Canterlot Castle, six months after Kovac’s assault
Archer

Five months. Five long, grueling months. That's how long I spent attached to Fireteam Osiris. And now that I’m home, I can finally begin to prepare for the next step in this journey. I was sitting outside the throne room going over some of the files for Operation Reflection: Princess Amore’s plan to find Dusk. As it turns out, he somehow survived going through the Nexus portal, and that was proving to be a bit of a problem. Apparently the memory orb that I had used six months ago imprinted his magical ‘fingerprint’ over my own, and as such the only way to tell the two of us apart was if we were standing next to each other. That in itself is the problem, as you can’t have one pony in two places at once. While Dusk obviously isn’t, the rules that govern existence don’t seem to care and reality has become, as Amore put it, unstable. To fix that, we need Dusk’s help to restore my own magic to its rightful state.

Admittedly I couldn’t help but think about how weak the idea seemed, given that a nuclear detonation was involved, but Amore had herself and the rest of the Royal Court convinced that Dusk was still alive. But how did I get here? Well for starters Dusk left me his group of misfits called the Ghosts. Did I keep them? Nope, I folded them into my father’s organization. But through that brief experience I learned something important. Thanks to his connections, Dusk had a set of power armor made for me. In fact, the same set that Osman said belonged to no-one in particular was meant for me.

The month after I underwent the augmentation procedures, and after I was back on my feet, I was attached to a Spartan fireteam for three months to train and get accustomed to the changes that my body underwent. I even took a ‘name’ for when I had the helmet on, taking it from my suit of armor. ‘Spartan Atlas’... That’s what Buck, Locke, and the others called me whenever we were in the field. I ended up keeping the latter half of the name, going by it after I returned to Equis and undertook some missions with the Northern Guard.

“Archer, are you paying attention?”

I finally sat up and paid heed to the voice in my helmet’s speakers. “You were saying something Grey?” I asked the AI that was inhabiting my suit alongside me.

“I was,” the AI replied as the grey ball that represented it flashed to life across the head-up display of my helmet. “I wanted to know if you’ve read Dart’s letter yet.”

“No, I haven’t. Go ahead and pull it up.”

Hi Archer. I guess it’s been a while, hasn’t it? I heard that you’d come back from your deployment with Osiris and went right to work with your dad. I’ve got to admit, it was something to see the headline ‘Atlas Strikes!’ plastered across my morning paper, with a picture of you dragging a drug-dealer out of a night club. But anyway, that’s not why I’m writing. I saw the doctor this morning and it’s official. I’m having a filly! I think I’ll call her Dawn… But enough of that. Next time I see you we can chat more.

I couldn’t help but smile once I finished reading the mint-green mare’s note. At least all was still going well for somepony… All I’ve done for months is train and prepare for the meeting that I was about to walk into. And when the guards finally opened the door and motioned to me, I knew right away that it was show time. As I stepped into the throne room, all the players were there: Celestia, Luna, Twilight Sparkle, General Meteor Shower, Blueblood, and Amore.

“Miss Archer, thank you for joining us on such short notice” Luna said, trying to sound as gracious as possible.

I pulled off my helmet and shrugged. “Well, I didn’t think that I had a choice.” As I looked at the assembled court, my gaze stopped on Celestia. She looked concerned, much more so than I thought would be reasonable given the fact that we were simply having a meeting. “Is something wrong, Princess?”

Celestia must have realized that her look was telling, because when I asked it disappeared rather quickly. “No, we just need to get this show on the road.”

Meteor Shower took the initiative and turned on a holotank that was sitting in the middle of the floor. It started glowing blue, and a large image of a starship appeared to loom over the throne room. “This is the UNSC Halcyon, the lead ship of a class of light cruisers of the same name. Thanks to Admiral Osman, she was pulled out of storage and transferred to us along with brand new reactors and a slipspace drive. While you were away, Archer, we’ve managed to get the ship back in full working order, as well as modifying the slipspace drive.”

“And just what is all of this for?” I asked.

“For Operation Reflection” Amore said. “Thanks to Twilight’s research and experiments with the quantum mirrors, we were able to devise a way to modify the slipspace drive that ONI gave us so it can function as a quantum portal projector, of course in addition to its standard functions.”

Well, I guess I should’ve seen this coming… Amore would’ve come up with a new way to travel around reality eventually. I just would’ve expected it to take more than five months of actual work. “Have any of these changes been tested yet?”

Amore was about to say something, but Celestia held up her hand. “Technically, that’s still classified.”

While hearing that didn’t alleviate my concerns over tampering with an already dangerous piece of human-designed technology, Amore looked like she was about to have an aneurysm. “Are you kidding me?!” She exclaimed. “How can you tell the pony that is supposed to lead this expedition that the tests we’ve run are classified?”

“Because it is, Amore, and Archer is technically not a member of the Equestrian military” Celestia retorted.

