I pushed my crewmember out of the docking port. His uniformed body went sailing out the narrow corridor and into the chest-high fence of the balcony. He tore his lip as he fell, slamming his face against the golden railing. I angrily marched out behind him. The stunned looks of the crew burned the back of my head, but I didn't mind. All that mattered was the solitary sailor who failed to comply.
I gripped him by his shirt lapel, ripping the expensive silk. Casually, I lifted him into the air. His legs began to frantically kick, but all they hit was air. Once or twice they chopped through my hologram, but all they did was disrupt the image. The hard light that made up my hands still gripped him tight.
"You." I said through the intercom. "Do you know what you've done?"
The sailor angrily struggled against my grip, but didn't say a word.
"Do you understand what you've done?" shouted the hologram.
He finally managed to open his bloodshot eyes, but all they managed to see was the pixelated, fuzzy image of me that choked him. He struggled some more, trying to pull away my hands. But even mundane mortals such as my crew know to never trifle with a capsuleer.
I threw the insolent sailor against the banister again, letting him fall to the ground. I stared at the trembling wreck as he tried to breathe, his lungs rapidly pumping. He turned his head to look at me. From inside my capsule, I turned the hologram's head so that it stared back. The pupiless eyes met with his, and he turned his head back towards the ground. The rest of the crew was still gathered around the undock tube. I could've sworn several were amused by the debacle, but many of them seemed worried.
About what, I wondered. They should just leave and spare themselves from this altercation.
I let the crewmember stand up. His lip was bleeding, dripping red blood onto his specially tailored silk uniform. The blood dripped all over the small golden pin on the right side of his chest. I watched him for a few more seconds before ripping the pin off his shirt. It took a good chunk of the shirt with it, but I didn't mind. It was only twelve million ISK, after all. A small price to pay.
The hologram took the pin and tossed it around while the sailor watched. A few crewmembers had squeezed out of the docking hatch, their shined boots clacking against the ground as they left to enjoy the station. The shadowless golden lights reflected off the gold trim of their uniforms. The few that left where what I considered my "elite", the leaders of various squads responsible for cleaning, maintenance, and engineering. The lackeys that remained were the ones who actually did all the hard work. The hologram clenched the pin in his translucent fist after a few throws. I turned to look at the bruised crewmember before me, and reached out to give him the pin.
As he was reaching for it, I suddenly smashed him in the face with a fist of hard light, the hologram reacting perfectly. For the second time today, he was down.
"I said, do you understand what you've done, sailor? You put your crewmates and our allies in danger. But most importantly, you've also caused my ship to sustain terrible damage. Damage that cannot be easily repaired."
I opened my left fist, and a small holographic model popped up, showing the boxy, yet knife-like shape of an Abaddon-class battleship. Numerous red boxes began to appear, highlighting several areas of the ship, including its warp core. Even a dedicated technoprobe would tell you that the ship was unable to fly. A dedicated engineer could tell you exactly what was wrong.
"So," I said. "By re-routing power to the microwarpdrive array, you successfully caused my armor hardeners to go offline. And, despite my best efforts, I could do nothing but let the Decimator take volley after volley of blaster shots to the bridge, starboard engine, sensors, and main warp core. It was a miracle that the enemy tackle ran out of cap when he did, and an even bigger miracle that I was able to get her back in one piece. Now her armor's all but destroyed, and her structure is barely holding together."
I shoved the beeping holographic model in his face.
"Is this what you wanted? To see me die? To see every last one of your crewmembers perish in a ball of fire? Well, I'll tell you something, sailor. You are worthless to me. You and every other crewmember that works on my ship. You die, so what? I can procure another. I can completely recrew my ship in a matter of days because all I need is a few people who can ride a tram and use a fusion torch. I don't need soldiers. I don't need exotic dancers. I need people who know what simple task I want them to do. And it looks like you're TOO STUPID TO EVEN FIGURE THAT OUT!."
The people from the lower levels turned to stare at us. I spotted several other capsuleer holograms scratching their fuzzy heads. It seemed like every person in the station was looking at us. But I didn't mind.
"Look at me." I said to him. "Tell me who I am."
"Y--you're a c-capsull--leer"
"Oh, no. I'm not just a capsuleer. Definitely not just a lowly capsuleer. You want a capsuleer? Go back to high-sec and work for a rookie ship. But I, I am not a capsuleer. I am a god."
