The Stranded Pilot

Twilight and Rainbow Dash were sitting on camping stools they had borrowed from the guard's tent, both listening to Maverick as he ran them through how the plane worked, how it created thrust, how it changed direction. Gear Grinder was standing nearby working with Iron Clad to stoke a portable furnace, ready to smelt the metal bars down and make glass with some of the sand that had been brought with the other materials on airship, Engie was laying down flat chunks of rock and cementing them together, and the Royal Guards were playing Go Fish.

At current Maverick was lying on his back under the plane with a chisel, scraping melted rubber away from the insides of the plane, at the same time telling Rainbow Dash how his plane took off and landed on carriers with such a short distance.

"…and a hook deploys, grabbing a rope and pulling the plane to a stop." Maverick said.

"Cool." Dash said.

Maverick grunted as he scraped off a stubborn piece of melted rubber and placed it in a bucket next to him. "Did you have to make that lightning so hot Twilight?"

"I said sorry." Twilight levitated up a book on time stopping spells. She was researching the spell she had used on the clouds.

Maverick looked back at the power junction. It wasn't built to be removed, but at least that meant it wasn't meant to wear down for at least ten years. If he was lucky, and damned careful, he would be able to repair the casing without taking the whole thing out. He realized it would be some time before the right engine could be turned on, but it should be safe to use the battery. He gave the small fist sized box another once over, and saw the wires to the right engine were the only ones that had been damaged.

The damage done to the engine itself would take longer to diagnose.

"Ok, that should be good." Maverick said before he grabbed the underside of the plane and pushed himself out from under it. He stood up and brushed himself down before moving alongside the plane. He jumped up and grabbed the side of the open cockpit, pulling himself up, then swung himself over the side and landed in the seat.

"Gotta clear this glass. Twilight, can you pass me the bucket I was using?" Maverick asked.

"Sure." Twilight lifted the bucket with her magic and held it in front of him, and then Maverick took it and placed it on the console.

"All the bloody glass on the console is cracked as well." Maverick muttered, looking over the controls. He began clearing the broken glass from the floor of the cockpit. After a few minutes he had all the glass, bar a few tiny specks he couldn't reach, in the bucket.

"Dash, take this will ya?" Maverick asked. Dash flew over and took the bucket before placing it next to the front gear.

"Well, here goes nothing." Maverick muttered. He hit the master switch and felt the energy course through the plane. A soft hum could be heard, but it was mostly drowned out by the sounds of Engie working on the runway, flattening the ground and laying flat chunks of stone down.

"Well, it hasn't shorted out, so it looks ok…" Maverick muttered. Turning the main flight computers diagnostic system on confirmed most of what he already knew. The right engine was currently inoperable, but it looked like the left engine could operate without the affecting the right engine in any way. He realised he had made a rookie mistake and in the heat of the moment hadn't rerouted power through the secondary power junction.

He decided that if he routed the power he could test the left engine, but the right engine was still a big no-no. It would take time to check that, but hopefully the computer would diagnose it well enough. He sighed and vowed he would check it manually anyway.

"So what are you doing now?" Dash asked over Mavericks shoulder.

"Gah!" Maverick shot around in his seat. "Rainbow Dash! Geez." Maverick thought about a possible scenario in his head.

"Hey, what does that button do?" Dash asked, pointing at a large red button.

"Don't touch that!" Maverick shouted, too late. He felt the seat explode beneath him, sending him into the air.

"Rainbow Daaaaaaaaash!" he shouted as the seat flew higher into the sky, while he held on for dear life.

Maverick shook his head and laughed. Sure.

"Sorry." Dash said meekly.

"No problem, just don't sneak up on me." Maverick said. "Don't want to hit any buttons by accident…" he muttered.

"What?" Dash asked.

"Nothing, nothing. Anyway, you wanted to know what I'm doing?" Maverick asked.

"Yeah!" Dash shouted.

"Well, it's pretty boring. I'm just making the computer check over the plane, make sure the only problems are ones I've found." Maverick explained, flipping switches. "And testing the left engine. Might want to cover your ears." He added.

Dash nodded and flew down to Twilight, before telling her the same thing. She nodded and both ponies looked at Maverick expectantly.

Maverick looked behind him. The way the plane had been placed meant the runway was on his right, and he was facing the river. He only had to worry about the trees, and they were a good 10 meters away, so it was safe. He looked down and set the turbines going in the left engine. As they sped up the noise increased to an loud whine. Maverick looked over the console. According to the readings the turbines were at were performing fine, but he knew they wouldn't give him enough thrust to fly. He shut the turbines down, and listened as the whirring died off. He got ready to power the heat sync coils that created the heat needed to provide thrust.

