Author's Note

Here it is, my longest chapter yet! Sorry 'bout the wait.

III: (Back)Story Time

Chapter Three

Not long after the boost had weared off the ship gradually fell to its main top speed. They cruised for a little bit, waiting for the FSD to charge only to be interrupted by a hail from a large ship that was approaching at a very rapid pace.

“Stop your ship and cut the engines, this is the system police!”

“Affirmative sir, proceeding to do so now.” Record replied swiftly. Throwing back the throttle controls to zero percent. The ship pulled alongside mine until the cabins were across from each other, each commander staring at the other. The other ship appeared to be an Anaconda, one of the larger ships a seasoned commander could buy. The nameplate on the side read ‘Grey Ghost’

“Identify your callsign immediately!”

“This is Commander Romeo Echo Charlie, I come in peace.”

“We did not ask about your intentions. We are detecting another lifeform in the vessel, what is it?” Asked a more calm voice. Most likely being the copilot of the vessel.

Lunar stepped beside Record in the cockpit and picked up an old looking microphone. “This is Commander Lunar Sky, My ship is still in the station, under pirate control.”

There was a long period of silence before he responded to Lunar. “You may proceed to the nearest station that is not this one. You are to have your apprentice give a full report of what happened in there, Captain. Have a good day.”

The Grey Ghost began to lumber off toward the station, it’s engines growling as it slowly slipped off out of view.

Record was in awe for a moment before he started to question Lunar. “I’m sorry but, did you know them or something?”

“Eh, I’ll tell you later.” She said as she started to walk back to her seat.

“Hmph, you better. I hate being out of the loop. Also what did they mean by apprentice? I am NOT in need of tutelage.”

She just giggled.

There was not much talking on the way to the other starport, which turned out to be just a small orbital station around a rocky moon of a gas giant. The planet was enormous, with its swirling clouds above its surface. They did have to wait a considerable amount of time before they could land with the sheer amount of police ships that were coming and going. The pair was eventually given permission to land, which went off without a hitch. The ship descended into the station to the sound of some distant cheering and hoof stomping. Record powered down the systems, only to hear a ‘clunk’ come from outside the ship.

Looking out the window he mused, “That’s odd, I didn’t order them to refuel us.”

“Hmm, it must be complementary. How nice.”

“I’m going to go have a look. Care to join me?”

“Yeah, why not. Nothing much to do in this ship anyway.”

They descended down the ramp where a group of ponies and oddly, one hippogriff were waiting. The hippogriff was quite large in comparison to the ponies, and to some of the griffons Record had previously encountered. He was also curiously colored, being all white with blue stripes horizontally across his legs, and a yellow beak. And his tail was pure black except for a blue stripe running the length of it. Around his waist was a belt that held a sword on one side, the hilt being partially covered by his wing.

“Ah, Lunar! You escaped, and rescued somepony. Congratulations!”

“Officer Gerret, good to see you again, and no, Record here helped me escape. This is his ship, after all.” We all looked at the ship to see that it looked completely different than before, being a white and shiny chrome instead of the dull green it had once been.

“So it is.” He mused as he made his way toward Record slowly, the soft clicks of his razor sharp talons hitting the ground could be heard as he walked. Their eyes met and he stared Record down, making him immediately freeze in place. His eagle-like eyes seemed to see right through him, judging everything he had done in his life up until this very moment, weighing his soul like the legend of Anubis, seeing if he was even worthy of speaking with him. Record was sweating in fear, but held his ground until they were beak to snout with each other.

Lunar rolled her eyes and spoke sternly, “Gerret, leave him be.”

He pulled away and looked at Lunar sadly, “Aww, relax, I was just having some fun.” He looked back at Record with a softer expression than before and offered his talon to shake, “Chief Officer Gerret Whitewing, pleased to make your acquaintance.”

“Commander Record Shatter, and likewise” he responded, accepting his hoofshake.

He smiled, “We are just topping off your fuel, free of charge, now come along you two, I was promised by the captain of the Ghost that I was going to get a full, detailed report on the events on that station.”

It was horrible. It took at least two hours, and Record had to tell EVERYTHING that he had done from the moment he entered the station until the encounter with the Grey Ghost. After that, he was not allowed to leave and had to sit there while Gerret and Lunar talked, catching up and just talking about this and that. Just as he began to doze off Gerret decided that his torture was over.

“Alright,” he began, “Record, we are going to bring your into the Federation. You seem like a good replacement for one of our more recently… retired commanders. What do you say?”

“I’d be honored to join.” He received a smack upside the head from a less than pleased Lunar, reminding him that he forgot something. “Ow, sorry. I’d be honored to join, sir.”

