This story is a sequel to The Olden World
For eighteen years, Equestria's northern neighbors have been at peace.
Despite instability further to the north and far to the east, the Theocracy of Yakyakistan and the technological powerhouse of Ironridge have walked the road of friendship, sharing their best and brightest minds in the remote mountain research colony of Icereach. An underground city built by scientists, for scientists, Icereach is the crucible of the most advanced technology in the world, as well as some of the loftiest dreams: sending ponies into space, and perhaps setting hoof on the moon.
But Icereach has never even sent up a rocket, let alone a random teenager like big-dreaming me. It feels like we've been months away from a proper launch for years now, and no one quite seems to care why. For that matter, there are a lot of things no one questions about Icereach, like why there's an ancient chapel in the deepest part of the caves. Or why historical data in our libraries is censored seemingly at random. Or what we even expect to find out there, beyond the stars.
Maybe it's because I'm not a real scientist, but I feel like I'm the only one more interested in the big picture than getting my name on some invention or other. They say Icereach is the pinnacle of civilization, but there has to be more to life than this...
This story takes place eighteen years after the events of The Olden World and can be read fully standalone. Having read The Olden World is not required.
Chapters are currently posted weekly.
It's been a year, but I'm back! This story has undergone an extensive amount of work between The Olden World's conclusion and today, and it's both nerve-wracking and a huge relief to finally put it out there. As was mentioned in the description, this story can be read standalone: it's a sequel that will give closure to a lot of TOW plot arcs, bring a lot of characters back for round 2, and eventually see Starlight return to the north in search of her old friends, but it's also written so that it can be fully understood without any of the previous story's context. Didn't read TOW? Started but didn't finish? Did read it, but forgot all the lore? Won't matter a bit.
Happy reading.
Is this story going to be as long as The Olden World?
Huh...changelingy without being a changeling. Wonder what her cutie mark really means...
I wonder if we know 'Mother' from TOW.
Also if she'd get some'a them thar patents that she's so derisive of, that could probably open doors to getting enough money for all that travel they want to do. Gotta play the game!
Exciting!!! I can't wait to get going on this one. It's awesome that this is a sort of spiritual successor to TOW but doesn't rely on a reader knowing TOW to get into the fic.
And so, we begin. Quietly, unassumingly, and yet, intriguingly.
an upside down crown, shapeshifting.... I have my theories.
for now though...
And now the speculation begins
Collaboration with KMRA? Or an independent and/or parallel line of research?
Now that I think about it, I wonder how separate/integrated Icereach's rocket development is with previous Yakyakistani efforts.
What would a communications conference need inertial stabilizer rotors for?
Really curious who Mother is. IIRC there's really only one candidate we know of from TOW, and some things match (dark coat, mane color (sort of), weakness (?), able to fight (?), Hallie's age, the term "cutie mark"), but others don't (Hallie, Mother's apparent age, thinness, type of injury). I'm leaning towards someone we haven't met yet, but that raises more interesting questions (in particular, how does Mother even exist?).
inb4 it's a pebble sitting on a table
Wonder what happened to Howe/Neon Nova's sound stone. Seems Shinespark had it last; seems Ironridge didn't get to figure out how it works in the meantime?
Hrm... So no blue-sky research at Icereach? That's mildly disappointing, though not wholly unsurprising.
Like a changeling in all but name, at least in terms of raw abilities.
Ok, this is certainly interesting so far.
I can only imagine the kinds of trouble Halcyon will get herself into... On to the start of a new book!
I just woke up and what is this? It's finally out?!
And Halcyon is already rivaling Valey for best pony?!
Preemptively liking and favoriting this for later.
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Well, if you read TOW, she may not be as "un-changeling" as you think...
Congrats on being featured!
Excitedly looking forward to more.
Updating weekly feels weird.
Why haven't you responded to my comment?
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Because I don't always respond to every comment I get. Questions about the future direction of the story, in particular, I might consider spoilers, or want to leave up to reader speculation, or just not be ready to commit to an answer on - the latter, in this case. The Immortal Dream is far too new for me to give a remotely accurate wordcount estimate.
In general, there are enough good reasons I might not have an answer to a question that I figure me not leaving a comment should be equivalent to me leaving a comment saying I have no comment. I'm sorry if that wasn't a good assumption.
Hmm.. a non dirigible airship...
I'm going to take a stab in the dark and say "Hello Shinespark."
As pointed out by others far smarter than I am, this is quite fitting given Halcyon's name.
Kind of curious what Luna would see when dreamwalking. Would Halcyon just never show up in the dream realm?
Getting some tantalizing hints, but nothing clear about what might be momentous enough to cause a fault plane in ether crystals... Or it might be a coincidence, the same way they thought the fault plane(s) corresponding to Nightmare Moon's return was a coincidence. If that's the case, I don't think we're going to know what it is given we're in uncharted waters timeline-wise.
