ARRIVAL
Another assignment away from Camp Celestia. I was starting to get rather sick of this. Every time that I had a new assignment it usually involved some form of Daring Do adventure. And usually it involved either me or Spitfire getting hurt. We had been through nearly twenty off-base missions and they all resulted in one of us getting hurt. I wish that I just had a mission where I could just stay in the regular routes that Spitfire and I were assigned to go over. Could I get just one of those kinds of missions from Wonderbolt HQ? No. Well, I guess I’m going to have a tough ride ahead of me. Sadly, I was dragging Spitfire along for the ride.
Thankfully, Spitfire was going to get a rest for this mission, which probably meant that it was my turn to get hurt. I could only be so unlucky. It would only figure considering that she was on a special solo mission after the last mission that nearly got us killed. Well, no point in dragging this out any longer. Here we go.
Soarin sat next me on the bus as we rolled down the road on the base. We were invited to attend the commissioning of a ship. I didn’t know why since the Wonderbolts hardly ever work with the Royal Equestrian Navy (REN). Yet, now I was confused because the base that we were on was far from the coast. We were at Camp Fare Weather, named for Admiral Fare Weather of the REN. Again, I was confused.
The bus came to a stop in front of a hangar and we got off. As the bus pulled away I noticed that the hangar was very large and was part of another building. We walked in and found a large B-52H bomber sitting inside. We continued to the back of the building and entered the main building. I noticed that the inside of this building was very different compared to some of the other Headquarters buildings on our military bases. This building was rather plan and had almost no decoration what so ever. I’m glad the Element of Genorosity wasn’t here because she was just die over the site.
We continued down the hall until we came to the front desk. We were greeted by a soldier that we knew very well.
“I’m glad to see that you two could make it,” Firebrand said.
“Did you think that we wouldn’t?” Soarin said as he walked up and shook Firebrand’s hand.
“No. I just thought that you two wouldn’t go for it. Where’s Spitfire?”
“She’s on a special assignment,” I responded. “Apparently, there’s a need for a temporary command position at one of our bases that she got called out to.”
“Oh. Well good for her. After everything that you two have been through, she needs a break.”
“Well what about me?” I complained.
Firebrand chuckled. “Yes, you deserve one also.”
“Thank you.”
“Anyways we had better get going,” Firebrand said as he looked at his watch. “We don’t want to miss the ship.”
He motioned for us to follow and her lead us to a door that needed a card to unlock it. He unlocked the door and we proceeded down a set of stairs. We then turned down several halls until we reached a security scanner.After passing the scanner, we walked past several offices and control centers. There were a few barracks and a couple of mess halls, but other than that, not much.
Firebrand stopped at the end of another long corridor. He told us to wait there. He then opened another door and closed it behind him. We stood there for several minutes waiting until Firebrand opened the door again and motioned for us to come in.
We entered the room and found us in a large waiting room. There were at least sixty other people in the room. Firebrand guided us to three chairs in the middle of the room. We sat down and a few moments later, the lights dimmed to the point that you couldn’t read a book.
A person in some form of Wonderbolt uniform walked up to the front of the room. We knew that it was a woman because we would make out the skirt she was wearing and it was kind of hard not to hear her high heels on the tile floor. She walked up to the front of the room and took off her hat, setting it down on a table. She turned to face the rest of the room.
“Greetings everyone. I will be your CO for this voyage. You have all been recruited for this voyage because you all are the best. Some of you are simply guests on this voyage and so I welcome you aboard. Some of you may be wondering why you are boarding a ship that is in the middle of the main land. The answer is that this is not your average ship.” The wall behind her opened up in several panels to reveal a massive ship. “This is the EAS OLYMPUS. She is the latest prototype ship of the Equestrian Air Fleet. She’s a brand new ship everyone. This is a test flight and we will be seeing what this ship can take. I intend to see to it that she is the best ship in the fleet. Now… Let’s get moving!” she ordered.
“Yes, Ma’am!” the whole room responded.
