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The Maretian

by Kris Overstreet

Chapter 1: Foreword

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic developed for television by Lauren Faust
The Martian written by Andy Weir
No ownership is claimed to either property.

DEDICATION

To Admiral Biscuit, who made me say, "I want to try that"...

and to Honda, for making a van that got over 300,000 miles before costing me enough money that it became urgently required that I "try that."

NOTES ON THE STORY

This story assumes a basic working knowledge of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic and the world therein. Most of the series is canonical to this story, with a few specific exceptions (most notably the Season Six finale). The comics and other ephemera are not canonical to this story.

This story occurs subsequent to the planned conclusion of Changeling Space Program. However, it was written not only to make it unnecessary to read that work but to actively avoid whenever possible spoilers for the planned conclusion of that story.

Likewise, this story was written to reduce the need to be familiar with Andy Weir's The Martian. (The original novel was the primary source for this story, with the movie used only for select details.) However, reading the novel is still strongly recommended for two reasons. First, reading the novel allows the reader to compare and contrast the altered and parallel situations between the two scenarios- Mark Watney alone and Mark Watney with visitors from a magical world. Second, on a great many occasions I deliberately avoided scenes which would have constituted either a direct repeat or a direct re-write of scenes extant in the novel. Although over three times the length of Weir's work, The Maretian is by no means a complete chronicle of the events that take place within its span, and reading the original book will help the reader fill in some gaps left by my decision not to redo what had been done.

WITH THANKS TO:

The readers (who enthusiastically called my attention to the handful of typos I let slip through each chapter while under the deadline gun and who debated points of technology and magic up one side and down the other);

The scientists of NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratories, whose work with various Martian missions provided almost all we know about the second most habitable planet in the solar system;

Evening Star and the late HarmonyPony on YouTube, who along with Kevin MacLeod provided much of the soundtrack used to aid in concentration while I was writing this; and

the late Douglas Adams, who along with Terry Pratchett and Lois McMaster Bujold is possibly the most influential author on my own writing style, and whose sense of both humor and adventure strongly influenced this work.

AND SPECIAL THANKS TO:

Canary in the Coal Mine, and his deep pockets.

Author's Notes:

AND ONE FINAL WARNING

Expect a hell of a lot of these, split half between explaining the material and detailing the trials and tribulations I was undergoing at the time of original writing. A couple of the notes ended up longer than the chapters they were for.

Next Chapter: Sol 6 Estimated time remaining: 31 Hours, 58 Minutes
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