Chapter 8
“Enormous ships that travelled not from coast to coast, but from planet to planet, spoke to me of an ancient and advanced civilization. But what I'd seen at that point brought to mind anything but civilized people. They used their power to dominate each other, using destructive potential I'd seen only from the most talented and powerful unicorns in the world. It was a living nightmare at times, and I feel like it couldn't be overstated how unfathomable the depths they sunk to were plumbed.”
-Twilight Sparkle, On Extra-Galactic Voyages, p. 188
Human.
The revelation about this species dominating most of the galaxy was startling to Fluttershy. She had heard about bipedal apelike creatures, but they had died out a long time ago, while ponies had ascended to be the dominant species on the planet. The news that humans here were not only dominant, but had conquered most of their galaxy was surprising, because Fluttershy had assumed that here, like on earth, the dominant species was the pony.
But then she could see why they would be dominant, with four fingers and a thumb on each hand, enabling them to grasp objects more efficiently. She was still proud of her heritage, with her species’ ability to manipulate their environment without the benefit of grasping appendages, but still, she had to admit having fingers would be useful. Not that she was about to trade her hooves in.
This revelation about humans paled in comparison to what R2-D8 had to say about galactic history, however.
For thousands of years, this galaxy had been at war, with massive spaceships fighting each other using horribly destructive weapons, and troopers wiping each other out by the dozen with energy rifles. Whole species had been wiped off the face of their worlds, and in some cases the worlds themselves had been reduced to slag by orbiting fleets.
It was all so much to take in, and Fluttershy was overwhelmed. Her existence in Equestria was peaceful. Most of the time. Sure, she had confronted a dragon, and a dragonequus, and Ponyville had had its share of mayhem. But even the Changeling incident was but a flash in the pan compared to what this galaxy had faced, and indeed what was going on right now.
The most shocking and horrible thing the droid had told her was about a starship called the Death Star. This gargantuan spherical vehicle had wiped out two whole worlds. Not just stripped them of life, but obliterated them. Smashed them. Killed them.
When she had heard that, she’d sunk to the ground, horrified at all the countless people that suffered for the briefest of seconds before being incinerated, and all the trillions of innocent creatures that no doubt suffered the same fate. She took a modicum of solace in the knowledge that it had been a quick death, but that it happened at all was enough to cause her eyes to well up with sorrow.
R2-D8’s holoprojector dimmed. For a moment the two of them sat in the dark, in silence, the droid saying not a word and Fluttershy trying to digest all that she had learned in the brief history lesson the droid had given her.
Finally one of them spoke.
“It’s all just so . . . horrible.”
The droid’s holoprojector flared to life again. “War is horror.”
She nodded. “Still, the taking of lives, innocent lives, is something nopony should stand for. I am glad that people rebelled, though I hate that they had to resort to violence to do it. Couldn’t they have pleaded with the Emperor?”
The droid rotated its head back and forth in an attempt to mimic a head shake. “No. He will not listen to reason or diplomacy. When a star system objects, the Emperor sends a fleet of Star Destroyers to -”
The droid waited, as though it were having a hard time choosing the right word.
“ . . .pacify them.”
Fluttershy dared not ask what he meant by that.
She sat in the dark with her new companion, their faces lit by the pitiful light cast from his still floating text message.
When she finally spoke, her voice betrayed a hint of determination.
“We’ve got to find my friends and warn them about the Empire. Then we need to find a way out of this terrible place!”
The droid chirped in response. “I agree, but we should wait till morning so you have a fresh start. I must shut down for the night, as my batteries will only last so long before they need a charge, and the reason I’m up here in the first place was I needed to find shelter in order to conserve energy.”
She nodded. “Then I suppose we both need to sleep. Goodnight my new friend. Sleep well.”
The droid beeped a goodnight of his own, then his external lights dimmed and all noises in his body ceased. Fluttershy then laid down next to the metal machine, put her head on her forelegs, and went to sleep.
-----
Blasts of energy hurled past her.