We all stood up and proceeded to a hall on the other side of the room. Firebrand stayed in front of us and guided us to the proper boarding terminal. It was a terminal on the second level. As we walked out on to the terminal bridge I got a better look at the hull of the ship. She was big. Her hull was about ¼ mile long. It was painted a dark blue with gold trim. She had turrets just behind the bridge and along the sides of the forward main guns. I looked at the base of the port side engines to see several missile port caps below them. The two massive main guns sat in the center of the ship behind the secondary gun turrets. The Sub-Light and Light Speed engines were separated on each side of the hull in two separate engine room so as to avoid completely crippling the ship in an attack. The super structure was clearly visuable on top of the hull. I couldn’t tell what the rest of the ship was made of, but I guessed that it was barracks, cargo bays, and labs.
We entered the ship and turned left down the second hall past the airlock. We passed by several different rooms, including the armory. After we passed those rooms, Firebrand stopped in front of one room. “This will be your room. The Access Code is WBOL1-R47,” Firebrand said to me. “Soarin, your room is next to his. The code is the same except for the last three numbers. Change them to R48. I’ll give you a few minutes to get unpacked and then meet me on the bridge."
LIFT OFF
I may have found it a bit strange that there was ship so far in land, but this made more sense. I also didn’t expect the quarters to be so nice. It was almost like getting a nice hotel room. Off course I didn’t have long to relax in my room. I took a few minutes to unpack and then I headed out into the hall. Soarin walked out of his room at about the same time. We both walked further down the hall until we reached an elevator.
Yes, I know that you thought I was going to say stairs seeing as it is an air ship. But, our military has a large budget, we can afford to make thing better. That doesn’t mean that there aren’t stairs. They’re mainly a secondary transit system.
We both got into the elevator and made our way to the bridge. I was very surprised to see how the bridge was laid out. It was different from what I had suspected. I had expected something like the bridge of the Enterprise. But this bridge was laid out differently. The Captain’s chair was on a sort of pedestal and the weapons station was in front of that. It was shaped like a crescent moon and had the ships whole weapons arsenal on it. There was also a holographic representation of the ship and everything around it to act as a targeting system. There were two consuls in front of that, which were the navigation and helm consuls. And on either side of the Captain’s chair were two sensor consuls, one for each group of two sensor systems. There were also some other consuls around the bridge that were used to work with other systems on the ship.
I almost forgot. There was also the crew. Almost all of the crew on the bridge was just getting into position with their appropriate systems. The only ones that I saw who were ready were the helmsman and the weapons officer. Then there was the Captain. I had no idea what her name was, but I could tell based on the number of medals on her uniform that she was seasoned officer of the Wonderbolts and that she shad trained a long time for this mission. She was sitting in her chair on the pedestal. She turned her head and signaled for me and Soarin to join her.
We walked up to her and she shook our hands. “Gentlemen, welcome aboard. What do you think of the ship so far?” she asked.
“It’s a lovely ship,” Soarin responded.
“Glad to hear it. I hoped that you boys would be willing to help with a few of our systems on this flight. During ground tests, she’s been a little problematic.”
“If it isn’t too much to ask, Ma’am, what do you mean problematic?” I asked.
“Nothing to be concerned about. She’s just been difficult when responding to her helm and she’s been giving false readings on her engines.”
“No offence, Captain, but that seems to be a little bit more than problematic,” I said. “If I had a plane that was acting like that, I wouldn’t go out and fly it.”
“That’s why you two are on board. Commander Soarin, I would like you to handle the engines in Engineering Room 1 and Lieutenant Wing, please take the main helm. You are dismissed.”
We both walked back down to the floor of the bridge and then left to take on our different stations. I walked down past the weapons station and found there to be another helm position. It was structured much like the weapons station in that there was a wide control panel in front of the chair and there was a holographic representation of the ship and everything around it. I took my place and adjusted my seat so that I could get a handle on the controls just right.
After several minutes the Captain starting orders.
“Alright people, let’s start her up. Disengage docking clamps.”
“Roger that. Disengaging docking clamps,” said one of the crew.
“Open bay doors.”
“Bay doors opening. Thrusters on standby.”
