Sleipnir Colony - A Short Story Collection

“Settle down class!”

It was a Thursday on Sleipnir, nothing hugely remarkable about it. Vast Knowledge was sitting at her desk, her eyes drifting over the register as she marked the last student down as present. She let the pen drop from her magical grasp onto the sturdy surface and moved her hefty frame from the seat, a slight sucking noise as her rear unhinged itself from her chair. She looked at her students, still young, but a number developing double and even triple chins already. From an early age ponies had ingrained that bigger was better, usually the lightest one in the group suffered terrible teasing.

The class fell silent. “Today is a history lesson, you have a practice paper coming up and I’d like you all to do well. It is on a very important subject.” She smiled, seeing a hoof shoot up. “Yes?”

“I-Is it about the founding of the colony?” One student asked, just a little too eager.

“Well...yes, and no - mostly no. I am taking you on a little journey this morning. Let me load up the holo-screen and you’ll see.” The mare said, pressing a chubby hoof into the side of her desk where a number of controls were located. The lights dimmed and the screen flickered to life, a large image of the Equestrian flag shown on screen.

“Now who can tell me what this is? Anypony? We covered it only a few weeks ago…” She said, her voice dropping a little when no hooves went up, until a student towards the front raised theirs and spoke. “Um...flag of Equestria?”

“Yes! Well done, this is the flag of the Equestrian Empire. Well, back then it was just all ponies united under a single banner, but as we moved into space and founded colonies it became the flag we carried as well to remind us of home.” The teacher continued, this was her favorite story to tell her students.

“Ponies did not always live on lots of planets you see, we all came from one place. Equestria.” The screen changed, showing a rather idyllic image of rolling green hills, a few ponies walking down a dirt track. A few students gasped.

“They’re thin!” One blurted out, making Vast Knowledge chuckle a little.

“Indeed they are! Ponies of many moons ago were indeed thin. Eating as we do today was not considered the norm.” She gave a pause as more inevitable gasps filled the room. That fact always seemed to get them. “I know, hard to imagine isn’t it? But believe me when I say it is true. Our race was not always big and hefty! Ponies of those times did not enjoy the benefits of food surplus we have today, or the technology such as grav-pads and other conveniences. In fact being fat was rather unheard of.” She said. The screen changed again, this time showing a few slightly tubby ponies alongside some thin ones, who looked a little uncomfortable at the big ones sizes.

“Around 700 years ago, things started to change. Without going into too much detail the planet often suffered great strife and threats that caused ponies the need to be agile, quick and light. These traits helped them survive, but this way of life would not last forever. Eventually the planet was tamed so to speak, we ruled all and kept it in check. There was no more threats to face. This is when the first ponies you might recognise today, in terms of size, started to appear. With nothing that needed to keep them agile, ponies began to enjoy themselves, as a big part of that enjoyment was eating.” She said, pressing the controls again causing the next slide to appear. This showed the same ponies as before, but this time all were fat, and the original fat ones showed even greated size.

“It quickly gained traction, as you can see. It was almost the fashionable thing to be big. It was around this time that royalty also started to take an interest…”

The screen changed again. This time three very blobby ponies were shown. One student piped up at the back of the room. “They’re not so big! The visiting Equestrians are bigger!”

“Yes, but remember this is when this sort of thing was still new to us. You are looking at three of the princesses who still rule us today. The white pony is Princess Celestia, the largest of us all. The dark blue one her sister, Princess Luna, who almost rivals her sister for size. The purple one is Princess Twilight Sparkle, who covers a large amount of her home town, Ponyville. At least she does these days. As you can see from this historical photo back then they could still fit in the same room!” She chuckled, moving the slide on.

“Eventually however, after many hundreds of years of this behaviour, it was starting to take its toll on the planet. Food was becoming less plentiful, and the sizes ponies were reaching was meaning that within a few hundred years, unless something was done, there would be no more room on our homeworld.” She watched the screen click over, it now showed a number of multi-coloured blobs that covered the rolling hills before. “What you see here are the new larger residents, not much room hmmm?”

The class continued to look, not many speaking as the slide once against changed. “The ideas for colonies came but a mere few hundred years ago. At that point the large residents of the homeworld were needing a way to continue expansion, in more ways than one I might add!” She laughed at her own joke, none of the class said anything. Some years it hit, others it missed, this year was a miss. She brushed it off and moved on with her presentation.

“Whilst magic has been a mainstay, not all ponies have magic. Technology was continuing to improve, and at the time science ponies were looking at offworld transportation. Princess Celestia herself took a keen interest. A way of keeping her population expanding was found, rewards were offered for those who would take up the role of founding new worlds. Bigger rewards were offered to those who would be farmers to feed the new worlds and the homeworld. Within but a few hundred years Equestria now holds a hoof-full of roughly 38 colonies in various clusters of its local and neighbouring star systems. This number grows each year, and faster as new worlds suitable for habitation are found.” The slide had changed again, it showed a number of large ponies planting the Equestrian flag on an unknown planet.

“These days, Equestria is seen as not only the homeworld, but home of the privileged. Only royalty and ponies of great status make their homes there. The two you may have heard visiting the colony are farmers of a long line of prestigious farm ponies who have plied the princesses with food for generations. Farmers of that ilk are seen as some of the highest of society, not just on Equestria but all over the empire.” The students still listened as she spoke, clearly interested. The slide changed a final time to show the main town square of the largest city on Sleipnir with ponies of varying sizes gathered.

“Because of this, we are free to continue to gain as we please. Most ponies as you know have their size dictated by their profession and status. The larger they are the more prestigious their job or position. There are some exceptions of course, but that is a good rule of hoof.” She finished, letting the class soak in the information. She tried not to overload them as there was only so much knowledge the brain could hold.

“Now I know you all might have some questions, but by my clock I make it break time. I have a little more to tell you, but we shall continue when you return. You are all dismissed for second lunch.” She said, her chubby hoof pressing another control button as the room lighted up again and the holo-screen shut down. There was so much more she could tell them, but a break was needed. That was such a light overview she had gotten it down to a tee over the years of teaching it. She watched them waddle out. “Remember single file! Otherwise you’ll get stuck…” She reminded them, a few sighs from the group. Next sessions she would delve a little deeper with them, and plonked her fat rear down on her chair for a break herself.