Fluttershy ran for all she was worth, dodging left and right to keep from being incinerated by the red packets of glowing plasma that chased after her. She heard the humans in white armor behind her giving orders, the image of their white skull-like helmets chilling her spine. “Don’t let her get away! If you can’t capture her, kill her!”
She didn’t care what they were saying though. Her mind was focused on a single task: escape her pursuers.
Her droid companion had already been shot, his metal body blasted apart. She had mourned her loss briefly, but then refocused her mind on getting away from the horrible men at her back.
A searing pain pierced her side.
She fell.
As she raised her head amid the torrent of pain washing into her mind, she noted the grapefruit-sized hole that the blast had carved into her side, bodily fluids rushing through the areas that had failed to cauterize completely, pooling in the base of the crater that had once been her ribs and dripping onto the green moss, turning it brown.
She was past the point of tears as the pain overwhelmed her.
Finally, a white armored trooper walked up, and as she looked at him with a pleading expression he calmly pointed his blaster at her head and pulled the trigger.
-----
Fluttershy awoke screaming, her instincts taking over and propelling her into the side of the cave. She hoped nightmares like that would not follow her the rest of her life after hearing such terrible stories, but she had a feeling that she would eventually encounter this Empire, and when she did she had little doubt the encounter would play out similarly.
Which was all the more motivation to get out of this cave and find her friends.
She walked back uneasily to her cylindrical companion and gently nudged him. “Wake up, sir.”
The gentle whir of cooling fans filled the small cave and the lights on R2-D8’s head illuminated their surroundings with the pale blue-and-red glow of his status indicator. The light increased as he projected a text message in front of her. “Are you ready to begin our journey?”
She nodded. “Yes, but first I need to find some breakfast. Do you want anything?”
The machine waited for her to remember what he was. “Oh that’s right. I’m sorry.”
She walked out of the cave and down the side of the mountain, sliding down on the loose rocks and reaching the bottom quicker than her fear of heights would have liked. But she determinedly shunted aside her phobias. This was an emergency, and she would not let her fears get ahead of the one thing that mattered.
She trotted into the forest and found a patch of green leaves. They were not quite like the ones that she had spotted before, but there were enough of them here to make a meal, so she did a quick test to determine their toxicity, and when they passed she hurriedly consumed them.
Licking her lips at the lovely aftertaste they left behind, she returned her gaze to the cave. “I better help R2-D8 get down from-”
Her sentence was interrupted by the sight of the droid rocketing out on jets of blue flame projecting from his legs.
As he landed, Fluttershy’s jaw dropped. “How did you think I got up there in the first place?”
She smiled to herself at how silly she had been to assume that the droid was as helpless as she. “Well I’m glad you’re able to get around so easily, friend. Let’s go.”
They trotted and rolled off on a path that took them deep into the forest.
-----
The trek was not easy, but it was certainly better than when Fluttershy had first arrived here. Before, she had been completely alone and had no idea how to find her friends.
But now, she not only had a traveling companion, but one that was fully equipped to find her friends. The rotating IR sensor on his head was alerting him to every sign of life within a hundred meters, and the lifeform scanner built into his radar eye was telling him that the five other ponies and two alicorns were scattered over a one kilometer diameter area. The size of the search perimeter didn’t matter, though. She knew where her friends were.
This shining ray of hope amidst the sea of despondency was enough to give Fluttershy an extra bit of bounce in her step and put a smile on lips that hadn’t curled upward this much in quite some time. She hummed a merry tune as she trotted alongside the rolling droid, pulling ahead of him without realizing it. R2-D8 burbled a negative tone. She looked back at him.
“I understand your happiness, but I can only roll so fast without tipping over.”
“Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t realize I had left you behind.” Her smile vanished from her face as her kind spirit took over, and she felt a bit uneasy with having left her friend in the dust.
The droid saw her dismay. “It’s alright, Fluttershy.”
She smiled, not as much as before however. But her spirits were too high for her to remain apologetic, and before too long she was back to humming and smiling. She minded her speed, glancing at her companion every once in a while to make sure she didn’t overtake him again.
