Star Trot

Star Trot

Cue this as intro music.

“Space, the final frontier. These are the voyages of the starship Equestallation, on its mission to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and ponivillations, to boldly go where no pony has gone before.”

Chapter 1 - The Launch

Equestria, Canterlot Shipyards,

Stardate 64428, 0800 Hours, Local Time.

Captain Twilight Sparkle was trotting through the Canterlot Shipyards, looking for admiral Celestia, wearing her grey uniform with red edges(All uniforms were like that: Red edges for Command, yellow for operations, engineering and security and green edges for medical and science. On these edges were pips indicating ranks: One empty pip was cadet, a full one ensign, one full and one empty for Lieutenant Junior Grade, and that went up until captain.)

She was supposed to be meeting the admiral about her new command: The PSS Equestallation, PCC 1701, crewed by a minimum of 750 ponies, and a maximum of 4000. The unicorn’s mouth fell open as she walked past a window: Behind it she saw the majestic ship. It was larger than she imagined, but then again, the ship could carry 4000 ponies. It was around 2500 metres long, 400 metres wide and 120 metres high.

“Twilight!” a familiar voice cheerfully said behind her. “It’s good to see you again!”

“Admiral Celestia, likewise!” Twilight replied, bowing a little. Even though she and the admiral were good friends, she still had the habit of bowing and calling her Admiral(and princess sometimes, but Celestia her royal duties were mostly forgotten since the discovery of space travel. She had mostly served as the admiral of the Equestrian Federation)

“It’s just Celestia, or 'Tia for you.” The other replied. “So, you have arrived. That is your new ship, in case you hadn’t noticed yet, but I think you have.” She then said, pointing a hoof at the vessel outside the window. “The PSS Equestallation, new flagship of the Equestrian Federation of Ponies, with you as captain.”

Twilight couldn’t help but show a little pride. She had only been a captain for a year, and now she was captain of the Federation’s flagship already! Then, with a more serious tone than before, she asked “Who will be my XO?”

“Commander Rainbow Dash.” Celestia answered, “A very… energetic individual. One of the fastest Pegasi I’ve ever seen.  Your entire crew is quite… let’s keep it at… energetic.”

“Commander Dash?” Twilight replied, “I heard that she could have flown with the Wonderbolts, but chose to go to the federation instead.”

“That is indeed true. As for the rest of your crew… Your chief engineer is Lieutenant Applejack, chief medical officer Lieutenant Commander Fluttershy, chief counsellor Ensign Pinkie Pie, chief of ops Ensign Rarity, and as your chief of security the rather small dragon Cadet Spike. He pilots the ship as well.”

The last caught Twilight her attention. “A dragon? On  a starship? How does that fit?!”

“He’s a baby dragon.” Celestia simply replied, as if it was a normal thing to have a baby dragon as an officer on a starship.

Twilight raised an eyebrow, but didn’t continue on the matter: She trusted the Admiral, and so she trusted the Admiral her judgement as well. “When do I get to meet them?”

“You can board the ship within 15 minutes, and meet them on board. You take off in 4 hours.” Celestia replied with a cheerful tone.

Deck 5, Airlock, PSS Equestallation,

Docked at Canterlot Shipyards, Equestria,

Stardate 64428, 0930 Hours, Shipboard Time.

As captain Sparkle was walking out of the airlock Equestallation’s airlock, a pink, cheerful pony in a green edged uniform bounced past her. Then, the pony bounced back, and looked at Twilight.

“Hello, captain!” The pink pony cheerfully said, “I’m Ensign Pie, or Pinkie Pie, or Pinkie, or Ensign Pinkie, or counsellor Pie, or counsellor pinkie, or counsellor Pinkie Pie!”

Twilight, overwhelmed by the rather hyper introduction, figured this must be her counsellor. Still a bit flabbergasted, she said “Uh, nice to meet you, Ensign Pinkie Pie.”

“Oh, it’s just Pinkie! Everypony calls me Pinkie. Anyway, I bet you must be veeeeery busy with your captainy schedule, so I’ll be going!” Pinkie replied. But instead of going, she continued with: “Oh, have you met Commander Dash yet? Ooooh right, I bet you haven’t as you just came out of the airlock, how SILLY of me! And it will probably take you a while to find her, because the ship is HUUUUGE! Did you know that yet?, I bet you d-“

“Ensign…” Twilight interrupted the pink pony, raising a hoof. “I need to get a move on.’

