///LOCATION - NLTT-512-3A/EQUESTRIA/CANTERLOT///TIME - 18:20 LMT///DATE - 13-05-2232///

As soon as Solar Streak's shift was over, he quickly went back to the telescope, in the hope of finding the object again. It took him some time to adjust the telescope, but after a while he was able to find it once more. He kept obesrving it, his curiousity growing and growing the more he looked.

Eventually, one side of the object started glowing, slowly becoming brighter as the seconds passed. Until suddenly, it created an incredibly bright light, shining like the stars scattered troughout Celestia's heaven. It was so bright, that Solar had to look away to keep himself from turning blind. When he looked at the object again after roughly a minute of rubbing his eyes, it was gone. Dissapointed that the object in the sky had dissapeared, he went back to his home. He was done for the day anyway, and he felt sleepy.

Back at home though, he couldn't stop wondering what it was that he saw; A spark, followed by a lightning cloud, out of which appeared an object with a red light, which didn't do much for hours, only to shine extremely bright and then dissapear. What could it have been? Was it a new weapon that was being tested by the Royal Guard? No, that wasn't likely, as he would have probably heard about it. Perhaps it was a project that was in development, and they were testing it? Maybe some kind of spacecraft?

"Impossible, that's the stuff from books, not science!" he thought, remembering the conversation he once had with a scientist at the Royal Canterlot University. "It's preposterous. There has to be a better explanation for what I saw."

Exhausted from a night full of pondering and mindstorming, Solar eventually tired himself out to the point of him simply falling on the ground. He couldn't think of any other explanation for what he witnessed. He knew he had to tell someone about this, but who could he trust? Wouldn't others think that he's crazy? What if they did, and they locked him up for his madness? He could only think of one pony he trusted enough to share this information with:

"Hey, is it okay if I come in? There's something I need to talk to you about." he said.

Lightning Sky looked at him with a concerned look. "Sure, come in." he said, opening the door wider to allow Solar to enter.

"Thank you, I knew you'd want to listen."

"Do you wan't a beer?"

"What do you think?"

"Two beers, coming up!"

Solar knew he could never get enough of his always joyfull yellow-coated friend. There was something about Lightning that always made him feel comfortable, possibly his positive energy, but more likely his seemingly endless supply of beer. He would never know for sure, and this was one of the few cases where the curious pegasus didn't mind not knowing something.

Solar was in the middle of pondering about the possible things the object that he saw could have been, when Lightning came into the room and passed a bottle of Hayneken his way.

"Catch!" Lightning yelled, startling Solar by doing so.

He caught the bottle with his wing just before it hit him in the face, and he looked at Lightning with an angry face. "Stop throwing stuff at me! You're gonna hit me one of these days!"

"Well, I haven't hit you yet, have I?" he said with a smirk on his face.

Solar was quite certain that he had, but he wasn't going to start a discussion on that. "You're right, you're right, but you still need to be carefull! If you were to hit me, my CO would want to know why I had a wound like that on my head, and I'd have to explain that I had been drinking!"

The red-and-white maned pegasus was confused by this explanation: "Huh, I thought you didn't have guard-duty around this time?"

"You're right, my shift doesn't start in another few hours, but since the changeling attacks have been picking up in frequency and strength, we received new regulations. No more drinking for any guards or soldiers, no matter if they're on-duty or not."

"Are the princesses really resorting to such measures to keep us safe? Seems a little bit over the top, if you asked me!"

"No, the princesses were not the ones who called for this action. It was Captain Armor. He recently arrived at the palace, and now he is calling the shots around here." Solar replied, clearly showing that he wasn't too keen on the new regulations either.

"Don't worry, I won't tell them anything. Unless you're a changeling!" Lighting jokingly said. "Anyway, wasn't there something else you wanted to talk about, or was that it?"

Solar remembered why he had come to Lightning Sky. The object. The strange thing that had appeared in their sky. "No, I do have something else I wanted to talk about. Today, while I was taking a break, I sneaked into the Royal Astronomy Wing, where I used the telescope. You know, the really powerfull one."

"Why were you in there? You could have gotten into trouble!"

"Pfft, since when do you care?" Solar said, trying to make it look like a joke, but somewhat failing by doing so.

"Hmpf, thanks. Good to know" Lightning clearly didn't like that.

"Oh come on, you know that was a joke!"

"Yeah, yeah. Was that it?"

"No, there's more." Solar said. "Whilst I was looking at the stars trough the telescope, I saw a sudden flash out in space."

"A flash? What kind of flash?"

Solar Streak tried to explain: "i don't know! I guess it was kind of like a lightning bolt. It was very, very, very bright!"

"Maybe it was just lightning?" Lightning asked.

"No, it couldn't be, because there was more. After looking around with the telescope, I found something that looked like a stormcloud, bristling with electricity, but it was strange. It was way up there in space. No pegasus can fly that high up!" Solar exclaimed. "And after a few seconds, the cloud started dissapearing, along with the electricity, and all that was left was a dark object in the place where the cloud used to be! It had a flickering light, but that's all I could see!"

"Wow, that is certainly weird! What do you think it could be?"

"I don't know, but as soon as I had finished my shift, I went back to the telescope, and I kept looking at that thing. Eventually, it started glowing, and then it was suddenly shining brighter than Celestia's sun! I was blinded by it, and after I was finally able to see again, the object was no longer there!" he explained, remembering all the events in fine detail. "I don't know what to do now! Maybe it is a changeling weapon? Maybe it's from some other place in the galaxy? What do I do?!"

Lightning Sky tried to calm Solar: "Relax, it'll be fine. We'll go to your CO tommorow, and we tell him everything we know. He'll know what to do."

"Are you insane?! You want me to tell my commanding officer that I went into a restricted area, and used restricted instruments?! Are you insane?!"

"No, I am not. If it really is a weapon, they have to know. He'll probably thank you!"

"Fine, but you're coming with me!"

"Ugh, if you really want me to."

Author's Note

Please keep in mind that this is my first time writing a story. Because of this, the reading experience might differ from stories written by more skilled writers. Names, locations, ships, technologies and events are inspired by various sources, including: Games - Elite: Dangerous, Star Citizen | TV - MLP:FiM, The Expanse | Companies/Organizations - NASA/JPL (Alcubierre Drive)

If you want your character to be featured as a human soldier, pilot, politician or civilian, or a pony civilian, politician or royal guard, please send me a message with the character's name, looks, characteristics, and role if you have any preference. All featured characters will be credited.

Featured Characters:
Lightning Sky - Oskar