Their journey had barely begun before Fluttershy was alerted by her friend. “We must be careful. I detected a TIE Fighter overhead not too long ago.” Fluttershy nodded. That must have been what had caused that roaring sound she’d heard a minute ago. “Are they very dangerous?”
“Only if you consider twin laser cannons dangerous. Don’t worry, there is too much life in the forest for their thermal sensors to detect you.”
Fluttershy was relieved at reading that.
“Oh I do hope we catch up with the others soon. I miss them dearly.”
The droid beeped a cheery tone. “We will reach them. It is only a matter of time with my scanners tuned to their life signature.”
Fluttershy nodded, then smiled to herself. This new hope had given her a wellspring of happiness that put a bounce in her step and a song in her heart, which she began to hum again.
-----
Their journey had taken them far from the cave where she’d met R2-D8, and soon she got close to one of the lifesigns on R2-D8’s scanner readout. This one had been running not too long ago, and just now stopped. Her companion had detected another signature along with it, however: a repulsorcraft, possibly a speederbike judging by the small size and speed at which it traveled.
“Oh my. Are they dangerous?”
The droid whistle-chirped back at her. “Yes, in the hands of a trained Scout Trooper. But its signature hasn’t moved in a while, so it is safe to assume that the driver is either incapacitated or dead.”
“Oh no, not dead. None of my friends would kill anypony.” She wasn’t entirely sure this was the case, however. She had been frightened into causing serious harm to a giant, who she had recently learned was called a Gorax, and if a pony as kind and loving as Fluttershy could be driven to that, there’s no telling how her other friends would handle themselves. But she hadn’t become such good friends with Twilight, Rarity, and the others only to now think the worst of any of them, and she was certainly not going to assume the worst just because this droid had brought it up.
They continued, following the signal as it wandered through the forest, getting closer and closer with each step.
-----
Eventually they got very close to the signal, about fifty feet according to R2-D8. “I’m so excited, I could just scream.” R2-D8 was about to reprimand her, to tell her that screaming in the forest was inherently a bad idea, not just because it would spook every creature within a hundred feet, but it might bring in Imperial patrols. His fears were put aside when Fluttershy released what might have passed for a light breeze, if not for the clearly formed “Yay!”
The droid thought to himself how odd this pony was. In any other part of the galaxy, he would have been treated as a mobile piece of equipment. Droids were given personalities and the ability to make decisions, but nobody ever assumed they had any more intelligence than a starship or a landspeeder. Everyone knew that droids were just machines, built for a single purpose, and when they eventually get worn out and cease to function, they are tossed in the garbage bin or disassembled and the parts bought off for scrap.
But this pony assumed that just because he had stroked her mane and emulated sympathy that he was alive. It was very odd indeed.
-----
“I can almost see who it is.” Fluttershy was approaching more cautiously than before, not wanting to startle whoever it was she had found. She knew that if she was too gregarious in her approach that she might spook one of her friends into running, and though she might be able to keep up for a while, every one of her friends could outpace her on the ground, and R2-D8’s sensors would be needed to find them again.
So with her goal so temptingly close, she endeavored to approach with all caution.
Suddenly she passed enough foliage to get a good look. “Applejack!”
The orange pony whipped around. “Fluttershy?!”
The two ponies ran toward each other, not caring how much the brush whipped their faces. When they met, they both shared in a warm embrace. “Oh Applejack, thank heavens I found you!”
“Ah’m mighty glad ta see you too, Fluttershy. Ya don’t know how much Ah missed seeing a familiar face, especially with all Ah’ve been through.”
Fluttershy smiled at her long-lost friend. “I would love to hear all about it.”
“Well Ah -” Applejack’s expression turned from relief to shock and anger. “What’re you doin’ here, you mechanical monster?” Fluttershy turned to look at what she was seeing. The orange earth-pony was pawing at the ground, looking right at the radar eye of R2-D8, who was visibly nervous, with his head moving back and forth quickly, frantic beeping emitting from his vocabulator. “Iffen you don’t turn and leave raht now, Ah’ll buck you so hard -”
“Applejack! No, stop! Don’t hurt my friend!”
