To Land Among the Stars

CHAPTER ONE: A MODESTLY OUTRAGEOUS PROPOSAL

Deep breaths, Twilight, deep breaths. Everything is going to be fine, everything is—

“I think I’m experiencing some technical difficulties. I can’t seem to... uhh, I can’t seem to move my legs.”

Twilight Sparkle flared her wings exasperatedly. We’re supposed to present our findings in—she quickly checked the clock—two minutes, and he picks now of all times to get stage fright? And if Spike is late with the cart...

They couldn’t have had more important ponies waiting for them. Professors from the School for Gifted Unicorns, the top inventors from Luna’s college... and of course, the two beings that mattered most of all.

“Okay, Austen, let’s go over this again. We’re going to walk out on stage—“

“Mm-hm,” Austenite said.

“—I’m going to introduce us—”

“Check.”

“—and give a short introduction to our work—“

“Yup.”

“—then I’m going to hoof it over to you. And you’re going to…?”

The tan pegasus looked back at Twilight. He put on his most confident, easygoing smile, which almost immediately faltered. “…Panic?”

Twilight facehoofed. It wasn’t just the four months of research they’d put into this. This was the first time she’d been back in the capitol since her ascension. The first time she would be meeting Celestia not just as her student, but as an equal. She had to make sure Celestia wasn’t disappointed in her for declining to move back to the capitol. That required their plan to go off without a hitch. Their equipment she could test. Her partner? He took a little more time to get ready.

“Austen, we’ve been working on your public speaking skills all week. You practiced this before. You even spoke in front of the Ponyville town hall for the architectural review board!” she said in an exasperated whisper.

“I’m fine speaking in front of ponies!” he hissed. “It’s the Princesses I’m worried about! Do you remember the Princess attendance count at that town meeting? Zero!” he shot back. He worked his wings back and forth with nervous energy.

“Don’t I count as a princess?” Twilight deadpanned, giving her wings a little flap.

“Er, well... I mean, of course you do!” Austenite backpedaled furiously. “It’s just that... well, you’re always so friendly and nice and you don’t act like a Princess at all! ...Wait, no! I don’t mean that you don’t act like a Princess; you do! I mean just... not like Princess Celestia and Princess Luna would act. I think. Not all stern and imposing and all-powerful! It’s easy to forget!” He scratched his mane sheepishly.

“Besides the whole, um, horn-and-wings thing, I mean.”

Twilight facehoofed again.

“It’s going to be fine! Pretend that the princesses aren’t there, if that helps.”

“Easy for you to say. I’ve never seen either of the Princesses before, let alone talked to them. How can I possibly ignore them? They’ll be sitting there, all... big!... And doing their hair... thing!”

Twilight raised an eyebrow. “Hair thing?”

“Yes. That’s the technical term for it,” he said matter-of-factly. “I checked.”

Breathe in, Breathe out. Right. Logic. Engineers like logic, right?

“Well, if everything goes according to plan, we’re going to be seeing a lot more of them in the future, so it’s best if you try to get over your fears now.” Twilight laid a foreleg on his shoulder, but she could still feel him shaking under her hoof. “We’ve practiced this before: I start talking, and you jump in whenever you’re ready. I can cover the magical aspects of our work just as well, but I’m really counting on you to help explain the mechanics.”

The back door bumped open, admitting a tarpaulin-covered dolley, a small, green fin poking out behind it. “Hey, Twilight,” Spike said in-between heavy breaths.

Twilight frowned and looked at the clock again. “You’re late, Spike.”

The dragon shrugged off the accusation. “Almost late.”

Spike poked his head through the curtains, checking to see if the audience was seated. Behind him, Twilight could see that the lights in the auditorium were already dimmed. “Hey, they’re ready for you guys,” Spike reported.

“Are you ready with the display?” she asked.

“Yep! I made sure to bring a fresh battery from the library like you said, and it’s all ready to be rolled out.”

“Great job, Spike. Ready, Austen?” Twilight asked as she nudged Austenite along, the pegasus needing a little impetus to start walking. They walked side by side out from behind the curtains. “Good luck!” Spike whispered.

Before them, the dim auditorium was almost devoid of ponies. Out of a capacity of five hundred ponies, only twelve sat in the first row. Twilight recognized several unicorns as professors from Celestia’s school, all dressed up in jackets and work apparel. There were several earth ponies and pegasi from Luna’s College of the Sciences. And there, at the end of the bench, sat the Royal Sisters, flowing manes carefully tucked behind them. The ponies were on their best behavior in the presence of their rulers, but Twilight could see several of them sneaking glances at watches or working their muzzles in an attempt to stifle yawns.