They heated up normally, and after a few more tests he confirmed the left engine was fine. He decided to test the wing and rudder flaps. He stopped to look over the digital image that had popped up on the main screen. The right engine, right wing flap, the tip of the left wing and the nosecone were all highlighted in red. That was not something he had wanted to see. Sure, the nosecone had been dented like most of the aircraft, but he hadn't thought it would be bad enough to cripple it.

And worse yet, most of the instruments were in the nosecone.

"God damn, cut me a break." Maverick said, sitting back in the seat and running his hand through his hair. Surely it wouldn't be too bad.

Now I've probably fucking jinxed it. he thought. He ran through a further diagnostic. Radar was offline, thermal imaging was offline, and communications were offline. All that was working was the GPS system, but that was pointless here. Now the nosecone was more or less dead-weight. He'd take the cone off and check it out. For now, run more diagnostics.

Maverick had run complicated and detailed tests on the aircraft. Other than the engine and nosecone, the right-wing flap was the only real problem. Hitting the trees had somewhat warped the metal on the wings, leaving head sized dents, but Maverick had learnt beavers had been working on cutting down some trees were he had crashed, and that was why the trees had fallen easier and the plane hadn't been destroyed. That and the trees had been planted twenty years ago, so were still only small.

They'd still done a number on his plane though.

The right-wing flap had been caught and smashed in half. One half was still loosely attached to the wing, the other had been imbedded in a tree. Maverick had had to resort to brute force to remove it. He had asked Iron Clad and Grinder to re-attach it. Iron Clad could smelt and deal with metal work, Grinder could help with the finer points of flight, like aerodynamics and aircraft systems. Engie was constructing the runway at a surprising rate. Already stones had been laid and set from the river to about 50ft down the runway.

Right now Iron Clad was helping Grinder re-attach the broken off wing flap pieces, using Grinders knowledge of aerodynamics and Iron Clads of metallurgy. Iron Clad was hammering the heated metal into shape, wearing a specially fitting blacksmiths mask that accommodated for his horn. Maverick was fiddling with the primary power router and a chisel. Twilight had gone back to the library, but Dash had wanted to stay. At present she was looking at the emergency wiring diagram on the inside of the service panel.

"Are all planes this complicated?" Dash asked. Maverick turned his attention from the planes internals to Dash, pushing a dangling wire out of the way.

"Pretty much." Maverick went back to the wiring, before shouting to Iron Clad. "What's the ETA on those wires?"

Iron Clad pushed his mask up and put the hammer down. "20 minutes!" Iron Clad wiped his brow, pulled the mask down and went back to hammering.

"Lovely." Maverick muttered. He looked at the wiring diagram, before turning back to the plane. He was heating the warped wire port with matches while reshaping it with the chisel handle. He tossed a burnt out match into the bucket before grabbing another and striking it against the inside of the plane, lighting it. He held it against the box and pushed the handle against it, nudging the hot plastic into place. Once he had it in place, he gently blew on it, cooling and setting it.

"Now, let's deal with the other end of the wire…" Maverick muttered, looking at the wire that had been melted away. The wire in question was actually a bundle of wires in a scarcely bendable rubber casing about 20cm long and 1cm in diameter, designed for handling heavy amounts of power. It would take some work to safely remove it from the engine.

Then he would have to fix the engine.

After twenty minutes, Maverick had cut through the wire and placed it next to him. It would probably be useful at some point. Iron Clad came over with the melted copper bars. He had smelted them into wires of different lengths, but needed to insulate them in rubber.

"The wires are done Maverick." Iron Clad said.

"Thanks Iron Clad. How's the block of rubber going?" Maverick asked.

"It's melting down now. Give it another few minutes."

"Alright then." Maverick slid out from under the plane. "I'm gonna have some lunch. You want any guys?"

"No thanks, I'll eat when I'm done today." Iron Clad turned and walked back to the portable furnace.

"I'll have my lunch on the Anastasia." Grinder said.

"Your airship?" Maverick asked.

"Yep." Grinder turned and walked towards the exit.

"Dash?" Maverick turned to her.

"Sure. I'll get something for Sugarcube corner." Dash took off and flew away.

"Well, you got anything Engie?" Maverick turned and saw the engineer leaning against a jackhammer, eating a sandwich. Maverick laughed, and Engie looked at him curiously.

"What?" he asked.

"Nothing, nothing." Maverick looked towards the Royal Guard tent. Captain Barehoof had returned, and the new 1st Lieutenant Jet had been sent to Canterlot to receive his promotion, before coming back to take over control of the Guards stationed here. For now, it was just the other two Lieutenants playing cards again.

Maverick sighed and sat down against the front landing gear. He pulled a tomato sandwich wrapped in grease proof paper out of his pocket before biting into it.