Applejack turned from the strange contraption to her friend, stunned. “Yer . . . yer friend?”
“Yes. If it weren’t for R2-D8, I would never have found you! Please, don’t do anything to hurt him!” The pleading in Fluttershy’s eyes was so strong it was almost tangible. Applejack was hesitant, but she knew Fluttershy was extremely shy, and when she was friends with somepony, or some droid, it usually meant she had been around them long enough to know whether they were dangerous.
“Alright, sugarcube. I believe you, though I must say ya have an awful funny taste in friends.”
Fluttershy blushed with a smile, then turned and motioned the droid forward. “It’s alright. Come on, don’t be bashful.”
The droid looked at Fluttershy, then at Applejack, and finally rolled slowly over. “Hello,” was all it projected toward Applejack.
Applejack was a bit confused. “Don’t he know how ta talk?”
Fluttershy looked away for a moment, confused. “Well, no, I guess not. When I first met him, all he did was whistle and make funny noises, but then I taught him the Equestrian alphabet, which let him talk to me.” She seemed a bit proud of that last accomplishment.
“Well Ah’ll be a suck-egg mule! Fluttershy, if Cheerilee ever steps down as teacher, you’d make a great substitute.”
The yellow pegasus blushed through her coat. “Thank you.”
“C’mon everypony, let’s go! Time’s a-wastin’!”
Fluttershy beamed, and with that the pegasus, the earth-pony, and the droid all set off to gather the rest of their friends.
-----
The three of them walked for what seemed like ages before they came across the closest of the three groups of signals. Applejack was in the lead, keeping an eye out for trouble, R2-D8 was in the middle acting as their guide, and Fluttershy brought up the rear, making sure she didn’t overtake her droid friend again.
“Ah sure cain’t wait ta see Twilight, Rarity, Rainbow and Pinkie again! It’s a great feelin’ ta know that we’ll find ‘em.”
R2-D8 chirped. “Technically I’m the one who’s finding your friends.”
Applejack was a bit taken aback by that comment, and apparently her expression showed it for the droid erased the message and wrote a new one.
“Sorry. Sarcasm and humor are hard to convey when one’s speech is limited to text form.”
Applejack chuckled. “Oh, sorry.” She laughed again, this time at how much this machine sounded like Twilight when it “talked”.
The droid let out what could have passed for laughter, and the trio continued on.
Eventually they found their way to a small clearing where the droid’s scanners had indicated the position of their friends. Applejack nosed a tree limb out of the way, just in time to hear a familiar voice.
“Oh come on, Rarity! It’s not like you can keep dirt from building up in your hooves! Just deal with it until-”
“You’re a pegasus! You don’t have to put up with dirt in your hooves ever!”
Fluttershy and Applejack tossed each other a look and giggled.
“Rainbow Dash! Rarity!”
The pegasus and unicorn turned suddenly and looked in their general direction. “Applejack?” they said at once.
The four ponies reunited in a warm embrace that even Rainbow Dash partook in. She was so happy to see her friends that she suspended her “No mushy stuff” rule. Temporarily.
A sudden whistle-beep alerted Rarity and Rainbow Dash to the droid in the back of the group. Rainbow swooped down and got right in its face. “Okay, metal-head! Who are you and what do you want?!”
Applejack grabbed Rainbow Dash’s dangling tail, holding her back. “Easy there, Rainbow. He’s a friend.” The rainbow-maned pegasus relented, though not without giving the droid the stinkeye.
Rarity smiled at Applejack. “Oh Applejack! You don’t know how much I missed seeing you!” She shot a look at Rainbow Dash. “Especially considering who I’ve had to put up with for the past two days.”
“Who you’ve had to put up with?!” Rainbow looked like she could have sawn Rarity in two with the laser-like glare in her eyes. “I’ve listened to you moan and groan since I woke up here!”
“Girls! Please, don’t fight!” Fluttershy was a bit louder than normal, but still the two were still at each other’s throats.
“Well at least I don’t constantly berate and belittle my friends!”
