Author's Note

This chapter is when the two stories merge.
And also I realised that I was spelling Flame Rider wrong the whole time.

Alternate Equestria?

Equestria? Equestria.

I guess I didn't have to do any burning to get to the planet or get captured into an orbit around it with a retrograde burn at the periapsis of the hyperbolic trajectory to the planet. I was on a collision course. From what the instruments detected, the planet was pretty far away, and I would collide in about 4 hours. The instruments didn't say what speed I would be hurtling towards it at.

I pulled out a calculator, which was stashed away in the storage bay, which was that repurposed service bay.I smashed in some numbers and symbols, and there it was, the speed I was going to be at when I enter the atmosphere, which I used Equestria's Karman line for the sake of simplicity. All I can say is that the entry speed was going to be fast, 8000m/s atmospheric entry speed. I was dead.

I might as well do a fully powered injection burn, but all the fuel was mysteriously gone. I don't know why, but it could be that rift. I'm dead. Even though I was going to be dead, there was still a chance I might survive, just saying, spinning my craft around like crazy to evenly distribute the heat. Either that or I'm dead.

I waited, getting more and more nervous. I entered the planet's gravitational well or its sphere of influence, and it was 1 hour until going into the atmosphere. I got more and more nervous as I approached it, hoping I wouldn't die. I couldn't take it anymore, so I started to spin my SSTO like crazy. I had to make the craft spin as fast as I could, so I started to spin it about 30 minutes before atmospheric entry. Reaction wheels were very useful indeed, especially for this case.

From all that spinning, it made the craft spin at a very helpful rate of 3000rpm. Ahh yes, 50 rotations per second, that made me dizzy, like really dizzy. I felt like vomit would explode in my stomach, but at least it didn't explode, it was still in there, my stomach churning. I entered the atmosphere, spinning at that insane speed.

The heat was distributed very evenly across the whole ship. The upper parts of the atmosphere being no problems. The atmosphere not even doing anything to the spacecraft. The only problems when I entered the thicker parts of the atmosphere. The spacecraft was going to melt, absolutely perfect, and yes, I'm being sarcastic here. Hey, at least I'm losing speed fast, right?

Even though that was a good thing, it was also bad, like really bad. Good thing was that I had a higher chance of surviving, the bad thing was spinning with extremely high G-forces acting on you literally making you feel suicidal. At least I got down to mach 3 from mach 24 or something like that in like a few seconds. Do NOT ask me how that felt, all I can say is that I didn't like it.

Miraculously, the little SSTO's instruments and sensors and don't forget, cameras, all survived. Yes, it survived all that shock heating and all that ridiculous spinning. And hey, I survived too, that's two thumbs, uh, hooves up from me. There was nowhere to land though, and even though the glide ratio of the Galaxy Scouter was unusually high for what it was, it wasn't enough to glide to the closest real land mass, which sucks.

'Fucking need to land somewhere,' I thought to myself, snacking on some berries at the same time. I had to eat right? I mean, I haven't eaten anything in a while now, so I had to eat something, 99% so I can survive and that remaining 1% because I wanted to, that relieved some stress you know.

There was an iceberg that had a flat that I spotted with the help of the camera. Perfect landing spot, though a little short and I could drop into the water or I could smash into the glacier. I mean, ice is slippery, I don't think the wheels would have enough friction control to slow it down in time. I don't want to smash into the glacier and especially not fall into that freezing water as a result, but that wasn't very likely to happen, right?

Thank goodness I had enough speed and glide ratio to get to the glacier at landing speed, which was about 50m/s when empty. I took a steep approach, which was more for reckless flying training than functionality. And no, I am not a reckless flyer, I mean, how am I one? I fly everything with care and I never do stunts with them, other than that time I flew a cargo plane with cargo in it fitted with ramjets and did barrel rolls with it at mach 3. That was not reckless flying, that was me flying very carefully trying to keep the cargo intact.

