First Equestrian Antlertic Research Station

0230 hrs

“Hey...hey, where’d Twilight get to, anyway?” Rainbow Dash asked aloud, her speech slightly slurred.

“I-I think she conked out after the party wrapped up,” Pinkie hiccuped in reply. “D’you have any threes?”

“Go fish,” Applejack answered, cradling her drink in one hoof and yet somehow managing to hold a half-dozen or so playing cards in the other. “Ah think Rarity an’ Fluttershy hit the hay after Pinkie started pourin’ shots into the test tubes.”

Pinkie snorted, remembering. “Ha, oh yeah! That was fun!”

“I’ll say,” Dash chuckled. “Just be glad Twilight wasn’t up to see you abusing her lab equipment like that. She’d flip! Hey, AJ, got any tens?”

“Consarnit,” the orange earth pony grumbled, relinquishing one of her held cards. “Well, I’m just glad that Twi’s finally gettin’ a good night’s rest. She was startin’ ta look a bit rough ‘round the edges, iffn’ ya catch my drift.”

“I’ll say,” Dash agreed. “Besides, those pegasi from the charter service were, like, slooooowwww. If it were me flying, we woulda got here days ago.”

AJ snorted. “Right, so what yer sayin’ is that you coulda single-hoofedly pulled three big ol’ pegasus carts chock fulla’ heavy equipment and heavier ponies. That about right?”

Pinkie suppressed a giggle. “Oh, AJ, that’s not very nice! That Arcane Fire guy isn’t that fat!”

“Wha-whaddya mean, ‘Arcane Fire isn’t’...didja think I was talkin’ about him?”

A rather portly unicorn stallion wearing a freshly-pressed white lab coat chortled, crossing into the room from the hallway. “Well, I should certainly hope not...though the Wife keeps telling me I should lay off the hay fries.”

Pinkie nearly tipped over her bottle of spirits. “M-Mr. Arcane Fire! Oh, I didn’t-”

“-think nothing of it, my dear,” he interrupted, smiling inwardly and holding up a hoof to silence the pink earth pony. “Pinkie Pie, was it? You’re one of Director Sparkle’s friends, yes?”

“Mm-hmm!” Pinkie nodded eagerly, her fizzy mane bobbing with the motion.

“And this must be Rainbow Dash and Applejack, if I’m not mistaken?”

“Yep, that’s me!” the cyan pegasus mare assented, leaning back in her chair and stretching her forelegs back behind her head.

“Pleasure ta’ formally meet yer acquaintance there, Mr. Arcane Fire,” Applejack said.

He chuckled, shaking his head slightly. “Please, Applejack, just call me Arcane. We’re all friends here, right? Well, we’re all soon to be friends, in any event.”

Pinkie Pie motioned to an empty chair across the table from where she sat. “C’mon, Arcane! Pull up a chair! We’re playing ‘Go Fish,’ want us to deal you in?” Arcane trotted casually over to the empty seat, plopping himself down onto it while letting out a whoosh of breath.

“Perhaps next round, hm? I wouldn’t want to interrupt anything.”

“Okie dokie loki!” Pinkie Pie chirped, cradling her nearly empty bottle in a hoof. She took a swig of the potent brown liquid, breath hitching in her nostrils ever so slightly as the bottle’s contents pleasantly stung her throat on the way down, warming her stomach. Arcane Fire gingerly turned the bottle so its label was facing him, a single eyebrow shooting upward in mild surprise.

“Wild Pegasus whiskey, eh? And straight from the bottle, too? You remind me of a mare I used to date in grad school,” he remarked, a toothy half-grin spreading across the lower half of his face.

“Pinkie Pie doesn’t mess around,” Rainbow Dash confirmed, swallowing a hiccup. “That shit’ll knock your socks off...y’know, if ponies wore socks and stuff.”

“Oh, believe me, Ms. Dash, I am well aware.”

“Wanna take a sip, Arcaney?” Pinkie asked, offering the older unicorn stallion the bottle in an outstretched foreleg.

“I shouldn’t...we’ve got an early start tomorrow, all of us...”

Applejack scoffed, eyes narrowing playfully. “Aw, c’mon then, ‘Arcaney’...you wouldn’t want word to get out ‘round yer department that you let a coupla’ young mares drink your plot under the table, now do ya?” Her words were met with a flash of resolve as the stallion’s eyes hardened. Without a word, he took the bottle from Pinkie Pie and downed the remainder of the bottle’s contents in a few large gulps. Arcane Fire slammed the now empty bottle back down on the table, not for one instant taking his eyes off of the orange earth pony as he began to smirk in victory.

“You were saying?”

Rainbow Dash whooped. “All right, finally! An egghead that can keep up with us three!”

Pinkie Pie trotted over to a table she had set up in the corner, surveying the various beakers and glass tubes she had filled with various spirits.

“What do you think, girls?” she asked her friends. “Should I give’im a super duper liquor surprise, a double-down upside-down rum runner, or the Pinkie Special?”

