to save him! Show me where he is!” Flarania took Cloudbolt down to the cave where Barzano was still sleeping. Cloud looked at him. “This looks bad. I can’t do anything for him, we need to get him to the nearest town, right away!”

“Barzano!” Oh, she’s back.

“Luna?” What do you want?

“You have to fight it!”

“Fight what? What’s happening?”

“Barzano! You’re dieing!” That’s strange, I feel fine.

“Luna, what are you talking about?”

“Your wound has caused you to lapse into a coma! You must wake up! That pony needs you!” Which pony was she talking about?

“How am I supposed to wake up?”

“Fight it Barzano! I believe in you!” The dream faded again.

Cloudbolt had tried to calm Flarania as best as he could, but she just kept staring at the dark-coated stallion sleeping on the floor of the skyrider. “Flara, listen, it’ll be ok! We’ll get him to a hospital and they’ll fix it,” Cloudbolt insisted.

“I hope so,” she sniffed.

“Flara….” Cloudbolt looked at her. “Did you have something for him?” Flarania stared at Cloud. “Yeah, yeah you did, didn’t you?”

“Maybe….”

“Hey, I’m really sorry, that sucks.”

“Yeah….he didn’t even know.” They sat in silence for awhile. Barzano sat up with a shot.

“Gah!” He yelled.

“Omigosh you’re awake!” Flarania shouted as she grabbed him tightly.

“OWWWWWWWW!” Barzano yelped.

“Oh! So sorry!” She backed off.

“You’re fine!” he said and returned the embrace. The two of them sat there in silence for the rest of the ride home, for there was no need for words. They had been through hell together, and were happy to return home.