Starlight Glimmer has been a Programmer in The Equestria for her entire life, working with the vast computer cores that maintain and operate the ship.
As Celestia, one of those cores, takes an interest in her happiness, Starlight finds herself seeking unorthodox methods to analyze her own personality and needs.

This is an entry into the Science Fiction Contest III by Bicyclette.

Cover artwork is being used with permission of the artist, Marenlicious.

Thousands of years into the future, the Empire of Equestria is in shambles, its ponies left to waste away in space colonies or dying terraformed planets without a strong leader to guide them.

With the Empire fragmented mercenaries like Grogar have risen to power and attacked it head-on with only one goal in mind: to get their hooves on the Stone of Harmony, the last vestige of the old magic left in the universe.

In a desperate ploy to protect the stone, Starlight Glimmer embarks on a journey to safeguard it in the last place her adversaries would anticipate—the lost planet of Equus...if she finds it first.

Her old friend Sunburst might have some answers, but in a galaxy where everyone only looks after themselves, Starlight's misplaced trust might not only cost her her life but the future of the Empire as a whole.

_{Written for the Science Fiction Contest III
Rated T for sci-fi violence, some swearing, minor character death, and a dash of awkward romance, but nothing too severe.}