“Fire thrusters, Mr. Wing.”
“Yes, Ma’am. Firing thrusters.” That was when I felt the ship lift off the ground. I followed the data that my monitors were sending me. I gazed up from my consul out the window to see the runway of the base before us and the mountains beyond that. I couldn’t help but gaze in amazement.
“Mr. Wing, ½ impulse power.”
“Yes, Captain. Engineering give me ½ impulse.”
“You got it. ½ impulse power.”
I felt the ship move forward as I raised the ship up higher into the sky. We soon lifted over the mountains and began heading for the stars. I couldn’t help but get excited about this. This was every kids dream.
It wasn’t long before we pulled above the clouds and soon the sky began to melt away. After that, I looked out the window to see nothing but space. I couldn’t believe my eyes. There were so many stars before us in the vast darkness that I didn’t know how I was going to control myself.
“Mr. Wing, take us into orbit please. Thrusters only for adjustments.”
“Aye, Captain,” I responded. I hit a few buttons and soon I could see the planet off the starboard side of the Olympus. This was great.
The captain got up from her chair and walked down to the floor heading towards the elevator. “Mr. Wing, you have the chair,” she said as the doors closed.
I looked around at the rest of the crew who were just as surprised. I didn’t really know what to do so I just got up and walked to the chair. I sat down in it and I couldn’t help but feel a sense of power childlike nostalgia as I sat there. Even if it was just for a little while, I was in command of a starship. This was so cool.
Unfortunately, my thoughts were interrupted by a loud explosion on the starboard side that rocked the ship and nearly sent me flying out of my chair.
Splash Down
I grabbed the railing in front of my chair so that I didn’t go flying across the bridge. I sat back down as the ship stabilized and stopped shacking.
I hit my com button that allowed me to communicate with engineering to see what the matter was. “Engineering, report! What the hell was that?”
Soarin’s voice cracked in over the radio. “I don’t know! The main FTL engine exploded! I don’t know what happened! We’ve sealed the hull breach and are trying to put the fire out! I would recommend deactivating the inboard keel missiles! The explosion breached that compartment!”
“Thank you, Soarin.” I turned to the weapons chief below me. “Saber Star, please deactivate the warheads on the inboard keel missiles.”
“Yes, Sir. Deactivating missile warheads.”
Just as he said that, another large explosion from the port side rocked the ship again.
“Damage report!” I yelled to the maintenance officer.
“Both starboard engines are out. The inboard keel missiles are completely gone and we have lost the port FTL drive. We also can’t deactivate the port impulse engine. It is locked at full power.” She said.
“Can we us reverse engines to counter act the force?” I asked.
“Negative, Sir. Their power is inadequate to the force of that engine.”
I hit my com button again to communicate with the captain. “Captain to the bridge.”
“This is port side engineering. The captain is dead.”
I slumped into my chair stunned. I was the XO of the ship so I had no choice but to take permanent command of the ship. I turned to look at the rest of the crew on the bridge who were waiting for my orders.
“Engage emergency protocols. Deactivate all weapons within the vicinity of the engineering rooms. Have all medical bays respond to the wounded and seal off the engine rooms. I want to see my senior staff in the Ready Room in two minutes. Let’s move!” I ordered.
The crew responded to my orders by getting them done right away. Within minutes, the engine rooms had been evacuated and sealed off from the rest of the ship. Soon after the stern weapons platforms were deactivated. I was all set to enter the Ready Room to see my senior staff to discuss our options when a sudden jolt rocked the ship. I turned back around to see a cone of fire was building up around the ship. That was when I began to panic! We were entering the planet’s atmosphere and we couldn’t pull out of it. I ran back to my chair and strapped in.
“This is the Captain!” I yelled into my com. “All hands, strap in at the nearest inboard location! We’re going down! Stand by for further orders!” I turned my com off and saw a few hull plates flying off of OLYMPUS’ bow. “Saber, raise shields.”
“Shields are offline, Captain. They were knocked out in the last explosion.”
