Breaking Dawnby Detsella MorningdewChaptersPrologue: Another FailureChapter 1: E.S.A.Chapter 3: We Are Not AloneChapter 4: First ContactChapter 5: The UFPChapter 2: Warp FactorPrologue: Another Failure Once again, I flew at the edge of space. Once again, I attempted to cross that barrier. Six months of constant effort. And that barrier still wouldn't budge. It didn't feel like a barrier at all. Flying was easier in space. Acceleration was really easy. But this barrier was persistent. The closer I got, the slower I accelerated. I had been accelerating for an hour already, the longest I had ever tried, and I was only getting slower. I had learned to bring a compressed air supply long ago. But this was starting to worry me. What if...what if it really was impossible? What if this was a practical application of those math equations, where the values always approached zero, but never made it there? I slowed down to just barely supersonic speed. If I was right, I would never make it there. If I was wrong, and I desperately hoped I was, there would be time tomorrow. I raced back down towards Equus, towards home. From up here, I could see all of Equestria, but not very well-defined. There were magical landmarks, but the map in the throne room of Crystal Castle gave me a clearer picture. What interested me was space, the unknown, the untouchable. And I was a long way from making it there. I landed at the castle. I still lived with Twilight, leading her Guard. It was a few years since I found out that I was an alicorn, but it was still a secret to the public. I had not grown a horn yet, and while I was a few inches taller, I did not look that out of place. Celestia explained to me that I was still weak by alicorn standards, and I would be a target for any enemies. Twilight actually did not know of her alicornhood until she got her wings. Apparently, a unicorn's rapidly growing magic is a lot easier to explain, especially given her talent in the first place. There was no need for her to be worried with the information. I was told mainly because I would notice easily. Twilight was standing outside the castle doors, pacing nervously. I landed beside her, and she immediately started shouting. "Where were you all this time?" "But I told you where I was going. I was practicing my flying." "For two days?!" "What? I was only up there for about an hour and a half...wait a minute. How long was I up there the last few times." "Oh, about two hours." Uh oh. Those other times, I was only attempting the break for about one minute, max "I may need to tell you something important, Twilight. You know about that theory of relativity that everypony criticized a few years ago?" "Yeah, that was ridiculous. I mean, there's almost no proof." "Well, I just proved it quite thoroughly." "How?" "Well, I didn't tell you what I've been trying to do, did I?" "No. Was it something special?" "Yes, actually. I was trying to break the light-speed barrier." "That's insane!" "And it turns out, impossible." "Why do you say that? You never label anything as impossible, I know that." "The thing is, the closer you get to the barrier, the slower you accelerate. So you can always accelerate, but never quite reach there." "Okay, but how does this prove that crazy theory? And why were you gone for so long?" "You see, I was traveling very, very close to the speed of light for about an hour." "And?" "And for me, I was only gone for an hour and a half. For me, time slowed down." Twilight gasped. "This changes everything!" I sighed. "Yes, it does. It means that I can't go after the Nightmare anytime soon. There has to be another way to get up there." Twilight snorted. "And what do you suppose you would've done if you could get there? Even Celestia couldn't defeat her alone." "Alone." "What are you talking about?" I can find a way to get to space, but it doesn't have to be under my own power. I could find a way to create some sort of...ship. One that can take several ponies to space. And then return safely. "Like an aeroplane? Those devices that allow ponies without wings to fly?" "No. There isn't any air for them to fly on. Rocket propulsion is the key. It can work without any air to support it." "But that's only used for fireworks, and that sort of thing. How will you get it to lift a pony? Or have any steering?" "Well, I guess I'll have to wait and find out, won't I?" "What about the Nightmare? Didn't you say she could return at any moment?" "When I saw its magic the first time, I panicked. I didn't know how she regained it, and assumed it was increasing at a far greater rate than it actually was. I looked at it today, as I flew above the sun. It has only barely increased in power. It will be at least another hundred years until we are in danger again." "So now what?" "It's time to get prepared. I still haven't given up. It's time for some research." Chapter 1: E.S.A. After my horn appeared (with accompanying explosion), I stepped down from my position as Captain of Twilight's guard. Or rater, stepped up into the role as Prince. I didn't really want the job. But the public found it inconceivable that an alicorn was not royalty, so I took the position. It did come with benefits, though. I already lived in the castle with Twilight, and I remained there, just as usual. But I did have authority now, and, with permission from Celestia (I was new at this sort of thing), I created the Equestrian Space Administration, or ESA. To my great surprise, Luna, who wholeheartedly supported my venture, removed all of the Equestrian stars, revealing the fainter, but genuine ones that had been for so long hidden. At first, the astronomers were outraged. But with more powerful telescopes came more discoveries. Discoveries of other planets. Of other systems. And Equestria had a passion for space again. The stars were kept in Canterlot Tower for safekeeping. You never knew when a star might come in handy. And mages no longer dominated the world of the scholars. They were important yes, but there was another discipline that was gaining respect -- science. And under my guidance, the ESA built the first rocket capable of bringing a pony into space. Magic-propelled, but technology-controlled, it was the most successful melding of the two. Supplied with more than enough oxygen for the one brave inhabitant, it took off, and for the first time, a pony achieved orbit. The systems of the rocket had backups and backup-backups for almost every system. Nopony would die under my watch. And nopony did. Many ponies with a bit too much ambition tried to advance too fast, pressing for higher goals without the means to safely do so. I put a stop to that. And on July 14th, 1025, the first pony set foot on the moon. Luna's moon, of course. I wasn't stupid. The moon missions went on for some time. Data was collected, technology improved, and the moon was mapped in detail. Rockets improved, and their size was drastically reduced. And a colony was established on the Moon. Luna liked it there. She spent nearly all of her time at the colony, helping it grow. And grow it did. A branch of the ESA was established there, and it was generally agreed that it was there that any further explorations would be launched from. The moon's lower gravity greatly increased the efficiency of the rockets. But it might be a stretch to call them that anymore. More elegant, and a lot smaller, they became more and more like the ships from science fiction. Magical propulsion had developed, and now they had really reached a limit. For you see once again, we had reached that barrier: my old enemy, the speed of light. We stayed far enough away from it now to avoid it's time-altering effects. But unlike before, a voyage of a few months was no problem. Food, water, and air were no longer a problem. Personally, I didn't need many of those things at all. I still needed a bit of food and water, since I had not fully matured, but alicorns do not really need any of those things. Right now, I could have walked into the vacuum of space and had no ill effects. But I knew that I couldn't do it alone. And finally, we were ready. It was time. And then the Nightmare disappeared. Of course, I would have been fine with this, if I didn't know where it had gone. I would have been glad to be rid of it. But I had seen it escape. It had escaped to the stars, and this time, the distant ones. It must have seen my preparations. It was not ready yet. So it was biding its time. And now, frustrated in my efforts, I had to as well. I couldn't ask any of these ponies to make a voyage that they could not come back from. For an interstellar journey would take more than a hundred years. For you see, the speed of light had beaten me again. All the scientists, all the scholars said "Impossible. Inconceivable!" But they said that to the sound barrier. They said that to the stars. And they had said that to space. And they were all wrong. There was some way to cheat. There was some way to break the system. And I was going to find it. Chapter 3: We Are Not Alone It was March 12, 1103 A.D, at 1:45 PM It should have been 2:00, but Rainbow Dash was impatient. So with clearance from ground control, we took off from the moon. Normal engines at first, of course. Although, they were officially called "impulse" engines, nopony really used that term. Except maybe Twilight, who used the official term for everything. Once we were in orbit, Twilight gave the order to go into warp. I convinced