No Pony's Sky

The universe at large unfolded back across her ship’s canopy as Twilight Sparkle dropped out of warp space. Only a single long jump away from the center, this put her in an extremely active region of glowing gas clouds and massive suns much larger than the majority of those she had already visited. This solar system held nothing particularly interesting for her. A lone airless world baked constantly by hard radiation looked no different from a dozen or so similar planets she had seen before.

It’s not like I have the time to explore anyway. She laid her ears back against her head and glared at her empty radar screen, which wouldn’t remain empty for long. The Equestrian fighters on her tail were closer than ever. Each jump not only brought her nearer to the galactic center, but also gave them ample opportunity to learn her tactics and anticipate her actions. She had begun her journey with a month long head start. Now, if her calculations were correct, she only had a minute or two tops.

As habit, she angled her ship’s nose towards the lone planet. Several asteroid fields orbiting it might provide a good place to hide if she ran into any problems changing out her empty warp cell for a fresh one. She had built several of the powerful energy storage cylinders to avoid any delays, but they still needed to be carefully swapped before every jump. Unlike her pursuers’ more modern equipment, her older warp drive did not automatically cycle out empty cells.

Her hooves squeezed the duel levers on her control yoke simultaneously, and a high-pitched whine filled the cockpit as her pulse drive spun up. The acceleration pulled her back, until the inertial dampeners kicked in and she could move around comfortably. Through the armored glass of her cockpit, the small lonely planet blurred into a dark smudge as her ship wobbled from an unbalanced engine thrust. Her computers automatically adjusted her ship’s vector, but it did not make the trip any more visually appealing.

This ship had thousands of hours on it without undergoing a single scheduled overhaul. Sure, she had been able to replace old or worn out equipment on her own, but the stress of such a long journey had begun to take its toll on her weathered starship. The various background clattering from its matured systems felt more familiar to her ears than pure silence would, and it allowed her to pinpoint any problems just by a change in the vessel’s usual ambiance.

As Twilight Sparkle quickly shuffled through her ship’s laden cargo stores, an unexpected chime quickly alerted her senses and an ear swiveled around to pinpoint its source. Carefully setting down a crate of lustrous emril ore, the alicorn princess followed the sound back into her ship’s cockpit.

In front of her, a holographic bar had appeared overlaid on the background image of the blurry planet that slowly grew larger by each second. She then spotted an outlined circle of black towards the top portion of her canopy. Encased inside, an image of a crudely drawn pony skull sat ominously above a single line of text.

Hostile sub-space scan detected.

‘What?” Twilight took a defensive step back. “That doesn’t make any sense!” She hesitated for a moment before climbing back into her seat and locking its straps securely in place. Reaching down, she lifted up her helmet from its stand next to her chair and slipped it on over her head.

The Equestrians have never initiated a hostile scan; ever! The most they’ve ever done is a cursory scan to narrow down my location. She tightened her lips and narrowed her eyes at this latest realization. Do they really find me as a threat now? After all that I have done to dissuade them? Are they panicking now that I am so close to my goal? She felt a knife stab through her heart and anger broiled up through her veins. Twilight Sparkle had just reached a hoof out to key her ship’s communication suite when another dire message flashed on her front canopy.

Hostile sub-space scan found valuable cargo.

“Valuable cargo?” Twilight spoke out loud to herself before pressing the switch to broadcast on all frequencies. “Hello? Captain? What are you looking for?” Too late she understood the significance of the probing when she waited for a response that would never come. Instead of a friendly hail, the dreaded skull icon once more appeared in front of her with a new alert.

WARNING – HOSTILE SHIPS ON APPROACH.

The horseshoe dropped at the moment when her pulse drive sputtered and died, leaving her with only her traditional sub-light engines to use. Though it definitely needed a little calibrating, the trusty inter-planetary drive had never failed on its own before. What now began to terrify her was the fact that if the Captain and his fighter wing chasing her had such technology to be able to remotely shut down the engine, they would have surely used it by now.