She glanced quickly at Princess Celestia, who gave a small smile in return. Twilight cleared her throat before beginning. “Good morning, Princess Celestia, Princess Luna, mares and gentlecolts. My name is Princess Twilight Sparkle, former student of Princess Celestia and librarian at the Golden Oaks Library in Ponyville.” She gestured toward Austenite. “This is my good friend and associate, Austenite, formerly an engineer at Wright and Colts in Trottingham, and we’re here to talk about some of our findings on the development of Spell Matrices.” Twilight paused to smile, and to look over at Austen. Her partner said nothing, but gave the tiniest, almost imperceptible shake of the head, prompting her to continue. Twilight looked back at the audience.

“Normally, when you want something enchanted, you need a unicorn to cast a spell for it, and in all cases the spell will eventually wear off. So if you want something to be enchanted for long periods of time, you either need to infuse the spell with an enormous amount of magical energy from the start, which is particularly inefficient, or you need to periodically re-cast the spell. For earth ponies and pegasi, this requires having a unicorn around to help, which can be a problem in a town like Ponyville that doesn’t have a very large unicorn population.”

Some of the ponies in the audience shifted grumpily, annoyed that they had been called there for a remedial magic lesson. The princesses sat still, though, and Twilight continued.

“Gemstones are already used as focusing elements in complex spells, and we believed that with the proper setup, gemstones could be used to convert electrical energy into magical energy to sustain a spell without any further input from a unicorn. There was even the possibility of taking that idea one step further. If gems could be used to sustain a spell, could they also be used to cast the spell in the first place?”

That elicited murmuring from the gathered ponies as they started trying to work out the implications of such a device.

“It took several months of work, but we were able to build a spell matrix that can sustain a spell for a short time using one of the new developed chemical batteries.” Seeing that the presentation was going along smoothly, Twilight decided to turn it over to the engineer. He's had enough time to calm down, and besides, he’s better at talking to the engineers, anyway. “Austenite? Would you care to discuss the physical matrix in more detail?”

Austenite’s eyes went wide and he clenched his wings tightly to himself as everypony’s attention turned to him. “Well… uh…” He stopped and cleared his throat. “I-in order to demonstrate the concept more easily, we have prepared a small demonstration. Spike? Can you bring out the display?”

On cue, Spike appeared from behind the curtain as well, pushing a large cart, a white sheet covering some bulky machinery beneath it. There was excited whispering, pointed hooves, boredom and agitation forgotten. Ponies leaned in and set forehooves on the stage, peering intently at the cart, trying to discern what was underneath the cloth. Austenite even gave a spastic little shake, his excitement boiling over. With dramatic flair, Spike whipped off the cloth, revealing the contraption.

The spell matrix, about half a meter tall, looked like a spider turned to silvery metal. About a central axis, thin, curving arms branched out in all directions, each arm ending with a gem, secured in fine silver filigree. The gems came in all varieties, but each was the finest of specimens, expertly cut and polished. It had taken Twilight a sizable stack of bits to order those. The arms were articulated, with bolts and pins for adjusting the gems. Even unpowered, the alignment of the gems sparked a sort of familiarity in the unicorns present, as if they could discern the spell the matrix was attuned to by simply looking at the pattern.

“As you can see,” Austenite’s voice cut through the buzz, “the active components of the spell matrix, the gems, are held in place by these arms here. When a current is applied through them, they convert the electrical power into magical power. At first, we saw that power was drawn to any ambient enchantment.”

“We almost discovered it by accident,” he said in a rush. “Each spell requires a specific number, type, and orientation of gems in order to sustain it, but we built a sort of generic matrix that was able to sustain a variety of spells. After one particular test, power was accidentally routed through the matrix after the spell had died, and Twilight said she felt the spell start to cast again.”

A grin had crept onto his face as he talked, and the audience almost seemed to blur into the background. He was almost trotting around the stage, the animation returning to his voice as he relived the moment of discovery. Now, the audience was caught up in his excitement, too, like foals exploring some wonderful new toy.

“It turns out that if the matrix is in a close enough configuration, it seems to ‘remember’ the spell architecture, and with some fine tuning, Twilight and I were able to create a matrix which performed a spell entirely on its own.”

Twilight hid a smile as he remembered to pause for dramatic effect.

“We’d like to show that spell matrix to you now.”

Austenite set about double-checking the matrix, moving mouth screws, making small adjustments here and there, while Twilight resumed the speaking.

