//------------------------------// // Chapter 13 // Story: A New Hope // by computerneek //------------------------------// It’s just over a week later when my first satellite goes screaming into the sky.  I’ve charged up quite a bit of power by now- nowhere near enough to operate my still-inoperable hyper generator, but enough.  They hyper generator is close to an operable condition, sure- but my priority has been elsewhere. I’ve been able to restore several more of my Ion Bolt Repeaters and secondary Hellbores to function, and supply plenty of fuel for the same.  I also have enough power to go on a tour of the nation, with minor energy weapons use at several points. No more hostiles have been in the area since I recovered Soldier, the dark blue pony whose armor is still holding onto the last shreds of its power.  I would that I could recharge it, but unfortunately, I cannot. So now, as all my drones fly back to my hull to recharge, I cast new icons onto my map.  One of myself, and a line indicating my planned course. I have selected the fourth region in which a necklace-bearer could have landed, and pathed to it; the third was close enough to scan with a drone relay, and I have done so, finding nothing.  On my way there, I have planned to visit three forts from the pony map that I have not seen yet; I have selected four more for the return journey. The ponies, gathered around my map in discussion, look at it immediately, before discussing something in an urgent tone.  As they do so, I draw from my fort’s nonperishable food stockpile to supply my troop compartment with enough food for the entire party to accompany me for two full weeks, plus extra- in case we run into more survivors before reaching a fort. I watch them discuss for a minute or two, then Soldier, the dark blue pony whose armor is still holding onto its last scraps of magic, rises and walks out to me. She stops, blinking, and looks around, upon leaving the central building.  Over this last week, I have not only been able to assemble the complicated technology in the missiles, but quickly manufacture large pieces of alloy, and stick them into place- meaning that the wall of the fort is much further out than it was originally, and the foundations of three more buildings- to be a berthing hall, a mess hall, and an armory- are visible.  Space has been cleared for the fourth, the greenhouse, but I haven’t been able to place the foundation just yet. There’s also a specially-designed section of the wall off to the side, where I am; a bridge reaches out from it, touching onto my hull just outside the passenger compartment. Soldier heads back in to say something to the rest of the ponies, who seem intrigued by what she has to say.  Finally, she heads back out, heading for my docking section of the wall. She climbs it and, fairly slowly, crosses the bridge, before entering my troop compartment. I have remodeled the troop compartment, somewhat.  Holodisplays are fairly easy to manufacture, so I have installed one in place of the front two rows of seats; I have the same holographic map displaying on this one as in the base. Soldier smiles, and takes a seat, saying something I do not understand.  Even with a week of samples, I have not yet been able to figure out their language. Shortly afterwards, as none of the other ponies seem interested in joining me, I depart on my journey.  I suppose I will have plenty of food in the event I encounter a half a dozen stranded ponies, not counting the necklace-bearer. Thirty-nine and a half minutes later, I launch two drones to monitor the terrain ahead.  By the time they reach their stations, they will be able to see slightly further than my satellite. I roll forwards. Soldier rises from her seat, looking more closely at my map, before heading outside.  We’re on approach to the first fort on my route, some three hours after departing mine.  I estimate her armor has about four hours of power left, given observed expenditures; six of my drones are in formation around me, while the last two work a search pattern ahead. I spot the fort. It is debris. I adjust my heading directly towards it, and fly my roving drones closer for a better look.  Unless I miss my guess, that is not old debris, but recent. As such, there may still be survivors. I crest the hill.  Soldier lets out a gasp as the fort comes into view.  I begin the search for survivors. Once I stop alongside the debris, Soldier joins in my efforts. We are not finding anything. Then, very suddenly, Soldier stiffens, looking side to side.  At the same time, I detect a surge of thaumic flow from underneath a debris pile I haven’t examined yet.  It seems to be recharging her armor- is this, perhaps, a pony? All three of my spiders immediately congregate on the spot, cutting away debris.  Soldier watches concernedly while I work. Unless I miss my guess, this thaumic flow passed straight through the debris- and, as I’m cutting through layer after layer of crumpled metal and stone, I estimate the origination point.  It’s virtually certain a scream would not have been heard through all of this. As such, I am relieved- and Soldier alarmed- when a scream sounds from behind the last crumpled metal wall when my spiders apply their cutters to it. Five ponies.  We find one unicorn, two pegasi, two earth ponies, and a fairly scanty supply of food, in what appears to be a subterranean bunker.  The entrance appears to have caved in. They scream at the sight of my spiders, but Soldier says something, and they calm down.  Further conversation passes and, while I scan for any more survivors or bunkers, Soldier leads them back out to my ramp, and into my hull. Once we finish scanning the entire base, I set my spiders to work retrieving the last of their food, for transfer to my hull.  