Rainbow Dash that Warp 2 was good enough, and trying to max out the speed would tire me out too much for continual use. She reluctantly agreed. We aimed in the general direction of where I had last seen the Nightmare. Once we were past the warp barrier, it was a lot easier to see. Just like when I crossed the sound barrier, I could see more clearly. While I could not see her magic directly, I could see a faint trail of magic in the places it had travelled before. We stopped at Selene, the old Equestrian moon. Under my direction, nopony had explored it, and so I owed it to them to come back with at least some data. We scanned it from orbit, then Twilight and Applejack teleported down to the surface for soil samples. Applejack was the expert on soil, after all. It was a quick trip, since the soil could be analysed easily on board. At least, that's what Twilight said. Personally, I think it was mostly because of Applejack. The soil on the surface was completely devoid of life. Applejack must have felt very strange. Luna's moon was designed to have fertile soil. Selene's soil was composed of minerals that could not support life. All of us felt that it was not worth a landing. It would take far too much time, and we wanted to get to far more interesting things. While I didn't want to lose the trail, I also wanted to visit other star systems. Getting readings from an active star was my next goal. Perhaps other planets. Maybe there were other planets that supported life. It was worth a try. We set off again, this time for a much longer trip. The trip to Selene took less than a second. The trip to the nearest star would take over six hours. I was very glad that the warp drive was improved. It would have taken ten times as long otherwise. We played board games to pass the time. The chairs in the main control room swivelled, and a central working table was designed for a similar purpose. It was only awkward for me. I could project myself onto any wall, and a magical node in the room allowed me to move pieces, but it wasn't quite the same. It took a while for everypony to get used to. But still, I kept half of my attention on the surroundings. I served as the autopilot, and I always had to monitor things. It's a good thing I don't have to do thing like sleep. Speaking of that, we arrived in the middle of the night, and the night was very boring. Of course, it looked the same as daytime, but there was a ship's clock, and it showed the equivalent Equestrian day and night cycle. Everypony was asleep. While I was waiting for them to wake up, I amused myself by scanning the solar system, collecting data, scanning the rest of space, then in a fit of boredom, played Tetris with the lights on some random control panel. I could have just used images on the wall, which acted as a screen, but this had a more retro feel. I really had to find a better way to spend time. I knew full well that I couldn't go to sleep. Well, I could, but it would be a very bad idea. We were in a completely unknown star system. The existence of "aliens" was highly unlikely, but all sorts of things could go wrong. A solar flare, if not detected beforehand, could wipe out crucial equipment. Random glitches in the automatic systems (that were actually automatic and not controlled by me) could cause all sorts of problems, possibly fatal ones. Just then, I saw something new. A faint spot appeared on my vision. I could detect its raw power, just like a star, but this was moving. I checked the sensors. Nothing showed up, but I wasn't surprised. The only thing that could sense that far away was my own sight. The other sensors were constricted by the speed of light. They only worked close-range. As it got closer, I realised it was coming right for us. And it was traveling much faster than the speed of light. I put the ship on alert, and woke the six up. I tried waking them up personally. This worked up until Rainbow Dash. Then I put on the ship's alarms. The loud ones. I received a few glares in the direction of the ceiling, but I showed them what I was seeing on the front screen. Twilight immediately took charge, making sure everypony was at their station. "Night, how long until it arrives?" "About a minute. And please, could you just call me Star? It's hard enough that I don't have a body right now." "But the ponies at E.S.A told me--" "I don't care what they chose to call me in the ship's manual. Call me Star." "Fine." The ship arrived. It was obviously a ship. And it was gigantic. Its shape was a cylinder with a saucer attached to the front. Two branches at the back of the cylinder led to two objects that looked quite a lot like our warp nacelles. The strange part was that I could detect no magic anywhere on the ship. I could detect life. Lots of life. And I could detect power. Immense power, as well as power flowing through the ship, indicating electronic activity. "Twilight, we are receiving some sort of high-frequency signal from the ship. It appears to be some sort of video and audio. Just give me a few seconds to decode it." "Can we respond in kind?" "Yes, I believe so. I am ready to open communications." "Ready." I displayed the incoming message on the screen, sending back the video feed from the control room along the same path. Noticing the different language, I cast a translation spell on all of the crew. "Channel open." The voice came from the other ship. The screen showed another room, a bit bigger than our ship's control room, and a bit neater, too. But it wasn't the room that was interesting. It was the ponies. Not ponies, though. Beings. People. Aliens. Chapter 4: First Contact "This is Captain Jean-Luc Picard of the USS Enterprise. Do you require any assistance?" The captain was very formal, but it looked as if several of the rest of the crew were struggling to keep a straight face. Twilight looked very surprised, but adopted a similar protocol. She was good at that. "This is Princess Twilight Sparkle of the ESS Night. No. Why do you ask?" "It seems that your warp field collapsed as you approached this system. Are you having any problems?" Twilight looked uncertainly at the ceiling, which I had gotten used to as her way of getting my attention. I almost laughed as I appeared on the back wall to address the Captain. "No, there isn't any problems. We just deactivated it. But I do understand your confusion. I can see your warp drive, and I can't imagine what you're using to power it with. Apparently, though, it can't just be turned off." "Yes, you're correct. But I have to ask, how can you "see" our warp drive? Do you mean that you see it on your scans?" "Well, sort of. I see with the ship's sensors. Technically, you could say that I am the ship." "I see. Now that I know that you aren't in danger, I would like to make first contact." "What do you mean by first contact?" asked Twilight with curiosity. "First contact between species. Now that you have developed warp technology, we can get to know each other." "That would be great!" said Pinkie Pie. Ever since the video screen had first come on, she was positively beaming. "Yes, that would be good," said Twilight thoughtfully. "But it is hard to get to know each other over a video screen. We could teleport aboard with your permission, but then we would have to leave Star behind, and I know he wouldn't like that." "Why not?" asked Rainbow, confused. "Because it would take about an hour to get him detached. Besides, that would leave the ship with no power." And by now, the looks of confusion were clearly visible on the faces of the aliens, despite their effort to suppress them. Picard spoke again, halting the discussion. "We could come aboard your ship, if you allow it." Twilight sighed. "That makes things a lot easier. Thank you. Whenever you're ready is fine with me." The video signal ended, so I put the view of their ship back on the screen. A few minutes later, a beam shone from the ship, and led directly into the control room, where three...people materialized: the Captain, and two others I recognised from their ship. I almost blocked the beam in my panic, but I recognized the life in the beam, and I trusted these people now. I did not believe them to be aggressive. I made my image appear on the wall. "I'm sorry that I can't be here, physically. It would take an unwieldy amount of time to get here, and I don't want to keep you waiting." "That is understandable. I do not mean to offend, but are you a person or a machine?" "I am sentient, if that is what you mean. I'm just the same as these other ponies." "Shall we introduce ourselves?" Picard asked, turning back to Twilight. "Of course. We both know each other's names, but this is Rainbow Dash, Rarity, Applejack, Fluttershy, Pinkie Pie, and this is Prince Starry Night, if we're still being formal." "This is Commander Troi and Lt. Commander Data." Both of them were strange. Data was a machine, a very complex one. Troi seemed to have a different sort of magic. One that I hadn't seen before. "What species are each of you?" I asked. "What do you mean?" Twilight asked me, annoyed. "Of course they're the same." "They are different." I whispered back. Kind of hard to do with a speaker. Picard smiled. "I am a human, Commander Troi is a Betazoid, and Lt. Commander Data is an android." "Thanks," I said, making a log of what the scans looked like for each of them. Rainbow Dash looked distinctly uncomfortable after the mention of android. "It's fine," I said. "I'm sure Data