<recording audio and transcribing>
Commanding Officer's Log 006
CMDR. Alex Rodriguez
U.T.E. Corvus
0831hrs 31 July, 2463 Earth Standard

So yeah, last night was nuts. We got a ton of samples but came across some sort of local wildlife. I was unsure of what the hell I saw, so Rose took a look at the video. Unless she has gone rampant in the last 24 hours, we saw the same thing with video supporting it. There are blue freaking miniature horses on this planet. Beyond that, we're not sure of anything large fauna wise. The plants seemed to be equally curious as well. What we thought were impossibly apples were exactly that. Rose spent all night sequencing one of the samples and it really is an analogue of the Terran apple, at least on the exterior. Due to differences in atmospherics and who knows how many millions of other things, there's no way to tell if it tastes like one. Mass spectrometer says it has the usual assortment of sugars and acids though. If it comes out as non toxic to humans, I might try one tonight.

In other news, we lost low orbit sat number 9 last night. Before the feed went dead it reported a change in local gravity. Personally, I have no idea what the hell that means since gravity doesn't work like that. I've tasked sat 8 to try to track the debris or locate a signal from 9 though. It can't hurt at least.

Considering we have found some weird wildlife now, we are going to spend today making sure the perimeter sensors and deterrents are working. So the frames can keep working on the engines, Rose and I are going to walk the treeline around the clearing to check everything. Shame I didn't think about bringing something better than auditory squealers, but it's not like crash landing anywhere was a big concern a week ago. Live and learn I guess.

Not that anyone really cares, but today is bacon, eggs, toast, and coffee for breakfast. In a minor thing, once we figure out the orbital period for the star, we're going to shift the system clocks to local time. Going off Earth standard is screwing me up since it's well past daylight, but I'm just getting started. If the system will let me I'll include both in the log, if not I'll just note the difference.

<end recording>

Since we still didn't know about the biome and my reaction to it, everything going into the ship went through a full decon shower. It's such a weird feeling to be fully armored in a room while getting sprayed with artificial rain, but a necessary evil. Last thing I'd need is to accidentally track in some microbe that would eat my eyes while I slept. I wish I could say what Rose and I were doing was exciting. It really wasn't. Literally zip checkpoint to checkpoint on a Shade really. Every now and again we'd have to walk a short distance into the woods to upright a sensor or squealer that started to fall over, but not much beyond that.

Yeah, it was boring. I was stuck doing just this, while Rose was rebuilding an engine, going over sensor logs, running a ship, and generally being a pain in my ass. Since we were so close to home, she declined her armor in favor of just the skin tight bodysuit. Naturally since I'm me, Rose demanded I wear a full suit so she could baby me. That or more so she could see exactly what I was looking at since the heavier armors had eye tracking tech built in. Normally it would be fine, but it had turned into a game for her. Bending over or other compromising positions, then giving me shit whenever my eyes drifted.

"You know, if I were anyone else I'd set your program to be as chaste as a nun."

Despite it being her turn to check a sensor and being in the woods yards away, her voice came through my helmet crystal clear.

"The only reason you haven't is you don't have a nun fetish. Hell, I'm starting to think you have an AI one. Here you are in your late thirties, owner of your own ship, veteran of the military, and slumming around with a slutty AI. What would people say if they knew..."

You can only laugh at some of her antics though. At least until a glob of mud shoots out of the trees to smear across my chest with a soft splat.

"Hey! Come on now, you know how long that'll take to clean. If you keep this up, I'll have to get out the collar and leash to keep you under control."

The moment that came out of my mouth, I just had a feeling of "you done fucked up." The petite redhead just stomped out of the brush half grinning and half glaring before pressing herself to my chest and moaning softly, "you know just how to show a girl a good time." Giggling the whole while, she jumped onto the Shade and floored it, leaving me standing there in a small shower of grass.

"What the hell..."

She made me walk back to the ship by myself. It wasn't more than a hundred yards, but that bitch.

Decon after that was...frustrating to say the least. While I had to stand there in the streaming water as it scrubbed my armor clean, Rose took a different route. Claiming that dirt had gotten into her suit, she decided to strip bare and parade around the airlock doing different stretches in the spray. I'll admit I was surprised her artificial skin held up against the pressure and heat from the jets. Less so when she decided to stand over one of the nozzles and shift her hips from side to side. Pervert. Honestly, I didn't even think AI tech was that advanced. Obviously I was wrong, but wow. Never piss off a moody redhead.

"So, I was thinking. What's the plan for if we find the missing unit? It's not like we have the spare parts to refurbish it, and it'll probably be little more than smoking scrap if it went down. I'm honestly not sure if there's a point to finding it since there's no data stored onboard."

Truthfully I hadn't considered that. Normally you could scrap them at a yard for a couple hundred credits, but there was a lack of those locally. One more thing I hadn't considered that joined the ever growing list in my mind. With my thoughts occupied, I stepped out of the airlock after it rattled open. I was so busy thinking about the what ifs of our situation that I didn't realize she was padding along silently behind me up the stairs to the crew deck. The only warning I got was a soft kiss on the cheek after I removed my helmet.

"Get some rest you idiot. I'll keep watch."

Rose spent a good deal of time watching Alex's vital signs that night after he'd enjoyed one of the apples. He'd described it as more tangy and sour than those on Earth, but very good. Both assumed it was largely due to the difference in minerals and the higher fluorine content of their new home.

Little did they know that the ship was being watched intently from inside the forest. The thestral guards had been unable to approach the perimeter due to the noise making devices, but Princess Luna forged onward. Stopping short of crossing a glowing red line that connected the strange boxes, she sat and watched the strange machines in the clearing. A missive was already on it's way to Canterlot to inform her sister of the discovery.

Something new had come to Equestria and she wasn't quite sure what it was yet. All Luna knew was that this could change the world. Next Chapter: 09. Getting Better by the Minute Estimated time remaining: 3 Hours