“At least I don’t constantly complain and -”
“GIRLS!” Rarity and Rainbow Dash turned and looked at Applejack. “Ah think we need ta quit grumblin’ and get back to findin’ Twilight ‘n Pinkie Pie!”
Rarity took a deep breath. “You’re right, Applejack. Let’s go! The sooner I get to a salon the better.”
Rainbow stuck out her tongue at Rarity behind her back, but then fell into line with the rest of them. Fluttershy looked up at her pegasus friend. “It really is good to see you and Rarity, Rainbow Dash.”
Dash looked down from where she was gently floating and smiled down. It really was great to see her friends again, even if they did happen to bring a machine along she didn’t fully trust yet. The four ponies and the droid started toward the next signal.
-----
Twilight was getting so frustrated.
This world was not only unyielding, but it had such a sameness about it that she felt like she was going in circles, even though she had the sun as a guide. The fact that they were not in Equestria was disconcerting for a while, but after the initial shock she regained her composure and set out to find her friends. She was most concerned with finding the princesses, however. The powerful alicorns that ruled Equestria had access to magic that even Twilight was unaware of and couldn’t hope to understand with her current level of understanding. They must know some way to get off this world and back home.
“Hey Twilight!”
Ugh. Pinkie Pie was a great friend, but even so she had certain irritating personality quirks that made spending a great length of time with her without a break taxing to one’s nerves.
“Yeah, Pinkie?”
“D’you think that if I hold my breath and then hiccup that my head will explode?”
“I don’t know Pinkie.”
“Well what if I hold my breath and sneeze?”
“I don’t know, Pinkie.”
“What if I held my breath and yawned?”
“I don’t think that’s physically possible, Pinkie.”
“What if . . .”
The relentless questioning had been going on since Pinkie had reported the alien world to Twilight, and even though she was flattered that Pinkie considered her knowledgeable enough to answer every question (though who else would she ask right now?), the fact was she didn’t know everything. To be constantly pelted with questions was quite irritating, and even a pony as nice as Twilight had her limits.
“Pinkie!” It came out a little more forceful than she wanted. “Pinkie, I appreciate that you wish to pick my brain and get answers to your questions, but right now I’d like to think.”
“Okay Twilight. But you shouldn’t let ponies pick your brain. That’s just gross!”
The reaction caught Twilight off guard, but she was glad for the break in the barrage. She had no doubt that it would resume as soon as Pinkie got tired of being silent.
“Hey Twilight!”
She thought the diplomatic approach would have bought her more time. “Yes, Pinkie?”
“I think someone’s following us.”
Spike piped up. “Yeah Twilight, I’ve been hearing a group of . . . well, I don’t know what, coming after us.”
This made Twilight slightly nervous. There were wild animals in this world, and some hunters travel in packs. Of course, prey animals did too, but it paid to be cautious.
“We better be careful. We don’t know if they’re friendly.”
Spike nodded. “Based on the creatures we’ve encountered so far, I’d say the odds are they’re not.”
Pinkie Pie looked in the direction of the sound, then a sneaky look appeared on her face.
“Uh, Pinkie, what are you thinking?”
“I was just thinking that maybe all they need is for me to give them a nice welcome. Pinkie Pie style.”
-----
The unicorn, earth-pony, droid, and two pegasi marched through the forest toward the location indicated on the scanner. Suddenly R2-D8 bleeped a warning. “One of the ponies moved away from the other two signals and then vanished.”
The rest of the pack looked at him. “Ah thought that thing of yers would track anathing, anawhere!” Applejack looked as worried as the rest of them.
The droid remained silent for a bit. “Well, I haven’t been in for my scheduled maintenance. Perhaps it just -”
“SURPRISE!!”
Every member of the small group jumped back as Pinkie Pie and a cloud of confetti and streamers burst out of a stump in the middle of the forest. Fluttershy and Applejack helped R2-D8 regain his balance as Rainbow Dash and Rarity recovered from the heart attacks that resulted from Pinkie Pie’s sudden appearance. Dash was the first to react, and hers was not a pleasant reaction.