I started to pace, my holographic feet tapped against the metal floor of the balcony.
"I am a god. You wanna know why? Because mortals like you can't fly on their own. Mortals like you can't control the darkness of space, or command a Titan. You can't hold an entire planet hostage with your laser cannons, or smite millions of people simply because you demand it. Mortals like you can't procure ships like raindrops during a storm, or managed billions upon billions of ISK. And mortals like you will never become one of us. You will never become immortal. You will never die, only to wake up in a clone with no feeling but a slight irritation. You will never fly blockade runners past multiple bubble-assisted gatecamps, nor will you ever lead a POS-bashing Oracle fleet. All you puny mortal hands can do is re-route the power when Aura can't do it for me.
I raised my voice. The crew began to share looks, and some of the weaker ones began to enter the station proper. The broken sailor in front of me had curled up, tears running down his face, his head trying to shield himself.
"You know what? I don't care about you. I don't care about how poor you are, or that 100 ISK paycheck you get every month. You won't be getting it from now on. You won't be there to re-route the power to the hardeners. Someone else will. You will be filling the slums like the rest of your sorry kind."
I pointed towards the station door, which connected the docking balcony with the rest of the station. He pulled himself to his feet. Trembling he began to walk towards the door, the cold stare of the hologram cutting into his back. But just as he reached it, he turned around. He opened his mouth, and began to speak!
"You... you will regret this. You and all of your-"
I had already grabbed him by then, the hologram instantly lifting him into the air again. This one crew member had been bothering me all day, and now, he wouldn't shut up.
"Go on, finish your sentence." I said. "What's the matter? Can't speak anymore?"
I tightened the hologram's grip around his neck. His veins bulged against the hard light. He gasped for breath, but his windpipe was already closing.
I walked over to the balcony's edge, and held him over it. His feet kicked the air. Below him, thousands upon thousands of stalls, markets, and stores stretched out in a vast bulls-eye. Hover-cars flew through the air, and massive battleships towed by tiny corvettes made their way to their docking platform. Wind actually blew through the massive corridors of the station. A burst of wind swept up his silk rags and whipped around his pants.
"You, you will never defy your god ever again."
"Aura, prep my Oracle for undock. I need a good POS bash."
It happened again.
Twilight had been seeing these strange lights in the sky ever since Luna gave her that telescope. It started out small, with a few colored lines. Then there were more of them. More lines flashed across the night sky, circling around the moon. Then, they changed to rapidly moving dots of radiance that burst into massive balls near a tiny yellow line. Then, the colored lines came back, in their whites and purples, yellows and reds. They had been coming back every week, the beams setting off a massive laser light show that only Twilight could see.
It was the thirtieth week now, and the lights shone as brightly as ever. Twilight really wanted to show her friends, but the beams always pulsed around midnight, and most of her friends never stayed up past ten o' clock. But this time, this time it fired at its usual time, then again around four in the morning. The magical telescope had woken her up with another "spatial disturbance". She had looked into the eyepiece, and sure enough the beams were going at it again.
Her magic picked up a quill. Another burst of magic summoned a small brown book from the shelf, and a third blast flipped the ink-covered pages. Twilight's immaculate writing covered each and every page. Spots of ink were everywhere, but one thing was discernable: that she had been watching the skies for much longer than there were pages in the book. She had started on day 101, after all.
Finally, after much page-flipping, the book settled on a blank page. Twilight put her quill to paper and began to write.
"Day two-hundred and ten" she said and wrote. "Part two. At exactly four-forty three in the morning, I have seen another light cone. Compared to previous occurrences, including the one earlier today, the volume of lights seems to be quite small. SInce the telescope is still magically aligned to the same object, I can say with absolute certainty that it is the same thing. However, , I cannot explain why the magnitude is so small. As I don't have much information other than this "laser light show" occurs only at night and only once a night until now, I still cannot conclude exactly why this is occurring. Further observation is required."
Something shone in the night sky.
"Wait. Something's happening. I can't tell what, but..."
The point of light burst, like a blooming flower in the height of spring. Expect this wasn't a flower. This... This was...
"Oh, by Cele...
[/hr]
"Dominx!" I shouted.