The landing couldn't have gone any better, ok, maybe I'm just being sarcastic, it was absolute dogshit. I crashed into the glacier instead of actually landing on the flat part. I blame the plane for having bad maneuverability, not my very careful piloting and great piloting skill. Ok, I'm being sarcastic again, but whatever, I got a bit, unconscious would the word I would describe it as.

I blacked out pretty quickly. Can't believe I blacked out because of a measly crash, what about that ridiculous reentry that happened a few minutes ago, I mean, that was more extreme than this, like a load more extreme. I then woke up again in like 3 minutes. Not bad eigh?

Next few events shocked me. To explain this is short words, this was an alternate universe. To explain this in long words, Starry Night was here, opening up the spaceplane door while I was snacking a bit. 'Holy shit,' she cried out loud, startled when she saw me, 'Is that you Planetshine?'

'Mhmm,' I thought to myself. 'Starry Night?' I asked, my mind trying to perceive what was going on. I burst out my calculator, which was now burnt from the damn reentry. Now it was useless. 'But I thought you were dead,' I complained, trying to fix up my burnt calculator, like seriously, why was I doing that, I'm not even that good at maths anyway.

'Well it's been 3000 years,' Starry replied, a bit confused.

'I mean I saw you die.'

'How?'

'Well you, Lyra, Sandbar, Derpy, and Flame Rider were killed in the war with the humans when your helicopter crashed.'

I couldn't remember very well about the events of the war. I'm not exactly sure if they hijacked only one helicopter or more than one. I don't have the best memory, but it was good enough to remember rocket equations and whatnot.

'Oh well, I went into cryogenic stasis for three thousand years and you guys all died,' Starry argued, 'Even the princesses are dead.'

This made me certain that this was an alternate universe, I mean, how is this possible unless this is in an alternate universe? Alternate universes were the closest thing to this situation, maybe the only answer. 'Wait a sec, two different stories with the same ponies?' I asked, but I already had the answer.

'Alternate universes!' we shouted in unison with joy. I was still smashing my calculator, not trying to fix it but more like destroying it. I don't think I need that anymore, there had to be more calculators somewhere.

'What happened to you and why are you rainbow?' Starry asked, having no time to examine me thoroughly.

The ice felt like it was going to crack, maybe due to my shocking attempt at a reckless landing. Then, a large metal floating base, more like a huge boat, pulled up near the iceberg. I wasn't cold at all, flight suit for the win. Starry looked like she was cold in some ways, but she didn't show any real signs of being cold at all. I guess she was used to the coldness anyway.

I then saw Flame Rider, waving at us from an iceberg that had a crane and a hanger on it. She was in the cockpit. It looked like a spaceplane cockpit though. That was something that I didn't entirely understand, why is that a spaceplane cockpit. And I'm saying spaceplane cockpit because if it looked like one, then it is one.

Starry flew up and stepped onto the deck, ice, but I'll call it a deck, slowly but steadily. I was the next one, and I also slowly got on. It was strange to step on such a large iceberg. The ones I've seen back at my universe were a lot smaller, I guess that's just a different universe. What can I say, different universes are different.

I took off part of my flight suit off, and it was cold, so I put it on again. Kinda strange how the other two can survive like that. I can definitely say it was something called adaptations which I learned from science class when I was in school. I mean, Starry had been in a cryo chamber for more than 3000 years, how is she not used to the cold temperatures. Flame Rider I guess is just Flame Rider, she doesn't care.

The glacier eventually melted, giving way for a robotic arm that grabbed the tiny spaceplane. The metal arm dropping the SSTO gently into the hanger for material salvaging and research and development I guess. There was not real other explanation why they would do that, the Galaxy Scouter was dead anyways from that crash, so I guess that was why they would salvage it.

Flame Rider came up to us, and I noticed something. Her left wing was cut, but that was mechanical, so it wasn't as bad as something like real wings, which I guess can be replaced with the mechanical wings anytime. She also got a broken, or at least that's I could say. Her walking didn't seem right, and what could be the best explanation for walking strangely? Not a fucked up brain, but a broken hoof. I mean, that was I guess paralysed, which made me feel sorry for her.