My Little Pony: My Little Pony The Martian

AMICITAS Mission Three – Mission Day 513

ARES 3 solar day 503

"Oh my dear, it's a mess."

Cherry Meimei's words really touched Starlight Glitter's heart. The 40 kilometers of climbing up the mountain with various slopes was already difficult, but at least the ground was still solid rock, with only a few small gravels and rocks scattered around. But then the order came from above to turn closer to the south, bypass the end of the ancient crater wall on their right that had been worn flat by time and eroded by the wind, aim at the mountain to their south, and then they drove on...

...driving into this kind of hellish place.

In ancient times lost in time, this massive mountain was part of the wall surrounding a giant crater called Schiaparelli. Perhaps related to the smaller Edom crater to the northeast, for some now unknown reason, part of the crater wall collapsed, sending countless huge rocks flying on the slopes inside and outside the crater. Eons of dust storms weathered the debris bit by bit, blowing sand and filling some of the gaps between the stones. Then the sand was gradually compacted into rock by gravity, leaving only a thin layer on the surface that was still loose enough to be lifted by a hoof. Then, finally, the ponies came, leading the ten-wheeled beast behind them, a model of engineering that was better than tinkering, to find a way down into the crater.

After just a few simple attempts, they discovered that some of the unprepossessing, medium-sized rocks were actually just the tip of an iceberg exposed above the surface. No matter how hard you kick it, it will not budge. Starlight reluctantly got into the car to take out a battery and tried to pull out a rock by the roots for the first time; the experiment not only consumed a third of the battery's energy, but also brought out a boulder that was nearly the size of the mobile home itself, and also triggered a landslide and the subsequent ground subsidence, which eventually forced the rover to take a detour of more than a thousand meters to avoid the accident.

After this battle, Starlight decided to switch to the Slicing Spell to cut off the stubborn obstacles that Berry could not kick. With the concerted efforts of the three of them (Berry, Starlight, and the almost exhausted magic battery), they cut through the thorns and moved forward for 20 kilometers, literally clearing a path for the mobile home.

So according to Mark's friends on the Hermes, they still have ten kilometers to go before reaching the top of the slope.

"It's a fucking mess," Cherry Berry added in English, "If the conditions going down are as bad as going up, I think we should just go back and try the other route NASA mentioned."

"We'll lose more than a week of base if we take that route," Mark replied on the other end of the radio. "Maybe more. The area just west of Schiaparelli is a mess."

"Worse than all this?"

"It's the kind of terrain where you drive 70 kilometers, but you only travel 40 kilometers because you keep taking detours," Mark replied. "I'm not exaggerating. Sheba Mesa is one of the most heavily cratered areas on the entire planet."

"Reminds me of home," Fireball chimed in. "The only thing missing here is, how do I put it, a fire mountain?"

“Volcano.”

"Yeah, that thing. Mountains, cliffs, rocks, it's all here. The bugs say the same thing."

"How long will it take... Wait a minute, Starlight, can you help me deal with this thing?"

"This thing" was a huge rock that was five times taller than the two ponies, sandwiched between two even larger irregular rock ridges on either side, standing on an open flat sandy ground. Starlight sighed, cast a few flashes of magic light, and then watched as the fallen rubble gathered into a pile, which was kicked away from the mobile home by Berry one by one.

"Thanks. How much is left in the battery?" Meimei asked after finishing the job.

Starlight checked the battery's energy meter as she hooked it back onto her back. "Maybe it can handle two more rocks like that," she replied. "It's almost empty."

Meimei sighed. "Let's just keep going," she decided. "It looks like the road ahead will be a little cleaner."

So the two ponies in space suits continued their trek, the mobile home following at a walking pace. The gap between the two ridges narrowed slightly as they went forward, leaving almost no room for the tandem rover to maneuver, but then it widened again, and the rocks on both sides gradually disappeared under the sand. Looking further ahead, there were smaller rocks, not much bigger than a hoof, still scattered here and there on (or protruding from) the sandstone surface.

