Diaries of the Smooze Research Crew

by Antsan

Rating: everyone
Tags: Crossover, Alternate Universe
Length: 3145

Making friends with a truly alien being isn't easy.

The Lunar Space Program finds the planet Smooze. After an initial period of disinterest it is discovered that the planet is not behaving like it should. Twilight is sent out to do research.

Published 1970-01-01 00:00:00 UTC
Last updated 2014-07-16 21:34:11 UTC

I - Excited

I stepped backwards into the capsule and put my legs into the safety straps. The pneumatic bed around me began to pump up with a hiss. Now I wouldn't be able to move the tiniest bit. I briefly wondered how Pinkie would deal with this if she had to follow me later.

"Ready, Twilight?"

"Ready, Luna!"

"Don't worry about a thing! The station is fully automated and ready to welcome you." she said and the hatch began to close. As it shut close darkness surrounded me and the capsule trembled slightly.

"I wish you luck!" the speakers squawked.

"When am I going to take off?" I asked.

"You are already flying. Be well!"

The viewing panel switched itself on. It wasn't strictly necessary, as the course was precalculated and even in the event the course had to be readjusted by hand one would be ill advised to do it by what one could see on the viewing panel. Other measuring instruments were more fitting for that job.

It was just there so the passenger could admire Luna's night. So, in a way, it was necessary, as admiring the night sky had been the point of space exploration in the first place. A thousand years ago the popular ignorance had grown too much to bear for Luna, so the royal sisters decided to educate ponies on its beauty. So the Lunar Appreciation Program had been born. I had been successful and had accomplished much beyond its original purpose.

I tried to see Equestria once again before it was out of sight, but when I looked it was too late. A light sadness settled in my chest as I realized that I wouldn't be seeing my home for a few months now - at least.

Then again my destination was worth it: Smooze was a planet that was circling around a star which wasn't even visible from Equestria. When it had been found nearly a century ago it didn't seem interesting, so - because it was almost wholly covered in some strange liquid - it was named after an old horror tale, a research satellite had been deployed and basically Smooze had been forgotten after a few months.

But then a student had discovered that Smooze wasn't on a stable orbit. According to him the planet shouldn't exist. I can only imagine how excited and uncertain he must have been - I know my first reaction would have been to assume that my calculations were incorrect and there would have been no way for me to show them to anypony else. It is a great fortune that this student back then had been braver then me. Who knows how many wonders go unnoticed because the people discovering them are to feared of the ridicule they might be facing?

Well, that student faced ridicule, and there was no lack of it. Of course, most of his critics were civil, but it must have been hard either way. Only little by little scientists anywhere had checked his work and couldn't find any errors which would make his conclusion invalid. After a few years it had been hard to deny anymore: Smooze's orbit, according to the laws of physics we know, is not natural.

As always, when something unexpected is discovered, quacks and charlatans everywhere had claimed that this was the final proof that science couldn't explain the universe. Kooks and crackpots had come up with all kinds of explanations that defied anything we knew - of course; anything more rational wouldn't do for them.

In this atmosphere it had taken a decade before a respected member of the scientific community had dared to speculate that there might be sentient life on Smooze. It makes sense - the similarity between Equestria's and Smooze's unstable orbit had been obvious in hindsight.

Excitement about Smooze had peaked and a provisional expedition had been sent. It did not have a planetary base. They were not able to find any signs of life but they had observed strange activity in the ocean. I have seen grainy videos of it. Gigantic morphing formations rise out of the ocean, partly liquid, partly solid, with mist and drops swirling about, colors shifting...

This had been almost two decades ago. The expedition returned after seven years and due to the carrot crisis research had been abandoned.

Smooze again was forgotten, as more pressing matters took over all parts of society - there was social unrest following the carrot crisis, ethical concepts taken for granted had to be reevaluated, new subcultures sprung up and came into the universities, with entirely different ideas of what was important to research and what was better left alone. Only after the slurry of new ideas started resembling something of a coherent whole, astronomers turned their gaze back towards Smooze, as it promised something new in a scientific world that, in itself, felt new.

An automated construction ship was sent and after two years construction was finally finished. I was to be its first inhabitant.

Through the viewing panel I saw the stars jump as the capsule teleported across a distance not any unicorn could teleport on it's own. Although interstellar journeys didn't take that much time on their own, still months of preparation were necessary, as alone this spell needed to be charged up for weeks.

I looked forward to my mission. If I could have moved I would have been scuttling by now.

II - Comfortable

After a short while I felt the capsule rotating. That meant I was to be landing soon; first I was able to even feel any kind of drag, which meant I was in a gravitational field, second the capsule was reorienting itself so its vertical axis was perpendicular to the surface.

