A Second Chance

Aldair woke up in his new bed casually getting up and going through his morning routine, get dressed, brush mane, leave.

The ship was much bigger than the dropship which also meant it was much harder to navigate to where you wanted to go, in his case the mess hall.

“It’s a freaking maze in here,” he grumbled to himself. He walked around the metal labyrinth looking for some sort of exit.

He found the way back to the docking collar where he had come in but it seemed that it wasn’t the exit. Eventually he found another pony leaving his quarters.

Aldair simply followed him through the many passageways and corridors, remembering which turns to take to get back.

He followed the pony to the mess hall which was pretty empty. He sat at a small table in the corner and pulled out his small flask. He took small gulps and looked around the place. A few more tired ponies walked in and got drinks, no one that interesting though.

Capping the flask he attached it to his belt again and walked towards the exit. The day had begun and he had nothing to do. He thought of exploring the ship himself or heading back to his quarters and messing around with his stuff. But he thought of another idea.

A pair of stallions walked by and went down another corridor, he simply followed them, he had nothing better to do and besides, maybe they would go somewhere interesting.

He followed quite a ways behind. They were talking but he was out of earshot and could only pick up small bits and pieces of what they were saying.

“Have you……… yet?”

“No…finished…time.”

The pair turned a corner and couldn’t be heard any longer. Oliver closely followed and came to a big set of doors. He opened them and saw a large room with a few ponies sitting around in various places.

There were a few desks and tables and a couch littered around the place. The room in whole looked like a storage bay but it had been ‘redesigned’ to be a lounge of some kind. One of the ponies he followed noticed him come in and waved.

“Hey new guy! Why don’t you come and have a seat?” he said gesturing to a small desk chair. Oliver walked over and sat down.

Somepony looked at the guy who had invited Oliver over “Why invite him over?”

The red pegasus glared at the joker “Shut it you.” He looked back over at Oliver “What’s your name?”

“Oliver Aldair,” Oliver said.

“Nice to meet you Oliver, I’m Flare.” Flare was a red pegasus who had an orange and yellow mane. He seemed fairly young (barely out of colthood) to be a mech pilot but he seemed to be the only friendly face there.

The other ponies around began to introduce themselves as well.

Another pegasus spoke up, “Cobalt, nice to meet you.” Cobalt didn't seem too happy, he was the one who had made the joke.

Another winged pony spoke up but the wings were that of a bat pony “Grey Dawn, welcome to the guard.” For some reason that welcome didn't seem very warm.

Oliver started to feel a little outnumbered with all these pegasi when he noticed a unicorn sitting in the corner of the room.

“Nick Drezary, your new lancemate.” Nick seemed nice enough but not as energetic as Flare was.

He quickly looked around and saw no more ponies. “Nice to meet you all.”

Flare looked back to him “Anyway, since you have no idea where to go for anything on this ship I’ll give you a tour.”

“Really?” Oliver asked. He was kinda irritated but Flare was right, he had no clue where anything was.

“Sure why not! Should be fun!” Flare hopped up and flew over to the door.

Oliver followed closely behind and the two walked around the enormous jumpship examining everything. Simulators, Med bays, storage rooms you name it this ship had it. It was a Star Lord class jumpship and they were quite large so the whole tour took an hour or two.

“Well I think that’s pretty much the whole ship, that was fun!” Flare laughed

“Great well thanks, I can take it from here.”

The pegasus nodded and flew down a corridor and was soon out of sight. Oliver decided to make his way back to the simulators. He had seen all the tech but never got to try it out.

As he made his way inside the room another pony was there. “Morning Oliver, well you’re here, that saves me having to find you, let’s see what you got.” Iron said as he gestured towards the simulator.

Oliver quickly hopped over and got in. While the simulators were not exactly military grade they were pretty close. They had good controls and a good HUD.

He was given a mech at random. “A TBT-5N, been a long time since I piloted a Trebuchet.” He said to himself. “Never had been a fan of missiles.”

The simulator loaded up and he got set straight into combat. Two targets only one of him, although they were quite damaged. They were far away but were closing fast. He quickly found the lock on reticule and aimed it at one of them. “Come on, come on.”

As soon as the reticule turned red he fired a volley of 30 missiles at the Centurion. The 30 impacted but didn’t destroy the mech. He fired another 30 and this time the mech slumped over and hit the ground. He focussed on the other mech now but it was too close now. It was firing lasers at him and Oliver responded by doing the same.

Focusing on the engine the lasers cut away at the small amount of armour that was left.  Meanwhile his mech was taking hits as well. The small mech ran circles around him targeting anything it could hit. Finally with a lucky shot Oliver tore apart the last bit of the mech and it slid across the ground in front of him.

Knowing simulators this was just the start. They give you a fully operational mech and give you mission after mission until you can’t go any further, which for Oliver was around 6 rounds. About an hour of attacks, defences and a combat drop later, Oliver had earned both a good score and had impressed the captain.

“Not bad not bad, could be better though.”

“It sure has been a while. I’m quite rusty.”

“Well than you should get some practise in. Be here tomorrow around oh shall we noon? The rest of the lance wants to see you.”

“So just you Nick you and somepony else.”

“So you met Nick? Try and beat his score on this thing, I dare you.”

“Who’s the third?”

“Oh you wait and see,” the captain said before walking past him and out of the room.

“Well I better get to work,” Oliver said as he walked towards the machine.

Many hours later Oliver walked out of the room hungry and tired. He had been there for god knows how long and had only improved his score by a miniscule amount.

Returning to the mess hall was easier but it still wasn’t easy. “I need to map this place,” he grumbled. He arrived, got food and sat down. Nothing seemed particularly interesting at the moment. Only a few ponies sat around either drinking or talking to each other.

Finishing his meal (which was surprisingly alright for military food) he got up and walked to the door. The doors however opened to show Starlight. “Hey Ollie! Where you been.”

“Ollie? I think I prefer Oliver Starlight. Anyway I’ve been exploring a bit, meeting new people. I’m meeting the rest of my lance tomorrow.”

“Really? I only met one of my lance. I can’t remember his name. Anyway I expect you’re going to bed?”

“Yeah, I spent all day in the simulators. I can’t remember the last time I was this tired.”

“Right. Well I’ll let you get to it!”

“Thanks, good night Starlight.”

“You too Oliver.” And with that the door slid closed and Oliver began walking back to his room. At least he could remember this route.

He hopped into the room and slid the door closed behind him. He undressed quickly and hopped into bed. He lay there thinking about today, a few new friends, a good simulator score and a basic knowledge of the ship.

Tomorrow would be a test, the lance there with him watching his every move, and who was the third member? All these questions would be answered tomorrow so Oliver’s answer to that was to go to sleep.