With a glimmer of hope in their hearts, the ponies sped forward, leaving the mobile home far behind. Looking ahead, they could still see a few scattered larger rocks, but none as big as the ones they had just passed. And as they continued to go down, the rocks they saw became smaller and smaller, and more and more sparsely distributed - and thank God, none of them directly blocked their way. The light gray sandstone surface covered by the dust on the surface was not completely clean, but it was obviously much smoother than before.

"Mark, the front looks good," Meimei called out, "I think we can speed up for now."

At this point, Starlight and Berry were no longer in agreement on the situation as they had been a few kilometers earlier. "I can't walk any more," she responded. "Can we please stop here for today? We're already over the time limit."

"Agreed." Unexpectedly, it was Fireball who answered on the channel this time. "I don't like what I see. I want to stop and take a closer look."

"Huh? You know something I don't know?" Mark was a little surprised.

"Maybe. Just wanted to see if I could be sure."

"Okay then. Girls, just stay still. I'll drive the car over here, and then we'll set up camp right here."

For the first time in twenty days, the six refugees stood on the surface of Mars in space suits and looked around at the scenery around them. Behind them was a mess of sand and rocks on the northwest slope. In front of them was mostly sand, and the slope seemed to flatten out in the near distance, with the number of scattered rocks decreasing sharply. Beyond the horizon to their left lurked the edge of the crater wall listed as Edom Crater on Mark's map. The name originated from Giovanni Schiaparelli's map of Mars drawn more than 150 years ago based on his telescopic observations mixed with his own wishful thinking, and the fallacies in it have been passed down to this day. (For example, the huge crater that would later be named after the cartographer was nowhere to be found on that ancient map.)

To their right, towering above the walls of Edom Crater, was a fragment of what was once the edge of the Schiaparelli Basin. The massive rock stood out and cast a long shadow on the ground. Even though its base was far below the Martian horizon, the peak stood out and attracted everyone's attention.

In fact, it was the Fireball that attracted most of the attention. For example, Fireball was different. He had no other vision, and he was focused on the ground. He first stomped heavily around them with his space suit boots, then stretched out his claws to scratch the ground, picked up a small piece of gravel on the ground and used it as a tool to dig through the loose gravel on the surface. After that, he even tried to knock on the ground like knocking on a door.

This novel performance finally shifted everyone's attention from the surrounding scenery to Fireball. Mark spoke first, but his meaning was basically the same as Starlight's own thoughts: "Fireball, are you looking for hobbits?"

"Not funny," he said solemnly. "Dangerous. Lots and lots of danger. Not a good place. It gets worse the further we go."

"Um, do you want to explain it to us first?" Starlight also asked, "Meimei and I have been dealing with 'Not a Good Place' all day. Is there anything worse?"

Fireball sighed, "I need to think about how to say this." He thought for a moment and said, "Go in. Have lunch."

After the crew members set up the solar panels to charge, rinsed their space suits, and completed other pre-noon chores (including notifying Hermes that they would be parking here that day), they gave Dragonfly a customary midday group hug and then began to prepare their own lunch. Fireball grabbed a handful of quartz lemon crystal chips from his food inventory and threw them into the bowl, but did not start eating, waiting for everyone to prepare their own hay, potatoes or food packs.

Fireball didn't speak until Mark, the last person to sit down at the table, brought three potatoes and a tangerine chicken entree from one of the food parcels. To Starlight, each word Fireball uttered sounded like a brick from a mason, carefully placed on the wall of language after careful consideration. "Dragons live in the wild," he said, emphasizing each word. "Mostly open spaces. Especially in deserts and volcanoes, there are a lot of caves. I grew up in the desert. I know about deserts and the dangers of deserts." He paused, turned to Starlight Glimmer, switched to Pony, and asked, "How do you say 'powder pit' in Earth?"

"Hmm... 'Pink pit'?" Xingguang made a bold guess, "But what is a pink pit?"