is quite safe. And none of the others have shown the slightest sign of anger." She relaxed visibly. Twilight spoke again. "We are ponies, from the planet that we call Equus, which is only about six hours away from here. We are on a scientific mission of exploration." Troi whispered something into the Captain's ear. He nodded, then continued. "We are explorers as well. It is not often that we come across others with a like mind." He smiled. Then, I noticed something. The strange sort of magic that Troi had was being used constantly, and it was directed towards every one of us. I had a pretty good guess what it was. "There is a secondary objective that they should know as well," I said. "I don't want to keep any secrets." Twilight looked at me strangely, but I continued. "There is a being that is quite dangerous to us. Our main mission is to explore, but we are also pursuing it. I know that it will not rest until it gains control of our world. We did not want you to get involved, hence the secrecy. But I can tell that you have an empath here. I do not want you to think we have bad intentions." "I understand. I do wonder, however, how you power your warp drive. It appears that you only have partial computer systems, and you have no power source powerful enough to generate a warp field." "Oh, that would be me." "What do you mean?" "I interface with all of the separate computer systems. And I power the warp drive." "You can power the warp drive?!" For the first time, Picard lost his professional expression. "Yes. Twilight can, too, of course, but I'm a bit better at it. More practice." Twilight stepped in. "Alicorns, like Starry Night and myself, have significantly more power than the average pony. Other than us, there are only three more on our planet. When we discovered that only power of that magnitude would fuel a faster-than-light engine, he volunteered, since he headed the project, anyway." "How exactly does he power the ship?" I cut in before Twilight mentioned "magic". I knew that they didn't have any, and probably didn't know what it was. "All ponies have...innate abilities...that they can use. We call these abilities magic." "I see." "What sort of abilities do you have?" asked Data with something resembling curiosity. Twilight answered him. "It varies according to a pony's race. Unicorns have the most obvious traits. Telekinesis is usually the first to be learned, and talented unicorns will learn abilities such as a shield spell or teleportation. Pegasi have flight despite their lack of wingspan or aerodynamics, and Earth ponies have varied abilities that are often the hardest to study. It is an oversimplification, but I hope it will do for now. Whole fields of study are devoted to the study of it." All three of them looked satisfied with the explanation, so I decided to change the direction a bit. "Would you like to see the rest of the ship? Compared to yours, the the tour won't take long at all." I smiled. "That would be great," Commander Troi replied. "Right now, you're in the control room. Each station has a different purpose, and controls a different computer system. You appear to have a similar setup on your ship. Since we are the only crew on the ship, there is no crew rotation. Therefore, this also doubles as the recreation room." "What do you do for fun?" Troi asked again, looking around. I smiled again. "Mostly board games. I confess that recreation was somewhat overlooked in our design. I was quite bored for the hours that the rest of the crew were asleep. I ended up playing Tetris with the Science console." "Tetris?" Data asked. "It's a very simple video game. I got a bit nostalgic." "Yes, I know. It was a video game on Earth as well, created in the 1980s. It is very strange that it should have the same name to you." Meanwhile, Twilight was glaring at me. I decided to move on quickly. "These are the sleeping quarters, pretty basic." "These are the kitchens, and also Spike's living quarters. He's probably still asleep. How he can sleep with those blaring alarms is beyond me." "Through here is, well, a farm. Perhaps it could be smaller if we used hydroponics, but Applejack wouldn't have any of that." "And finally, engineering. It's mostly just the computers, and me." Commander Troi gasped at the sight of me hooked up to the machines. "I know, it looks absolutely terrible. I would come out, but it takes an hour to get back in here, and---" Pinkie interrupted me. "Silly, it only takes that long to get the wires on. It only takes a few seconds to get them off." She started pulling them off at random. "See?" Now completely disconnected, I turned back to face Pinkie. "And now the ship's dead. Sure it has emergency power, but really? Now if anything happens, we'll have about an hour-long response time. And the orbit always seems to need minor corrections. And I doubt the Enterprise has docking ports that are compatible." "Well, maybe they have some sort of beam that can move us remotely, so we can land in their shuttle bay." "That's ridiculous, Pinkie. That's even if they have a shuttle bay. And while I can move the ship like that, I doubt they can. Remember, they don't have magic." "Actually, she's right." "What?" "We have a tractor beam that can move you into our shuttle bay. Your ship is small enough for it to work." I turned towards Pinkie. "How did you know that?" "Just a hunch." I sighed. You are so random. Chapter 5: The UFP As much as I was mad at Pinkie for acting without thinking, it was great to stretch my legs and have a real body. And I really wanted to see the ship. We disembarked from our ship into the shuttle bay. Personally, I was quite glad for their advanced technology. Electricity was running through everything, so I was able to see. This was going to be great. Well, maybe not everything. But close to everything. The doors were still made of solid metal. Then they opened mockingly with a soft hiss. "Are you okay?" It was Commander Troi. "I'm fine." "Wait, are you blind?" "Yes. Well, I can see most things." Confusion. "Metal isn't one of them." A slight bit of amusement. "It's a long story." Data walked up to me. "Could I ask you something?" "Yes?" "Are you able to see the warp drive from here?" "Yes." "I understand. You can see power signatures." "I suppose that's true. But I don't want to hold every...one up." "Of course not," said Picard. "What would you like to see first?" Twilight spoke first. "I assume since you detected our ship from so far away, you must have better sensor systems than we do. If you have an observatory of some sort, we can tell you where we live." "I think that would be a splendid idea." "And there it is. There is home." "But that's a white dwarf. Your planet should be freezing!" "Zoom in to the planet," I said. "See, there it is. Artificial sun and moon." "How long ago did this happen?" "We don't know precisely. Over two thousand years, though." "But how did you make something of that colossal size?" "Celestia and Luna made them. It took almost all of their power." "Who are Celestia and Luna?" "Two of the other alicorns I mentioned." "You said this was over two thousand years ago?" "Yes." "How long is a pony's lifespan?" "Normally? About 85." "How long is an alicorn's lifespan?" "We don't know yet. None of them have died." "You said there were only five in existence. What happened to the rest of them?" "The rest of...oh. No, alicorns aren't born. Rarely, a pony ascends to become one, but how it happens is virtually unknown." "I...see." "I have a theory, of course, but it requires a thorough understanding of the theory that makes our magic work." "Now, where do you live?" The rest of the tour was rather uneventful, while very interesting. Other than a few funny stares, most of the crew left us alone. The scariest part of the tour was in Engineering. Not the vast amount of antimatter, but the fact that Pinkie understood it so well. Picard refused to explain how any of the technology worked, telling us about the Prime Directive, and it did make a lot of sense. I knew quite well the dangers of too much progress too fast. I had avoided all death in my space program on that principle. Meeting Lt. Commander Geordi LaForge was fun. While we toured Engineering, both of us focused on ignoring Pinkie Pie, and comparing what each of us saw. He saw a lot more than me, but still, it was fun to talk with someone else who understood. After the tour, we gathered in the meeting room. "As you do not have a unified government, we cannot accept you into the Federation as we had once hoped. However, there is another option." "What would that be?" Twilight asked. "A treaty. An agreement, in essence. Both the Federation and Equestria would agree to give assistance should any of them be in danger." "We would have done that, anyway, and I'm sure you would too, based on your actions today." "Of course. But this makes it official. Starfleet Command has already given approval." "Then I will give my approval as well." "Thank you. But about this Nightmare you were talking about; what is it, and why is it so dangerous?" After our conversation, we went back to our ship. All agreed that it was a resounding success, even Rainbow Dash, who was still suspicious. Pinkie hooked me up in record time (just under 30 minutes) and we set off, following the Nightmare's trail. My scans of the system could be analysed mid-flight, and I was already beginning to feel that we spent too much time there already. Captain