“Once powered, this matrix should cast a telekinesis spell on an object at a specific relative distance away.” Twilight conjured up a falcon feather, and placed it over a small dot she had marked on the stage beforehoof. Austenite connected a large chemical battery to some leads, and he, Twilight, and Spike retreated a few paces away. Twilight and Austenite thought they had accounted for any possible complication, but one too many mix-ups in her basement laboratory, and a few too many singed manes, had taught them the virtue of wariness. Twilight gathered her magic in case she needed to cast a shield around the matrix if something went wrong.

Austen threw a switch, sending blue sparks sailing through the air. Eleven ponies, three Alicorns, and a baby dragon watched the spell matrix. The gems in the matrix flickered and began to glow a pure white. The machine started humming, each gem producing a glassy note, the different pitches combining into an eerie, yet weirdly melodic sound. Austenite gripped a knob with his mouth to adjust the voltage to the correct level. The feather was bathed in a faint miasma of matching white color, which grew more opaque as the humming grew louder. Nopony said a word as the feather began to twitch, then rise, ever so slowly, suspended only by the spell matrix. As the brightness and the humming reached a climax, it stopped, hovering a meter off the ground, revolving lazily about itself. Austen left the machine running for ten more seconds, then shut off the power. The magical field evaporated, and the feather drifted back down to the stage floor.

It was as if Twilight had stepped down from the stage and slapped every single pony across the face. The audience was speechless. Princess and pony alike sat there with mouths agape. The wooden bench creaked as ponies rocked back appreciatively. She could see it in their eyes—they had all just heard it, but nopony had truly believed it until they’d seen it with their own eyes. Some among them had suspected a trick; some unicorn standing offstage levitating the feather. Only a unicorn could make magic, they all knew that. The idea that some... thing, some inanimate machine, could perform their greatest gift? Preposterous! But to all the unicorns present, it was clear that there was no pony casting that spell. There was an otherworldly feeling to the magic: cold, uniform, and lifeless.

Twilight was prepared to see surprise on the ponies’ faces. She had certainly been in their horseshoes the first time the machine had worked. What she hadn’t been prepared for were Celestia and Luna’s reactions. Both of them looked as shocked as the normal ponies. She could almost swear that her mentor’s look bordered on alarm.

She hadn’t considered that Celestia wouldn’t know about this; she had always assumed that Celestia knew everything about magic. How couldn’t she have? Celestia was an alicorn who had lived for thousands of years. Her magic was powerful enough to move both of the heavenly bodies at the same time! Thousands of years of knowledge, the entire Canterlot library, and she had never come across something like this? Twilight knew that there were other researchers, some of them in this very room, probing the details of spellcraft, but she thought that the magical knowledge of ponykind was largely complete.

Have we discovered a completely new field of magic?

Celestia was the first to speak, her normally melodious voice reduced to a whisper. “Twilight… is this real? Did that spell matrix… did it really just do that all on its own?” The princess looked incredulously back and forth from the machine to the feather to her student.

Twilight’s eyes met her mentor’s gaze, and she slowly nodded.

“In all my years, I have never seen magic such as this,” Celestia said. Princess Luna, on the other hoof, expressed her opinion with traditional Royal Canterlot Subtlety.

“What an incredible machine!” Luna exclaimed, and the ponies present jumped to their hooves and gave Twilight and Austenite a standing ovation. Both of them blushed slightly, Twilight smiling sheepishly while Austenite beamed. Any shred of decorum was lost as the ponies crowded around the researchers and their invention, craning their necks to inspect every nut and bolt, shouting questions like ponies shouting prices at market.

“How much mass can the spell matrix lift?”

“—quality of gems does it need?”

“—fancy Crystal Empire magic? Your account of the charging of the Crystal Heart—“

“—able to create a pony-portable version?”

The commotion was overwhelming; Twilight and Austenite were almost bowled over by the crowd, when Celestia stood up and cleared her throat, the action silencing the other ponies almost instantly.

“I know that you all have questions for Princess Twilight and Austenite,” the Sun Princess soothed, “but I’m afraid they will have to wait. I’m sure in a few days they will be available for comment. Thank you all for coming, and for your enthusiasm.”

Celestia brought both Twilight and Austenite under one of her giant wings, herding them toward one of the corridors, while Luna replaced the sheet on top of the prototype and gingerly grasped it in her magic. The Royal Sisters quickly whisked them out of the auditorium.

* * *

“I’m so proud of you, Twilight. You have done wonderful work. Both of you have.” Celestia nuzzled Twilight affectionately.

“Thank you, Princess,” Twilight responded, returning the nuzzle.

