My Little Pony: My Little Pony The Martian

Mission Log – Solar Day 451

Well, Cave Farm is now seventy-one kilometers northwest of us. We moved to the trailer and basically had nothing to do except wait for all the batteries to recharge all day. Yes, I’m talking about all batteries. Starlight Glimmer took a small battery and ran the magic field projection for ten minutes. Then she linked all the batteries together to charge the small battery. If all the batteries are fully charged in the end, it means that they are able to bear the energy consumption of the magic field for ten minutes a day, which should be enough for Tingting to maintain her current physical health. If it doesn't succeed...then we'll just have to figure it out.

It's weird, but while I'm excited that we've finally taken the first step to escape this fucking planet, I'm also a little concerned. Only once before did I experience the feeling of traveling such a long distance away from the residential area when I went to find the Pathfinder; and even on the way to find the Pathfinder, I was always sure that if we encountered any problems, we would always be there. There is still a way to return to the residential area. But this time we will not have the opportunity to return to the residential area and cave. This time our trip would be more than twice as long as our previous trip to Ares Valley and back, and this time there was no turning back.

Of course, in theory we still have a way out. The amount of food we carry is even enough for us to walk all the way to the MAV and then turn back the same way. When we return to the residential area, there is a high probability that there will be a batch of newly grown hay and potatoes waiting for us to eat. But this is the most ideal situation without any accidents. After leaving this time, no one will stay behind to take care of everything for us, and we cannot predict what events we will encounter on the way. The chances of an accident happening are simply too high.

For the first time, I began to think seriously about the dangers of our profession. At the same time, I can’t help but wonder if there were other considerations that led NASA to decide that this path was the lowest risk and gave our plan the green light. Could there be some major event like a meteorite hitting the residential area on Sol 552, and they decided not to tell me? Or is Hermes about to be out of warranty, and in another day, an interstellar tow truck will come to your door and force you to tow it to a local AAA certified spaceship auto repair shop? Or is it that someone secretly inserted a secret clause into the international treaty that prohibits all countries on earth from asserting territorial sovereignty in outer space, stipulating that "aliens who have resided on a certain planet for days can obtain ownership of the planet"?

Okay, I admit that I was being stupid again. But to be honest, I really don’t know what to do. And Venkat, although as my boss your relationship with me is almost as close as brothers, I still don’t expect you to answer this kind of question truthfully. You will only tell me what you think I need to know in order to complete the task, which is still far from the unabashed truth. And no matter how much grievance I will suffer from this, your way of handling it can still be found to be reasonable.

Alas, it's better not to worry about such things. It's better to think of a way to organize a four-player computer heart battle. Starlight says she hasn't quite finished writing her new campaign setting for Pony Middle-earth yet. Her goal was to work out, in detail, a complete theory that would allow the Ring to operate within the magical laws of her world.

Now that I think about this, I feel more and more panicked.

Mission Log – Solar Day 452

The sleeping environment here...how should I put it...is very communal. And extremely uncomfortable.

A brief explanation: The rear of the habitable section of the former Pony spacecraft now houses the life support equipment and RTG appropriated from the Rover 1. The cupboards were almost entirely filled with hay, with a small amount of space reserved for medical supplies and other supplies that might be damaged by direct exposure to Mars' barely-there atmosphere. The floor is also surrounded by twenty-one metal-cased crystal blocks one foot wide each - magic batteries. After all that, the remaining horizontal surface for sleeping in the cabin is actually not much larger than a king-size bed.

So you might be asking, "So where did the ponies sleep when this trailer was a spaceship?" The answer is: hanging on the cupboard. Unlike Hermes, which relies on autonomous rotation to maintain a 0.4 times gravity environment in the habitation module, there is no simulated gravity environment of any kind in the Friendship module. The ponies all slept in sleeping bags tethered to the front of cupboards, similar to how astronauts have slept since our Skylab days and up to the modern space station.

The problem is that this sleeping space is vertical rather than horizontal. Even in the weaker gravity of Mars, only dragonflies can sleep in a slightly comfortable way in a bag hung on the wall. And in fact, it is unlikely to be very comfortable. For example, when we woke up this morning, we saw her crawling down and getting into our group of pillows to cuddle up for warmth.

Yes, even though the RTG is only a few feet away, even though all the portholes have been sealed, and even the pressure hatch to the bridge is tightly blocked, plus the big one we spent so much time and effort to stuff in. With a pile of rudimentary insulation materials, the room was still a bit cold before dawn. This is a tug-of-war between the air supply of the RTG and the pony life support system against the metal skin that conducts heat to the outdoors and is wasted in the deadly cold night of Mars. So what started as a small private space each of us occupied on a few mattresses in the cabin bunk eventually developed into a tangled mess of limbs when the alarm clock went off in the morning.

But looking on the bright side, at least no one has kicked me in the belly yet.

On to something else; the charging system is currently working perfectly. Permanently affixed solar panels with enhanced crystals complement the fourteen original solar panels stacked on top of Rover 2, allowing us to top up the battery well before sunset. And since we usually start driving early before dawn when the sky is just getting light, there is no need to drive late at night to increase extra power consumption.

So I drove for another three hours, covered another seventy-one thousand kilometers, and parked again with the attached solar panels to charge.

But there is a small problem: the current charging effect of the magic battery here is worse than the two original batteries when the ponies first arrived in the residential area. Starlight's estimated charging rate is 1.4% per battery per day. She attributed the decrease in efficiency to the decline of Dragonfly's body, which caused it to absorb more magic energy than before. In addition, it was also because when they first arrived, she often deliberately squeezed herself to inject the magic energy reserves in her body into the battery to speed up the charging of the battery. Now Berry and Spitfire have made up their minds and will not allow her to do her old tricks again; the comatose unicorn syndrome concept has been played out for a long time, and it is impossible to laugh about it.

The good news is that even this small amount of energy is enough to make up for the energy consumption of maintaining the magic field for ten minutes - but it's just barely, and only because we decided to make these twenty-one pieces heavy, uncomfortable, angular and easy to kick. Toe hazards surround our bedside to accompany us to sleep. The current daily magic output is just enough to support the magic field that lasts ten minutes, as well as the arrangement of refilling the giant battery every day.

We will practice and explore along the way. But so far, it’s basically been smooth sailing.

Mission Log – Solar Day 453

Great news – today we drove out of that part of Asidaria that is full of shallow valleys. Theoretically this means we are currently in Crisis Plains, but the geographical boundary between the two is actually quite blurry. They are both part of the Great Northern Plains; Cres is the southernmost extension of the Martian depressions, while Asidalia is the northeastern region sandwiched between Cres, the Arabian Mesa, and the Martian poles.