15 BE (Before Exodus)—[DATA REDACTED BY ORDER OF THE SOLAR COUNCIL]
15 BE—Equestria's star, Epona, initiates a violent solar maximum, expelling solar flares towards the planet. Due to the magical nature of it's orbit, Equestria faces destruction. It takes all of Princess Celestia's power to hold back the storm.
10 BE—A team of Arcanoscientists propose the Exodus to Princess Celestia. The Princess, weary from maintaining the protective shield around Equestria, accepts the proposal.
0 AE—(After Exodus) The Exodus begins, with the launching of the first space ship, the Manehatten. It takes another ten years before the Exodus is completed, cluminating in the launce of the Canterlot. The non-pony races leave, forming the Confederacy of Species
10 AE—Celestia crowns herself Queen of Equestria. The Exodus is completed and Queen Celestia cancels the spell protecting Equestria. The home world is ravaged by the solar storm, rendering it uninhabitable. Queen Celestia falls into a deep year sleep, during which the Equestrian fleet migrates from system to system.
15 AE—The Equestrian government reorganises itself as the Solar Empire, with the still sleeping Queen as the head of state.
-all records lost-reasons unknown-
100 AE—Queen Celestia awakens from her sleep and takes control of the Empire. The fleet continues its journey through the galaxy.
250 AE—The Solar Empire is reunited with the Confedracy of Species, who have chosen to settle on planets under a democratic rule. Initial meetings are cold, but not hostile.
300 AE—Valuable trade agreements with the Confederacy enable the Solar Empire to establish a stationary base around Epona-2. Both nations prosper.
400 AE—First pirate activity is detected.
410 AE—Prince Goldenhooves, Celestia's favourite nephew, is killed by pirates. In response, the Empire militarises its entire navy, causing relationships with the Confederacy to become strained, who veiw the now armed merchant ships with distaste.
515 AE—The Appleoosa incident. 300 ponies and 200 buffalo, including Chief Thuderhorns, a prominent senator for the confederacy, die. Relationships between the Confedracy and the Empire deteriorate.
600 AE—The Confederate ambassador is recalled from Canterlot over a perceived insult. The ambassador for the Empire is likewise recalled.
650 AE—Galactic economy collapses.
700 AE—The Confederacy places trade sanctions on goods imported from the Empire in an attempt to support their economy. The Imperial economy suffers.
800 AE—Philosopher and Fleet Admiral Sunny Hooves writes the The Science of War. The ideas, tactics and philosophies within are spread across the fleet, granting a greater degree of unity and tactical superiority in fleet actions.
950 AE—The Confederacy breaks all democratic ties and seals it's borders.
975 AE—The Confederacy declares war upon the Empire.
985 AE—Present date
-Timeline of major events in the past 1000 years, from the Royal Canterlot Archives.
---
Agoraphobia is a common anxiety disorder in ponies, characterized by anxiety in situations where the sufferer perceives the environment to be dangerous and difficult or embarrassing to escape. It is commonly refered to as a 'fear of the outside". Due to the nature of the Empire's infrastructure- cramped, crowded, ceilinged rooms- many ponies become adjusted to small rooms. The worst sufferers feel a sense of panic when forced to experiance wide open spaces, such as the Aggriships, where food is grown, or the Pegasus flight halls. Whilst this fear is common (affecting over 90% of the Imperial population), it is rarely experianced, most ponies living out thier lives within the confines of the great space stations. However, it is not unheard of for Imperial Navy teams to occasionaly be sent on planetry missions. The open skies and endless horizons can inspire panic in even the most exemplary officers, are often a factor that navy captains and their support staff have to account for. Consider the following Case Study:
Lieutenant Starry Skies-Okay, Commander, we have touched down on the planet and I am oppening the hatch now.
Commander Greymane-Thank you Lieutenant , come on boys we nee—OH SWEET CELESTIA THERES NO CEILING! IT DOSENT END IT DOSENT END—[incoherant screaming, followed by the sound of the chariot hatch closing]
Lt Skies-Commander? are you okay?
Com GM-[Incoherant wimpering]
Lt Skies-Uh, come in Vanhoover. We are aborting the mission, and you may want to bring the Doctor to the chariot bay.-End transmision-
As you can see, the commander's extreem agoraphobia hindered the mission (to recover a downed probe) and cost the navy valuble time and resources. The only known way to relive the symptoms of agoraphobia is to either spend several weeks geting those affected used to the concept of being outside, through techniques that will be described later in this text, or to force the pony to focus on more immediate matters-—a pony's brain is willing to ignore it's fears if they can focus on something else more immediate, such as the mission, or the griffin pirate about to disembowel them, for example.
-From An Introduction to Psychological Illnesses, By Dr Bright Mind
---
Teleporting, whilst a technically easy spell to learn and perform, has a great many issues that prevent it from being more widespread. The most important factor that limits its use is that any pony or object loses any momentum they had during the jump. Since most locations are in constant motion, anypony teleporting would find that the ground beneath them is in fact moving at speeds liable to inflict serious damage. Indeed, a common tactic in warfare is to simply teleport a piece of junk metal into an enemy ship, where the ship's own momentum would finish it off, assuming the opposing ship stays still long enough, and doesn't have its teleport damperners active.
The invention of the Teleportarium is a partial solution to this problem. Consisting of a magically charged framework of metal plates, often connected to a teleporter, the Teleportarium provides a stable location to teleport to, accelerating any incoming teleport to match its speed and direction, preventing any unfortunate collisions.
Due to the expense of this technology, Teleportariums are often small, about the size of a room, the exception being Canterlot Station, which has key parts of both the residential district and the palace district converted into Teleportariums in order to assist the large unicorn population in traversing it.
-From A Beginners guide to Teleporting, by Professor Vanishing Act.