Smooze itself came into view. I could see the sun to my left, partially hidden behind the planet. The ocean below had a deep violet tone with pinkish lights dancing where the sunlight reflected off the surface. I could see something lighting up at the borders of the viewing panel; the outer hull was heating up in the atmosphere. Gradually the outline of the planet transformed into a horizon.

"Station Smooze to incomer. Passenger transportation capsule is under control of Station Smooze. Everything is fine. Prepare for landing in two hundred and forty five – two hundred and forty four – two hundred and forty three – ..."

The voice itself was warm and friendly, but the words weren't pronounced naturally. Of course – there was nopony on the station, so it had to be an automatic voice.

The capsule shuddered as the parachute opened. Besides the countdown of the automatic voice and my own breathing it was quiet – the hull was thick enough to be soundproof.

My flight towards Smooze turned into falling towards its surface. The ground seemed to be growing rapidly and I couldn't see the station; it was most likely below me.

I began tumbling. This was a bit frightening, but I knew that the transportation device was built to correct those things. Also, the station was there to enhance the precision of the calculations done by the circuits on board. There was a tremor and the capsule stopped tumbling.

Suddenly my descent slowed down, I heard the hissing of pneumatics that where to take the force of impact and before the realization could sink in the viewing panel deactivated itself and the capsule hit the ground.

Now I understood what my physical training had been for. It wasn't painful, I wasn't bruised and the air wasn't pressed out of my lungs – all those things were a thing of the past, when interstellar travel was a thing for astronauts alone. Still, after the serene experience the travel had been until now I felt my body all too much – my stomach was revolting, my sense of balance was telling me that I was spinning wildly in all directions and my joints were tensed up.

"Station Smooze, null null. Passenger capsule safe and sound in port." What a strange way to put it – but then again ponies that were alone on a station would always need something beyond cool functional efficiency.

I still hadn't regained my sense of orientation. It took a moment to realize that I was just bobbing up and down until the energy from the impact was absorbed. After the worst was over, the door hissed and opened slowly.

The safety straps undid themselves and the pneumatic bed gave me a push in the back so I fell to my hooves.

The metal crackled behind me as it cooled down and ventilation shafts were sucking out the last traces of poisonous atmosphere that had come in here while I had been landing. The space port was brightly lit and tidy, safe for were the capsule had blackened the floor with soot.

I didn't step forward immediately. I stood on the ramp that led to a metal door. To my right tracks led from the capsule to a large metal gate. Almost everything here was metallic. Only the capsule was made of some kind of ceramic.

On the door there were 6 circles of different color. I knew them - violet for the physics complex, yellow for the chemical laboratories, black for the cybernetic complex, red for storage of research items and substances, pink for subsistence storage, green for the living quarters. The dots told me that I had to go through this door if I wanted to get to any of them.

After a while I shook my head.

No need to stand around doing nothing! I scolded myself.

Although it hadn't felt like it, the flight had taken two hours. For the whole time I had been squished into that air mattress, unable to move. I was covered in sweat and felt itchy all over. I needed a shower.

So I went through the door and followed the green arrows that were printed on the floor, guiding me through hallways until I reached a metal door that was varnished in green. Not that I needed the colors to guide me. I had been living in an exact copy of the station on Equestria for the past three months.

In the living quarters there were 6 habitations, 3 on each side of the central corridor, and a shower, located at the end of said corridor. As I was alone on the station either way and since I hadn't brought anything with me – everything I needed (besides books) was already here – I went straight to the shower.

It took me longer than was strictly necessary. I was lost in thought.

That the stars were far away suns instead of lights sprinkled onto the sky came as a great shock to Equestria when it was discovered. It implied, that while Celestia was moving only one such object, Luna had been moving millions of them. Still measurements showed that the magical exhaustion of the sisters didn't reflect that fact at all.

Even more upsetting was finding out that other stars had their own planets circling around them - and they did it all by themselves, with day-and-night cycle and everything. It almost seemed as if Celestia wasn't doing anything at all.

The sisters also didn't know anything about the matter and were as confused as anyone else.

As astrophysics advanced a startling discovery was made: Equestria's orbit shouldn't have been stable and the planet should have crashed into the sun long ago. Obviously that hadn't happened.

Finally a research team brought everything together in one paper: Celestia hadn't been raising the sun but she had been accelerating the planet just in the right way to keep it on it's orbit. It was calculated that she might slack off for maybe two months before the planet was irreversibly lost. Luna's way of moving the stars didn't require anywhere near the same precision as what Celestia was doing, explaining the difference in effort for moving one star.

This discovery, of course, was also very important to how we saw Smooze, but nobody in the scientific community wanted to jump to any premature conclusions.

This process had taken centuries and had shown how ignorant even the princesses were of everything around Equestria. Before that, nopony had considered flying into space and educating ponies on the beauty of the night had just been a matter of celestial mechanics and natural sciences.