After the presentation, Spike had gone off to enjoy a well-deserved break, and Twilight and Austenite had accompanied the Royal Sisters into a private study somewhere near the princesses’ personal chambers. The room was cozy, with a fire combatting the chill of the early spring day, and rows of bookshelves lining the wall. Luna sat perched in a high-backed chair, while Celestia sat with Twilight and Austenite on the rug. Austenite, to his credit, seemed to be more at ease in the presence of royalty than he had during the presentation. Celestia was examining their prototype in more detail, sometimes probing the individual gems with her magic, and occasionally asking questions about its operation.

“How on Equis did you come up with this marvelous idea, Twilight?” she mused.

Celestia’s prized pupil made a dismissive gesture with her hoof. “Well, after my friends and I returned from helping the Crystal Empire, I began thinking about the Crystal Heart. I was wondering how the Heart was able to focus the magical energy of the Crystal Ponies and cast the, well, whatever spell it was. We’ve been using gems and crystals to help focus spells for forever, but that still requires the unicorn to know what she’s doing. The amazing thing is, that without any of the ponies actually knowing the spell, they were still able to banish Sombra and cleanse the land. It was as if they were only supplying the magical energy, and the crystal itself was shaping and casting the spell.

“Of course, it’s not like I could have just walked back and borrowed the Crystal Heart, so I needed to build something similar.” Twilight nodded at her partner. “That’s when I wrote to Austenite; I know enough about the magical aspects, but I needed an engineer to help with the actual design and construction.”

“And you came all the way from Trottingham?” Luna asked him. “Surely there are many capable ponies in Ponyville…?”

“Yes, Your Highness, but Twilight had met me before. See, Wright and colts was one of the firms that helped rebuild Ponyville after the parasprite swarm.” Twilight suddenly found something very interesting on the floor to look at, and Austenite chuckled. “Twilight was in charge of organizing the re-building and I guess she was impressed by my work,” he shrugged. “I... happened to be in Ponyville at the time, and...” he trailed off.

Twilight nodded and continued, eager to get past the part where she’d had a hoof in destroying the town.

“So Austen helped me build the first model. Originally, I was testing it by just channeling my magic through the device, which was tiring to say the least. But then Austen suggested that we try powering it with earth pony magic, with electricity, and well, Princess, you’ve already seen the rest.”

“Marvelous,” Celestia repeated.

“Indeed,” Luna affirmed. “Such a device will have a great influence on all of ponykind. Can you imagine, sister? With this device, anypony can create magic! Earth ponies could use such a machine to farm twice as fast. Menial jobs only possible for unicorns could be taken care of. Why, there may be no limit to what this can do!” It was the second or third time that Luna had reiterated that point.

“Yes, Your Highness!” Austenite said. “But remember, this is just a prototype. We can’t get it to run for a long time or move anything massive yet. But when we reach state of the art, it will probably take years to figure out all of the potential applications for a spell matrix. Automated farming, fabrication, that’s just the start. A spell matrix can be anywhere there’s a power source. Cast a levitation spell on a chariot? Suddenly you don’t need pegasi to pull it through the air anymore. But levitation is one of the more simple gravity spells. Some of the more advanced ones could have more... interesting uses.”

Twilight’s eyes widened, realizing where Austenite’s line of reasoning was taking him. Is this how he’s planning on bringing our plans up to the princesses?

Luna brought a hoof to her chin in contemplation. “We could use a pony like you at the engineering college, Austenite. You could do great things with our resources…”

“Yes, it certainly bears thinking on,” Celestia interjected. “But we will have to be careful in deciding how to introduce this new device to Equestria.” She laughed nervously. “My little ponies are still trying to get used to the idea of electricity. I don’t think we should reveal your invention just yet.” The Sun Princess’ voice turned graver than Twilight was used to hearing.

“Oh.” Twilight felt crestfallen. She had been looking forward to showing the princess her research, and had wanted so much for Celestia to approve, because all of their other ideas hinged on Celestia’s approval. She saw Austen squirm as well, but the determined look on his face told Twilight that he was going to press on. After all, he was the one who had initially thought of the idea, and he wasn’t going to be so easily dissuaded.

“I’m not sure you understand, Your Highness,” Austenite said quietly. Celestia turned to regard the pegasus, and Twilight’s stomach sank to her hooves. Despite risking the displeasure of one of the being who controlled the very sun, he pressed on. “We’ve already done some preliminary testing with a gravity reversal spell, which could be a more efficient way of achieving flight than using a conventional hot-air balloon.”

Technically true: they had done tests with the gravity reversal spell Twilight had used in the Crystal Empire, but none of those tests had been entirely successful. Twilight had forgotten to adjust the range of the spell matrix. They were just lucky that nopony had been in the library when gravity suddenly started pulling the books and all of the shelves up. Indeed, it was rather fortunate that there were no pony casualties, as Twilight was quick to admonish Spike whenever he brought up the loss of his painstakingly crafted breakfast.