“Pinkie Special,” Rainbow Dash and Applejack answered simultaneously, wearing identical devilish grins. Arcane Fire, puzzled, looked onward, trying to figure out what the pink earth pony mare was mixing up. He flinched instinctively when a test tube began to hiss and bubble, somehow steaming despite the lack of an open flame.

“Hope ‘yer good with hangovers, Arcane,” Applejack half-warned/half-teased.

---------------------------------
6 km from the First Equestrian Antlertic Research Station

0630 hrs

“It’s heading where?!” The cart dipped ever so slightly as the pilot temporarily forgot how to flap her wings.

“According to the map,” her passenger called out, “it’s heading straight for the new Equestrian Research Outpost!”

“Jævla helvete,” the pilot spat viciously in her native tongue. “How long do we have?”

“Judging from our current rate of travel...oh no...we’re not gonna have enough time to catch up to it!”

“We wouldn’t NEED to catch up to it if you weren’t such a piss-poor shot with that long bow!”

“Well, excuse me if I’ve never had the need to ever touch one of the fucking things before in my entire life! Can’t you aim and fly at the same time?”

She scoffed. “Can’t I-...uh, well... that is...”

“What?”

“I’ve never shot one, either.”

“...WHAT?”

“I’VE NEVER SHOT ONE EITHER, OK?”

“And you were just on my ass about that?!”

“S-shut up! See if you can hail them on the radio, all right? We should be in range by now!”

“...fine. On it.”

-------------------------
First Equestrian Antlertican Research Station

0700 hrs

“...*kzzrgt*...-ikke un hund-*kzzrgt*...dsituasjon!-*kzzrgt*”

The speakers crackled to life, harsh static jarring the late night revelers from their decidedly unrestful slumbering. Applejack, having been sprawled out across a table and for some reason wearing her signature cowboy had on her rear, groaned and flopped onto the floor.

“Ohhhhh...mah head...” she grumbled. Rainbow Dash, still asleep, sat upright in a chair propped up against a wall, trademark thick sunglasses drawn over her eyes. Pinkie Pie, not surprisingly, was already wide awake, hammering aimlessly at buttons on the console.

“Pinkie Pie...what in the name of Celestia’s beard are ya doin’ up so durned early?” Applejack muttered, blinking her unfocused eyes in an attempt to shut out the sudden ear-splitting headache.

“Wellll...I was waiting for you girls to get up and then there was this really funny sounding voice on the speaker-thingy over here, so I thought-” she gasped, “-that somepony might have wanted to talk to somepony here or something like that so I started pressing buttons and-”
Applejack, who had been slowly advancing on the babbling pink pony, suddenly forced a hoof into her mouth, silencing her.

“Pinkie Pie...mah brain ain’t functional quite yet, an’ I’m findin’ mahself a mite irritable this mornin’. Can ya see if ya can go ahead ‘n give me the short version there, sugarcube?” Pinkie nodded, still somehow grinning. Applejack, heavily sighing, apprehensively withdrew her hoof, wincing in anticipation.

To her delight, Pinkie Pie continued rather quietly. “Um, there were voices on the speaker-thingy so I’m trying to see if they want to talk to somepony.”

Applejack nodded, still squinting her eyes as she glanced at the array of buttons and knobs. “I reckon I don’t know how to work one of these here contraptions. Maybe Twilight knows? D’you know if she’s up-”

“Maybe Twilight knows what?” a voice asked. Applejack and Pinkie turned their heads and saw Twilight standing in the doorway, dressed in a distinctly familiar white lab coat and wearing a pair of thin eyeglasses with red-tinted frames. Applejack started, somewhat taken aback. Twilight, she looked so...professional. Smart.

The unicorn chuckled, noticing the expression on her conscious friend’s faces. “Don’t look so surprised, girls! It’s just a lab coat - and besides, it gets a bit chilly in the hallways, I’m finding. Now, what’s this about a...a ‘speaker thingy,’ right? Is that what you said, Pinkie?”

“Yep! Voices on the speaker thingy!” Pinkie Pie said.

“Let’s take a look, here,” Twilight said, walking a few paces toward the console. She briefly studied the control panel, noting the locations of the knobs and switches she would need to use to operate the device. “Were they coming from this console here, Pinkie?”

“I think so,” Pinkie nodded.

“Right. Well, it’s not just a speaker thingy - it’s a short-wave radio! I can remember working on one of these back at Canterlot University. If you heard voices, it must mean that somepony’s trying to hail us.”

“Well, who else could have a radio on this frozen rock, Twi’?” Applejack asked, scratching the side of her head with a hoof.

“Let’s see...there’s the Gryphonian Paleontological Society, there’s the New Zebrican Antlertican Labs, but they’re not in use this season...plus, I think one of the charter pilots mentioned something about some of the local Elk settlements using short-wave. Well, then! Might as well see who’s calling, hm?” Twilight clapped her front hooves together, allowing a big, goofy grin to creep across her face. “Oh, this is so exciting! Our first official communication!”

“Ugh...” a muffled voice sounded. “What’s all the ruckus, huh? Can’t a girl get a good night’s rest ‘round here?” Rainbow Dash tentatively lifted her shades from her bloodshot eyes, but immediately regretted the decision and decided to leave them on.