A whole new world had opened to us. Well, I wasn't born back then, as all this was now centuries ago.

I stepped out of my shower and was immediately lost. I didn't know what to do. I was excited, so I didn't want to choose my lodgings and hide there, but at the same time I was exhausted from the flight so I didn't feel up to actually starting my field research.

While I toweled myself off I decided to just go read some of the papers on Smooze.

III - Alone

Magic books were to be found in the living spaces on the tables. Of course they were blank right now and it would take a few hours before they would be filled with content. I would need to make a request and that had to travel around an hour to reach Equestria and then it would need to be processed and matched against some papers and then those papers would need to be sent back to the magic book, so that alone probably took around 2 hours and that wasn't even counting the time I would need to formulate a request in the first place – I wouldn't want to clutter the magic books on the station with stuff we won't read only because I was too lazy to express my needs properly.

Just an outline from here on out

{Leave showers}.

"Hey Twilight, what are you up to?"

{Acknowledge Rainbow Dash}. My stomach curled into a knot.

"What are you doing here?"

"Huh?"

I wanted to argue - I just had been cheated out of my great pride. Rainbow Dash had been here before me. Of course she had to be first again, no matter how important it had been to me. As if she even cared about that particular station. She could just speed around on any other planet, show off wherever she wanted, but she needed to steal from me the biggest opportunity I would ever have. Who had allowed this to happen? How cold Luna do this to me?

"You have no idea how important this was to me, do you?"

I had intended to hiss, but the last two words where accompanied by spittle. The embarrassment added to my rage.

"You couldn't just let me have this tiny opportunity to once, only once..."

"Whoa, now just a minute! You've got this totally..."

"Yeah, of course there is some explanation why you are here first once again - I wouldn't trust myself either with a research station, because, frankly, I am no astronaut and no engineer or..."

"It's got nothing..."

"...maybe I have just shown to be too damn labile to stay up here all alone. How very nice of the Academy to prepare some company! Wouldn't have a disaster like last year..."

"Damn, shut up! It's complicated enough as it is without you making a fuss. As if I'd do this to you! Just let me explain!"

"Ha! That's an explanation I'd like to hear!"

"Well, basically, there some stuff going on with your neurons and the planet and probably you have no idea about now and what just was and... Damn, if only you could explain that stuff to yourself!"

"Yeah, that sounds very convincing. How stupid do you think I am?"

"Look, I was not here before you."

"Don't tell me you landed just after me!"

"No! I..."

"So the other option is that you're only a figment of my imagination."

I stopped. This seemed disturbingly plausible. The image of me yelling at empty air appeared in my head. Maybe I was to labile to stay on a planet all on my own, unbelievably far from the next pony or even familiar living creature.

"I am not a figment... You know what, forget it! Let's just go with that.

"I think you made some notes. Let's just go to your room and then everything will become clear."

She turned to her left, opened the door. I felt very tired and embarrassed. It must have been a while before I got my nerves together and followed.

When I spoke again my voice shivered a bit.

"I really have no idea what you're getting at."

I went after her.

Rainbow Dash wasn't in the room.

The sudden loneliness was worse than the anger. Worry crept into my head. I felt sick.

I made some shaky steps.

"Rainbow Dash?"

It seemed like her to mess with me.

"Rainbow Dash? This isn't funny!"

Then again she probably wouldn't be messing with me in a situation like this. I made my way to the locker, stopped at the table on the way to collect myself, peered inside. She wasn't in there.

I must have hurt her pretty bad just then, maybe she had been angry enough to torture me like this.

"Come on, Rainbow, I apologize! Please, come out!"

There was no answer. Of course. There was no Rainbow Dash. There couldn't be - she'd only arrive here a week after I explicitly sent a request.

We had talked about this - the team, Luna, Rainbow, the others. Everyone had agreed it was my responsibility to prepare the station, to make a schedule based on what I'd learn.

This left me with one conclusion - I was going mad.

Maybe it was the loneliness. It only had been a few hours but I knew I could become agitated easily under pressure. I was no psychologist and had no idea about neurology - maybe the subconscious knowledge about my solidarity was enough to make me conjure the images of friends? Even trained astronauts were known to crack when left alone for long enough. How would someone untrained like me react?

Another, maybe less frightening, possibility entered my mind: There may be a leak in the station and some unknown hallucinogenic substance was responsible for what I had just experienced.

My heart was beating fast. My tongue felt like a washcloth that had lain unused and unwashed for too long. There was no sense in marching into madness deliberately. I needed to calm down.

I sat down on the floor and started to breath consciously. First out, long and slow and then some more. Stop. In, slow, into the belly. Stop. Out...

My heart calmed down a bit. I went to the sink and drank.

IV - Crazy