I promised my father that one day, I would make it to those stars. I promised myself. I still remember the first time my father took me stargazing.
"Daddy, what are those?" I questioned, pointing to the innumerable pinpoints of light in the night sky.
"Those are stars, baby girl," Daddy answered. "Princess Luna allows them to shine beside her beautiful moon."
"Does Princess Luna control the stars, too?" I asked, staring through the lens of Daddy's telescope.
"No. She only allows them to be visible when she raises the moon, and turns day into night," Daddy told me. I was quiet for a few minutes, the gears in my mind turning as I rested my head on a pillow of soft grass beside my father.
"How many are there?"
"Billions. No pony has ever counted them all. There's just too many," Daddy replied, his dark blue coat almost invisible in the weak moonlight. My coat was the complete opposite, the aqua green color radiating into the night.
I focused on the stars. "One... two... three, four, five..." A pause. "There's twenty!"
Daddy chuckled. "Twenty billion, maybe," He said.
"What are they made of?"
"Gas," Daddy answered. "And dust, and fire."
"Has anypony touched the stars, Daddy?" I pushed.
"No, Star Bright. Never," He said, never faltering under my constant questions. "They would get hurt if they touched a star. They're very hot."
"Cross Fire? Star Bright?" Mommy called from the house. "It's getting late! Come inside!"
"Coming, Heart Song!" Daddy called back. "Let's go, Star. Time for bed."
I took one last look through the telescope, looking just below the moon. A streak of light shot across the sky within my gaze. I gasped.
"Daddy! What was that?!" I shouted, jumping up and down, hoping he'd seen it too.
"That, sweetie, was a shooting star," Daddy answered, smiling down at me. "Now make a wish."
Silently, I made my wish. "I wish to touch the stars."
I heard Daddy gasp behind me. I looked up at him questioningly. He pointed to my flank without saying a word. I looked. There on my previously bare flank, was the image of star, with a contrail of light behind it. My cutie mark was a shooting star.
Now, standing in that same field behind my home, I was reminded of that wish. Since that night, I'd spent countless hours in the Ponyville Library with Twilight Sparkle, poring over dusty books about the cosmos. I'd learned everything I could about the stars. Held together by the thermonuclear fusion of hydrogen into helium, they burned at a temperature of nearly 90,000 degrees.
My wings tingled with excitement every time I thought of flying to the stars.
"That's impossible," Twilight Sparkle always told me. "There's no air in space." But I'd find a way.
And soon enough, I did. The Equestrian Space Administration was looking for new recruits in Canterlot. I was just out of high school, and begged my parents to take me to Canterlot to sign up. The caved, buying the train tickets that night.
Three weeks after I'd turned in the countless forms and papers, from my diploma to my physical health records, a stallion showed up at our door.
"Is there a Miss Star Bright in this household?" He asked brusquely.
"That's me," I said nervously.
"I'm here to inform you that you've been accepted into the E.S.A Academy. Congratulations."
If he said anything else, I didn't hear it. My dreams were coming true! I'd be going to Canterlot to go to college! I'd become an astromare! My parents had never smiled so wide. Momma had Miss Applejack bake me a special apple pie, and Daddy bragged to everyone in Ponyville.
I knew I had to be in tip-top shape before I got to the Academy. I took to working out every morning and evening, accompanied by Rainbow Dash and Scootaloo. Soon, I was the strongest Pegasus in Ponyville. Speed was not my specialty, but endurance was. I could fly from Ponyville to the Crystal Empire if I wanted to, without having to rest.
At the academy, I was top of my class in physicality as well as mentality. If I wanted to fly to the stars, I had to be able to carry a heavy oxygen tank on my back, as well as fly several miles straight up, and know what to do in the case of system failure. Learning and memorizing a constant slew of formulas and algorithms, figures and variables was not the easiest thing for a pony my age to do.
I was younger than almost all of my classmates. Very few ponies made it to the Academy straight out of high school. I was also the one and only mare in the entire Academy history. Never before had a mare possessed the intellect, strength, and determination to be an astropony. I would be the first astromare.
This, however, also meant that so much was expected of me over everypony else, that I had to spend hours upon hours in the Academy library. Graduating at the top of my class was one of the most rewarding feelings I'd ever experienced.
Today, I stood on the launch pad with my two crewmates, knowing my parents were watching. As we helped each other with our suits and helmets, I once again thought back to that first stargazing experience. That spark that had ignited my cutie mark had also ignited my mind and my body, and here I was, living the dream I'd had since I was a little filly.
I heard the click of the camera, and turned to see my mother and father coming towards me, face alight with smiles.
"Hey, you need clearance to be here," I said, though I was really unconcerned with protocols.
"Your crew leader let us in," Daddy answered. "He said you were a little nervous."
"I'm fine. Antsy, if anything," I responded, casting my gaze on the sunlit sky. The team had made sure the weather Pegasi cleared every cloud within a fifty-mile radius, ensuring no weather-related complications.
"You'll do great, honey," Momma reassured me, stepping forward to nuzzle my neck.
"T-minus fifteen minutes!" The overseer boomed over the loudspeaker. My heart skipped a beat.