I mentally cursed at our luck. Without shields, we might burn up on reentry. I was not going to be responsible for the deaths of 200 crew members. I watched as the planet below seemed to disappear before my eyes the cone of fire nearly consumed the front of the view screen.
I looked on as we reentered our atmosphere. It was five minutes until we passed the burn up stage. During that whole time, we had been doing everything to try and restore our shields. After we reentered we began to fall. Not a complete fall, we were more like gliding.
I was concerned for the survival of the crew when we were heading for the mountain range North of Ponyville. I knew that there was nothing we could do. Suddenly, we began to actually fall. We were out of the upper level of our atmosphere. I became seriously worried because we were heading for the ocean.
I hit my com and the EVAC button. “Attention all hands, this is the Captain! Abandon ship! Get to your designated survival pods and all emergency shuttles! Use cargo shuttles if needed!” I ordered.
Just after I turned my coms off another large explosion rocked the ship from the port side. I knew that it was our port side bilge keel missiles. I had the damaged compartments there sealed off to avoid flooding when we landed. We fell for several more minutes and we had all kinds of things going wrong. I was getting all kinds of reports from the other stations on the bridge and around the ship that we had structural failures and mechanical failures all over the ships outer passageways. One of the worst problems was that the survival pods wouldn’t engage at our speed and neither would the shuttle bay doors.
I had to make a quick decision because the water was coming up fast. I knew what I had to do and so I decided that I had no other choice. I hit my com button again. “Attention all hands! Evacuate from the outer hull! Get to the inner parts of the ship and brace for impact!” I turned to the rest of the crew. “Helm, fire all forward thrusters! Everyone else, shut down all unnecessary systems that could cause damage to the ship when we splash down. Communications, send a message to Canterlot and let them know that we are crashing into the ocean and require assistance immediately!”
They got right to it and soon all of my orders were carried out. We careened towards the ocean at lightning speed without any signs of slowing down. Thanks to my idea about the thrusters in the bow, we had been able to even out the ship for a landing. It was still going to be ruff and we would take more damage, but it would hopefully make the landing smoother. I watched as we came even closer and soon felt the ship begin to skim the water. The OLYMPUS began to shake more violently with every passing minute. It seemed as though we would never stop.
After about three minutes of gliding across the water, the bow suddenly jolted upwards. That did absolute wonders for my neck. For a few seconds we were in the air. We had hit a sandbar. Then what was left of our stern hit the water and the bow slammed back down bringing the ship to a sudden halt. Again, I was nearly thrown from the chair.
I stood back up and looked out the window. The mussels of our two main guns of our bow were under the water and we had smoke coming from a series of breaches in our hull. The water lapped at them vigorously as we settled.
Canterlot, we have splash down.
Up is Down
I gazed out the window for a few minutes. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. Our ship had crashed into the ocean and from what I could see on the flickering hologram, we were sinking. Fast.
I turned and headed for the stairs that were right next to the elevator. They had gone offline and so I had no other choice. I walked at a very brisk pace down the stairs. I stopped on Level 5 and began walking through the damaged halls towards the engineering room on the starboard side. I had to know if Soarin was alright.
I was nearly to the engine room when a sudden shift in the ship’s weight startled me. The ship began to roll to the starboard side. I began to run down the hall in an attempt to reach the engine room. The ship reached an angle of 90 degrees and I began to run along the walls. Then the ship’s bow sank even further into the water and I was forced to stop running. I made it to a junction in the halls and grabbed on to the wall as the bow sank down and the stern began to rise up.
I hung there for several minutes trying to shield myself from the debris that was falling down past me. My hands soon became weak and I tried to pull myself up, but couldn’t. When I couldn’t grasp the wall any longer, I let go, but I didn’t fall. I looked back up to see Soarin holding my arm. I grabbed his arm with my free hand and began to help him pull me up. He heaved me up into the other hallway at the intersection and we both collapsed against the wall.
“Thanks,” I said.
“No problem, Captain,” Soarin replied. “Both sides of engineering are completely flooded. There are several areas of the hull that look like they’ll bust sometime soon.”