What no description of what they look like?
I'm half convinced these are deliberate red herrings hinting at Felicity/Senescey/Larceny, but there's just oh so little to go off of.
My new tangled-web-of-red-string hypothesis is Larceny, but there's very little (if anything) to support that...
Hmmm... Wonder if what Herman said in TOW still applies: "And while I know not what was delivered in a streak of light over the mountains at sunset... An experimental, ultrafast technology known as rocketry... I can see the details of its security classification. A classification that mandates it be protected by a group of yak warriors." It'd explain the silos, at least, assuming that's where the rocket came from in the first place.
Batponies? Now that's interesting. Was that from Halcyon's recollection, something Mother said, or what she was taught in school?
Seems like Harmony tech has gotten further out of the prototype stage? Wonder how many airships of that kind are flying around at this point in time.
Well that was an idea that went from planning to success slightly faster than expected...
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Maybe her design but doesn't she have her hooves full with Ironridge?
Oh boy, just who does that airship belong to?
Aaand there goes my red string (and a nice
to go along with it). Really quite curious how she managed to survive the events of TOW. There are only two ways I can think of for her to have not been affected (distance or something like what happened to Crystal), but Halcyon said they're from the southern Empire and the latter seems rather resource-intensive.
Now that's a peculiar phrase...
That's... one way to describe it, I guess, though I have to wonder whether the major fighting (if any) came after TOW or whether it's an embellishment.
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I don't remember Nehaly very well but I remember the name, which one was she again?
The whole Mistvale invasion things screams of revisionist history... granted I'm not sure how many people would have known or even understood the truth let alone believed it.
History is written by the survivors after all.
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I can't find any mention of that name in TOW, so unless it's an assumed name we know nothing about her.
Lack of any mention of the sarosians being transformed is one rather big missing piece, though as you said it might be a bit difficult to convince other ponies that that actually happened.
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She was a minor character in the griffon lands, wasn't she?
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That name's not showing up in my search at least, and my memory isn't good enough to remember precisely who you're talking about, unfortunately :(
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don't worry, I'm probably wrong and remembering the character name from another story... I think I'm mis-remembering her as the daughter of that monk when Valey first meets when gets to the griffon lands.
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The only other characters present when she first meets Grandpapa are Dazzle and Kouskous, a pegasus and a unicorn, respectively. Were you thinking of someone else?
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probably... It's been awhile.
I find it odd that Halcyon thinks of brands as cutie marks. That's so Equestrian.
A Mistvale invasion and two gods disappearing/dying? It’s been too long, I have no idea if that happened in TOW haha.
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Funny, that. I wonder where she heard that name from.
Been around since Valey's time it seems.
Oh really? You only just now realized that? And poor Ansel.
A new member has joined the party!
Hrm, a Harmony extractor, and it seems that the Immortal Dream's tech hasn't become widespread between TOW and now. IIRC during TOW only Shinespark/Arambai, Dorable, andor Chauncey had the extractor tech, so it's possible that Aldebaran have some interesting connections.
Wonder what the power source here is. Don't think we've seen this particular color in an extractor before?
Or that's a reasonable explanation, I guess. Way to rain on my speculation
Kind of curious what Valey would think of this.
Huh. A memento of pre-TOW times, or another sign that someone interesting is behind the scenes here?
Well, that's quite a surprise, especially given Elise's high rank in Icereach. Something even she wasn't aware of, something she forgot, or something else? Kind of surprised she didn't go find Halcyon/Corsica as soon as she found out how important this is, either.
Lots of sketchy stuff going on. An opportunity with timing that's just good to be true for Corsica/Halcyon, the redacted law... Ansel certainly has good reason to be unsettled.
I'm a bit concerned that that isn't Elise. That 180 is VERY abrupt and pretty suspect.
"She may have dug her own grave, but you gave her the shovel."
Doppelganger talent huh...
Number 5 is Jamjar's, calling it now.
And she's in that room, just invisible.
Hmmm... Very interesting implication here. I'm a little surprised Ansel knows, since he was born in Icereach, but I suppose he could have been filled in easily enough. Also makes me wonder how much Halcyon remembers of her time in the Empire; I wouldn't be surprised if she was too young to remember, but maybe there's the chance she had first-hand (hoof?) experience.
Still wonder how Mother/Halcyon survived, but I suppose we'll learn that later.
Yeah, this is super sketchy. Could be played off as a mistake, but that doesn't appear to be characteristic for Elise.
Oh no
Oh no no no
...What in the world is Jamjars doing here?
Huh. Did the original bat ponies get forced out or otherwise leave? Or did they simply not pass on their history? Or is sixty years longer than I think it is?
This is very interesting. Felicity says precisely that phrase in TOW, and her, Senescey, Larceny, Maple, Valey, and Starlight appear to be the only ones in the room at the time.