“I am glad you accept, now your first mission is a supply run to the station called Hutton Orbital, in the Alpha Centauri system.” Lunar looked mortified, but relaxed and casually asked to go to her locker to grab some things and Record was told he could go back to his ship.

He returned to the ship to find it had been modified a bit. In a short amount of time the fuselage had been extended slightly, making room for a co-pilot’s seat directly behind the pilot’s. There was a note on the dashboard that read:
Commander Record Shatter, We at the Federation are pleased to hear you have accepted the offer to join us. In accordance with our laws, your ship now partially belongs to the Federation itself. As such we have taken the liberty of upgrading your ship slightly. We hope you like it.
Safe travels, The Galactic Federation

“Huh, I should’ve read the contract, oh well.” he thought to himself.

He decided to catch up on some much needed sleep while waiting for Lunar to return. He awoke to her roughly setting her saddlebags on the ground.

She spoke as she put her respirator on, “Alright, let’s get this over with.”

“What’s the matter?” He asked

“The matter is, they are pranking us for your first mission.” She said as she sat down in the newly installed co-pilot’s seat. He went to his seat and thought of the mission details in his head, still not catching on to what she was talking about.

“Just forget about, you’ll catch on soon enough.” she said after a while.

He shrugged and took her word for it and pressed the button on the HUD to go up to the top of the hangar. He powered on the systems and took off, luckily, Alpha Centauri was relatively close to the system they were in, so only one jump was needed to get there. Upon arriving, Lunar was setting up a waypoint for him to follow, as she had been given her own holograms to use. He swung the ship around toward the waypoint and his jaw dropped.

“I-is that distance real?” Record asked to no one in particular.

“Yep, point twenty two light years to Hutton Orbital, and you get to fly the ship for those two hours.” She said, setting up what looked like a tablet to the hologram in front of her.

She put in some earbuds and started to watch a movie, leaving Record to make sure the ship stayed on course.

~<>~~<{}>~~<>~

Now we go back a thousand years, back when all the ponies, griffons and deer were still back on the home planet of Equiis. There were two sister Princess’ Who ruled over the ponies and raised the Sun and Moon. Among the ponies that were ruled over was one who went by the name of Starswirl, who looked to the night sky, and wondered what could lie beyond the small planet they called home. He studied what was already known, pondering and musing over various ideas in his head. He eventually made a plan to go up there, to see the heavens with his own eyes. The two Princess’ caught wind of this, and invited him to be the new royal scientist. He accepted, but with this new position, he had to give up on his old plans and dreams.

Things went from bad to worse for Starswirl, though. A rumor had spread through the kingdom, that the younger Princess of The Moon was having ‘relations’ with the young wizard. The young Princess Luna would have none of this. Feeling underappreciated and disgraced, she snapped. A new form had taken hold, turning her into Nightmare Moon. She made threats to bring eternal night upon Equiis. The eldest Princess of the Sun, Celestia intervened and banished Luna to the Moon. Feeling lost, Starswirl wanted to save her, turning to the deer of Whitetail for help. He gave them one of his journals, all of his plans, calculations and dreams for space travel. But what it also contained was the truth.

The deer were furious that they had been kept in the dark. Celestia was also enraged that Starswirl had betrayed her, and declared war on the deer. A war that was devastating on both sides and lasted a century. The Equestrians eventually won a hard fought victory. Starswirl, devastated that he had lost his love and started a war that cost hundreds of thousands of lives, disappeared from public view, and was never seen again.

About one thousand years Nightmare Moon returned from her exile, seeking to carry out her plans from a thousand years before. But six ponies stood up to the threat, and returned her to her former self. The Sun and Moon ruled together once again. The de facto leader of the six who rebelled eventually became a Princess herself, the Princess of Friendship, Twilight Sparkle.

But all this bliss would not last, however. An archaeological expedition exploring the Whitetail woods, came across a small earthen hut seemingly in the middle of the woods with the remains of a unicorn and a small chest inside. The chest contained various articles of clothing, numerous letters, and a number of journals dating all the way back to before the war. Everything the ponies knew was a lie.

The Princess’ had known of Starswirl before they had recruited him to the castle staff. The Lunar Princess had been watching his dreams, keeping track of his thoughts and ambitions. As soon as he had a good enough plan for space travel, the diarchs stopped him. The scandal was not planned, but they worked with it. Luna would scare everyone from looking at the sky with her Nightmare Moon character. In truth, she was not banished to the Moon. She stayed on Equiis and out of public view, still communicating with Starswirl through his dreams. Somehow she had let it slip to him that they did not actually control the Sun and Moon, but only said so to receive worship from the dull minded ponies.

