Bon Bon was the first one to wake up from the nap, then it was Princess Luna. Planetshine was still fast asleep in her part of the command pod. Bon Bon looked out the window and realised that the moon was very close to them and that they entered its sphere of influence. She then looked on her little map, and it said the injection burn on the moon would be in 10 minutes. 'Phew, at least we didn't pass the injection manoeuver, that would be just disastrous,' she said.

Once she checked the map and did some science experiments, she called Planetshine to wake up. Even though she wasn't a scientist, the command pod can store all the data from the experiments for recovery, a scientist can observe it and give more information about the experiments, so that means that they could know more about a particular celestial body or interplanetary space.

'Planetshine, Planetshine, PLANETSHINE! WAKE UP!' Bon Bon shouted at her.

Planetshine finally woke up after a while of Bon Bon shouting at her extremely loudly. Once she woke up, she questioned, 'Where are we?'

Luna responded this time instead of Bon Bon, 'You might want to look outside.'

Planetshine looked outside out of the window on her right. The moon looked very close to her, and that was that is very close to her, but Equestria looked very small. 'Wow, that looks pretty large, and Equestria looks like a ball or something like that,' she said.

They waited for a while, Bon Bon and Luna each sharing an apple while Planetshine was just snacking on the mountain of her own snacks, cleverly hidden in a monopropellant tank, which was empty as it was basically useless for that mission. Once they were a little bit away from the manoeuver node, Planetshine fired up the little Terrier engine to complete the injection burn to put them into a stable orbit around the moon.

Planetshine then did a little EVA to take a few photos just for the sake of it. Once she was out of the command pod, she pulled out her camera, and almost slipping out of her hooves, took a few photos of the moon and the lander orbiting the moon in all its glory.

Once she was all done with the pictures and all that, she transferred the photos to the ponies at the space center. Then, they asked for a selfie with all three ponies on the mission. She climbed down into the bottom level of the command pod, which was very cramped when she got in and took a selfie with all three ponies squished together.

Once she finally sent the photo to the space center for every pony to see, she decided a place to land and started to turn the lander retrograde so they could land on the east far side crater, the one that was partially visible from Equestria at night.

Once she was on a trajectory that would land where she wanted to, she let the lander coast along in space above the moon, waiting for the perfect time to do her suicide burn, which actually happened to be pretty early. She started her suicide burn as late as possible, aiming to have 0m/s about 1m above the ground. It was a very dangerous manoeuver, but she pulled it off flawlessly as she was a great mathematician as well as a pilot.

Once they landed very softly, trying to not overstress the landing legs from touching down, Planetshine told the other ponies to put on their spacesuits as they would step on the moon for the first time in Equestrian history. More than a thousand years ago, Luna was banished to the moon, but what she told the other ponies, she actually didn't step hooves on the moon, she was just banished there, with a mark on the moon as her physical body and spirit.

Planetshine was the first one to put on her spacesuit and was also the first one to jump out and step on the moon's surface. Bon Bon was helping Luna put on her spacesuit, so she took a little time to get out of the lander. Luna was last, as she had to get a bit used to wearing a spacesuit, and after about 2 minutes, she jumped out of the lander, and then she realised something, the gravity was lower than the surface of Equestria.

Planetshine then went into the lander to do a quick gravity scan while the others were just standing outside, waiting for Planetshine. Once she was complete, she concluded that the gravity on the moon is about 1/6 of what they would find on Equestria. She then posed for a few photos, even doing a selfie with all three ponies. Their visors made it hard to distinguish which pony was which, but their spacesuits were all made differently, so it was pretty obvious which pony was which.

Once they were done with the photos, surface samples, experiments, flag planting, footprints and some jetpack training for Bon Bon and Luna, they were now about to head off back home. Luna was the first one to get into the lander, next was Bon Bon, and the last one was Planetshine, who said that she would look at the moonscape for a little bit longer. They then all took off their spacesuits except for Planetshine, who wasn't bothered to.

Once all the ponies were in the lander, they were ready to take off, but Planetshine realised that they had more than enough delta-V to get to somewhere else on the moon, and so they did, even if they weren't supposed to. Once Gene heard the news about the extra delta-V and another landing, he thought to himself for a while. After a quick while of thinking, he agreed that they should do another landing somewhere on the moon, as it would make the mission seem more impressive.

'Mission control, can you hear me,' Planetshine said through the radio in her part of the command pod.

'Loud and clear Planetshine,' Gene replied.

'Just saying, but this mission might take a bit longer than expected, every pony on board including me wants to stay on the moon for a longer time, like a lot longer.'

'Well, you can, but the only problem is food and water, do you have enough to last however long you want to be on the moon?'

'Yeah, should be enough to feed all of us for about 3 days or so, and going back home only takes about a day or so of coasting in space.'

'Very well, you may stay longer on the moon, just don't get stranded or anything bad like that ok?'

'Ok.'

All the ponies in the lander were very happy, especially Planetshine, who wanted to see the moonscape for a lot longer because it had beautiful formations. The first stop and only other stop on the moon was the edge of the farside crater, which looked like a nice place to find a good view of the surrounding moonscape.

Planetshine jumped out of the command pod first while the other two were putting on their spacesuits again because they took them off when they went in the lander. Planetshine planted another flag while Bon Bon was doing some experiments in the lander and Luna struggling to put on her spacesuit.

'Bon Bon, Luna,' Planetshine called to them via the microphone in her spacesuit, 'You guys have to come out here, the view of the crater looks so beautiful from here, like seriously.'

'Alright Planetshine,' Luna said, 'I'm coming out, Bon Bon's doing some experiments so she is going to take a bit longer.'

'Mkay, you say so.'

Luna jumped out of the lander, looking around after landing on her hooves. Bon Bon was the next one to come out, but when she finally got out, she was amazed by the moonscape. After a while, the three ponies were getting a little bored with looking in one direction, and so they turned to another direction and gazed at it for a little while.

Once they were done with gazing into the moonscape, Bon Bon went to check the lander if there were any problems with it while Luna and Planetshine were just playing around jumping and jetpacking around the lander. Bon Bon later joined the 2 ponies at jetpacking around the lander. Once they were done with playing around with the jetpacks, Planetshine insisted on going on a little expedition.

Bon Bon and Luna agreed to join the expedition, and so they followed Planetshine. The destination was a hill about a kilometer away, which wasn't very high, but it definitely would give a great view of the moonscape. Once they finished jetpacking over to the hill and landing, Planetshine realised that she had barely any EVA propellent, which was a huge bummer because it meant she had to walk back to the lander. Bon Bon's EVA propellent was also mostly depleted, and so was Luna's.

'Uhh, guys,' Planetshine called out to them, 'Since we don't have pretty much any jetpack fuel, we need to walk back to the lander.'

The other ponies were disappointed that they had to walk over to the lander which was about a kilometer away, but it was their only way to get back home. Then, out of nowhere, Planetshine said, 'Don't worry everypony, the spacesuits don't restrict much movement so you guys can walk on the moon just like you would back home, other than the gravity being one-sixth of Equestria.'

They gazed at the moonscape for a while, and when they finished that, they were ready to hike back to the lander, spend the night there, and get back home.

Author's Note

Just to make this clear.

Planetshine: Space Explorer / Pilot
Lyra: Spaceplane Pilot
Bon Bon: Engineer
Derpy: Assistant Engineer
Dr. Whooves: Scientist