“Now, Rainbow,” Twilight scolded, “if you girls would have wrapped the party up a few hours sooner, I’m sure you wouldn’t be so...cranky this morning.”

“Sure you wouldn’t have been so cranky this morning,” Rainbow Dash mocked under her breath, tongue lolling out of the corner of her mouth.

“...*kzzrgt*...-nødsituasjon!- *kzzrgt*-” The radio interjected, again crackling with static and distortion. Twilight adjusted a few knobs with her magic, simultaneously flipping a few switches which powered on certain components. She reached over and snagged the headset, putting it on and adjusting the large earpieces so they sat on her head correctly.

“This is the First Equestrian Antlertican Research Station, hailing on frequency 61.6 - anypony out there? Please respond, over.”

“Hallo? Hall-*kzzgrt*-”

Twilight furrowed her brow. “Hmm...we must be picking up some interference from that storm over the southern coast. It’s a shame that Wind Speaker isn’t up yet, he’d probably be able to work this thing better than I could.”

“You rang, ma’am?” a thin pegasus stallion called. Twilight, Applejack and Pinkie Pie jumped reflexively - they had not heard him approach. Rainbow Dash cackled, having witnessed the whole thing.

“D-don’t do that, Wind Speaker! Sweet Celestia, I nearly spilled my coffee on the console!”

The pegasus grinned sheepishly. “Sorry about that, Director. Won’t happen again, I promise. Now, did I hear you say somethin’ about sending out a hailing call with the short wave?”

Twilight nodded. “According to Pinkie here, somepony’s been trying to reach us, but I’m getting a lot of static. Think you could-”

“-already on it,” he replied, turning knobs and flipping a few more switches on the control panel. “May I?” he asked, motioning to the headset Twilight was wearing with a wing.

“Oh! Oh, right. Here.” Twilight pulled the headset off with her magic, levitating it roughly a foot away from Wind Speaker.

“Thanks,” he said, reaching forward and taking the headset from her. Readjusting it, he flipped a final switch on the console and spoke. “This is a general hailing broadcast, origin the First Equestrian Antlertican Research Station. If anypony copies, please respond. Over.”

“...*kzz* Vokt deg for hunden! …*kzzgt* -er det en ting! Ikke un hund-” Without warning, the transmission was overwhelmed by the background static, eventually falling silent.

“Damn. You’re right, Director. Can’t raise ‘em with all this interference - but if they were replyin’ to our signal, that must mean that they’re close. Real close.”

“How close, would you estimate?”

“Three, maybe four kilometers, tops. Our short-wave can’t get much further with a storm brewin’ up over the coast. Say, what language were they speakin’, anyway? Weren’t anything that I could understand.”

Twilight scratched her head. “I can’t say for certain, but I think it may have been a Griffonian dialect.”

“Dia-what, now?” Applejack asked. “Y-mean that griffons speak a whole ‘nother language than pony-folk?”

“In their homeland they do, yes.”

Pinkie furrowed her brow. “Well, if that’s true, then how ‘come that big meanie griffon Gilda spoke Equestrian, huh?”

“That’s ‘cause she was born and raised in Equestria, Pinkie,” Dash said. “We went to Flight Camp together, remember?”

“Oh,” Pinkie said. “Oh, right!”

“D’ya speak griffon, Director? I sure as heck don’t,” Wind Speaker said.

“Well...I speak a little,” Twilight admitted. “Barely enough to get by. I think he was saying something about a dog.”

“A dog?” Rainbow Dash asked. “What’s a dog doing in a frozen place like this, anyway?”

“Sometimes the native Elk population raise huskies to use for their sledding teams,” Wind Speaker replied.

“Makes sense,” Pinkie said. “Who’d wanna be around all this snow without a sled, anyway? That’s just silly!”

“In any case,” Twilight began, “there’s a certain protocol we need to follow, here. Rainbow Dash - could you fly up to the watch tower and scan the surrounding area?” Rainbow Dash, not entirely enthralled with the prospect of flight so early in the morning, did her best to ignore her body aches and cramps. She offered a hardly-felt salute, stretching her wings outward and taking to the air.

“Oh! Dash, before you go - take this, ok?” Twilight levitated a small rectangular device out to Rainbow.

“What’s this?” Rainbow Dash asked.

“It’s called a ‘Walkie-Talkie’. They’re pretty neat! See that button there on the side? Press that down, speak into the microphone, and I’ll be able to hear you from the console. Cool, huh?”

Rainbow rolled her eyes. “Yeah, I guess. I let you know if I see anything.” Twilight nodded. With that, Rainbow took off.

“Say, Director...what didja mean by ‘protocol’, anyway?” Wind Speaker asked, looking up from the console.

“Well...” Twilight began nervously, “...the other word I thought I heard...it was ‘emergency’.”

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Author's note:

If anypony reading happens to speak Norwegian, and I happen to be mucking up the translations horribly, feel free to yell at me in the comments!

-Scriber