"I always knew you'd make it," Daddy said, wrapping his forelegs around my neck in a hug.
"You know, Daddy, you were the one who kick-started this," I pointed out, knowing his reaction. He rolled his eyes and lightly punched my shoulder.
"I took you out to see something your mother and I love. You did everything else yourself," He pressed.
"Didn't you say he took you stargazing on your first date?" I asked Momma.
She nodded. "He even had special permission to use the orchards of Sweet Apple Acres." Dad blushed, ducking his head and coughing nonchalantly.
"T-minus ten minutes!
"Mr. Cross Fire, Mrs. Heart Song?" My team leader, Rocket, said, trotting up to us. "You have to go back outside the viewing fence now."
"Yes, sir," My father said, nodding respectfully. Rocket smiled and trotted away.
"Good luck, sweetheart," Momma said, hugging me tight.
"Flap those wings, baby girl," Daddy said, mimicking my mother's actions. They were escorted outside, and I turned to my crewmates, Spark and Milkyway.
"Let's do this, boys," I said, grinning fiercely. Their facial expressions mirrored mine as we strapped on our oxygen tanks.
"Helmets go on at t-minus five, you three," Rocket reminded us. "And don't kick on your boosters until you're going into, or returning from orbit." The three of us nodded.
"T-minus five minutes to takeoff!"
The glass orbs that were our helmets locked into place, and our breathing mechanism kicked on. Right now, we weren't using any tanked oxygen. Our tanks automatically turned on when it detected the outside levels getting too low to support life.
"T-minus three minutes to takeoff!"
We took our positions. I was lead pony, Spark to my left, and Milkyway to my right. We ran last minute checks on every mechanical system we had.
"T-minus one minute to takeoff!"
My heart pounded. I could feel my neck sweating inside my full-body suit.
"This is it, guys," I shouted. "The moment we've been waiting for."
"T-minus thirty seconds!"
We crouched, flexing and flapping our wings in a last minute loosen. My pulse was racing, my stomach roiled.
"Ten... Nine... Eight..."
The countdown seemed to slow down as I held perfectly still in anticipation. I tensed, preparing for that final command.
"Clear for launch in five... Four... Three... Two... One!"
In perfect unison, the three of us launched ourselves into the air, wings flapping forcefully. Straight up, past the clear sky the weather Pegasi had made, into the clouds where the air was too thin to fly efficiently. I felt the oxygen tank come on. We kept our pace just below Sonic Rainboom speed. The explosion resulting from one could be disastrous.
I felt the air tighten around me. The sky was steadily darkening. Over our earpieces, we heard, "Kick on your boosters!" And we obeyed, quite literally. I slammed my hind hoof into the lever that lit our rocket booster, and they sputtered to life, pushing me out of the atmosphere, and into the airless region of space. We were in orbit. We would stay in orbit for twenty-five minutes, then return to our launch pad on our last bit of oxygen.
We could relax now. I kicked off my boosters, and breathlessly congratulated my crewmates. "We did it, guys." I lightly flapped my wings to move myself closer to Spark and Milkyway, shaking hooves with both of them.
I then focused my attention on my surroundings. The tiny pinpricks of light I loved to stare at from the ground were now the size of small bird eggs, and still so far away. I would probably never get to touch one, but this... This was just as good, if not better. Finally doing something you'd been preparing for your entire life... It gave me such a feeling of ecstasy, I actually squealed in pure glee (eliciting roaring laughter from my companions).
I had kept my promise to my father- and to myself. This was far better than trying to become a member of the Royal Guard (which had been my backup plan, if this had not worked out for the better).
"You realize that we'll be front page news by tomorrow morning?" Spark said, grinning from ear to ear.
"Duh," Milkyway replied. "We're awesome."
"Don't get cocky, boys. We've still gotta get back on solid ground," I said, tearing my gaze away from the empty beauty of the solar system.
"We'll be fine," Millkyway said. "We've run through the procedure a million times."
"Yeah, Star, nothing will go wrong," Spark added. I took a deep breath. Rocket came on the radio and informed us that we had ten minutes left in orbit.
"Yeah, but we're still the first ponies ever in space. No matter how well we've been trained, we're still guinea pigs," I said uneasily.
"Easy there, Star," Rocket said over the radio. "Don't get worked up."
"I'm fine," I replied. It was mostly true. I was slightly nervous, but not paralyzingly so.
Our last ten minutes passed quickly, and soon, we were kicking the boosters on and aiming for Canterlot Launch Pad. Our oxygen tanks shut themselves off, allowing us to breath fresh air again.
"You're just over Ponyville. Head north east," Rocket's voice crackled into my ear. My crew and I level ourselves out and flew at breakneck speeds to Canterlot. When the launch pad came into view, a thought wormed its way through my concentration.
We'd done it!
As my hooves touched the ground, and my parents came flying towards me (literally flying, they're both Pegasi), my heart swelled with self-satisfaction.
"I'm so proud of you, baby girl," My father said as soon as I had my helmet off.
I hugged him tight and whispered: "I told you I'd touch the stars one day."