The sound of the electronic buzz from the bedside videophone sounded as if a train was plowing through Rainbow Dash's apartment as she awoke from a deep slumber. Though still half-asleep, her instincts kicked in, forcing her hoof nearest the table to reach for the answer button and punch it like an alarm clock.
"Dash, don't tell me you're still in bed at this hour." A male voice sounding as if it transmitted through a tin can barked at her.
Now fully awake, Rainbow unlidded her eyes and let out a stretch as she faced the image of an older stallion on the wafer-thin screen. "I'm not here right now, please leave a message after the beep."
The stallion snorted. "Cute. Do you have any idea what time it is?"
In order to answer his question, she looked to the other side of her bed where an interface projected from the wall. There a digital clock illuminated the time; "5:46 PM." Wait, that can't be right. She punched the machine, causing the clock to speed towards the correct time; "8:46 AM." Sensing the change of time, lights and other devices optically connected to the interface came to life, including the TV across the room and the overhead lights.
The time finally registered. "Oh, horseapples! I'm late!" She kicked the blankets away and reached for her goggles on the table, knocking empty cider bottles and take-out containers onto the floor in the whirlwind of panic.
"Hey, hey! Dash!"
She stopped and faced the tiny screen. "Yes, sir?"
"Since it's a technical issue I'll give you a break. Get some breakfast, drink some coffee, and be here in fifteen minutes. Alright?"
She relaxed a bit. "Thanks."
The stallion on the screen nodded, then reached for something off-screen, prompting the signal to pop with static, followed by a plain black image with greet text reading "CONNECTION TERMINATED".
Fifteen minutes was more than enough time for her, given the distance between the office and her apartment building. Not to mention being one of the fastest pegasi in Equestria. It was slack meant for the unicorns and earth ponies in their aerocars, but of course no protest was felt against it. Now she could get her coffee and something to eat without a major rush.
She now realized the pain that was aching through her head, almost making her nauseous as she sat up in the bed. It was undoubtedly the cider from last night. Rubbing her hooves on the various pressure-points along her skull seemed to momentarily relieve her to a certain degree, but not to a satisfactory effect.
The automated voice of the videophone machine startled her out of her peace. "If you would like to make a call, please hang up and try again."
With adrenaline now pumping through her veins, she angrily picked up a cider bottle and threw it at the machine, hitting the "terminate" button to hang up. She went back to massaging her head, then finally stumbled out of her bed, kicking away a blanket caught on one of her hind legs.
First stop on the way to life outside of the cozy bedroom was, of course, the bathroom. And there upon the throne to relieve herself, she watched a small computer screen facing her from the opposite wall. As soon as the overhead lights detected her presence and flickered on, the screen crackled to life and displayed the following green text:
"Scanning..."
Done with her duty, the computer beeped, followed by the automatic flush of the toilet. It now read:
pH . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7.0
Uro-Gen . . . . . . . . . 1.0 Ehr U/dl
EtG . . . . . . . . . . . . 215 ng/mL
TeN . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.0
LLC . . . . . . . . . . . . -40
AC . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.0
T-Tox . . . . . . . . . . . 3.1
SG . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.041
"Excess sodium and alcohol traces detected. Please adjust diet accordingly."
As usual, the resulting data made no sense to her whatsoever, but the final remark was crystal clear enough for her to snort at with disregard.
Rainbow reached for a bottle of painkillers on the counter, spilling the small white capsules onto the surface and swiping a couple of them into her mouth. She then filled a nearby glass of water from the automatic faucet, proceeding to wash the drug down her throat. When finally making her way out of the room, the lights dimmed away.
She expressed no concern about the mess of painkillers she had left on the counter, not with the pain she had at the moment. She would take care of it later when she got back home. By then the drug would have already done its job and she could think with more clarity.
More automatic lights turned on as the sensors detected her motion towards the kitchen, open and facing the living room. Window panes scrolled upward to reveal a vast metropolis outside of her confinement. Yet despite all, the apartment was still in gloomy darkness due to the old-fashioned bulbs installed in transparent panels above, and the morning sun being blocked by a poisoned atmosphere of smoke and storm clouds.
The city was a grand work of engineering art, structures tall and bright, filled with life. But they were undertoned in a network of industrial workings serving functions that modern society could not live without. Below the magnificent buildings lay alleyways and street corners of an old Canterlot, neglected and wasting away.
Above were massive smokestacks entwined with webs of mechanical dismay, coughing and bellowing flames of their foul byproduct. The smoke mingled with shady clouds that rained endlessly upon the artificial nightmare, as if to weep in longing for a land that once was.
Rainbow Dash remembered what it once was. In her younger years she had walked upon the streets of this once perfect city, taking all of its glory for granted. It was peaceful, regal, and so spectacular. Times were simpler then. She had friends she could adventure with every day and a job at a weather factory with decent pay. She even had a house upon the heavens themselves.
