The blue-green world rolled into view slowly, appearing larger with each passing moment. At this distance, it was a barren sphere of stone and water. Details were few and far between, just what the long-range scans had provided them with. The visible signs of life were extremely few, but they were still there. A gaseous atmosphere covered the world. With that came a noticeable but not overly worrying amount of storms swirling about.

Twilight Sparkle sat in her captain's chair, eyes darting from screen to screen as information began to come in from every direction. It was far too much for her to take and she waved it away. "Status?" She had a crew. Learning to rely on them was a skill she forced herself to. "Does it look safe for a landing?"

A team of officers set to work immediately. "Our probes are in position," confirmed one officer.

The humans exchanged words. They weren't worried about some things, but they were all watching closely for others. "Moving into position over the planet."

The monitor showed the probe being fired at the planet, plummeting brightly into its atmosphere. "We're already getting data." Harriet tapped at her keys. "Atmosphere is tolerable. Biosphere is... negative. Particulates are within specs. No air masks are required."

Twilight frowned slightly. "That's it?"

"Negative." Harriet turned in her seat. "Biosphere shows no signs of life. There are no biological molecules bigger than a stray protein that was likely an accident."

Twilight considered that, her mind working. "But there was a seed pod left behind." She stood up and went to the screen. "That doesn't reflect well on their odds." She sighed with the weight. "We owe it to them to gather them, and any data they may have left behind."

Rainbow came rushing in, wings flapping. "Odds? What odds?" She grinned down at Twilight. "Send me in there. You know I can handle it." She punched at the air. "I'm space hardened. I could take off and hit the planet like it owed me a few bits."

Twilight gave a slow nod, but didn't respond to Rainbow directly. "See if we can't find signs of the seed. It was made of metal, some of it ferrous. It shouldn't be that hard to at least get a basic read on its location."

Harriet was working already, "Aye, ma'am." She typed with increased speed. "We're looking for a big hunk of metal. Shouldn't be that hard."

Twilight settled back in her seat. "I know you're excited, Rainbow. Let us at least figure out where to aim you before you go flying."

"Right." Rainbow pumped a fist into the air. "Ready when you are!"

Harriet blinked and looked up. "Ma'am, I've got a contact, just southwest of the equator." The main screen swiveled the planet and showed a circle. "Somewhere in there. A large amount of ferrous material and some others that are either human or pony in manufacture."

Rainbow grinned widely. "See? Knew we could find it. Time to get things started." She headed off to prep for launch, no longer able to contain herself.

Twilight tapped her chin with a hoof. "I can see you're not going to be stopped. Rainbow, please be as careful as you can be. I want you safe and sound."

Rainbow huffed at that. "Twi, Space. Hardened." She tapped at her reinforced skull. "Unless something down there has a star busting laser or something, I'm probably fine. Really." She dashed away. "Heading out! I'll call with good news."

Twilight stared after her. "Please do." She turned to the rest of the crew. "Keep as many eyes on her as we can. Alert me if anything happens.

***

Rainbow plummeted through the atmosphere with a scream entirely of her own choosing. "Oh. Yeah!" she let out as she crashed through the air, burning all the way. She could see her target and banked. Every adjustment made her wings feel like they wanted to pop free, but she did it anyway, coming in for a rough and through impact. "Ow."

Not that this stopped her from groggily getting to her hooves, shaking away the dizziness as her body regenerated. She breathed heavily, but otherwise seemed unaffected by the hard landing. "Well, let's see what we have here." She gave her wings a small flap to send dust away from her, and walked closer to the metal husk of what had once been a spaceship. "That wasn't hard." She accelerated towards it. "Captain." She tapped at her right ear. "I have eyes on what looks to be the target. Told you I could find it."

"I never doubted you." Twilight chuckled quietly. "Approach and examine. No touching, please."

Rainbow began doing just that, striding through the broken landscape, towards the mass of metal. She scanned around, trying to find the most obvious way inside. "Huh, guess it came down like a brick." She knew that feeling, having just done it herself. "Come on, some of you shoulda been hardened." She advanced on the ship. "Why did you all die?"

"That's what we're here to figure out." Twilight sighed gently over the mic.

Rainbow tried her best to ignore the cacophony of pain in her wings. "Regeneration, love it, and hate it." She knew the pain was temporary, but it was quite real in the moment. She spotted what would have once been a sort of window. "Hey, check this out. Can I try rubbing the dirt off it?"

Twilight hesitated a moment. "If you must."

Rainbow dragged her wing along the wall. "The surface is just, dusty. Gotta clean it."

"Anything interesting?" Twilight's voice came over the line, loud and clear.

Rainbow redoubled her efforts, bringing her hooves into the act. Inside, a pony looked back at her. Rainbow fell back in surprise. "Woah!" But the pony wasn't moving, just staring at her.

"Rainbow?" Twilight prodded gently. "What happened?"

Rainbow regained her composure and took a few steps back. She found her legs being shaky. "I found what I think is the bridge of the ship." She stepped slowly to look at the pony, staring, lifeless. "I think I found at least one of them. Died right on their ship. Eesh, what happened?"