Meteor finally stepped between the two Princesses. “Look, we aren’t scheduled to launch for another month. I’m sure we’ll—”

BOOM!

The General was cut off when a large explosion rocked the castle. “Uh… what was that?” I heard Twilight ask.

I looked to Celestia and the look on her face from when I walked in had returned. “That was our time running out.”

The castle shook again, and a chunk of marble fell from the ceiling. Everything seemed to slow down as I watched it tumble towards Princess Sparkle, and all except Meteor Shower stayed locked in their respective places. He managed to tackle her out of the way, and the brick smacked into the back of his head. As he crumpled to the ground, everything sped back up again and I found myself on my knees turning the old stallion onto his back.

Celestia was right next to me and seemed relieved as she put her fingers to the General’s neck. “He’s alive, just unconscious.”

“And he’ll probably have a massive headache when he wakes up”, Blueblood retorted as he helped Celestia to her feet.

As Luna scooped up the unconscious General, a stray thought crossed my mind. Thinking back to my time with Osiris, I remember how Locke always said to trust my instincts. And right now, my instincts were screaming that something was very wrong. I finally just came out and said it. “You knew something was going to happen, didn’t you?” I said, directing the question at the Solar Diarch.

While the other still-standing ponies looked rather shocked at my blunt and somewhat rude question, Celestia actually nodded. “I did, but I thought that we’d have more time.”

“More time for what?” Luna asked as more explosions rocked the castle.

“More time to prepare”, Celestia retorted. “We need to launch Endeavor, and we need to do it now.”

“Wait, Endeavor?” I asked. “What’s Endeavor supposed to be?”

“It’s the Halcyon, we renamed it after it arrived.” Celestia replied. More bricks were falling loose from the castle structure, and the Princess only shook her head. “Listen to me, Dusk is the key to all of this.”

As her horn started to glow, I quickly pulled my helmet back on as Blueblood and Amore crowded around me. “I still don’t know what ‘all of this’ is supposed to mean!” I yelled.

Celestia nodded. “I know that you don’t… but you will.”

I was blinded for a brief moment by the flash that came off of the Princess’ horn. But as I blinked rapidly to clear the spots from my vision, I realized that I wasn’t standing in the throne room anymore.

“We’re on Endeavor…” Amore muttered as she approached one of active bridge consoles. “Celestia must have teleported us up.”

“Well no shit!” Blueblood exclaimed as he took a seat at the helm, stopping as he looked out the viewscreen. “Uh… where are the stars?” He asked.

Amore and I both looked out into space, and sure enough, everything around Equis was just pitch black. “Archer?” Greyscale said over my armor’s speakers. “Pull me.”

It took a second, but I realized what the AI wanted me to do. With a fluid motion that came mostly from muscle memory at this point, I pulled the datachip from the back of my helmet and slammed it home into the holotank next to the helm. The lights flashed, going from blue to grey, and a three-dimensional silver orb developed instantly within the confines of the tank’s projector. “That’s better…” The AI said. “Well I can say with the utmost certainty that Prince Blueblood is correct with his observation.”

“Then can you tell us the why, Grey?” I asked as I sat down in the Captain’s chair.

“For starters it appears that the stars are being blocked out by some sort of barrier comprised of an unknown energy.I’m taking copious sensor readings, and it also appears that the energy is also attacking Canterlot.”

“Damn…” Blueblood muttered.

“Damn indeed” The AI replied. “Hold on, I’m receiving an incoming message from the Paris.”

The bridge speaker crackled for a moment before smoothing out. “This is Admiral Baxter to all ships. Break orbit and scatter. I repeat, break orbit and scatter. This is not a drill!”

“Greyscale, prepare to jump” Amore ordered as she placed a golden amulet in a slot on her bridge station.

“Of course, plotting random—”

“No!” Amore yelled. “Celestia told us to find Dusk, so that’s what we’re going to do.”

“Understood”, the AI replied. “Prepare for void transit.”

The chair I was in vibrated slightly before a massive green portal opened in front of us that grew larger as we approached it. All of the sudden a second portal opened right next to it, and I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. “Grey… what is that?”

As the shape of the other cruiser passed us, both Blueblood and Amore dropped what they were doing and looked out the starboard viewscreens. “Endeavor to all ships, belay that order.”

We didn’t hear anything else as the Endeavor entered the portal. As the lights danced against the viewscreens, Greyscale made a sound quite similar to somepony clearing their throat. “Well, Archer… that was us.”

***

Location: Unknown
Subject: Dusk Light

Most ponies (or humans, for that matter) may not realize how slowly time ticks by. They might notice if they looked at a calendar, but for the most part they pay no heed.

Me?

Well, I’ve been dragging myself through every waking moment for the past six months. I should’ve died in Canterlot, but I didn’t. Instead I woke up in the hospital ward of the building that has been home for the last six months, with a snapped-off horn and wounds that would’ve killed an adult dragon. Yet here I am… bruised, but alive. I don’t know where or when I am, and I have no clue where home is.