But now she was among the society of an industrial and technological revolution. The factory went defunct and the house was lost to foreclosure when she could no longer afford the payments.
She still had her best friends at her side, though they were unfortunately caught in the grasp of the new age as well. Nothing was the same anymore, and she envied those who needed not to endure it. It felt like a drain of her life, but it was all she could aspire to. Or so she told herself now that old dreams once fulfilled had long ago died.
Rainbow let out a depressed sigh as she poured herself a cup of coffee already prepared by the time-activated machine and pulled two burnt pieces of toast out of a toaster-oven. And so starts another lousy day.
...
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...
Eastern and Stratodyne were both branches of the Elytron-Ahmani Corporation, a joint military-funded Changeling and Equestrian research organization with multiple sectors of interest.
Eastern was an energy refinement organization that oversaw the production and use of fuel and energy within the major Equestrian cities, including Canterlot. Stratodyne was a supplemental atmospheric-management organization to help purify and regulate the atmosphere from pollution emitted by Eastern's sector.
Rainbow Dash worked at one of Stratodyne's atmosphere processor plants as a cloud technician. Unlike her previous work at the Cloudsdale weather factory, the majority of her work was in front of a computer screen, monitoring atmospheric activities and acting upon them from there with mechanical influence. Nothing weather-related was managed manually or magically anymore.
Though the plant's limited capability still left the air as dark and miserable as ever, it at least made it less toxic to breathe in and made thunderstorms less severe.
Rainbow Dash barged into the main lobby of the facility dripping wet from the outside rainstorm. She shook most of it off like a dog before she stepped further into the building, preparing to make her way to her office down a corridor at the far end.
"Rainbow Dash," a secretary at the nearby service counter called.
She remained still. "Yeah?"
"Lourke wants to see you."
She huffed with anxiety, as she stared in the direction of her office. All she wanted was to get to work and get the day over with as soon as possible, no delays. But alas, that was not going to happen. Interruptions of trivial measures were inevitable around here.
She slowly turned and made her way to the left of the great lobby, where Lourke's office was located. Lourke was the plant's primary manager, and therefore was her boss. He was a stern and demanding individual, but had a warmth about him that made working at the facility less of a strenuous nightmare. He cut people breaks when they needed them, without losing efficiency that met the cold agenda of his corporate overlords.
Rainbow opened the door to his office and closed it behind her, making her way to the front of Lourke's desk.
"Dash," he greeted, "just the pony I wanted to see. Have a seat."
She complied at sat in one of his old-fashioned armchairs situated around the huge desk. Everything was old-fashioned in this room, except for the computer system and the various ducts in the ceiling. Lamps, a phonograph, an 8mm projector, wooden cabinets, paintings, and rugs over an already carpeted floor were among the most notable items in the room that predated the cyberindustrial revolution.
His desk was even made of cedar, though worn down due to the traffic of office work upon it. Paperwork and various other items piled and scattered among the surface as if a filing cabinet exploded. The shelves behind him were also a mess with books and papers with organization that resided only in the mind of Lourke himself.
He pulled out a newspaper from underneath an "In" tray to the right of his desk. "Did you hear about Elytron-Ahmani's Mars program?" He spoke with a lazy tone that made him sound as if he had not slept in years. This implication could easily be reinforced due to the bags under his eyes from old age.
Rainbow shifted her eyes around the room with obvious impatience. The conversation-starter neither bore significance to her, nor did it interest her at all.
He casually looked over the related article and continued. "Some bright idea for off-world colonization. They want to survey and study the planet to determine if its safe to put a starter colony up there. They already got a ship in an orbiter up there they've been building for a couple of years in preparation. Just needs a ninth crew member and they're set. Good goddess, no wonder where all the money's going." He crumbled the paper up and threw it in a waste basket across the room.
"So, you wanted to see me about something?"
"Yeah." He awkwardly trailed off and grabbed a bottle of Scotch from the shelf behind him, along with a couple of glasses, then filled them both up. Rainbow grabbed the one nearest to her while Lourke took the other and continued. "Stratodyne got a hold of our health scans. Yours a few minutes ago and mine a little earlier this morning. We're being let go."
Her heart sank and her vision narrowed. "What? How?"
"Apparently they have a new policy to read our bathroom scans as they're generated as a type of sobriety test. Since our secret pleasures, as they were, are against company policy, they've come to the conclusion we're no longer fit to work at this facility. We're to clear out our stuff within a few hours to make way for our replacements."
Rainbow sat and stared at one of Lourke's paintings with a complete loss of words.
"I tried reasoning with the head of our division, but thanks to our screw-up we're the perfect trials candidate for E-A's new line of simuloids. I'm sorry, Dash."