Lief's views sound vaguely familiar, but I can't remember if I've seen them before in TOW.
...Boy, it'd be quite something if that turned out to be Jamjars.
You had to say it, didn't you...
Quite a few more hints here. The mystery grows....
Yup, between the posters, perfume and description, that's totally Jamjars... or maybe Puddles?
Also locking the fake Elise up in the ship under guard... Lets file that under "sounds good but totally going to backfire"
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From what I recall, Leif's views are quite similar to those of Larceny, Felicity, and Senescey (or, if I'm misremembering the names, the prostitute/assassin batpony sisters). Although I know some of them died...
Eh, I'll just throw this out there: Elise is actually Valey, who has discovered and developed her latent shape-shifting powers. She's there to investigate Jamjar's highly-suspicious involvement in Icereach (they aren't on the best of terms). The Aldebarans have no idea about any of this.
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Hmmm... yet another interesting link then. You got the names right, and we know that Senescey’s cutie mark/soul returned to the lifestream, but Larceny and Felicity’s ultimate fates are still unknown, though I’d guess Felicity would still be in Equestria.
Wonder where that particular hint is leading.
Oh god, oh no, oh why. Don’t do this to me. I thought I was finally rid of that little devil. Please...
Next chapter two days late… withdrawal begins…
i.giphy.com/media/2GjTdNHnmk2IM/giphy.gif
So, unfortunately, this is the part of the story where I start to run out of buffered material and have to start slowing things down. I initially had this plus two more chapters pre-written, and was expecting to get two or three more done during the catch-up publication period, but what essentially happened is that live comments are just too much of a muse to ignore while posting everything as-is. The earliest chapters, I had just been giving once-over editing passes. Starting with chapter 4, I was changing the ways certain characters reacted to things, and then the decisions they made, and more and more in order to fine-tune the story for what people were interested in, what people picked up, and what no one seemed to notice. This chapter was a week late because I wound up completely writing the second half of it and adding that in from scratch. The next two chapters won't be any better. Fortunately, I think these chapters have all been much better for their changes, so at least it's counting for something worthwhile.
I'll see if I can do an every-other-week schedule at least for the time being, but for all intents and purposes, chapters will be posted when they're ready from here on out.
That's a pretty cool concept! Quite different from what I had expected when I learned there was a harmony extractor on board. Wonder how the technical side differs from the Immortal Dream's.
Some windigo hints there. It'd be interesting if that were a product of using windigo hearts more directly as fuel as opposed to more as fuel tanks.
I'm not sure whether I should be more worried that Whitewings are that combat-capable, or that Aldebaran are downplaying their own combat prowess...
Suppose that makes sense, given the hints Leif was dropping earlier.
What about the inertial stabilizer rotor?
Wonder how they managed to get a horn scan from Corsica.
Yellow fur, yellow fur...
A quick search through TOW yields the following yellow ponies:
Jamjars seems like the best candidate given the room on the Aldebaran. Not-Puddles might be another, if she (it?) somehow managed to find a way back into the world.
That... explains a few things (Elise, "handing out personalities"), and raises quite a few more questions. Seems like they've come quite a ways since we least saw them.
Wonder if the changelings here are capable of copying cutie mark powers, or whether they're getting them from moon glass or something similar.
and just like that, Halcyon knows what she is...
Oh my god oh my god oh my god. This story is pushing all the right buttons for me... And Changelings! Aaahh! No wonder Rondo had to enter last. I imagine Halycon’s friends are going crazy looking for her, since she disappeared without warning. I wonder if this terminal has access to the outside world, and if they can somehow get a message to Icereach? And what does Nemestasis mean? Is there literally a chamber where some being is being held in stasis ( a “nemesis”?) or is it just referring to hiding in a bunker as something akin stasis? There has to be more to it than the latter explanation. I can’t wait to find out more!
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You mean Cuddles? I was kind of hoping that this was a new storage facility for her. So the impersonator for Jamjars was probably Elise's replacement... Although that begs the question why all the stuff? Was the ship the successor to the Dream and Jamjars allowed to hang around? After the stunt she pulled with the writ I would have figured she would have just been dumped back with her mom and left to her own devices.
Each answer brings more questions.
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Yeah, I was referring to Cuddles.
I honestly hadn’t thought of Jamjars being impersonated. As you said, the room decor might be a bit much, though it might arguably be “method acting”, for lack of a better phrase (though I’m not sure when the difference would be observable). Makes me wonder just how “deep” changeling copying goes; is it more like a “kit” of quirks/personalities/abilities the changeling can use, or do they more “become” the target?
Jamjars has proven resourceful in her own way, so I wouldn’t be surprised if she were to wander off again if she were returned home. Not sure how she would have ended up with Aldebaran, though, or if she is aware of their true natures.