Picard, once suspicious, now agreed with our decision to follow and destroy it. Although they would not travel with us, since that would interfere with our internal affairs, he promised that if we were ever in need of assistance, they would be there to help. I looked at the time until the next destination. Two days. We really need to find a new form of entertainment. For now, though, stargazing would have to do. Chapter 2: Warp Factor As it turns out, I never solved the problem of faster-than-light travel. But somepony else did. The theory went, if you compressed space in front of you, and lengthened it behind you, you technically didn't move, and therefore were not traveling faster than the speed of light. It sounded like a loophole, devised by lawyers to get around a law. But the thing was, it was happening all the time. Years ago, we discovered that the universe was expanding, and even measured its rate of expansion. But if you took two points at opposite ends of the universe, even if it was only the part that we could see, those points were moving away from each other at more than the speed of light. Space expansion did not count towards the speed of light. The theory might actually work. But it was a long time, a very long time, before a prototype engine was finished. Twenty years. Perhaps not a long time for such a surge in technology. But for me, who was waiting uncertainly for the Nightmare's sudden return, it was an eternity. But perhaps it was a good thing that it took so long. Other technologies developed, like more efficient and smaller computers. It was dubbed a "warp" engine, since it warped the space around it to move. The operation of the engine was magical in origin, while the controls were technological. The engine would create a warp field around the ship, isolating it from the rest of space, then direct space around it. Unfortunately, this would be disastrous if the space being warped had any matter in it, so traditional engines were required to get it off a planet (or moon). The only catch was the power supply. The amount of magical power required was immense. The crew would have to contain over 100 unicorns, all working together. Or about half of one alicorn. Guess who. Although there were several ponies that wanted to test the prototype, I insisted on doing it alone. I refused to risk anypony but myself. Anyway, I might be able to survive the explosion, and I would be able to survive the vacuum of space before I got rescued. This was the first test of a theory, after all. There was a chance that it wouldn't work, period. I didn't want anypony to die on my account. The ship worked, for the most part. It did pass the speed of light. It was a bit bumpy (actually, a lot bumpy), but in the next models, we were able to fix the problems with the first one. By the time we fixed those problems, the drive was a lot more efficient, and it could reach Warp 2.1. The Warp scale was a new system to measure light speed travel. Almost like the Mach number was used to calculate speeds above the speed of sound, the "Warp Factor" was used to determine these speeds with relatively few zeros. It was a logarithmic scale. Warp 1 was the speed of light. Warp 2 was ten times, etc. And finally, finally, it was time. Time to go after her. And time to explore the unknown. And the ship was built. It was obvious who should be my crew. The original Elements of Harmony. They had stopped aging long ago. And right now, they were the only ones that were still personal friends. All of them agreed to go, from boredom, want for adventure, or just seeking the presence of friends. The ship was named the E.S.S. Night, named after me. Not really my first choice, but everypony on the project insisted it be named after me. Not necessarily in my honor, but it would be strange to call the ship something other than what it was addressed by the crew. You see, there are some disadvantages to being the engine of the ship. One of which is that you can't walk around. The other is that you have so many wires attached to you that you look like one of those creepy aliens that control large machines in sci-fi films. It sort of is exactly like that. Magical connections enable me to see anywhere on the ship, as well as outside the ship, control sensors, and use my own magic to cast spells from different points on the ship. In essence, I am the ship. Hence the name. I would be able to talk to my friends, of course, but through speakers in the walls, not face-to-face. I could project a virtual image of myself, but it just wasn't the same. And if they did actually meet me face-to-face, the atmosphere would be pretty awkward with me still connected to the ship. It was inconvenient, but necessary. I had complete access to every system on the ship. Technically, I could fly the whole thing myself. But that would require me to focus on every single detail at the same time. For example, I could use the ship's sensors, but actually deciphering what everything meant was beyond me. That's what the crew was for. In emergency situations, I could gain control, but they were the ones that really controlled the ship. They were the ones that gave the instructions to the computers, and those computers would use my magic as necessary. Of course, I could override those commands if necessary. Otherwise, I might be in real danger from overdrain. But for the most part, I didn't have to think about much. My job was defence. As the one with the access to the magical lines throughout the ship, I could create shields, fire magical bolts, or perform pretty much any magical spell on the outside of the ship. I had gotten quite good at it. We needed to be prepared for the Nightmare. Of course, I knew that I still wasn't powerful enough, so there was a station for Twilight as well, but there were less options, and a lot less flexibility. Twilight's job was to use the ship's technological and magical sensors to collect and compile data. At least, that's what she said it was. I just called it the Science console. The main purpose of this mission was scientific. Even if I did want to find and destroy the Nightmare, it was no longer the primary goal. I wasn't going to lie to all the scientists under me at E.S.A., and I had grown fond of space. I would have made the voyage anyway, even if the Nightmare disappeared forever. Rainbow Dash was the pilot. She wanted to be in charge of the weapons, too, but Twilight vetoed that. I was slightly relieved. Partly because I knew she would be trigger-happy, but mostly because I would actually have something to do. Rarity had the Communications station, and was the unofficial uniform designer. Spike was in charge of Special Communications (Dragonfire mail in case of emergency - it was actually faster than our normal communications), and also the cook. Applejack was in charge of growing the food. Fluttershy was the doctor. She had actually studied quite a lot over the years, and had several degrees now. Pinkie Pie was in charge of Engineering. I wasn't quite sure how I felt about that, but she apparently knew her stuff. Maybe she broke physics so often that they knew each other personally. So, ship ready and crew assembled, we boarded the ship. Well, we went to the moon together. I had to get on about an hour before the others, connecting myself to the machine, making pre-flight checks, and initiating certain necessary spells, like the artificial gravity. Then they boarded the ship. It was a small ship, about the same size as the shuttles that were used to get between the Earth and Moon. The Warp Drive didn't take that much space, being just a computer that translated my magic into the appropriate form. I had tried shaping my magic myself, but it was too much concentration to be worth it. It looked quite ordinary - the only addition to the mostly standard ship was the two nacelles on the outside of the ship that held the machinery directing my magic into the warp field. Apparently they glow blue when I'm using them. Maybe it's because of the color of my magic. I wonder what would happen if Twilight used them. That was another reason why it was important that she be there. If something happened to me, the ship would be able to return home safely. But I dwell too much on disaster. Perhaps I'm too careful. The ship itself was streamlined, designed both aesthetically and utilitarian, made to cut through the atmosphere, minimizing reentry heating. Its hull was made of adamantium, an alloy of magic-infused steel designed to reflect hits in case my shields failed. On each side, the Equestrian flag was painted, along with the ship's serial code: ESA IS-AD-01. All in all, a ship that I considered beautiful, and I was proud to call it my own. I called it that, but on this voyage, it wasn't really true. I was not the captain. I was the ship's override mechanism, and I could take control in an emergency, but Twilight was the one to make the decisions. She was the one with the most experience with the Nightmare, and although I knew the most about magic, she was more experienced with the scientific method, and that's what this mission needed. She was the best pony for this mission, and I was not about to compromise that for my own selfish desire. She was better at leading than me, anyway. I was good at teaching. I was good at learning. And I was good at doing a job well. But leading was not one of my talents. I technically had authority over I.S.A, but I always was the one working with the personnel, not giving orders. Twilight was the real leader.