By now, most ponies might have up and killed themselves. But I got lucky… the humans that found me have been rather friendly. They patched me up and put a roof over my head. All they asked was to learn about me and my species in return. At first I didn’t know what to think, but after one of the military officers gave me access to their archives, specifically interactions with other species and cultures in relation to something called the ‘Stargate Program’, I felt a bit more relaxed. To an extent I’ve even come to trust these humans, with one General O’Neill proving to be the closest thing to a best friend around here.

‘Here’ is obviously subjective. The humans call this place ‘The Pentagon’. I guess when you make a five-sided building to house your military command structure, a creative name isn’t high on the list of priorities.

“So, have you found anything interesting, Dusk?”

I looked up from the desk that I had taken over and saw the General walking into the otherwise empty office with two cups of coffee and an older woman following him. “Well, it’s all quite interesting, General”

The General rolled his eyes and sat down on one of the chairs on the other side of the desk. “Did you at least find the stuff about the alien worms that took over human bodies and claimed to be gods yet?”

For a moment I thought that the General was trying to be funny, but after a silent moment I came to the conclusion (once again) that this was him trying to be serious yet engaging at the same time. “You mean the Goa’uld?” I asked. Silently the General nodded, to which I shrugged. “Well, I did… about three months ago.”

The General nodded, then bobbed his head around slightly and leaned back into his chair. “So, what are you on now?”

I turned back to the pile of papers on my desk and shrugged. “From the looks of it, a lot of equations and math… for whatever reason I found this filed under ‘Destiny’ in the archive, but there’s a whole hell of a lot more stuff there.”

“What made you want to look at that stuff?” The General asked, his expression seeming to shift to a more serious tone.

“Well, it was one of the biggest files in the archive, so I figured I’d dive in and see what it's all about.” I said in return. The woman sitting next to the General seemed to be reminiscing, while O’Neill had furrowed his brow. “Is something wrong?”

O’Neill shook off his stupor rather quickly. “No, not at all. It's just… look, I’m still a bit raw over the whole Destiny mission.”

I sat up at that. “Why?”

“Long story short, about two years ago, the official funding towards the project was pulled,” the General explained, “We’re still working on it, but we’ve had to fold what we were doing in relation to Destiny in with other active projects. Add in the lack of communication from the expedition…”

“I think I understand.”

“Thanks…” O’Neill got up, “You know, I think I’m going to take a walk.”

The General ended up abandoning his charge as he hurried out the door, who turned back to me with a sheepish grin. “Did I say something wrong?” I asked.

The older woman shook her head. “Jack made bringing the Destiny expedition home a personal mission of his… there just hasn’t been much progress over the last few years.”

For a moment I wanted to ask how long the pair had been married but I quickly wrote the thought off. There was a far more logical explanation, I just don’t know it. “So what do you know about Destiny?”

The woman shrugged. “Well, about seven years ago, my son solved the power equation that the expedition had been struggling with. He was picked up after that… and I haven’t spoken to Eli for six years.”

“So you were talking to your son until about a year into his time with the expedition?” I asked. “Where exactly did they go?”

“For that first question, yes we have spoken. The communication stones—”

I held up my hand once I heard the woman refer to the strange technology that allowed minds to trade places. “So he’s far enough away where you need to use those weird paperweights to talk to him… and the equation, that helped them figure out how much power they’d need to power the stargate. Right?”

The woman nodded. “I don’t think I caught your name...”

“It’s Dusk.” I closed the folder on the desk in front of me. “And you?”

The woman shook my hand as I got up from my chair. “Marian Wallace. It’s a —”

“All personnel, we are at condition red!” A voice yelled over the loudspeaker.

I brushed passed Ms. Wallace. “Stay here.” I didn’t even look back as I rushed out into the hallway. As I tore off down to the control room, red lights began flashing. Armed guards began rushing about, but none of them seemed to know what was going on.

As I threw open the door to the control room, I nearly knocked General O’Neill to the ground. “Hey, watch it!”

I held up my hands. “Right, sorry!”

One of the technicians handed the General a clipboard. “It’s confirmed, sir.”

I tried to peek over O’Neill’s shoulder as he read the papers, but it was of no use. My next effort led me to the computers lining the room, but with heads and bodies blocking my view to the screens I had to admit defeat and try the direct approach. “General”, I gave up on any pretense of subtlety, “What’s going on?”

O’Neill handed the clipboard back to the technician as a grave frown developed on his face. “Isn’t it obvious? We’re under attack.”

Author's Note

Updated with Calamity's edits 3/7/18

Of course Dusk is alive, that's been established. But hey, he's on the other end of existence! Huh, I wonder who we'll pick up for this band of misfits along the way?

...OK, I do already know because I wrote that far, but still. We'll be picking up some supporting crew members for the Endeavor and her mission. But believe me when I say that this won't end with a return to Canterlot, oh no it won't... It'll only get far bigger from there.

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-Striker