"Danger," Fireball went on to explain. "Danger to baby dragons who haven't grown wings yet. Dangerous to ponies, too. It's like this." He held out a paw and spread it out. "The desert floor is made of sandstone. Solid. But something made a big hole - water, or a giant monster or something." He pinched his paw to make a pit. "And then sand blew in and filled the hole." He held out his other paw to cover the hole. "Sand is the same color, and looks like stone. But it doesn't bear weight. It's too loose. When a dragon steps on the sand, it sinks. If the hole is big enough, it all sinks into it." He then clenched his paw tightly to form a pit, crushing the unfortunate person he imagined in his fist.

"Okay," Mark said calmly, "I understand. So how do we find this kind of pit?"

"Don't find out," Fireball continued to mutter in a deep voice, "Stay away. In the desert, stay close to plants before you grow wings. Plants absorb groundwater, grow roots, and cause the pink pit to collapse." He stretched out his claws behind him, indicating that he was referring to the outside world, "Do you see any plants outside? I don't have any anyway."

"There must be more than one way," Starlight asked, "Are there any other ways to avoid this kind of pink pit?"

"Then watch the other baby dragons," Fireball replied. "If a dragon falls in, just say, 'Don't go there,' and go around it. That will be bad luck for the other dragons, but what else can you do?"

"I can't say for sure," Tingting asked sharply, "but maybe we can save him?"

"Dragons don't always have time to wait for a crazy changeling to pass by," Fireball replied, "no matter how plentiful you think those changelings are."

"I mean let you go and save it yourself." Tingting was annoyed.

Fireball looked nonchalant, "The Dragon King might be able to make that happen," he shrugged, "but before her, no chance. You all know what we dragons are like."

"No," Tingting said seriously, "I know you are not like that."

Starlight watched Fireball turn his head away from the bug's gaze. "Yeah," he muttered, "but I'm a lunatic too. Otherwise I wouldn't be here with you guys."

"Guys, please be serious," Mark interrupted, "So there might be danger next. So what should we do?"

Fireball sighed again. "Just like I said," he muttered. "Watch the dragon. See if he falls." He turned to Berryberry and said, "I'll go scout tomorrow." Turning back to Dragonfly, he added, "You turn behind the rover. You've seen enough to know what to do."

"So we have to just stand by and watch you fall in?" Xingguang said in shock. "This method is too outrageous!"

"And it's terribly slow," Mark said. "Are you sure this thing is really that dangerous?"

"What would happen if the rover flipped over?" Fireball demanded. "Hell, imagine if the rover was missing just one wheel? Yes, we're slow. But we can get there. It won't end up like Roscoe or Cletus."

Mark nodded in acceptance, repeating, "We go slowly, we can get there."

"Can we go back to the beginning and talk about you falling into the pit and dying?" Starlight firmly objected. "Although I don't know how you think we view you, we have never considered dragons to be consumables."

"Huh? Expendable?" Fireball was confused by the word.

"We won't let you make such a sacrifice just for your own safety!" Starlight insisted.

"Oh. So how can I join them?" Fireball pointed at Mark, "You pushed me away from the perchlorate fire and I almost died." Then he pointed at Starlight, "You saved the cave from leaking and I almost died." Then he pointed at Tingting, "You almost drained yourself to save Mark and I almost died." Finally, he pointed at Spitfire, "You flew into a Martian dust storm carrying something twice your own weight and tore your space suit apart and I almost died." As he spoke, the corners of his long mouth rose slightly, and he concluded, "I don't want to be left behind by you."

"Well, I can do that," Cherryberry suggested. "I'm an Earth pony. I might even be able to sense if there's something wrong with the ground."

"You may not be able to do it either," Fireball replied. "If you fall in... at least I'm taller than you." He stretched out a claw to measure Berry's height. "It will be easier for Starlight to drag me out. And I'm stronger. Maybe I can climb out by myself."

"That makes sense," Meimei replied, "but you can't just go out by yourself. If you want to go, we should go together. That way we can take care of you."

Fireball shrugged and said, "I agree." Then he buried his head in eating the bowl of crystal cereal, and it seemed that he didn't want to talk about this topic anymore.