Feeling betrayed, Starswirl turned to the deer to expose the diarchs. Luna knew he would this, and told Celestia who sought to stop the deer before they could let everypony know, by killing them. When the Equestrians won, he knew Celestia would do everything within her power to track him down, leading him to leave the only home he had ever known.

Revolution was brewing in the hearts of the Ponies after the archaeologists made this knowledge public, with Twilight being the tip of the spear, for she was left out of the loop, being a scientist. The castle was stormed. Celestia, knowing there was no way out, fled. Luna accepted her fate and was allowed to live. Now leaderless, the ponies sought democracy and held an election. Oddly enough, though she wasn’t even running, Twilight was voted in unanimously by the population.

At the behest of her subjects, Prime Minister Sparkle heavily invested into research of space travel, leading to the first space flight after three years, and then the first Moon landing just five years after that. It was a renaissance of sorts, around two hundred years after the initial flight, they had the technology to travel to other systems and land on other planets with the Frame-Shift-Drive, based on sketches and predictions from Starswirl’s journals.

The planet Equiis’ leaders all came together and unified the planet under one flag and leader, Prime Minister Sparkle, and started spreading her influence across the galaxy. Though this was not without some opposition, of course. Those still loyal to the original two leaders set off to start their own government led by none other than Princess Luna (now Queen Luna) herself with Princess Cadence, Luna’s niece. It was peaceful at first, but when the two factions borders clashed, it led to the First Interstellar Border War that ended in stalemate.

Now that leads us to present day in the year of 3303. Prime Minister Twilight’s Federation and Queen Luna’s Imperial Family both controlling half of colonized space, each vying for more control of the other’s territory in a war-but-not-really-a-war kind of way. The Federations HQ being on a neighboring planet to Equiis called Concilii in the system of Sol, and the Imperial Family ruling from the system Capitol on the planet Nova Equiis. And Equiis is now just a popular tourist destination, a monument to how life used to be before the planet became enlightened.

Still no one knows where Celestia, Sol Invictus, disappeared to. The search efforts on Equiis still go on to this day, with barely anything turning up, and any evidence deemed useful by the federation will net you a sizable amount of bits. Some say she might have died, others say she is among us in disguise, living out the rest of her near-immortal lifespan as a commoner. A sad fate for someone who had been royalty their whole life, but then again, no one is really quite sure.

~<>~~<{}>~~<>~

Lunar set down her earbuds, “Well, that wasn’t the worst movie I have ever seen, but it certainly wasn’t the greatest either. How you doing up there Record?”

Some grumbling was heard but not much else.

“That’s how I was when I first came here too. Your head gets used to it, but your backside never does.” She remarked, shifting and stretching in her seat.

“You act like you’re older than me.” He said staring at the star they was heading towards, a faint shimmer of light was orbiting around it. The target was in sight.

“That’s because I probably am kiddo.”

“What? No, impossible. I refuse to believe that.”

“You better believe it kid. I am about to be fifty in a few months time.”

“Jeez. I just turned twenty. You look good for your age. I guess that’s what ponies want though.”

“Yep, it does take a lot to stay looking like this, so any and all praise is appreciated darling.” She said in a Rarity-esque manner, earning a chuckle from Record. It was still weird to him hearing her use her respirator, and also hearing his own voice come through the helmet. He laughed softly at the thought of what it might sound like without context, two gruff ponies complimenting each others looks and giggling like fillies.

It was quiet for the rest of the time, Lunar stared out the window and did periodic maintenance checks while he flew the ship. Finally after another thirty minutes of flying, they arrived at the isolated, well, truck stop for lack of better term. The ship made touch down and entered the hangar where they were being waited on by a group of worker deer who right away set about unloading the supplies from the back of the ship.

“Huh, even in this day and age the deer are still mostly isolated from the rest of society.” Record commented.

“Maybe they like it that way. Being just with their own kind.” Lunar replied.

“You’re probably right. Say, do you know why I barely see any other bat ponies like yourself?”

“Oh that’s because most of us turned to exploring, only returning to collect their reward and then they’re back to isolation among the stars.” She said looking nostalgic.

“That sounds like an adventure.”

“You think you’d be up to it? That’s a long time to be out there, not to mention the danger along with it.”

“Such as?”

“Oh ya’ know, running out of fuel because you find too many brown dwarfs you couldn’t scoop fuel from. Having a chance meeting with another lone traveler with a bloodlust who knows that nopony can hear you scream that far from civilised space. And there's also the possibility of aliens out there.”

“You really believe in that nonsense?”

“You never know.” She said in a sing-song voice before leaving to oversee the unloading. Record shook his head at the thought. There was no such thing as aliens, all of the sightings that he heard about are from ponies who have been out of contact with society for too long. Ponies who are obviously crazy. Or at least that’s what he thought.