Prologue: Another Failure Once again, I flew at the edge of space. Once again, I attempted to cross that barrier. Six months of constant effort. And that barrier still wouldn't budge. It didn't feel like a barrier at all. Flying was easier in space. Acceleration was really easy. But this barrier was persistent. The closer I got, the slower I accelerated. I had been accelerating for an hour already, the longest I had ever tried, and I was only getting slower. I had learned to bring a compressed air supply long ago. But this was starting to worry me. What if...what if it really was impossible? What if this was a practical application of those math equations, where the values always approached zero, but never made it there? I slowed down to just barely supersonic speed. If I was right, I would never make it there. If I was wrong, and I desperately hoped I was, there would be time tomorrow. I raced back down towards Equus, towards home. From up here, I could see all of Equestria, but not very well-defined. There were magical landmarks, but the map in the throne room of Crystal Castle gave me a clearer picture. What interested me was space, the unknown, the untouchable. And I was a long way from making it there. I landed at the castle. I still lived with Twilight, leading her Guard. It was a few years since I found out that I was an alicorn, but it was still a secret to the public. I had not grown a horn yet, and while I was a few inches taller, I did not look that out of place. Celestia explained to me that I was still weak by alicorn standards, and I would be a target for any enemies. Twilight actually did not know of her alicornhood until she got her wings. Apparently, a unicorn's rapidly growing magic is a lot easier to explain, especially given her talent in the first place. There was no need for her to be worried with the information. I was told mainly because I would notice easily. Twilight was standing outside the castle doors, pacing nervously. I landed beside her, and she immediately started shouting. "Where were you all this time?" "But I told you where I was going. I was practicing my flying." "For two days?!" "What? I was only up there for about an hour and a half...wait a minute. How long was I up there the last few times." "Oh, about two hours." Uh oh. Those other times, I was only attempting the break for about one minute, max "I may need to tell you something important, Twilight. You know about that theory of relativity that everypony criticized a few years ago?" "Yeah, that was ridiculous. I mean, there's almost no proof." "Well, I just proved it quite thoroughly." "How?" "Well, I didn't tell you what I've been trying to do, did I?" "No. Was it something special?" "Yes, actually. I was trying to break the light-speed barrier." "That's insane!" "And it turns out, impossible." "Why do you say that? You never label anything as impossible, I know that." "The thing is, the closer you get to the barrier, the slower you accelerate. So you can always accelerate, but never quite reach there." "Okay, but how does this prove that crazy theory? And why were you gone for so long?" "You see, I was traveling very, very close to the speed of light for about an hour." "And?" "And for me, I was only gone for an hour and a half. For me, time slowed down." Twilight gasped. "This changes everything!" I sighed. "Yes, it does. It means that I can't go after the Nightmare anytime soon. There has to be another way to get up there." Twilight snorted. "And what do you suppose you would've done if you could get there? Even Celestia couldn't defeat her alone." "Alone." "What are you talking about?" I can find a way to get to space, but it doesn't have to be under my own power. I could find a way to create some sort of...ship. One that can take several ponies to space. And then return safely. "Like an aeroplane? Those devices that allow ponies without wings to fly?" "No. There isn't any air for them to fly on. Rocket propulsion is the key. It can work without any air to support it." "But that's only used for fireworks, and that sort of thing. How will you get it to lift a pony? Or have any steering?" "Well, I guess I'll have to wait and find out, won't I?" "What about the Nightmare? Didn't you say she could return at any moment?" "When I saw its magic the first time, I panicked. I didn't know how she regained it, and assumed it was increasing at a far greater rate than it actually was. I looked at it today, as I flew above the sun. It has only barely increased in power. It will be at least another hundred years until we are in danger again." "So now what?" "It's time to get prepared. I still haven't given up. It's time for some research."
Chapter 1: E.S.A. After my horn appeared (with accompanying explosion), I stepped down from my position as Captain of Twilight's guard. Or rater, stepped up into the role as Prince. I didn't really want the job. But the public found it inconceivable that an alicorn was not royalty, so I took the position. It did come with benefits, though. I already lived in the castle with Twilight, and I remained there, just as usual. But I did have authority now, and, with permission from Celestia (I was new at this sort of thing), I created the Equestrian Space Administration, or ESA. To my great surprise, Luna, who wholeheartedly supported my venture, removed all of the Equestrian stars, revealing the fainter, but genuine ones that had been for so long hidden. At first, the astronomers were outraged. But with more powerful telescopes came more discoveries. Discoveries of other planets. Of other systems. And Equestria had a passion for space again. The stars were kept in Canterlot Tower for safekeeping. You never knew when a star might come in handy. And mages no longer dominated the world of the scholars. They were important yes, but there was another discipline that was gaining respect -- science. And under my guidance, the ESA built the first rocket capable of bringing a pony into space. Magic-propelled, but technology-controlled, it was the most successful melding of the two. Supplied with more than enough oxygen for the one brave inhabitant, it took off, and for the first time, a pony achieved orbit. The systems of the rocket had backups and backup-backups for almost every system. Nopony would die under my watch. And nopony did. Many ponies with a bit too much ambition tried to advance too fast, pressing for higher goals without the means to safely do so. I put a stop to that. And on July 14th, 1025, the first pony set foot on the moon. Luna's moon, of course. I wasn't stupid. The moon missions went on for some time. Data was collected, technology improved, and the moon was mapped in detail. Rockets improved, and their size was drastically reduced. And a colony was established on the Moon. Luna liked it there. She spent nearly all of her time at the colony, helping it grow. And grow it did. A branch of the ESA was established there, and it was generally agreed that it was there that any further explorations would be launched from. The moon's lower gravity greatly increased the efficiency of the rockets. But it might be a stretch to call them that anymore. More elegant, and a lot smaller, they became more and more like the ships from science fiction. Magical propulsion had developed, and now they had really reached a limit. For you see once again, we had reached that barrier: my old enemy, the speed of light. We stayed far enough away from it now to avoid it's time-altering effects. But unlike before, a voyage of a few months was no problem. Food, water, and air were no longer a problem. Personally, I didn't need many of those things at all. I still needed a bit of food and water, since I had not fully matured, but alicorns do not really need any of those things. Right now, I could have walked into the vacuum of space and had no ill effects. But I knew that I couldn't do it alone. And finally, we were ready. It was time. And then the Nightmare disappeared. Of course, I would have been fine with this, if I didn't know where it had gone. I would have been glad to be rid of it. But I had seen it escape. It had escaped to the stars, and this time, the distant ones. It must have seen my preparations. It was not ready yet. So it was biding its time. And now, frustrated in my efforts, I had to as well. I couldn't ask any of these ponies to make a voyage that they could not come back from. For an interstellar journey would take more than a hundred years. For you see, the speed of light had beaten me again. All the scientists, all the scholars said "Impossible. Inconceivable!" But they said that to the sound barrier. They said that to the stars. And they had said that to space. And they were all wrong. There was some way to cheat. There was some way to break the system. And I was going to find it.