“OOOH, right!” Pinkie said, “See you later, then!” and she bounced on towards her destination, waving at the captain.

After staring at where to the pink pony, Pinkie, had left, Twilight figured that she might as well meet her XO next, still a bit overwhelmed by the sudden introduction and the shower of words the Ensign had given her. Then, she commanded the computer: “Computer, locate Commander Dash”. The voice commands for the computer were useful, but a bit embarrassing at first, especially in crowds. It was as if you were talking to yourself.

“Commander Dash is in the Pegasus Flying Range, located on deck 7” the computer replied in its stale voice.

Twilight nearly replied “Thank you”, but got a hold of herself just in time. She had heard that the ship had a Pegasus Flying Range… A giant hall specifically designed for Pegasi to fly around. The rumours were that the holographic system there even supported clouds so the Pegasi could simulate weather. Most ships couldn’t fit such a thing, but as this was a flagship it was fitted with all the luxuries.

As Twilight trotted towards an elevator, she looked around the corridor, becoming more aware of her surroundings. This corridor belonged to the “Luxurious” part of the ship: It was a wide corridor with a soft yellow colour. Even though it was pleasant to walk in, it was deserted at this time. Everypony was probably too busy to be in the areas where all the crew facilities were. She entered the elevator she had been walking towards, and commanded “Deck 7, Pegasus Flying Range.”.

The elevator took off with a fast pace. These elevators could, if it were for an emergency, take you as far as 2 kilometres in 30 seconds! And they went both horizontal and vertical! No more stairways or maintenance shafts for her. Unless they had a power failure, of course.

The elevator came to a stop, and the doors slid open. She walked through the yet again deserted corridor, and took the first door to her right, labelled “Pegasus Flying Range”

As she stepped inside, her mouth fell open once again. It was an enormous room, with holo-projectors so good that she could actually smell the grass she was standing on, and the clouds above her head seemed real.

The place was more or less empty: There was only one Pegasus flying around. The Pegasus was blue, with manes that had all the colours of the rainbow, was flying very fast and was wearing a red-edged uniform, just like Twilight herself. When Twilight came in, the Pegasus descended to see who had entered. At the moment she saw that it was her commanding officer, she made a few loops and landed in front of Twilight’s feet.

“Good day to you, captain Sparkle!  I’m Commander Rainbow Dash” She said, nearly as cheerful as Pinkie. As she saluted, she said “Nice to meet you, and what can I do for you?” and offered her hoof.

“Nice to meet you too” Twilight said, and she shook the Pegasus’s hoof, glad that she could actually talk to this member of her senior staff. “I was just meeting the rest of my crewmembers and touring the ship, so nothing in specific right now.”

“Oh, can I come with you?” Dash asked, adding “I have nothing better to do at the moment anyway.”

“Uhm, sure, why not?” Twilight replied, and they left the room.

As they were walking through the corridor, Twilight asked “So commander, have you met the rest of the senior staff yet?”

“Yeah, I’ve transferred here together with most of them. We all had our previous posting together: The only one I haven’t met yet is that Cadet Spike.” Rainbow replied. “He’s a dragon, isn’t he?”

“Indeed, he is a baby dragon.” Twilight answered, as they walked into the elevator. “Deck 11, main engineering” She then commanded, and the elevator moved.

Rainbow was silent for a moment, and then asked, “How did a baby dragon get to serve on a flagship, anyways? Isn’t he a bit too… young to serve on a Federation ship?”

“I have no idea, but I believe that the admiral has faith in him, and if she has, so do I.” Twilight replied.

Rainbow accepted that explanation with a simple “If you say so.”. She did glance at the captain with a bit of doubt, but when her eyes met Twilight’s and she saw only certainty, she decided that she would trust the Admiral her judgement. She did consider making a sarcastic remark at this point to break the silence, but it wouldn’t be too smart to insult her captain on her first day. It would be better to wait for at least a week. And so her thoughts went on as the elevator continued on its path.

Deck 11, Corridor outside of Main Engineering, PSS Equestallation,

Docked at Canterlot Shipyards, Equestria,

Stardate 64428, 0930 Hours, Shipboard Time.

The elevator arrived, and the within it silence was broken as the doors slid open. Unlike the deserted corridors on decks 5 and 7, deck 11(at least, this part of deck 11) was full of ponies. Everypony was either talking louldly, galloping or busy with preparing the ship’s systems for launch. In contrast with the luxurious corridors on the aforementioned decks, these corridors were much smaller, hexagon-based tunnels with dark grey floors and a lighter grey walls and ceilings. Both Twilight and Rainbow made their way towards the double doors labelled “Main Engineering”. When the doors slid open, the bulk of the engine room was revealed to be behind it.

