Livewriting: Yes, more CSP (Patreon)

Fauntleroy sat in the passenger compartment which was all that remained of his spacecraft and pondered some fundamental truths of existence. 

The first fundamental truth that had come to him, in almost a week of nothing to do except contemplate such matters, was that his statement that he was a better pilot than Leonid had been grossly in error. Leonid would not have attempted a direct flight to the moon without an Equus orbit. Thus, he would not have gone far higher than standard orbit before discovering the trajectory was off. He would not have fiddled around seeking an equatorial orbit for a second attempt with the remaining fuel, because he would have known there would be no remaining fuel after the long burn required to get such an orbit. 

And, since he wouldn’t have allowed himself to get in such a situation in the first place, Leonid would not have succumbed to the traditional yak rage and the even more traditional yak rampage. Smashing everything in sight, while momentarily relaxing, did one no good when everything in sight was required to keep you alive. 

Fortunately he’d still been wearing his full space suit when the hull breach happened, and he’d been able to get behind the pilot’s flight couch and down into the passenger compartment, with the food and the backup life support, before the capsule more or less fell apart on him. And, even more fortunately, the passenger compartment contained the emergency reserve rations- one week’s worth- provided by the changelings with every capsule and passenger compartment they sold. 

So he’d had plenty of time to come to terms with his inevitable demise… and then, when his demise became evitable, he still had plenty of time remaining to come to terms with that as well. Oh, he could still die up here, and if he lost his temper again he certainly would die up here. Yak culture, with its glories and follies alike, was such a hard thing to escape, lamentably. But there was a chance… 

“Horseton, Twenty-one… we have zero relative velocity to target at six hundred thirty-eight meters. We have rendezvous, over.”

“We confirm, Twenty-one. We still want you to ease in as close as you can to make it easy for Fauntleroy to get to the ship. This will be his first spacewalk, after all.”

“No problem, boss. Didn’t I tell you I could do careful and delicate?”

“Don’t call me boss.”

And there was that chance now, close enough that his suit comms could pick up chatter directly from the rescue ship. Up until now his only communications had been through the pony communications satellite network. “Horseton, this is Yak Shot Four,” he said aloud. “Standing by for instructions on rescue.”

“We read you, Four,” the unmistakable voice of Cherry Berry called back. “Keep the channel clear until we’re ready for you. Twenty-one, go ahead for five meters per second towards the target.”

“Copy, Horseton.” That sounded like a changeling- probably their third-tier pilot, what was her name? Oh yes, Dragonfly. They’d met in EVA training at Cape Friendship. She was the one who was… what was the kirin phrase? Gung-ho, that was it. Excessively eager. 

“Horseton, this is Yak Shot Four,” Fauntleroy said again. “I’m quite sure I could cover half a kilometer by suit thrusters. There’s no need-”

“Four, please keep the channel clear.” Cherry Berry’s voice had gone from light and friendly to hard steel, while somehow retaining its little squeak. Only a pony, Fauntleroy thought, could pull that off. “We are coming to you. Sit tight. Twenty-one, proceed.”

“Five hundred meters and closing.”

Fauntleroy’s life flashed before his eyes. It was very short, and most of it was books, smashing, and snow. He’d hoped for a little more before the end… 

“One hundred meters and closing. Slowing to two meters per second… wait a minute.” The changeling voice went silent, and then came back filled with obvious consternation. “Yak Shot Four, is that a passenger capsule you’re in? What were you doing bringing up that dead weight for a one-person flight? What were you thinking?”

“As I understand it, the griffons and the dragons launched passenger compartments as a test to see if they could sell tourist flights around the moon,” Fauntleroy said. “But I think my compatriots threw this on the stack because we had it in the barn. No other reason, really, except using everything up in one last glorious flight.” Which, of course, was a foolish thing to have done, but it was also a very yak thing to do.

“Eh, makes sense,” the changeling pilot replied. “Fifty meters.”

And, evidently, also a very changeling thing to do, except the changelings had more sensible people to keep them in line. A most enviable condition, Fauntleroy thought.

“One meter per second,” Dragonfly called out. “Going to stop at about ten meters separation. I don’t want to bump into you by mistake.”