Chapter 3: We Are Not Alone It was March 12, 1103 A.D, at 1:45 PM It should have been 2:00, but Rainbow Dash was impatient. So with clearance from ground control, we took off from the moon. Normal engines at first, of course. Although, they were officially called "impulse" engines, nopony really used that term. Except maybe Twilight, who used the official term for everything. Once we were in orbit, Twilight gave the order to go into warp. I convinced Rainbow Dash that Warp 2 was good enough, and trying to max out the speed would tire me out too much for continual use. She reluctantly agreed. We aimed in the general direction of where I had last seen the Nightmare. Once we were past the warp barrier, it was a lot easier to see. Just like when I crossed the sound barrier, I could see more clearly. While I could not see her magic directly, I could see a faint trail of magic in the places it had travelled before. We stopped at Selene, the old Equestrian moon. Under my direction, nopony had explored it, and so I owed it to them to come back with at least some data. We scanned it from orbit, then Twilight and Applejack teleported down to the surface for soil samples. Applejack was the expert on soil, after all. It was a quick trip, since the soil could be analysed easily on board. At least, that's what Twilight said. Personally, I think it was mostly because of Applejack. The soil on the surface was completely devoid of life. Applejack must have felt very strange. Luna's moon was designed to have fertile soil. Selene's soil was composed of minerals that could not support life. All of us felt that it was not worth a landing. It would take far too much time, and we wanted to get to far more interesting things. While I didn't want to lose the trail, I also wanted to visit other star systems. Getting readings from an active star was my next goal. Perhaps other planets. Maybe there were other planets that supported life. It was worth a try. We set off again, this time for a much longer trip. The trip to Selene took less than a second. The trip to the nearest star would take over six hours. I was very glad that the warp drive was improved. It would have taken ten times as long otherwise. We played board games to pass the time. The chairs in the main control room swivelled, and a central working table was designed for a similar purpose. It was only awkward for me. I could project myself onto any wall, and a magical node in the room allowed me to move pieces, but it wasn't quite the same. It took a while for everypony to get used to. But still, I kept half of my attention on the surroundings. I served as the autopilot, and I always had to monitor things. It's a good thing I don't have to do thing like sleep. Speaking of that, we arrived in the middle of the night, and the night was very boring. Of course, it looked the same as daytime, but there was a ship's clock, and it showed the equivalent Equestrian day and night cycle. Everypony was asleep. While I was waiting for them to wake up, I amused myself by scanning the solar system, collecting data, scanning the rest of space, then in a fit of boredom, played Tetris with the lights on some random control panel. I could have just used images on the wall, which acted as a screen, but this had a more retro feel. I really had to find a better way to spend time. I knew full well that I couldn't go to sleep. Well, I could, but it would be a very bad idea. We were in a completely unknown star system. The existence of "aliens" was highly unlikely, but all sorts of things could go wrong. A solar flare, if not detected beforehand, could wipe out crucial equipment. Random glitches in the automatic systems (that were actually automatic and not controlled by me) could cause all sorts of problems, possibly fatal ones. Just then, I saw something new. A faint spot appeared on my vision. I could detect its raw power, just like a star, but this was moving. I checked the sensors. Nothing showed up, but I wasn't surprised. The only thing that could sense that far away was my own sight. The other sensors were constricted by the speed of light. They only worked close-range. As it got closer, I realised it was coming right for us. And it was traveling much faster than the speed of light. I put the ship on alert, and woke the six up. I tried waking them up personally. This worked up until Rainbow Dash. Then I put on the ship's alarms. The loud ones. I received a few glares in the direction of the ceiling, but I showed them what I was seeing on the front screen. Twilight immediately took charge, making sure everypony was at their station. "Night, how long until it arrives?" "About a minute. And please, could you just call me Star? It's hard enough that I don't have a body right now." "But the ponies at E.S.A told me--" "I don't care what they chose to call me in the ship's manual. Call me Star." "Fine." The ship arrived. It was obviously a ship. And it was gigantic. Its shape was a cylinder with a saucer attached to the front. Two branches at the back of the cylinder led to two objects that looked quite a lot like our warp nacelles. The strange part was that I could detect no magic anywhere on the ship. I could detect life. Lots of life. And I could detect power. Immense power, as well as power flowing through the ship, indicating electronic activity. "Twilight, we are receiving some sort of high-frequency signal from the ship. It appears to be some sort of video and audio. Just give me a few seconds to decode it." "Can we respond in kind?" "Yes, I believe so. I am ready to open communications." "Ready." I displayed the incoming message on the screen, sending back the video feed from the control room along the same path. Noticing the different language, I cast a translation spell on all of the crew. "Channel open." The voice came from the other ship. The screen showed another room, a bit bigger than our ship's control room, and a bit neater, too. But it wasn't the room that was interesting. It was the ponies. Not ponies, though. Beings. People. Aliens.
Chapter 4: First Contact "This is Captain Jean-Luc Picard of the USS Enterprise. Do you require any assistance?" The captain was very formal, but it looked as if several of the rest of the crew were struggling to keep a straight face. Twilight looked very surprised, but adopted a similar protocol. She was good at that. "This is Princess Twilight Sparkle of the ESS Night. No. Why do you ask?" "It seems that your warp field collapsed as you approached this system. Are you having any problems?" Twilight looked uncertainly at the ceiling, which I had gotten used to as her way of getting my attention. I almost laughed as I appeared on the back wall to address the Captain. "No, there isn't any problems. We just deactivated it. But I do understand your confusion. I can see your warp drive, and I can't imagine what you're using to power it with. Apparently, though, it can't just be turned off." "Yes, you're correct. But I have to ask, how can you "see" our warp drive? Do you mean that you see it on your scans?" "Well, sort of. I see with the ship's sensors. Technically, you could say that I am the ship." "I see. Now that I know that you aren't in danger, I would like to make first contact." "What do you mean by first contact?" asked Twilight with curiosity. "First contact between species. Now that you have developed warp technology, we can get to know each other." "That would be great!" said Pinkie Pie. Ever since the video screen had first come on, she was positively beaming. "Yes, that would be good," said Twilight thoughtfully. "But it is hard to get to know each other over a video screen. We could teleport aboard with your permission, but then we would have to leave Star behind, and I know he wouldn't like that." "Why not?" asked Rainbow, confused. "Because it would take about an hour to get him detached. Besides, that would leave the ship with no power." And by now, the looks of confusion were clearly visible on the faces of the aliens, despite their effort to suppress them. Picard spoke again, halting the discussion. "We could come aboard your ship, if you allow it." Twilight sighed. "That makes things a lot easier. Thank you. Whenever you're ready is fine with me." The video signal ended, so I put the view of their ship back on the screen. A few minutes later, a beam shone from the ship, and led directly into the control room, where three...people materialized: the Captain, and two others I recognised from their ship. I almost blocked the beam in my panic, but I recognized the life in the beam, and I trusted these people now. I did not believe them to be aggressive. I made my image appear on the wall. "I'm sorry that I can't be here, physically. It would take an unwieldy amount of time to get here, and I don't want to keep you waiting." "That is understandable. I do not mean to offend, but are you a person or a machine?" "I am sentient, if that is what you mean. I'm just the same as these other ponies." "Shall we introduce ourselves?" Picard asked, turning back to Twilight. "Of course. We both know each other's names, but this is Rainbow Dash, Rarity, Applejack, Fluttershy, Pinkie Pie, and this is Prince Starry Night, if we're still being formal." "This is Commander Troi and Lt. Commander Data." Both of them were strange. Data was a machine, a very complex one. Troi seemed to have a different sort of magic. One that I hadn't seen before. "What species are each of you?" I asked. "What do you mean?" Twilight asked me, annoyed. "Of course they're the same." "They are different." I whispered back. Kind of hard to do with a speaker. Picard smiled. "I am a human, Commander Troi is a Betazoid, and Lt. Commander Data is an android." "Thanks," I said, making a log of what the scans looked like for each of them. Rainbow Dash looked distinctly uncomfortable after the mention of android. "It's fine," I said. "I'm sure Data is quite safe. And none of the others have shown the slightest sign of anger." She