Twilight made a small sound. "Go ahead and investigate. Stay safe. Call if you need me."

"Alright, I'll do that." Rainbow lifted her wing and began recording what she was seeing. "Uh, Twilight, they're not breathing, and their eyes aren't moving."

"Death will do that." Twilight was quiet a moment. "Search. If their computers are intact enough, maybe they have syncs. Can you recognize who it is?"

Rainbow leaned closer to look at the pony, covered in dust. She used a wing to brush some of it off. "Uh, nah. Time and dust makes that hard. Can't pick out their cutie mark at all." She nudged the mummified body. "Creepy. Oh, I am inside the thing. It smells of, uh, well, dust? It smells old and abandoned."

Twilight let out a small sound. "There was life there. No decay though. Seems like there wasn't any bacteria left alive on the world."

Rainbow peeked around inside the bridge. "I'm getting the idea they were already dead by the time they even got here."

Twilight perked her ears. "Why do you say that?"

Rainbow tilted her head, "Seems like their bodies are long since dried up. I don't see any remains of food, no signs of where they put it either." Rainbow slowly walked through the ship, at least the parts she could reach in the partially-crushed structure. "I think this was a coffin before it slammed into the planet." She flapped her regrown wings, settling them in place.

Twilight was quiet a moment. "Rainbow, be careful. I've got my worries."

"Nothing's happening." Rainbow found a chair and dusted it off. She perched on it and slowly turned to examine the room. "Light, I summon you!" Such dramatics were not required, willing her head-mounted flashlight to turn on, revealing that pony from before, approaching her with dusty teeth and hungry eyes.

Rainbow reeled back in shock, taking flight as she bumped her head against the ceiling. "The! The pony's up! And moving!" She zipped around the room, doing her best to stay away from it. "And it's after me, I think."

"Rainbow? What's happening?" Twilight's voice cut through her panic.

Rainbow zipped about, trying to keep some distance between herself and the not-dead-at-all pony. "The pony, it's moving! It still looks super ultra dead, but it's moving! Permission to punch it until it stops moving!"

"Rainbow, don't!" Twilight raised her voice slightly. "Do not attack!"

Rainbow groaned at the command, swerving towards the exit instead. "Fine!"

The dead pony took flight in pursuit, "You can't get away!" He dove for Rainbow's tail.

Rainbow blasted out of the ship as fast as she could, "See ya, sucker!" She twirled around only once she was comfortably in the air. "The dead pony can fly, and talk. It's not friendly."

Twilight did a double take. "What?!"

Rainbow faced off against the now-sulking-on-the-ground pony. "It chased me outside." She snapped a picture of the still-super-dead-looking pony. "It's not flying, right now. Thank Celestia for that; but it is eyeing me."

Twilight took a slow breath. "Well, now that you've escaped, why don't you take a closer look at him? Try and figure out who he is?"

"Dude, he's gonna try and eat me." Rainbow flew a few feet away instead of towards the monster. "What even are you?!" she shouted down at it. "You can talk, so speak already!"

The pony craned his head up at her. "We are what we are." He growled and paced around. "Your kind would never understand. This world belongs to us. You have no place here."

Twilight took a sharp breath. "Mission abort."

"What?!" Rainbow scowled at the unseen voice of her friend and captain. "Twilight, why? I can handle this. We came here for a reason."

"Mission. Abort." Twilight folded her arms, though also unseen. "This planet is hostile. Mission. Abort. We are not a military vessel, Rainbow. We're just civilians. We don't wage wars, and you're ready to start one."

Rainbow flicked her wings. "Hey, it started this!" She tried to stare down the dead-looking pony below her. "What even are you?" She looked the corpse up and down, no visible cuts or injuries that she could see. "Creepy as all—"

"Rainbow! Get back here, now. That is an order. Please, Rainbow. As your friend, and your captain, come home." Twilight took a slow breath. "I want to rescue them too, but not this way."

Rainbow growled softly. "This is dumb." She bobbed her head in a quick nod. "Fine, fine. Rainbow Dash, returning to ship." She brought down her wings in a powerful flap, jetting away from the site.

The zombie pony leered at her, still growling. "We are still here. We are waiting. You cannot hide from us. We will keep the secrets of our world safe. None may have it." Not that Rainbow stuck around to hear much more, already ascending into the upper atmosphere. The zombie pony continued speaking anyway. "We won't let you take our secrets away. We've been through too much."

Rainbow glowered as she pushed herself through the air. "Mission. Abort. Sure." She ascended up, and away from the world below. "Jeez, Twilight." She called over her communicator. "I'd love to punch him into paste."

She broke through the atmosphere into the calm silence of space. She could feel her fur and skin adjusting to the void, a strange prickle that greeted her. "Ah, space." She angled for the ship, powering towards it with her wings stretched wide. "I'll be back in about ten, then we talk. I want to know why, Twilight. And you owe me an answer."

The cold voice of the ship's communication officer answered. "Affirmative." They paused briefly. "The Captain is preparing herself to speak with you directly."

"Good." Rainbow grumbled a little as she thought about what she had seen. "Something is off."

Author's Note

Why did Twilight immediately abort the mission? What are your thoughts?

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