An Astronomer’s Light

By: TitanicIsBestShip

Chapter 1: Mount Silver

Cold. It was always cold this time of night, on the mountain of course. Barzano stared into the dark sky. Although he longed to just sit there forever and stare, he had work to do. The unicorn walked back inside the mountain observatory. In a corner of the room were some starmaps he needed to work on. I do have to pay my bills, he pondered. I supposed I'll get to work. The charts would be sent to Canterlot the next morning, and back would come the money. As Barzano sat down to his work, his thoughts drifted to other matters. He had friends back in Canterlot, and he hoped they were doing well. His work on Mt. Silver unfortunately forced him out of the loop of information. This lack of knowledge, was in fact, so bad, that all of Equestria could burn down and he wouldn't notice until the food and supplies stopped coming. But there were upsides to working on a mountain in the middle of nowhere. There was nopony there to distract him from his work, or get on his nerves .... nopony....

Barzano got up from his desk. He headed towards another part of his home and workplace. On his bedside table was a picture of his older brother, Crimson Peak. Barzano missed his brother, the only part of his family he loved. Crimson had gone to serve in the Royal Guard a year and a half ago, and as he was the only pony who visited Barzano on a regular basis, Barzano was now completely alone. Knock. "Humm?" Barzano mumbled. He looked around quickly.
More knocking. Somepony? At the door? Whatever for? He quickly walked to the door and opened it. "Uhm, hello?" A tan coated pegasus mare with a creamy green and yellow mane was standing in the doorway.

"Mount Silver Observatory?

"Uh..y-yeah."

"Are you Barzano?"

"Yes."

"This is for you," the mare said as she handed him a package.

"Thank you," Barzano said softly as he picked up the package. The mare turned around and began walking. "W-wait!" She stopped and turned her head around.

"Yes?"

"What's your name?"

"Uh-I-um....Flarania," she stuttered as her cheeks turned red.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to startle you, I- It's just that I don't see many ponies around here," Barzano stared at the mare.

"It's ok. I'm in the Frontier Service, so package delivering isn't usually my job."

"Well, thank you Flarania, not many ponies even know I exist-" The mare stopped Barzano.

"Are you kidding? Your name is on everything!"

"What?"

"Our navigation papers! Everything we use on the Frontier!"

"I-I never knew they were actually used practically!"

"Oh yeah, you make great stuff! You like your work?"

"Oh u-uh yeah, get's kinda lonely sometimes....."

"Oh, you don't have anypony to keep you company? That's horrible!"

"It's fine, I-" Flarania stopped him.

"I'll stop by when I get some time off," she said quickly. She stared at the ground for a few seconds before turning and flying off. Nice mare, Barzano thought. Probably just trying to cheer me up though....

The next few days went be easily. Barzano was more upbeat than usual. Some ponies actually know who I am! He thought. He'd had somewhat of a hard life, so it felt nice to be appreciated. Time flew as he worked, and he hadn't noticed he had missed lunch until 2 hours after the fact. He sighed, got up, and took some leftover salad out of his pantry. He finished eating and went over to the package that had been left for him yesterday. Barzano wondered what was inside as he used his magic to cut the packaging tape. It was a book, and a rather large one at that.It read on the cover "Daylight Starmapping, a Guide to Deep Space Radio Telemetry."

Barzano had studied the stars and ways to map them for the better part of his life, and he had no idea what this book was about. He opened the first cover and inside was a note, which read: "Barzano, I obtained this through my travels elsewhere, and thought that you might enjoy it. Unfortunately, I cannot say where I discovered this, but I hope it proves useful. -Princess Luna." Well, that was interesting. Barzano made a note to thank Luna later. As he flipped the next page over, he saw the title was repeated, along with the author. That's strange, he thought, why would somepony repeat their name? "Daylight Starmapping, By: Stephen Rogers." That was interesting, Barzano had never heard of anypony with a name like that. Must be Royalty. Barzano looked over the next few pages. Three Rivers Press? Copyright 2004? I've never seen these markings before! Barzano had his face in the book for the rest of the day. He only stopped reading when his stomach growled at him. "Wha? Already?" He looked at the clock: 9:41. "Are you kidding me...." Dinner could wait, Barzano had to write his brother about this. He'd eaten at some pretty weird hours before. Barzano sat down at his desk, pulling out a pen and some paper. He started the letter:

"Hey Crim!

I got a book from Luna recently that could not possibly have been written by ponies. It describes something completely alien that, hopefully, will be of use to my work....."

Barzano described the book and what it contained, drew a few pictures of the photographs in the book, and sealed it all in an envelope. He'd send it out tomorrow.

Author's Note

Special Thanks:

Celestia Radio - For giving me good music to listen to while I worked on this
DerpTime - For giving me some inspiration, and for putting up with me on his show, and for creating the cover art
DJ Cloudbolt - For letting me put him in this story, and for encouraging me to keep writing
Whitecloud/Emeraldsnow - For helping me keep writing, and for giving me inspiration and the name of this fic, and for editing it.
My Non-Brony brother - For letting me put him in this story, and for being the best brother ever!
The people that have been with me from the start:
-Whitecloud/Emeraldsnow
-DJ Cloudbolt
-Doctor Whooves/Pretty Pony
-HinderburgIsBestZepplin/Lightning Stryke
Thank you all!