There were computer panels on the walls, and in the middle of the large room stood the FTL engine core. It was a brand new design: A bubble engine. It was a very tall core, clearly going up 2 more decks, as well as going down 2 more. Main engineering was positioned exactly at the middle of the core, with a class floor and ceiling, looking both up and down at the other levels of the hall. There were small elevators positioned in the corners of the hall that allowed for quick travel between engineering levels.

On the subject of the engine core: previous FTL engine designs required a lot of fuel and worked on more of a slingshot system. The engine would basically give out a giant burst of propulsion throwing the ship it was equipped on into light speed.

Now the ponies at the federation’s R&D department had come up with a much better design: This made a bubble around the ship, allowing it to travel much faster at the expense of less fuel, and they could actually turn while travelling. The bubble thing was complicated, and it took around a year to completely learn how it worked for an average pony.

While Twilight and Rainbow were admiring the core, an orange earth pony approached them. She had two pips on her yellow-grey uniform, indicating she was lieutenant.

“Howdy there, cap’n! G’day Dash” The pony said cheerfully. “I’m Applejack, lieutenant Applejack, your chief engineer!”. Just as Commander Dash did in her introduction, Applejack offered her hoof to the captain.

“Nice to meet you, lieutenant.” Twilight replied, not really sure what to think of her crew so far. Sure, they were friendly, but they were also rather… Eccentric. Not really her kind of types, but she would have to get used to it. “So… how are the preparations for launch going?”

“Mighty fine, but I kinda think that we’re launchin ‘er – the ship – a bit too soon. Not all systems are 100% dandy yet.” Applejack replied, with a bit of a worried tone. Then, a grey Pegasus behind twilight caught her attention. “Buck, Derpy, that plug ain’t supposed to go in there!” she warned, and ran off to help the grey Pegasus, saying “s’cuse me” to the captain and Rainbow.

“So, Derpy transferred as well…” Rainbow said with a tone that was a mix between amusement and fear. “I can’t see how this could possibly go wrong…”

“Excuse me?” Twilight said, rather shocked that her XO was talking like that about a crewmember.

“She’s a bit… clumsy…” Dash replied. “Her heart’s in the right place though. I meant no disrespect towards her.” She added upon seeing her captain’s shocked look with a little bit of shame in her voice. It was a bad habit of her to be insensitive things like that.

“Right.” Twilight said, deciding she would forget about this discussion as she turned her back on the core. “Let’s go to sickbay, I’d like to meet my chief medical officer.”

“Okay, wait for me!” Rainbow replied, back to her usual cheerful voice.

Deck 4, Corridor outside of Sickbay, PSS Equestallation,

Docked at Canterlot Shipyards, Equestria,

Stardate 64428, 0950 Hours, Shipboard Time, Stardate 6

Twilight and Rainbow stepped out of the elevator yet again, to find themselves in the more luxurious yellow corridor variant. This deck was a bit more crowded than the previous ones, as part of the junior crew’s quarters were here, but it wasn’t as crowded as it would usually be: Everypony was still preparing for the launch.

They slowly trotted towards the Sickbay doors, and stepped inside. It was quite a large room; Not as large as the Pegasus flying range or main engineering, but it was still of considerable size. Around 22 beds were positioned against the walls the left and right walls(11 each), all with a life support monitoring system panels above them, and on the far side of the room there stood 3 operating tables.

A yellow Pegasus with pink manes wearing a green-edged uniform was gently flying through the room, humming a tune whilst putting her equipment in their designated shelves and closets.

When Twilight and Rainbow entered they startled the Pegasus. She nearly dropped the tools she was carrying and let out a soft squeak.

“Oh, I’m sorry, we didn’t mean to startle you!” Twilight quickly said, surprised by the Pegasus’s rather scared reaction. “I was just touring the ship, getting to know the crew. I’m Captain Twilight Sparkle,” She then added, offering her hoof(this would be her third hoofshake of the day.).

“Uhm, I’m Lieutenant Commander Fluttershy…” The yellow Pegasus answered softly, cautiously accepting the Captain’s hoof.