Damn, Twilight made good sandwiches.

Maverick re-attached the service panel, sliding it into place. He had fixed the primary power router, and Iron Clad and Grinder had successfully repaired the wing flap. Engie had constructed an impressive 100ft of runway base, and when Maverick and Dash had pushed the plane onto the area of runway that had been built, Engie had built a solid base of rock for the plane to park on. With the Royal Guard tent they had made a temporary hangar.

So far, it was good progress.

Maverick had taken the crude solar panels and the generator to the clearing and, with some extra support, had erected the solar panels on the Royal Guard tent over the Eurofighter. The battery would charge in the day while they worked. When the sun had started to set the engineers went to a hotel in Ponyville to sleep, while Maverick had gone back to Twilight's library. Grinder had moved the Anastasia to an area outside Ponyville.

Maverick was lying on his bed, reading a book on the history of Ponyville. He was tired after the day of work, but when Twilight came in and asked if he wanted to go to a Pinkie Party, he guessed it couldn't hurt. By the time they left it was dark out.

"One of my ex-girlfriends used to like clubbing. Going out all night and dancing." Maverick said.

"Ex-girlfriend?" Twilight asked.

"Yeah, it didn't really work out. We we're too different."

"So how many girlfriends have you had?"

Maverick shrugged. "I don't count."

"Oh really?" Twilight laughed, but before she could continue they arrived at the club. There was music playing inside, a song Maverick didn't recognize but sounded similar to Pop music from earth. As Maverick and Twilight entered, Pinkie Pie ran up and handed them both slices of cake.

"Welcome to the party!" she turned to Maverick. "Talk to ponies, dance, mingle!" she bounced off into the party crowd as they stamped in applause as the song ended.

Maverick blinked before shrugging and taking a bite out of the slice of cake. Chocolate with pink frosting.

"Mmm." Maverick mumbled, raising his eyebrows and nodding in approval. He swallowed. "Not bad."

"Pinkie makes the cake herself. Bakes it from scratch."

Maverick looked up and saw a white unicorn with a wild blue and cyan mane and tail and purple tinted goggles. She had a musical note cutie mark. She held out a hoof.

"I'm DJ Pon-3, DJ. Real names Vinyl Scratch." Maverick shook her hoof.

Maverick had an idea. "A DJ huh? Well, I have something you might wanna have a look at." Maverick smiled knowingly.

Vinyl raised an eyebrow, barely visible behind the goggles. Maverick wasn't wearing his flight vest, and the IPhone was still in the pocket. He smiled sheepishly when he realised. "Oops. I'll be right back." Maverick turned to the door, but Twilight was standing there with his IPhone and headphones in her hoof.

"Thought you might want this." she said with a grin.

"Wow, thanks Twilight." he took it and nodded at her in thanks. He turned back to Vinyl and held out the device. She looked at it oddly, wondering what to do. Maverick kneeled down next to her and swiped his finger across the screen. He held out the headphones.

"You need to wear these." he said.

"Sure." Vinyl held one to her ear and Maverick hit play on his music playlist. Vinyl's eyes shot up as Party Rock started playing.

"You have a whole song on this?" she asked.

"Dozens of songs." Maverick smiled at her. "Cool right?"

"Hay yeah! Dude, I gotta get me one of these! Hey, you think I can play this on the speakers?"

"Dunno, I'll have a look." before Maverick could finish saying it, Vinyl was pulling him towards the DJ booth. He knelt down and had a look at the connections. For reasons unfathomable the speaker cable had the same connection as the IPhone headphones port. Maverick shrugged and looked at Vinyl.

"I think it'll fit here. Want me to try?" Maverick asked.

"Go for it." Vinyl turned and took the record off the booth, attracting a few curious glances. She turned to Maverick and nodded. Maverick pulled the cable out and placed it in the IPhone headphone port. He reset and played the song, and sure enough the familiar beats of Party Rock came out of the speakers on either side. Vinyl shouted over it, because the mic was no longer working.

"This here's a cool song from Maverick here, enjoy everypony!"

"Part Rock!" came out of the speakers.

"Yeah!" it continued.

Ponies were looking round at the speakers as the song continued. A few started dancing, and before long the club of ponies had taken to the song. A small area cleared in the centre of the group, and Maverick could see Pinkie breakdancing in the middle, the other ponies cheering her on. Maverick laughed, and joined Pinkie in the middle of the group as the music lulled.

"Every day I'm shuffling."

On cue Maverick began shuffling, to the cheering and applause of the surrounding ponies. Vinyl Scratch was banging her head, and threw her hoof in the air.

He had never realised the nightlife in this world would be like the nightlife in his.