“PINKIE PIE!!” Her annoyance was not mirrored by the rest of the group however as Applejack and Fluttershy trotted over to join Rarity in greeting their party-loving friend.
Applejack gave her a hug. “Pinkie Pie, it sure is good ta see ya!”
Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes. “Yeah, thanks for shaving ten years off my life.”
“Whatever are you doing here, darling?”
“Well, me and Twilight and Spike heard something in the forest and we didn’t know what it was, and I was all like “I need to give them a welcome, Pinkie Pie Style”, then I- GASP!!!”
Her attention was now drawn toward the droid at the back of the group, and being Pinkie Pie, she immediately ran over to get a better look at the new thing in her vision.
“OOOoooooh! Hi! I’m Pinkie Pie! Who are you? What are you? Are you a machine? Are you alive? Can you believe the size of this forest, it’s like SO BIG!! What about all these animals-”
“PINKIE PIE!” This time all of them called her name to break up her hurricane of questions.
Rainbow Dash swooped over to the pink party-pony, an annoyed expression on her face. “Hey Pinkie, ya think you can knock off the questions long enough to show us where Twilight is?”
She looked at Rainbow with a huge grin. “Oh, sure! Follow me, everypony!”
They all hopped, walked, rolled and flew over to meet up with Twilight and Spike, weary from their travels, yet simultaneously relieved that they had finally found each other.
-----
This whole situation made Twilight uneasy.
Sure, she valued the help this droid, who she learned was an astromech unit called R2-D8, offered. She had to admit that the technology this machine possessed was nothing short of incredible; the ability to detect ponies at incredible distances and even separate them from the wildlife around them was miraculous, not to mention all the other functions he possessed.
Still, there was something . . . off about him.
The purple unicorn didn’t know what precisely, but there was definitely something odd not only in the way the droid behaved, but the circumstances surrounding the discovery of the machine by Fluttershy. She looked at him from across the carefully built campfire where they made their camp for the night. Was the droid staring at her? Did he suspect something? She confided her feelings in the most level-headed pony she knew.
Applejack agreed with her. “Well, Ah do see yer point Twilight. This machine just happenin’ ta be in the same place as one of our friends is jest mighty peculiar to me, too. And after that chase through the forest, Ah’m a mite hesitant ta trust machines in this world. But ya gotta admit, if it hadn’t been for this little fella bein’ there when Fluttershy needed ‘im, we might never have found each other.”
Twilight reluctantly agreed. “But I still think we should keep an eye on him. It’s probably nothing, but it’s better to be safe than sorry.”
Applejack nodded her approval. Twilight smiled at her, but as soon as the orange pony’s back was turned her smile dropped to a concerned frown. The issue with the droid was still bothering her.
After a few moments of consideration, she decided to put it out of her mind. It wasn’t doing anypony any good to be concerned about it, especially since she couldn’t prove that the droid was doing anything wrong. Experience had taught her that accusing ponies without proof was trouble, so this would be filed away for now.
Twilight trotted over to the campfire where Pinkie Pie was scaring the living daylights out of everypony with a ghost story. She smiled. At least with her mind on other things she would get a far better night’s sleep than her friends.
-----
They all awoke at roughly the same time. They had been very grateful that R2-D8 was capable of defending them, and so slept easier with the droid standing guard. However, that didn’t mean everypony slept easy.
As soon as she was fully awake, Rarity marched over to Pinkie Pie. “My dear, the next time you decide to grace us with a ghost story, please have the presence of mind to prepare a bit of brain bleach so we may have a good night’s sleep, will you?”
Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes. “Oh c’mon Rarity! It was fun, and besides, nopony else had nightmares.” Well, it wasn't a total lie; she did have fun.
“Ugh. Not all of us are so graceful under terror, Rainbow Dash.”
“Girls, please!” Twilight walked up after freshening up at a nearby stream. “We need to get moving and find the princesses soon.”