Just as Twilight was about to say something, the doors of sickbay slid open again. To Twilight her surprise, a baby dragon in a Federation uniform(Red edged) entered. He had one hollow pip on his uniform, indicating he was a cadet.

Twilight greeted the dragon by saying “Hello there, cadet!” with a friendly tone.

The dragon was slightly surprised to see both his XO, CO and doctor in the same room, but quickly recovered from his surprise. “Hello captain Sparkle, nice to meet you! And you too, commander, and you too, lieutenant commander. I’m Cadet Spike, chief of security and flight officer. As far as you can call a cadet an officer.”

“It’s nice to meet you too, cadet.” Twilight said, looking at the tiny dragon. There were two thoughts going to her head. The first was something among the lines of “How will he reach his controls, let alone pilot the ship?”, and the second one “Aw, a baby dragon… How adorable!”

He then shifted his attention towards Fluttershy, who was clearly fascinated by the entrance of the ship’s smallest crewmember. “I came to deliver my medical files doc. The federation doesn’t have them yet.”

“Oh, uhm, alright. You can put them over there.” Fluttershy replied, pointing her hoof at the nearest medical bed, still fascinated by the dragon.

After a short silence, Twilight said “Well, it’s been nice meeting you all, but I should really go meet my chief of Operations.”, and she then looked at Rainbow to see if she was coming with her again.

Rainbow saw Twilight’s gaze and said “I think I’ll stay here for now. I’ll see you on the bridge in a few hours, captain.”

“Me too, captain.” Spike added to Rainbow her sentence, not sure if the captain wanted him to come with her. The little dragon seemed not to mind all the attention. Actually, he seemed to like it above all else.

“Alright, I suppose that we will meet again later.” Twilight said, and she left sickbay.

Deck 1, Main Bridge, PSS Equestallation,

Docked at Canterlot Shipyards, Equestria,

Stardate 64428, 1010 Hours, Shipboard Time.

After quickly consulting the computer, Twilight found out that her chief of ops, Ensign Rarity, was on the main bridge. She had yet again walked into the elevator and went to the main bridge. This was something she wanted to see anyhow: It was where she would usually be for the next couple of years.

When the elevator arrived, the doors slid open, yet again. Before her was exactly what she had imagined a command centre of a flagship to be. The back half of the room was slightly elevated, with a workstation on the edge of the elevation. On the back of the room were multiple smaller workstations, all with different purposes. There were both solid panels on the walls as holographic panels floating around, their colours in contrast with the white and grey walls. In the middle of the room – where the elevation ended – were two chairs. The Captain’s chair and the commander’s chair. Behind and above that was the Ops station, and in front of it was Security/Navigation. How the little dragon was going to manage both things at once wasn’t clear to Twilight, but she had faith in the admiral and the dragon. And, at last, in front of Navigation, there was  the main viewscreen.

There were three ponies on the bridge. The one who stood out the most was a bat-like pony, working on a security terminal in a corner, wearing a yellow-edged uniform. The bat-like ponies, or the Chiropterans as they called themselves were the first other species the Equestrian ponies made contact with. The Chiropterans weren’t a very trusting race, so not many of them served in the Equestrian Federation, but Twilight had heard that this one on the bridge, “Darkie Wings”, was quite friendly(Although some ponies described her as “Plain Creepy”).

At the Ops station stood a brightly white unicorn with a purple mane, complaining about her yellow-edged uniform to her colleague(who was the third person on the bridge). “Oh, I don’t see how they COULD pass this as acceptable. I mean, look at it! Whatever is this line doing HERE?! It is simply Unstylish! My word, the designer clearly has NO sense of fashion at all."

She broke off her flood of complaints as she saw the captain walk in. “Oh, good day madam.” She gracefully said with a small bow, surprised of her commanding officer’s sudden appearance(and slightly ashamed for complaining about the fleet’s dress code) “Fabulous to meet you. I am Ensign Rarity, chief of Operations”

Twilight had to force herself not to smirk. Seeing the mare complain about the uniforms, then seeing her being shocked and trying to recover from that shocked looked hilarious from her point of view. “Likewise.” She said, nodding towards Rarity her colleague, adding “Is everything going well up here?”

“Yes, everything is going as planned so far. My compliments to the one who came up with the release schedule.” Rarity replied. Even though she wasn’t impressed by the Fleet’s fashion designer, she clearly was by the one who came up with the schedules, as she just said.