“I’d be most grateful if you didn’t, miss,” Fauntleroy replied politely. He’d put his spacesuit on as soon as he’d heard the first buzzing of Mission Twenty-One over the comms, and now he slipped his helmet over his radio headset and locked it into place. “Standing by.”

“And… there!” A ring of satisfaction. “Zero relative velocity at eight point eight meters! It’s a shame there’s no way for me to just grab on to your ship. I could probably just kiss that can with this ship, easy. And it’d make ship-to-ship transfer a lot easier if the two ships could, I dunno, connect somehow.”

“The bulls like your idea, Twenty-One,” Cherry replied over the comms. “Four, we’d like you to exit your craft in your own time. Once you’re free of your craft, we want you to use your thrusters to translate over to the rescue ship. There are handholds all over the ship, including ladders leading to the pressure doors of the passenger cabin. Do not, repeat, do not go for the capsule; there is no internal connection between the capsule and the passenger cabin. Copy that, Four?”

“Four copies,” Fauntleroy said, double-checking his suit life support, then reaching for a handle near the passenger cabin hatch. “Depressurizing cabin now.”

Air hissed out of the cabin, vented to space. The cabin backup life support shut down as the pressure inside the cabin dropped. When Fauntleroy couldn’t hear the hiss anymore, he said, “Cabin depressurized. I’m coming out now.”

He reached up and rotated the latch for the airtight door which, under happier circumstances, would have taken him through to the capsule. The instant the latch released, Fauntleroy discovered two things: first, that the air had not all left the compartment; second, he was indeed coming out now, much faster than expected. 

The now-dead passenger compartment which was all that remained of Yak Shot Four tumbled slowly away behind him, while Fauntleroy tumbled swiftly forward, popped out like a cork from a pony popgun. 

Well, he thought. This is exactly like the training, isn’t it? Take a deep breath. Resist the urge to smash things, because it will not help. Bring arms down and back to activate the suit thruster controls.

Twin armrests, each ending in a control joystick, popped out of the suit backpack and under Fauntleroy’s spacesuit-covered hooves. 

Good. Activate controls. The inertial system will sense the spin and automatically stabilize me.

The system did so, firing thrusters in what seemed like a frantic, random series of bursts, then settling down as the tumbling stopped. 

“I’m all right,” he reported. “It appears I was wrong about the cabin being fully depressurized.”

“Yeah, we got that,” Dragonfly’s voice said dryly. “Boss mare, we need to make a note of that- the passenger cabin needs indicators to show pressure level.”

“Roger, Twenty-one, and don’t call me boss-mare,” the voice of Horseton Mission Control answered. “Four, can you see our ship?”

“Stand by…” Fauntleroy checked the navigation ball in his suit’s little cluster of readouts. “The ship appears to be right above my head.”

“Copy,” Dragonfly said, and a moment later she said, “I see Fauntleroy. Repeat, visual on Fauntleroy.”

Fauntleroy worked the controls, pivoting his suit to face upwards. “Visual on rescue ship,” he repeated. “I understand I am to go to the large hatch amidships?”

“Affirmative, Four,” Cherry replied. “Just take it easy and float on up.”

“Understood.” Fauntleroy touched the controls with un-yaklike gentleness. His suit glided forwards, up towards the massive bulk of the changeling rescue ship. Minor adjustments left, right, backwards, forwards, zeroed him in on his target- not the hatch itself, but the ladder rungs above it. “Ten meters… five meters… I’m reaching for a grip…”

It was just that easy. Spacesuit hooves hooked over rungs, thrusters shut down, and Fauntleroy swung himself upside down and, as it happened, almost on top of the hatch. Two rungs down, and he was on the hatch, its controls directly in front of him. 

“Firm contact,” he reported. “I’m coming in, and thank you, CSP.”

And as the yak space program came to a close, its last pilot thought, Leonid might have done the rest of it better, but I bet he couldn’t have done this as smoothly. Not in a million winters.

Tomorrow:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Skxg6E0Y7XkDiHs3rdAzQeXlJHVmyExGLnSLcZmLWi4/edit

Tomorrow's live-writing will begin at 6 PM Central and run not later than 8:30 so that I can do this week's KWLP livestreaming radio show at dementiaradio.org. There may, or may not, be livewriting Thursday night.