relaxed visibly. Twilight spoke again. "We are ponies, from the planet that we call Equus, which is only about six hours away from here. We are on a scientific mission of exploration." Troi whispered something into the Captain's ear. He nodded, then continued. "We are explorers as well. It is not often that we come across others with a like mind." He smiled. Then, I noticed something. The strange sort of magic that Troi had was being used constantly, and it was directed towards every one of us. I had a pretty good guess what it was. "There is a secondary objective that they should know as well," I said. "I don't want to keep any secrets." Twilight looked at me strangely, but I continued. "There is a being that is quite dangerous to us. Our main mission is to explore, but we are also pursuing it. I know that it will not rest until it gains control of our world. We did not want you to get involved, hence the secrecy. But I can tell that you have an empath here. I do not want you to think we have bad intentions." "I understand. I do wonder, however, how you power your warp drive. It appears that you only have partial computer systems, and you have no power source powerful enough to generate a warp field." "Oh, that would be me." "What do you mean?" "I interface with all of the separate computer systems. And I power the warp drive." "You can power the warp drive?!" For the first time, Picard lost his professional expression. "Yes. Twilight can, too, of course, but I'm a bit better at it. More practice." Twilight stepped in. "Alicorns, like Starry Night and myself, have significantly more power than the average pony. Other than us, there are only three more on our planet. When we discovered that only power of that magnitude would fuel a faster-than-light engine, he volunteered, since he headed the project, anyway." "How exactly does he power the ship?" I cut in before Twilight mentioned "magic". I knew that they didn't have any, and probably didn't know what it was. "All ponies have...innate abilities...that they can use. We call these abilities magic." "I see." "What sort of abilities do you have?" asked Data with something resembling curiosity. Twilight answered him. "It varies according to a pony's race. Unicorns have the most obvious traits. Telekinesis is usually the first to be learned, and talented unicorns will learn abilities such as a shield spell or teleportation. Pegasi have flight despite their lack of wingspan or aerodynamics, and Earth ponies have varied abilities that are often the hardest to study. It is an oversimplification, but I hope it will do for now. Whole fields of study are devoted to the study of it." All three of them looked satisfied with the explanation, so I decided to change the direction a bit. "Would you like to see the rest of the ship? Compared to yours, the the tour won't take long at all." I smiled. "That would be great," Commander Troi replied. "Right now, you're in the control room. Each station has a different purpose, and controls a different computer system. You appear to have a similar setup on your ship. Since we are the only crew on the ship, there is no crew rotation. Therefore, this also doubles as the recreation room." "What do you do for fun?" Troi asked again, looking around. I smiled again. "Mostly board games. I confess that recreation was somewhat overlooked in our design. I was quite bored for the hours that the rest of the crew were asleep. I ended up playing Tetris with the Science console." "Tetris?" Data asked. "It's a very simple video game. I got a bit nostalgic." "Yes, I know. It was a video game on Earth as well, created in the 1980s. It is very strange that it should have the same name to you." Meanwhile, Twilight was glaring at me. I decided to move on quickly. "These are the sleeping quarters, pretty basic." "These are the kitchens, and also Spike's living quarters. He's probably still asleep. How he can sleep with those blaring alarms is beyond me." "Through here is, well, a farm. Perhaps it could be smaller if we used hydroponics, but Applejack wouldn't have any of that." "And finally, engineering. It's mostly just the computers, and me." Commander Troi gasped at the sight of me hooked up to the machines. "I know, it looks absolutely terrible. I would come out, but it takes an hour to get back in here, and---" Pinkie interrupted me. "Silly, it only takes that long to get the wires on. It only takes a few seconds to get them off." She started pulling them off at random. "See?" Now completely disconnected, I turned back to face Pinkie. "And now the ship's dead. Sure it has emergency power, but really? Now if anything happens, we'll have about an hour-long response time. And the orbit always seems to need minor corrections. And I doubt the Enterprise has docking ports that are compatible." "Well, maybe they have some sort of beam that can move us remotely, so we can land in their shuttle bay." "That's ridiculous, Pinkie. That's even if they have a shuttle bay. And while I can move the ship like that, I doubt they can. Remember, they don't have magic." "Actually, she's right." "What?" "We have a tractor beam that can move you into our shuttle bay. Your ship is small enough for it to work." I turned towards Pinkie. "How did you know that?" "Just a hunch." I sighed. You are so random.
Chapter 5: The UFP As much as I was mad at Pinkie for acting without thinking, it was great to stretch my legs and have a real body. And I really wanted to see the ship. We disembarked from our ship into the shuttle bay. Personally, I was quite glad for their advanced technology. Electricity was running through everything, so I was able to see. This was going to be great. Well, maybe not everything. But close to everything. The doors were still made of solid metal. Then they opened mockingly with a soft hiss. "Are you okay?" It was Commander Troi. "I'm fine." "Wait, are you blind?" "Yes. Well, I can see most things." Confusion. "Metal isn't one of them." A slight bit of amusement. "It's a long story." Data walked up to me. "Could I ask you something?" "Yes?" "Are you able to see the warp drive from here?" "Yes." "I understand. You can see power signatures." "I suppose that's true. But I don't want to hold every...one up." "Of course not," said Picard. "What would you like to see first?" Twilight spoke first. "I assume since you detected our ship from so far away, you must have better sensor systems than we do. If you have an observatory of some sort, we can tell you where we live." "I think that would be a splendid idea." "And there it is. There is home." "But that's a white dwarf. Your planet should be freezing!" "Zoom in to the planet," I said. "See, there it is. Artificial sun and moon." "How long ago did this happen?" "We don't know precisely. Over two thousand years, though." "But how did you make something of that colossal size?" "Celestia and Luna made them. It took almost all of their power." "Who are Celestia and Luna?" "Two of the other alicorns I mentioned." "You said this was over two thousand years ago?" "Yes." "How long is a pony's lifespan?" "Normally? About 85." "How long is an alicorn's lifespan?" "We don't know yet. None of them have died." "You said there were only five in existence. What happened to the rest of them?" "The rest of...oh. No, alicorns aren't born. Rarely, a pony ascends to become one, but how it happens is virtually unknown." "I...see." "I have a theory, of course, but it requires a thorough understanding of the theory that makes our magic work." "Now, where do you live?" The rest of the tour was rather uneventful, while very interesting. Other than a few funny stares, most of the crew left us alone. The scariest part of the tour was in Engineering. Not the vast amount of antimatter, but the fact that Pinkie understood it so well. Picard refused to explain how any of the technology worked, telling us about the Prime Directive, and it did make a lot of sense. I knew quite well the dangers of too much progress too fast. I had avoided all death in my space program on that principle. Meeting Lt. Commander Geordi LaForge was fun. While we toured Engineering, both of us focused on ignoring Pinkie Pie, and comparing what each of us saw. He saw a lot more than me, but still, it was fun to talk with someone else who understood. After the tour, we gathered in the meeting room. "As you do not have a unified government, we cannot accept you into the Federation as we had once hoped. However, there is another option." "What would that be?" Twilight asked. "A treaty. An agreement, in essence. Both the Federation and Equestria would agree to give assistance should any of them be in danger." "We would have done that, anyway, and I'm sure you would too, based on your actions today." "Of course. But this makes it official. Starfleet Command has already given approval." "Then I will give my approval as well." "Thank you. But about this Nightmare you were talking about; what is it, and why is it so dangerous?" After our conversation, we went back to our ship. All agreed that it was a resounding success, even Rainbow Dash, who was still suspicious. Pinkie hooked me up in record time (just under 30 minutes) and we set off, following the Nightmare's trail. My scans of the system could be analysed mid-flight, and I was already beginning to feel that we spent too much time there already. Captain Picard, once suspicious, now agreed with our decision to follow and destroy it. Although they would not travel with us, since that would interfere with our internal affairs, he promised that if we were ever in need of assistance, they would be there to help. I looked at the time until the next destination. Two days. We really need to find a new form of entertainment. For now, though, stargazing would have to do.