"Why didn't you tell me before I..."
He waved his hoof to interrupt. "It wouldn't have mattered. They have access to archived reports now."
Anger boiled within Rainbow as her face and eyes reddened. Her hooves pressed hard in the arms of the chair, leaving deep indentations.
Lourke reclined in his seat with a look of helplessness. "What a world. You try to be a sensible pony who looks out for the best interests of your employees. But in the end, you're just an anomaly. A glitch in a grand computer system so cold and logical." He looked at Rainbow straight in the eyes, now sitting forward. "Efficiency over equinity's trademark touch. Unless we're a mindless consumer, we're a thing of the past." He held his drink in the air. "Welcome to obsoletion, kid."
Rainbow lost hold of her anger and bolted from her seat, storming out off the office in a blur.
...
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...
There were barely any aerocars in the sky at all compared to the ground traffic, thanks to the storm. Rainbow was cautious to walk closer to the buildings by the sidewalk to avoid being splashed by speeding vehicles. The pouring acid rain was enough for her in her depression. The last thing she needed was muddy and trashy sludge from the side of the streets to drive her off the edge of her sanity.
She knew the reason Lourke had called her all the way down to the office to let her know of the situation instead of on the videophone was to give her a chance to sympathize with her in person, not just for her to clear out. But she had no social ties with him. Not to mention that her stuff mostly consisted of office supplies and photographs she already had digital copies of at home. She could care less what came of everything. Her job at Stratodyne was dead. Over. Just pick up and move on from there without looking back.
As far as a paycheck, of course it was a setback. But due to its minority, it was not her largest concern. Her employment with the Wonderbolts during weekends was enough to live on. But there was something missing. There was no edge to them anymore. She needed something of an adventure in her life. She was born for this sole desire, but her search for it was becoming impossible as the days went by.
Thick steam from the grates in the ground dissipated for a brief moment and revealed a food stand in the middle of a plaza situated where the sidewalk became wider. Suddenly food was the only thing that came to mind that would distract her from her thoughts. The hottest, saltiest, greasiest fries in Equestria, here I come.
Rainbow sat at a long bench they had situated at the front of the stand, like an outdoor bar. She was relieved to finally be out of the rain and under an awning that covered the length of the entire stand. It was made of a tough plastic, which caused the colliding raindrops to amplify on the surface, making it difficult to hear conversations from surrounding ponies.
"What'll it be?" The vendor shouted to her.
"Fries."
He put a hoof up to his ear. "What was that?"
"Fries! Big ones."
"We're out of fries, sorry."
She she put her forearm on the table and rested her face on her hoof. "Alright, I'll have a daisy sandwich. Don't be shy on the mustard. I like mine spicy."
He nodded and put gloves on. "Sure thing." He turned around and began preparing the contents of her meal from small compartments along the table in the kitchen side of the stand.
Rainbow loved the smell of these outdoor food stands. It was a kind of smell that was so warm and inviting, no doubt the perfect lure into ingesting probably the worst ingredients to one's health.
Her gaze wandered about the table at other ponies' meals. Eventually she came across a newspaper tucked underneath a food tray belonging to a pony next to her. It had the same article Lourke was referring to earlier, the one about E-A's Mars program and their need for a ninth crew member.
She patted the pony on the shoulder. "Hey, can I borrow this?"
The pony nodded thoughtlessly as he was engaged in a conversation with another.
Rainbow slid the paper out from underneath the tray and began reading the article more closely. According to the text, launch was supposed to be scheduled for tomorrow night, that is if they were to acquire their ninth crew member, an Assistant Navigator. It mentioned that a recruitment ad had been out for weeks with no one able to fill the position's requirements.
"Pegasus with fifteen Wing-Power, eight-second Dizzitron recovery at one-hundred fifty RPM..." She muttered as she read some of the requirements. A feeling of confidence uplifted her in realization that she had beaten these records many years ago. It was no wonder that not one pegasus was meeting these outrageous requirements. She was the only one in this city that had reached such extremities and beyond.
Others included Wonderbolt service history and experience with weather-related duties, which were standards for navigation roles on board E-A transatmospheric craft. All of which fit Rainbow's capability to perfection.
This was it. This was the adventure she had sought so tirelessly after all of these years. Suddenly Mars in its mighty red glory was all that she could think about.
She stood from her seat and edged back out into the rain, looking up in wonder at the stormy sky. She imagined the vast field of stars twinkling invitingly amongst the heavens, so mysterious and mystical. The wonders of what was out there, the possibilities that lay beyond bounds of our planet, and what would come of us should we reach these outer worlds. And to be a part of such an incredible feat of equinity?
Nothing was for sure, except for one thing: it all started with a journey to a cold, desolate, red planet known as Mars.