Just as he said that, the ship hit bottom and fell down to land on her super structure. At the same time, a stream of water began to flow along the celling that was now the floor.
“I guess we had better get off this level. Let’s try and head back to the bridge. That part of the super structure is armored. We’ll be away from the water and we may be able to call for help,” I said standing up. Soarin stood up as well. I could see from the look on his face that I wasn’t going to get any argument from him.
As we neared the entrance to the stairs There was a load bang and we turned to look behind us. Instead of seeing a beam that had fallen behind us, we saw a large wall of water come careening towards us.
“RUN!” I yelled as I headed for the stairs. Soarin was right behind me. We ran as fast as we could towards the stair door. I managed to get it open in the nick of time. We both climbed into the stairwell and slammed the door shut behind us. Just after we did, there was another load bang as the water slammed into the door. A little bit if water trickled out from the edges of the door and it formed a small stream that began to flow towards the bridge which was now below us. We leaned up against the wall and gasped for air realizing how close we had just been to dying again.
After a few minutes of resting from our near miss with death, we got back up and began climbing down to the bridge. It was easy most of the way down because the stairs were the same on the bottom as they were on top. But, when we got down to the bridge level we had to use a rope to get down to the bridge door.
I opened the door only to be greeted by a wall of water flooding out from the bridge. I climbed back up the rope and began running back up the stairs with Soarin. It was a good thing that we did because, for a time, the water was rising quickly. We ran until we reached the door for Level 7. I opened the door and we climbed out of the stairwell.
“I am starting to get really tired of this,” I said.
“Me too. This is not what I signed up for when I joined the Bolts,” Soarin panted.
“Not to mention that this seems to happen with almost every mission that I go on,” I commented. My feet suddenly felt wet and I looked down to see that my boots were in about 3 inches of sea water. “Soarin we had better get moving,” I said. “We’ve got water.”
We began moving down the hall and the water slowly got deeper. We turned down a hall that led to the old port side of the OLYMPUS. I saw a sign that pointed in the direction of the survival pods. That was where we needed to go. We continued down the hall until we came to another junction of hallways. One way was blocked and down the other was filled with more water. We then saw the sign the pointed to our left for the survival pods.
We started heading down that hallway when we heard screaming coming from the other hall. We turned back around and wadded into waist deep water. The screaming continued to get loader until we came to a door at the far end of the hall. We began trying to open the door It wasn’t opening. I was just about to give up when Soarin pushed me out of the way. He aimed the pulse pistol that I hadn’t seen before. He shot the door controls and the door opened. A man and a woman came running out of the room. We began to head back up the hall when the man was pulled back into the water. I turned around just in time to see a long and armored tail disappear into the water.
“What is that thing?!” The woman screamed.
“Armor Eel! Keep going and don’t look back!” Soarin yelled as he pushed the woman and I farther up the hall.
We continued to run but there was still plenty of water. We kept running and running until we came to a barricade of debris. The woman and I clambered over it and we waited for Soarin on the other side. We heard gun shots and then the defining screech of the Armor Eel as it attacked. We waited for several minutes until there was nothing but silence on the other side. We waited and listened for some sign that Soarin was okay. Yet, there was no such sign. After a few minutes, we moved on.
Life Raft
We walked together in silence as we continued down the hall. We passed several other collapsed sections of the ship. Some halls that we saw were nothing more than piles of debris holding back tons of water.
We came to a door and found that it was still functioning. We opened it and entered the next hall. This one was larger than the other halls on the ship, because it was an evacuation hall. It was meant to be wide. Not only was it an evacuating hall, but it was filled with other members of the crew! We ran down the hall after them. I found the security officer who was trying to direct people to pods that were active. He was having a hard time controlling the large amount of the crew, because they were panicking. I walked up to him to address the problem.
“Saber, what seems to be the problem?!” I inquired as I approached him.
“Sir, I am attempting to evacuate the ship, but it is hard to find survival pods that weren’t damaged in the crash or the explosions.”
I looked around and noticed the officer’s pod on the far end of the chamber. “What about the officer’s pod? Is it still active?”