They all agreed, and soon everypony was pitching in and getting everything ready to leave. Rarity and Applejack doused the ashes of their campfire, Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy retrieved their food bag from an overhanging limb, having filled it the previous afternoon with a surprisingly aromatic array of edible plants and fungi, and Twilight, Spike and Pinkie Pie did a quick check of the surrounding area to make sure no predators were lurking. R2-D8 stood by, conserving energy.
Finally, Twilight made it back to camp. “Is everything all set to go?”
“All set with us, dear,” said Rarity.
“Ready ta go, boss!” was Rainbow Dash’s reply.
“Then let’s head out!”
The eight of them started toward the final signal, which Twilight was most anxious to arrive at. It was the most valuable asset they had on this planet, and the one hope they had of ever returning home. The last signal was undoubtedly the two princesses, Celestia and Luna.
-----
The trek to the last signal lasted several hours. In that time Fluttershy had filled them in on what she knew of galactic history.
For millennia, the Republic had kept the peace in the galaxy. Systems were prosperous, and there hadn’t been anything approaching a full scale war since the Republic’s formation.
But prosperity often brings corruption, and this was no different. It was made worse by the fact that the Galactic Senate was far too large to handle matters efficiently, for issues that were important to one system wouldn’t be important to the ten systems waiting behind it to be heard on the senate floor. So favors were called in. Bribes were traded. Threats were made, and sometimes carried out. All of this was under the lax eye of the Supreme Chancellor.
After he had been elected to the chancellorship, the senator from Naboo, Palpatine, had promised to bring an end to this corruption and return the Republic to a state of peace and prosperity in the process.
Unfortunately war broke out.
Thousands of star systems announced their intentions to leave the Republic and form the Confederacy of Independent Star Systems. At least, that was the name they called themselves. The chancellor had simply called them Separatists. With negotiations failing, the Chancellor was given emergency powers to create the army needed to defeat these Separatists, a navy to back them up, and a force of starfighters to engage the enemy from above, all of which the Republic had gone without needing for centuries.
The war lasted three years, with a bittersweet end. The Separatists were defeated, but it ravaged and consumed the Republic in the process, and from the ashes of the burned out Republic rose the First Galactic Empire.
The Empire was a far worse proposition than anything any being in the galaxy had ever conceived. Not since the Sith ruled the galaxy had people seen such callous and fearsome behavior from their government under the guise of preserving law and order. Local problems were delegated to corrupt and ambitious sectorial governors because the Emperor didn’t care about anything other than consolidating his rule, and when systems rebelled against this unfair and brutal treatment, they were met with a lashing in the form of Star Destroyers and Stormtroopers beating them into submission.
Eventually, some would say inevitably, a rebellion broke out. Isolated pockets of resistance soon grew to what the Emperor would term a cancer. Soon they had the resources to not only defend themselves using starships and planetary shield generators, but they could even strike blows against the Empire, tarnishing it’s self-made reputation as a stalwart and invincible defender of peace and harmony.
The hostilities truly escalated to horrific proportions with the advent of the Death Star, an armored space station which had in its possession a super-laser capable of reducing a planet to nothing more than a field of scattered asteroids.
The rebels were able to destroy it due to an incredibly lucky shot made by a pilot named Luke Skywalker, but had been on the run ever since. With the destruction of the Death Star, they had awakened a sleeping giant, and the Emperor was now devoting all of his resources to crushing this resistance once and for all.
When Fluttershy finished relaying this tale of woe, the ponies walking with her were stunned into silence. None of them spoke, for they had never imagined disharmony and destruction of this magnitude was even possible. The thought of thousands of people being wiped out by a single ship being destroyed, not to mention the notion that a weapon capable of obliterating a world had not only been built, but used more than once, and against a backdrop of pure, unadulterated evil, was so saddening and terrifying that none of them could form a coherent sentence describing what they thought of it.
Finally, Rainbow Dash broke the silence. “Well I for one can’t wait to get home. This place is just one big galaxy-wide war zone, and I’m awesome, not suicidal.”
“RD’s right,” piped Applejack. “We gotta get out of this world before somepony gets hurt. Ah was lucky when Ah got the best o' that human chasin' me, but Ah ain’t about ta try mah luck agin.”