"Holy shit!" shouted Angel through the comm. "Its a fucking Domi fleet!"
"They're warping in on us!" shouted another Oracle pilot.
I switched to a hull-mounted camera, gazing in awe and fear at the massive blob of bulbous, brick-shaped battleships that stared us down. Green lights glowed from thousands of metaglass windows, but there were no shadows. No people running around the deck. Those were capsuleer ships, each piloted by a single man or woman in a pod exactly the same as mine. And, it looks like we truly kicked the bee's nest this time.
"Warp out." I whispered into the comm. "Warp out and get to a safe."
"Can't, sir." said Angel. "We're tackled."
I pivoted the camera to see several small frigates, each about a tenth the side of my Oracle. They circled around us. Cone-shaped beams of light flew from their hulls, scrambling our warp cores and preventing our escape. Blasts of multicolored light flew from small satellite dishes on their wings. Even as I turned my lasers to meet the frigates, Aura, my shipboard A.I, whispered in my ear that the capacitor was empty.
"Holy fuck." I said. "Eject from your Oracles. We're getting out of here-"
Boom.
I rapidly switched my camera to see an Oracle take the full brunt of the Domi assault. Several thousand energy pulses flew from tiny cannons orbiting the Domis, and several more small fighter drone were approaching us. I took a look at the capacitor readout, hoping there was some left.
1%... It'll have to do, I thought, as I switched on the armor hardeners.
My ship began to shake as the fighter craft unleashed a barrage of energy blasts towards the overshields. The weak energy defenses of the Oracle fell easily before the assault. However, I usually planned for that to happen. My Oracle was designed to absorb damage with its heavy armor, not with its pitiful shielding. I laughed as the drones blasted my armor, only for the shots to bounce back and ricochet.
"I have a warp-out!" shouted Angel. "Warping in 3.. 2.. 1.."
Angel's Oracle flared its engines, the bright blue flame growing longer and brighter. Suddenly, it rushed forward. The sonic boom shook my ship as the battlecruiser took off, rapidly moving towards the sun. The frigates floated for a bit, dumbfounded, before focusing their warp disruptors on me.
"Are you alright?" said Angel. "Do you want me to get AHHH!! AHHHH!! WARP OUT WARP-"
"Angel! Angel! Can you hear me! Angel!!!"
My ship shook violently. There was something wrong.
"The armor is compromised." said Aura.
"Yes, yes, I know. I can't get a warp-out. Cap's dry. Looks like we're ejecting fro-"
Another blast. This one sounded severe.
"Aura, give me a damage report."
"The warp core has been disabled. Our main engine block is heavily damaged. The eject port has been compromised. Fire detected in the mainframe."
The Dominixes stared me down, now. Their T-shaped bridges hungrily focused on my lone Oracle.
"Hostile ships are locking."
"Shut up, Aura, I know!"
Warning lights began to flash. I felt the data pass through my brain as I quietly hit the damage control module.
"Structure is sustaining damage."
"Aura, be quiet and let me concentrate!"
I offlined my turrets, rerouting the power to the warp core. Although around fifteen frigates had point on me, I felt the smooth rumble of an activating warp core throughout the ship. The main boosters flared. I stretched out in my pod, a smile forming on my face.
"Warp destabilizing." said Aura.
The ship began to shake. I sat up in the hydrostatic fluid.
Boom.
"Aura!" I shouted. "What the flying fuck is going on?"
"Our warp core has detonated. The rear engines have overheated."
I immediately switched to the engine cam. Sure enough, the main engine block wasn't firing. It was melting. Canceling a warp when the engines were already revved up was disastrous for the ship. It was only a matter of time before...
"We are losing altitude."
I switched to the port gun cam. The staticky image that it produced only lasted for a few seconds, but it was enough. I saw the Dominix fleet falling away, but it wasn't them who were falling. The second before the camera disintegrated, I saw the tell-tale signs of a heat cone, forming around the smooth surface of a ship never meant to land. The Oracle was falling in feet-first, the bottommost layer of armor and structure burning away like tissue paper. The damaged ship shook violently, throwing me around the interior of the pod.
"T minus 60 seconds until atmospheric breach."