That only leaves one possibility… pirates! Twilight Sparkle’s eyes shot to the intervening distance between her and the planet. The numbers dwindled down but nowhere near quickly enough for her. She had met her fair share of aliens in the beginning parts of her journey, but they all seemed too callous, too distrustful, or too violent for her taste.

Twilight felt the cold creeping tendrils of fear sliding over her mind. Her darting eyes dashed across the expanse of stars outside of her canopy, looking for any sign of the approaching pirates. In a panic, she gripped the pedals on her control yoke to reignite her pulse drive. Instead of the reassuring high pitched wailing she associated with her inter-planetary thruster, all she heard was a pitiful moan as another warning flashed on her canopy.

Pulse Engine Interference Detected.

“No… no… no… No!” Twilight Sparkle repeatedly squeezed the accelerator triggers on her control yoke but the engine refused to start. All of a sudden, something struck her ship hard and then again, and again. A steady rhythm of hammer blows rocked her little spacecraft fore and aft, while the view outside the cockpit was replaced with a blinding fusillade of infernal red light. Somepony was screaming and only when the attack had ended did she realize that it had been coming from herself.

Whimpering in panic, Twilight ramped her sub-light thrusters to full and she pulled the exploratory craft in a tight turn away from the lonely planet. It represented the only safety she had but she knew she would never make it in time. The first strafing run had hit hard, and her eyes scanned over the system readouts in front of her. Luckily it seemed her shield had borne the brunt of the attack.

Shields at sixty-seven percent. Twilight worked on the math through her head as stars swung about at dizzyingly speeds. She spotted the nearest cluster of asteroids and vectored in towards the densest region she could see. I need to find cover.

The gangly insect-like spaceship rocketed around the outermost asteroids, neatly avoiding any of the tumbling bolides. As she placed a house-sized rock between her and where she thought her attackers might be, a line of glowing red photon shells flew by harmlessly missing her by dozens of meters. They didn’t anticipate that turn. Twilight felt a small rise of elation grow in her chest. Maybe I can get through this.

No sooner had the thought formed in her head when another pirate ship unleashed a much closer burst of its starship cannon. They stitched a line across a mountainous asteroid in front of her ship, blowing off huge chunks of it. Twilight bit down on her tongue with concentration as she spun her ship through a hole that extended all the way through the floating rock. On the other side, she yanked back on her yoke just in time as another incoming wave of fire passed right through the empty space where she would have otherwise been.

Twilight Sparkle continued the turn, coming up and over the now donut-shaped asteroid, where she could now see the pirate fleet chasing her. Seventeen ships! Any inkling that she had felt about escaping unscathed trickled away completely. In its place, she began to feel the inevitability of her inescapable fate.

The nearest hostile spotted her and it pulled up to bring its weapons to bear. Before the pirate could open fire, Twilight answered with her phase beam; the lone weapon she had installed on her spacecraft. For a split second, twin brilliant columns of golden light snapped into existence and linked her ship with the aggressor’s. Then, just as quickly as it happened, the lights vanished and the pirate’s ship broke apart in a tumbling explosion of flame and metal.

Her unexpected retaliation threw the incoming fleet into disarray, and the rest of the pirates scrambled to avoid her oncoming vessel. It didn’t dissuade them in the slightest, as she could see them coming about on her radar, but it bought her a few seconds at most. She took advantage of the respite and threw her ship off to the left at full throttle, hoping to reach another group of orbiting asteroids.

Sixteen versus one. I can’t outrun them, and I can’t use either of my FTL drives with their jammers activated. Twilight’s ears fell and she closed her eyes shut as the only option she had dawned on her. I have to try to fight my way out. A glance at her ship’s shield and hull integrity answered the unspoken question about her chances in the upcoming battle.

With nothing else she could do, the alicorn princess narrowed her gaze and kicked her thrusters around to turn back towards the pirate fleet. Already, the much nimbler vessels had formed up in a chevron formation aimed straight at her. Twilight Sparkle let out a primal yell, gripping the phase beam’s trigger as every ship opened fire simultaneously, and the universe filled with light.