The Red Sun Rises: Voyages

by The Atlantean


Hope For Equestria Yet

The Princess of the Sun spent the next several days in mourning. Both her sister and protege had died. Not even Amber could comfort her.

Meanwhile, the King of the Dominion and his scientists worked day in and night out to find a solution. There was always a light on in the Magic Research Institute, and it was never the only one. The telescopes tracked the sun and moon, searching for any sign in the heavens. The DX-99 computer ran constant simulations to get the right problem fixed at the right time in order to cascade into fixing the others. But without Luna, it couldn’t work.

Robinson got in touch with the Pentagon and asked for classified intel on alternate worlds. He obviously wasn’t getting anywhere at first, but then said that it was the only way to get home and stay there. For the entire week, he searched it all and got nowhere. But after those seven days of fruitless research, he found what he was looking for: a decoded blip that came from deep space many years ago. It was a Dominion signal trying to locate other habitable planets in order to one day get to them. The admiral stood up and ran to the Magic Research Institute.

“Lost Legacy! King Ice! I found something in old military documents!”

The two Unicorns looked up in surprise. They hadn’t found anything, and they had access to more equipment. “What?” they both asked at the same time.

“You guys won’t believe it. This signal hit my world in the late twentieth century. We spent years decoding it, and it comes from the Dominion.”

“What does it say?”

“‘We search for the ancients. One day they will return home to us and the circle of empires will be complete. The Dominion will rise to the heavens and rule the universe.’”

Flawless Ice jerked his head around. “My ancestors sent that out into the heavens seven thousand years ago. You’re saying that you actually received the message?”

“I guess so. We happened to have a radio telescope pointed the right way at the right time. But since that kind of message requires a certain broadcast system, where could it have come from?”

Lost Legacy, more refined in the ways of history, spoke up. “The Crystal Empire. We found that the most effective way to send something to the nearest habitable world and still be intact enough to be decoded was to use a magic blast. Back then, ponies weren’t as respectful for the dead, and removed fifteen alicorns from their tombs and combined their magic into a large gem.

“The first test to see if it would actually do anything was powerful enough to build a crater many kilometers in diameter into the ground. We created the Badlands, right next to the Macintosh Hills, which formed as the dust fell. Knowing the signal would degrade slowly, we took our chances and shot it into the sky. After that, we buried the gem under five kilometers of solid ice and rock. We left the area and rebuilt our society here, and have stayed to the present. However, most of our technology then was destroyed in war, and we had to start from scratch.”

Celestia soon came in to learn what was going on. The usual noise had nearly doubled in the past hour and the army was mobilizing. She found that there was hope for Equestria yet.

The Dominion had declared war on Sombra.