Rarity nodded her agreement. “While I was rather looking forward to getting a better look at their fashions, I must agree. This place is simply too dangerous for six unarmed ponies and a baby dragon to stay in very long.”
“There’s an even bigger problem, girls.” Twilight had a look of determination on her face. “Without the princesses to raise and lower the sun and moon, the earth will simultaneously freeze and burn, and with each passing day the temperatures will rise on one side of the planet and lower on the other, eventually culminating to a world that’s a desert of heat on one side and a desert of ice on the other.”
They all took a moment to let that sink in. Finally Spike spoke. “Then it’s settled. We gotta get to the princesses, and fast.”
“Excuse me . . .”
Twilight looked at her small companion. “Of course we do Spike, but we must also conserve our energy. The princesses may need our help to complete the spell to return us home.”
“Um, I beg your pardon-”
Rainbow piped up. “Well you can bet if they need my help, I’ll do my best to beat the horseapples out of whatever’s attacking them.”
“Uh, girls, I just wanted to-”
“And Ah’ll be mighty glad ta buck those Imperial fellers inta the middle o’ next week. If the first one was any indication, they’ll go down easier than an apple pie after a long day ‘o apple-buckin’.”
“Girls, please, if you would just listen-”
R2-D8 made a frantic trill and the ponies all turned and looked at him. “What is it, R2-D8?”
The droid looked at Twilight, then projected the holographic map, highlighting their current position, and the position the princesses were supposed to be. She gasped as she realized why the droid had been panicking.
The signal was in the middle of a large group of metallic blips which had significant energy signatures. They all looked at Twilight for an explanation.
“The Empire must be holding the princesses. That’s why their signals are in the middle of this formation of machines!”
The rest of the ponies, including the normally energetic and bubbly Pinkie Pie, gasped collectively. Spike appeared the most concerned. “What’re we gonna do Twilight?”
She was worried. This presented a huge problem. The Imperials were armed, armored, and trained for war, while they were none of those things, and even though Twilight was able to form a shield, they couldn’t very well use it to fight their way to the princesses. But they had a job to do, and Equestria was depending on them to get their monarchs back home.
She steeled herself, then looked determinedly toward their goal. “We’re gonna rescue the princesses, Spike. That’s what we’re gonna do.”
They started off down the trail. I just hope we’re not too late.
-----
The pain was intense.
So intense in fact, that she was blinded by it for the time being. But Celestia remained steadfast, unmovable. They would not break her so easily.
She had no idea what they were doing to her sister, and she hoped her younger sibling would be able to handle it. She took comfort in the fact that if her sister had succumbed to the torture, she would have felt it by now.
The red glowing panels beneath the grating that surrounded her gave her coat a pink sheen. It did not however affect the color of the black uniforms the officers around her wore or the armored plasteel shell of the torture droid hovering over her, its pulsating, deep warble sending pangs of fear coursing through her brain, its single red glowing eye giving her a cold chill. Yet she resolved to remain unflappable in the face of this brutal treatment.
She looked up, mentally burning through the pain to glare at the officer standing over her.
“You would treat members of royalty with such flagrant disrespect?”
The officer sneered. “You are alien, and therefore undeserving of respect from the Empire. The only reason you are alive at all is that you are a previously hereunto undiscovered species, one which may prove useful to his majesty, the Emperor.”
“Do your worst. I will not cooperate, nor will I give in to your attempt to belittle my royal heritage.”
He quietly chortled. “My dear, you will soon regret your choice to remain silent.” He paused. “After all, we have two of you. And we really only need one.”
The look in her eyes was all the confirmation he needed that his words had hit a nerve.
The officer flicked a gesture toward the hovering black sphere. It complied by activating an electrical arc between a set of pincers mounted on its side.
He turned his attention back toward the white alicorn. “Let’s see how well your stubborn constitution holds up under 30,000 volts of electricity.”
The droid closed in, and Celestia closed her eyes, bracing for the inevitable.