Chapter 2: Warp Factor As it turns out, I never solved the problem of faster-than-light travel. But somepony else did. The theory went, if you compressed space in front of you, and lengthened it behind you, you technically didn't move, and therefore were not traveling faster than the speed of light. It sounded like a loophole, devised by lawyers to get around a law. But the thing was, it was happening all the time. Years ago, we discovered that the universe was expanding, and even measured its rate of expansion. But if you took two points at opposite ends of the universe, even if it was only the part that we could see, those points were moving away from each other at more than the speed of light. Space expansion did not count towards the speed of light. The theory might actually work. But it was a long time, a very long time, before a prototype engine was finished. Twenty years. Perhaps not a long time for such a surge in technology. But for me, who was waiting uncertainly for the Nightmare's sudden return, it was an eternity. But perhaps it was a good thing that it took so long. Other technologies developed, like more efficient and smaller computers. It was dubbed a "warp" engine, since it warped the space around it to move. The operation of the engine was magical in origin, while the controls were technological. The engine would create a warp field around the ship, isolating it from the rest of space, then direct space around it. Unfortunately, this would be disastrous if the space being warped had any matter in it, so traditional engines were required to get it off a planet (or moon). The only catch was the power supply. The amount of magical power required was immense. The crew would have to contain over 100 unicorns, all working together. Or about half of one alicorn. Guess who. Although there were several ponies that wanted to test the prototype, I insisted on doing it alone. I refused to risk anypony but myself. Anyway, I might be able to survive the explosion, and I would be able to survive the vacuum of space before I got rescued. This was the first test of a theory, after all. There was a chance that it wouldn't work, period. I didn't want anypony to die on my account. The ship worked, for the most part. It did pass the speed of light. It was a bit bumpy (actually, a lot bumpy), but in the next models, we were able to fix the problems with the first one. By the time we fixed those problems, the drive was a lot more efficient, and it could reach Warp 2.1. The Warp scale was a new system to measure light speed travel. Almost like the Mach number was used to calculate speeds above the speed of sound, the "Warp Factor" was used to determine these speeds with relatively few zeros. It was a logarithmic scale. Warp 1 was the speed of light. Warp 2 was ten times, etc. And finally, finally, it was time. Time to go after her. And time to explore the unknown. And the ship was built. It was obvious who should be my crew. The original Elements of Harmony. They had stopped aging long ago. And right now, they were the only ones that were still personal friends. All of them agreed to go, from boredom, want for adventure, or just seeking the presence of friends. The ship was named the E.S.S. Night, named after me. Not really my first choice, but everypony on the project insisted it be named after me. Not necessarily in my honor, but it would be strange to call the ship something other than what it was addressed by the crew. You see, there are some disadvantages to being the engine of the ship. One of which is that you can't walk around. The other is that you have so many wires attached to you that you look like one of those creepy aliens that control large machines in sci-fi films. It sort of is exactly like that. Magical connections enable me to see anywhere on the ship, as well as outside the ship, control sensors, and use my own magic to cast spells from different points on the ship. In essence, I am the ship. Hence the name. I would be able to talk to my friends, of course, but through speakers in the walls, not face-to-face. I could project a virtual image of myself, but it just wasn't the same. And if they did actually meet me face-to-face, the atmosphere would be pretty awkward with me still connected to the ship. It was inconvenient, but necessary. I had complete access to every system on the ship. Technically, I could fly the whole thing myself. But that would require me to focus on every single detail at the same time. For example, I could use the ship's sensors, but actually deciphering what everything meant was beyond me. That's what the crew was for. In emergency situations, I could gain control, but they were the ones that really controlled the ship. They were the ones that gave the instructions to the computers, and those computers would use my magic as necessary. Of course, I could override those commands if necessary. Otherwise, I might be in real danger from overdrain. But for the most part, I didn't have to think about much. My job was defence. As the one with the access to the magical lines throughout the ship, I could create shields, fire magical bolts, or perform pretty much any magical spell on the outside of the ship. I had gotten quite good at it. We needed to be prepared for the Nightmare. Of course, I knew that I still wasn't powerful enough, so there was a station for Twilight as well, but there were less options, and a lot less flexibility. Twilight's job was to use the ship's technological and magical sensors to collect and compile data. At least, that's what she said it was. I just called it the Science console. The main purpose of this mission was scientific. Even if I did want to find and destroy the Nightmare, it was no longer the primary goal. I wasn't going to lie to all the scientists under me at E.S.A., and I had grown fond of space. I would have made the voyage anyway, even if the Nightmare disappeared forever. Rainbow Dash was the pilot. She wanted to be in charge of the weapons, too, but Twilight vetoed that. I was slightly relieved. Partly because I knew she would be trigger-happy, but mostly because I would actually have something to do. Rarity had the Communications station, and was the unofficial uniform designer. Spike was in charge of Special Communications (Dragonfire mail in case of emergency - it was actually faster than our normal communications), and also the cook. Applejack was in charge of growing the food. Fluttershy was the doctor. She had actually studied quite a lot over the years, and had several degrees now. Pinkie Pie was in charge of Engineering. I wasn't quite sure how I felt about that, but she apparently knew her stuff. Maybe she broke physics so often that they knew each other personally. So, ship ready and crew assembled, we boarded the ship. Well, we went to the moon together. I had to get on about an hour before the others, connecting myself to the machine, making pre-flight checks, and initiating certain necessary spells, like the artificial gravity. Then they boarded the ship. It was a small ship, about the same size as the shuttles that were used to get between the Earth and Moon. The Warp Drive didn't take that much space, being just a computer that translated my magic into the appropriate form. I had tried shaping my magic myself, but it was too much concentration to be worth it. It looked quite ordinary - the only addition to the mostly standard ship was the two nacelles on the outside of the ship that held the machinery directing my magic into the warp field. Apparently they glow blue when I'm using them. Maybe it's because of the color of my magic. I wonder what would happen if Twilight used them. That was another reason why it was important that she be there. If something happened to me, the ship would be able to return home safely. But I dwell too much on disaster. Perhaps I'm too careful. The ship itself was streamlined, designed both aesthetically and utilitarian, made to cut through the atmosphere, minimizing reentry heating. Its hull was made of adamantium, an alloy of magic-infused steel designed to reflect hits in case my shields failed. On each side, the Equestrian flag was painted, along with the ship's serial code: ESA IS-AD-01. All in all, a ship that I considered beautiful, and I was proud to call it my own. I called it that, but on this voyage, it wasn't really true. I was not the captain. I was the ship's override mechanism, and I could take control in an emergency, but Twilight was the one to make the decisions. She was the one with the most experience with the Nightmare, and although I knew the most about magic, she was more experienced with the scientific method, and that's what this mission needed. She was the best pony for this mission, and I was not about to compromise that for my own selfish desire. She was better at leading than me, anyway. I was good at teaching. I was good at learning. And I was good at doing a job well. But leading was not one of my talents. I technically had authority over I.S.A, but I always was the one working with the personnel, not giving orders. Twilight was the real leader.