Built in space and meant to stay in space, the Oracle was never tested before in a planetary setting. No ship that I had ever flown (save for a few shuttles) were meant to break even a barren planet's atmosphere. The tritanium they were made of lost its structural integrity when exposed to atmospheric conditions, and as a result most crash-lands failed to execute. In fact, many ships were rigged with auto-eject and self-destruct systems that activated whenever the structure was breached. The pod would escape without a scratch, and the ship would be reduced to a pile of floating ash - safe enough to float around forever or be burnt in a planet's upper gaseous layer.
But I had failed to eject from the Oracle. Aside from a Domi landing a lucky shot on the tiny escape hatch, my pod was going nowhere.
"T minus 45 seconds until atmospheric breach. We aren't going to make it through."
I felt the bottom of my pod grow hot. Something was disastrously wrong.
The entire bottom half of the ship had burned away. Should I continue on this entry trajectory, the entirety of the vessel would be reduced to ash. Including my pod. While that could be a good thing, the flames would probably destroy the sensitive equipment long before the pod's armor breached. It wouldn't be pretty.
I scanned the systems one last time. Most of the onboard equipment was either scorched or destroyed, and what wasn't dead was practically useless in my current situation.
"Sensor booster? No. ECCM? No. Heat sinks? Overloaded. Pulse lasers? Nope."
I looked over the red Christmas tree once more, hoping that I'd missed something.
"Auxiliary thrusters... aren't those the rigs I put in last week? Aura? Do the auxiliary thrusters still work?"
"Only the top ones. Would you like me to fire them for you?"
"Yes. Please fire them, Aura. Now."
The two nozzles on the top of ship flared, sending blue flames shooting out of the metal pipes. I felt the pod tilt forward, however slowly. Despite the huge amount of force being applied to the front of the vessel, the auxiliary thrusters were somehow pushing the beast forward. I felt a huge bump as one of the forward armor plates flew off, revealing the metallic structure beneath.
"We are entering the mesosphere. T minus 20 seconds until atmospheric breach."
The bottom of my pod was beginning to cool down.
"Atmospheric breach imminent."
Suddenly, where there was noise was only silence. The heat cone had dissipated, leaving only the charred remains of a once-proud vessel. The devastated yellow banana seemed to hang in the air for a second, then fell.
I felt my stomach immediately jump to my throat as the thousand-ton metal beast plummeted towards the green ground below. Everything began to shake. I swore I heard the rattling of the nails in my head as the armor plates began to detach. We weren't going to survive this one.
"Aura, prep the transneural scanner for activation. I'm getting out of here."
"I'm sorry, I can't-"
We slammed against the ground with such force that I felt my body being jostled around in the pod. But just as quickly, we were back up into the air. Although we didn't fly far, our second impact felt as deadly as the first. We bounced a third time, and I caught a few glimpses of the insides of my pod. My neural link was disconnecting. With the fourth bounce, I lost control of the wreck and snapped open inside the pod, just in time for the Oracle to break into a million piece. With a massive explosion, my pod was sent flying from the wreckage. I felt the egg bounce once, twice, then slam into something hard, sending my face straight into it.
I saw a bright, shining light, and it all went silent.
[/hr]
Before I wake up in a med bay with a few medical scars and a wheelchair, let me reinforce the fact that I am a capsuleer. I've always been one since I signed that agreement a few years ago. Since then, I've died a couple thousand times, maybe even more. I've seen my friends get destroyed. I've seen whole stations get demolished. And you know what? I don't care. Because every capsuleer who lives and breathes in that station will simply get reincarnated in a fresh new body in some distant system far far away. Because every time our pod receives the smallest dent, a small machine called a transneural burning scanner takes a snapshot of my brain, burns the grey matter, and sends the information to a clone of me sitting in cryogenic storage. In short, my current body dies, and a new one is activated. All I have to do is blink, and I'm alive again. It's extremely efficient, and extremely accurate. So far, the capsuleer reincarnation network hasn't had a single failure. All capsuleers are reactivated moments after their "death". All they have to do is be in their pod.
Sure, we have access to a small room in each station, where our pod is steps away. But if we want to explore, holograms must be used. That way, be don't get accidentally killed while out and about, and we don't break our reincarnation cycle. As long as we're in our pod, or alone without any means of killing ourselves, we'll never die. Ever.
So, I'll leave you to contemplate that while I'm reincarnated.