“Yes, but I need your permission to use it for anyone other than officers during a ship wide evacuation.”
The fuse in my head began to burn. “Saber, if we were in a battle and the only way to save everyone was to use that pod, would you use it without my permission?”
“Yes, Sir. If you sounded an evacuation and the only way that I could save everyone was to use that pod, I would.”
“Then why aren’t you using it now? I sounded an evacuation and it seems that the only way to save these people is to use that pod. So, what are you waiting for?”
The Saber turned towards everyone else in the room and began to move people towards the officer’s pod. We followed him and I saw to it that the young woman following me got on safely. I then helped observe the evacuation on the rest of the crew. By the time that the crew were onboard the officer’s pod, there was no room for any other people. I activated the ship’s onboard launching mechanism and then began to move to a small crew pod in the middle of the chamber. I stopped when I heard and saw a massive wall of water come roaring down the hall.
As I started to come out of my daze, I was pushed into the pod by a figure that I couldn’t see. I strapped myself into my seat and then I got a good look at the figure. It was a man who had a tattered uniform and he was covered in cuts and bruises. The upper part of his uniform was black and so was his face and hair. I watched as he activated the launch system in the pod just before the wall of water hit the side of the ship.
We launched and rocketed towards the surface of the ocean. I looked out of the window next to me and saw the OLYMPUS inverted on the sea floor. I also saw that her keel had been broken. Her hull was split wide open on one side where she had hit a rock. She was sparking where active electric was in contact with the water. For several minutes we rushed like a bullet to the surface. Soon we burst through the water and we were on the surface. I looked out of the windows and saw the rest of the pods floating on the surface.
I then turned to the man in the pod with me. Now that we weren’t desperate for our lives I got a good look at him. Under all the grim and oil, I recognized who it was. It was Soarin.
“Soarin, how did you survive?” I asked in both shock and joy.
“You don’t want to know,” he said panting.
“That bad?” I asked jokingly.
“Captain, as much as I would love to regale you with the glorious tale of how I defeated the beast, I am very tired. Also, let’s just say that being knocked into an oil tank and then an engine duct is not a fun experience while you are also trying to keep an Armor Eel from burrowing into your face.”
I cracked a small smile at that. “So it was a good day then?”
Soarin cracked a smile and gave a small chuckle. “Yeah, it was a good day at the office.”
We both sat there laughing about the whole thing for a few minutes. But, we soon fell silent from sheer exertion. We sat there for nearly two hours in silence until we were picked up by a rescue ship. I was happy to be back on something that wasn’t going to sink as easily as the OLYMPUS.
Within a few hours we were back on land and I nearly collapsed into the arms of a good friend who was waiting for me. She had been crying and hugged me for the longest time.
“I thought that I would never see you again,” she said weeping into my shoulder.
“Come on now, Spits. You know that I’m tougher than that. Someone has to keep an eye on you,” I said with a chuckle.
Spitfire pulled back and look at me through tear filled eyes. She was smiling. We said nothing as we walked back to the truck waiting to take me and the other survivors to the hospital in Manehattan. The whole entire ride there, Spitfire sat by my side never leaving me. I didn’t want her to and I know that she wouldn’t leave even if I asked. We just sat in silence. Spitfire laid her head on my shoulder when we were about half way there and she never moved another inch the rest of the trip. I thought of moving to make her more comfortable, yet I decided against that idea and so I just sat there listening to her slow and steady breathing.
Starships and oceans are two things that shouldn’t come into contact with each other. I watched as they raised the broken OLYMPUS and brought her on shore. They righted her and set her down at the Manehattan Ship Yards. She was in bad shape, but she was a tough little ship.
I came by a year later to find her surrounded by scaffoldings. She was going to be redeployed with her problems repaired. Spitfire and I walked up to the ship’s name plates and took out a pair of paint brushes and dipped them in black paint. We both wrote a second name next to her first. When the ship was recommissioned a month later, people saw the new name next to her old one and wondered what it meant. The old crew and I already knew. She was not OLYMPUS any longer after her maiden voyage. Her name was now OLYMPUS ATLANTA.