By chance, the pony who organised the launch and came up with the launch schedules was Twilight, but she didn’t want to brag, so she simply said “I’ll relay that to the organiser. And now I’ll let you get back to your work. I will be in my office.”, and she walked towards the doors that were labelled “Captain’s Office”, nodding to Darkie Wings on her way.

The office was mostly what she expected: Not too large, but larger than an average office. There were two couches positioned against the north wall(as far as you had a “North” on a spaceship), and above them were windows that took up the rest of the wall. Nearly directly in front of her stood a sizable desk with a terminal on it. There was a comfortable office chair behind it, and several lamps were embedded into the ceiling.

Twilight sat down and got to work, looking over a couple of reports before the launch.

Listen To I Am The Doctor from the Doctor Who soundtrack.

Deck 1, Main Bridge, PSS Equestallation,

Docked at Canterlot Shipyards, Equestria,

Stardate 64428, 1200 Hours, Shipboard Time.

Nearly two hours had passed, and now the time had come to see if the magnificent flagship actually worked. Twilight, Rainbow, Spike and Rarity had all taken their positions on the bridge. A communications link was open to Engineering and Sickbay so the rest of the senior staff could speak with the ponies on the bridge during the launch.

“All departments, report.” Twilight commanded, both to her officers on the bridge and through the intercom. This was more of a ceremony than anything else: All systems were already checked and operational, it was just tradition to have all departments ready.

“Engineerin’ standing by!” Sounded through the commlink from Applejack, with a tinge of both excitement and nervousness in her voice.

“M-medical, standing by.” Was then said, again from the commlink, but this time it was Fluttershy. It was if she could barely get the words out of her mouth: The Pegasus was clearly scared to go into space, whilst behind her Pinkie Pie could be heard bouncing around, who sounded cheerful and excited.

“Security and Flight, standing by.” Spike said from the front of the bridge, turning his chair backwards to the Captain.

“Operations, standing by.” Rarity said from behind the captain with a proud tone. “And with that, all departments, standing by.”

“Good” Twilight said with a satisfied and  just as excited tone. “Cadet Spike, full power to thrusters and take us into orbit.”

“Yes captain!” The young dragon replied, turning his chair back to his terminal. “Full power to levitational  thrusters” he repeated, and he pressed a few of his buttons. Upon that, the ship began to move as the thrusters fired.

Slowly the large vessel raised from its docking clamps, leaving behind large amounts of smoke. The ship took off horizontally at first, but then Spike slightly lowered the power of the aft levitational thrusters. The ship shifted until it hung there diagonally, with the gravity plating struggling to compensate as they were still within the Equestrian atmosphere: Ever pony inside the ship had to brace themselves to make sure not to fall over.

Then, Spike fired  the aft thrusters. These were much more powerful than the levitational ones, and the ship was launched out of the atmosphere and into Equestrian orbit.

Upon reaching orbit, he turned on the automatic stabilization thrusters, and turned his chair around with a proud look on his face. He wanted to say “I hope that after that you’re convinced to serve me gemstones at dinner!”, but resisted.

“Well done, cadet!” Twilight said, impressed by the dragon’s flying skills.

Then, there was a beep that Twilight knew to be the communication system, and Rarity said “We are being hailed by Admiral Celestia.”

“Put her on the main viewscreen, please.” Twilight commanded.

The Admiral appeared on the viewscreen. She had a very content look on her face, and said “Well done, everypony. You have successfully launched!”. Then, towards Twilight she said “You know what you are supposed to do captain. Good luck with your test flight!”, and she ended the communication.

Around two seconds after the communication had ended, Twilight said “Alright. We are supposed to make our test flight to Wheat Space Ten, where we will receive our first mission.”. Then she commanded through the still open commlink to Engineering “Lieutenant Applejack, activate the engine core and prepare for FTL travel.”

“Yes ma’am!” Applejack replied to the Captain, and turned to her staff. “You heard the cap’n, let’s buck this lady into jumpspace!” She said, after which you could hear cheers. Both from the commlink to engineering and the Bridge. Even in Sickbay there were some cheers(A huge one from Pinkie Pie, and  a soft “yay” from Fluttershy.).

There was a soft humming sound as the main engine core was activated. Down in engineering, the core lit up like a Christmas tree, glowing a sharp blue light.

“Cadet Spike…” Twilight said with a smile, “FTL Cruising speed, headed towards Wheat Space Ten.”

“Course laid in” Was Spike his simple answer. More was not required.

Twilight took a deep breath. “Engage.”