[/hr]
"Something fell from the sky. Whatever it was, it was huge. Who knows what kind of-"
"Alright, Silver Quill, that's enough." said Princess Celestia. "We understand that the griffons sighted this strange "space object" headed for your country. We take it that your leader has dispatched recovery teams to examine the wreckage?"
"Yes, your majesty. Crews are working away. I flew here as fast I as could, to tell you the news. King would be very upset if-"
"And this wreck," said Princess Luna. "Have the workers found out what it is yet?"
"From what we can tell, it's of foreign construction. It looks nothing like any creature we've documented. It certainly can't be some sort of vehicle, we can't make things that big."
"Where did it land? Show me."
The Sun Princess projected a map with her magic. The lines opened up to reveal a perfect topographical representation of the Isles of Gryph, the griffon homeland. The white-feathered griff that stood in front of the Princesses scratched his feathery chin for a second before pointing at a large section of forest on the bulbous west bank of the cross-shaped main island. After a moment's consideration, he also circled the sea around it.
"Villagers near the forests heard a loud noise, like a carriage crash, only magnified. Also, moments later, they heard something akin to millions of firecrackers going off at once. A flying witness claims there was an explosion, blue in color, spreading debris all through the forest and into the surrounding sea. Again, teams are working on collecting whatever they can, although most likely it was some sort of meteor. I do believe it's nothing to worry about, Princesses, but my King wishes for the news to be spread."
The Princesses looked at each other, before Luna bent in to whisper something into Celestia's ear. Silver Quill looked at his claws for a minute, marvelling at the dirt that was trapped beneath the sharp blades. He scraped some off onto the purple rug.
The Princesses turned back around.
"Very well, Silver Quill, you are dismissed." said Celestia " We, the Crown of Equestria, thank you for your report. Guards, escort this gentle..er.. to the front gates."
"The blessings of the Golden Claw be upon you." said the griffon as he was lead out.
The golden doors closed behind him. The royal hall stood silent for a moment.
"So?" said Luna. "What shall we do?"
"If what you say is true, sister, than this may be much, much greater than we expected. I'll need to think about this..."
"We haven't got time, sister. You heard what the griffon said. Their teams are removing as much of the wreckage as they can. Its not like they're going to share. We need a team down there now."
"If we send a team, we're going to cause an international incident."
"Then how are we going to get our hooves on a piece of that wreckage?" asked Luna.
A maid walked in with a broom and dustpan and swept Silver Quill's claw residue from the rug. The butler walked in carrying a cup of freshly-squeezed lemonade. Twilight urgently flew in through one of the windows, saddlebags slung over her back.
"Oh, Twilight." said Celestia. "How good to see-"
"Princess Luna!" said the purple alicorn. "I have today's report on the lights! It seems like whatever the object was fell from near the light's focal point."
"Ah, uh, thank you, Twilight. I'll be taking that... report now, thanks again."
Twilight levitated a small paper scroll out of her bag and placed it in Luna's hoof.
"is that all, Twilight? I'm so sorry to shoo you out, but we have a strange situation on our hooves and-"
"Oh! Right, second topic. I want to go to the Isles of Gryph and investigate the wreckage!"
"On your own?" asked the Sun Princess.
"Of course not! My friends and I can more than fit inside the Friendship Balloon. It'll just be a short trip. We'll be back in a few days."
"Twilight..."
"Oh, come on, Princess, ple-"
"No, it's alright, Twilight. I support your decision to go."
"Really? That's wonder-"
"So long as you agree to some... demands."
"Um... okay?"
"I want you to bring me back a sample of that wreckage. I don't want the griffons to keep everything. The tiniest piece of it would do."
"Uh, Princess?"
"Yes, Twilight? Is there something I haven't made clear?"
"No, Princess. I und-"
"Then, you have my full permission to set sail. Go on. The site isn't going to be up for much longer."
"Yes, Princess, I'll get on it immediately."
Twilight jumped out the window, wings extended.
Luna sipped some lemonade as she read the scroll.
"You know, Tia, you really should work on your social skills. It kind of sounded like you were threatening her."
"Luna, I try. I really do. Only this time I'm also worried."
"Really? The all-powerful Tia is worried? Worried about what?"
"Worried about what's up there."
Celestia pointed at the sky.