But Austen was getting ahead of himself. They had agreed not to bring up the second part of their proposal if the princesses didn’t like the spell matrix. Although, it seemed that Luna, at least, was intrigued, Twilight didn’t really want to go ahead with it if Celestia wasn’t interested.

But Austenite was ready to take the plunge. He had gotten up and was now pacing about the room. “A craft outfitted with a gravity spell matrix could fly higher than a hot-air balloon, too. Maybe—“

“Austen! We said we wouldn’t!” Twilight tried to cut him off. Celestia turned to her, perhaps about to ask her to clarify, but Austenite stole the attention back with his next words.

“Maybe we could travel all the way to the moon.”

For a moment, everypony was silent, and all that could be heard was the crackling of the fireplace. Twilight, to her credit, managed not to instantly turn around and try to apologize to her mentor. “To the moon…” Luna repeated slowly, not in disbelief, but in a thoughtful tone.

“Yes, your highness,” Austenite said, his words taking up an almost reverent quality, “in a special craft. A boat, designed not to keep the water out, but the air in.” Now that he was committed, he explained in more detail. It became clear to the princesses that the two ponies had already given this some thought. “Even pegasi have difficulty flying higher than a certain point, so the craft would need its own reserve of air—“

“No.” This time, the simple word was enough to bring Austenite to a halt. The ruler of Equestria had brought her hoof down, and the princess, no matter how polite she was normally, was not used to her commands being disobeyed. Celestia stood, bringing her full height to bear, towering almost twice as tall as Austenite, evoking the days when risking the princess’ displeasure was to risk life and limb.

Twilight jumped in to try to distract her mentor from him. “Princess Celestia, I’m so sorry!” She ran up next to the pegasus. “It was just a little idea that we talked about. We weren’t even going to bring it up if you didn’t like the spell matrix! We can promise not to talk about it anymore if you want!”

“That is quite alright, Twilight Sparkle.” Celestia relaxed her tone a bit. “It is only natural for ponies to be curious about the world around them, and what lies outside that world, but sometimes it is best if the farthest reaches remain… unexplored. It simply is not safe for ponies to travel in space.” She bent down to rest her head on Twilight’s neck and sighed. “There are many dangerous things out there, Twilight. I wouldn’t want anything to happen to you.”

Twilight seemed taken aback by this. “Of c-course, Princess. I didn’t imagine that it could be dangerous. I wouldn’t want to make you worry.”

Celestia smiled. “Thank you, Twilight. Make no mistake, you and your friend have created a wonderful thing today. We just need to make sure that it’s safe for everypony.”

Austenite cocked his head to one side. “So that means…?”

Celestia gazed thoughtfully at the pegasus. “I want you to leave the spell matrix and its blueprints here so I can study them here in Canterlot. I’ll send Spike a letter when I’ve finished.”

“How long do you think that’s going to take, Princess?” Twilight asked.

“I’m not sure; I may have to send for experts from all over Equestria. It will probably be for the best if you return to Ponyville in the meantime.”

Luna rose from her chair and walked over to the spell matrix. “Fear not, Twilight Sparkle and Austenite. I will not allow your invention to gather dust on some shelf,” she said as she reached out to brush the device with her wing.

Celestia looked at her sister for a long moment. “That’s right. My sister and I will give this our highest priority.”

“Oh, thank you, Princess Celestia, Princess Luna!” Twilight hugged her teacher’s leg, and Celestia smiled again. Austenite, not on quite the same terms with the princesses, just felt that a simple ‘thank you’ would be sufficient.

“You’re quite welcome, both of you. Now, however, I’m afraid royal duty calls. Princess Luna and I are due to meet with the Gryphon ambassador, and it would be quite rude to be late. And if I’m not mistaken, you’ll have just enough time to catch the train back to Ponyville.”

Celestia led the ponies out of the room, and they took off to go collect Spike. Looking back over her shoulder, her gaze met Luna’s. Luna suppressed a sigh.

She knew that look, the one that Celestia reserved for… special occasions. That look meant that the royal sisters were going to have a chat when this was through.

* * *

Skinfaxi held a special meeting today. One of my informants described to me a wondrous device now in her hooves, one that could solve all our problems.

Have an agent ready on a day’s notice. I will contact you in the usual way. And damn the new ambassador- tell him nothing. You may work for him now, but I am still in charge of operations.

Mit ausgebreiteten flügeln, bruder.