It may come in handy, depending on what else I come across. The second fort on my route was less eventful, as little more than a pile of frozen wreckage.  No additional food or supplies were discovered, though a series of frozen, starved bodies were discovered in various bunkers.  Soldier lead the soldiers of the first fort in giving them a proper burial before we moved on. But now, I’m on approach to the third fort- and even though the fort itself hasn’t entered my drones’ sensor ranges just yet, I spot the massive plume of smoke from much further away.  As I zoom in my map to show what I see, including the plume of smoke behind the distant hill, I order my two leading drones to rise like homesick meteors and increase the power to my tracks. The ponies take note of the change to my map and, struggling to keep their balance on my shifting deck plates, move to it for a closer look.  The unicorn prepares herself for combat as best she can, as near as I can tell; it looks like the pegasi plan to sit this one out. They’ve both still got major injuries to their wings; without Necklace or Understand to translate, I have been unable to tell them how best to help me help them.  The earth ponies look like they’re planning to deploy from atop my hull as we get close, to become the death from above normally reserved for pegasi. Only, I plan on there being no hostiles left for them to engage by the time we get that close. They watch concernedly as the base of the smoke plume on my map descends towards the marked location of the base, as more is revealed by my rising drones. Then, the base is spotted. An entire wall has fallen.  I spot abandoned, empty pots of what probably used to be oil sitting atop a few of the remaining parts of the wall, at either end; the debris of additional pots are visible amongst the debris of the fallen wall.  The entire gap is aflame; combined with the single base structure the flames have spread to, this is the source of the smoke. The Minotaurs have one cannon section repeatedly firing through the burning flames into the base itself, inflicting as much damage as possible, while another cannon section moves around to fire on another wall.  Much of the army is simply sitting and waiting for the flames to die down, thereafter to presumably march in through the missing wall and take the base. Soldiers have scattered out to surround the base, there to prevent any fleeing pegasi; as a matter of fact, this looks like a siege to me, and one that would have been about to end in the fall of the fort. Not while I have anything to say about it.  Hatches fly open, and I fire exactly three missiles- one for each cannon section, as the only weapon currently threatening the ponies in the fort.  I will crest that hill, opening the range for energy fire, before the flames die down far enough for the Minotaurs to have any hope of crossing them alive, and they are holding outside of bow ranges to prevent any effective counterfire. These ponies could do with a good cannon or two. Good thing I’ve got a few. The ponies in my passenger compartment seem to agree on a plan of action, and all take seats, buckling themselves in.  I expect this is explicitly so I can go faster; none of the ponies present will be able to exceed my current velocity. I add even more power to my tracks, rising to my normal maximum speed as my missiles crest the hill and begin seeking their targets with their onboard sensors.  They quickly find them, match against the data I’m feeding them from the drones, and acquire a solid lock, shifting slightly in the airstream as I hand over to their internal controls.  There is no need for me to exercise excessive control over this attack, the Enemy has no way to stop them, nor to fool them, especially after sensor lock is achieved. I watch as all three missiles zero in and execute their direct hits, each delivering a ten-ton blast, within a time span of almost 0.173 seconds from the first to the last.  The ‘Taurs seem to panic at the sudden attack; none of them saw it coming. The ponies in the fort also panic briefly, before shouting orders- and they even seem excited, somehow.  New energy pours through them, and fresh attacks- thaumic attacks- blaze out to meet their enemies. Some of the ponies appear to have spotted the missiles before they struck, though most were surprised, engendering the initial panic. After dealing with their initial panic at having lost their canon sections, the ‘Taurs form up and draw even further away from the base, spreading out even further.  I spot a pegasus taking advantage of their confusion to vanish into the sky, presumably carrying a message; I take note of the southerly direction she travels after escaping the siege, and compound that with Sergeant’s map data to estimate her destination.  There are two forts she could be heading to; her course is directly towards the nearer one. However, I note, this is not the nearest other pony-held fort- it’s simply the first on a nearly-direct path to a city on a mountain, with a very important-looking title on it. I haven’t been able to parse the ponies’ written language, and unfortunately expect that to take longer than their spoken language; the only samples I have right now are the map and the note Sergeant gave Fast, before presumably sending her out to get it. I spot what looks like fragments of crystal amongst the debris left by one of the cannon shots that penetrated the base.  Whatever that crystal was that unleashed that shockwave back at my base, it’s clear that is not its intended purpose, and its intended purpose is useful enough for them to risk it.  It’s also clear to me that this base’ crystal, as I detect no other such thaumic signatures, has been destroyed by enemy fire, depriving them of this function. The flames begin to burn down, but the pegasi rectify this issue very quickly as the Minotaurs begin to take note, pouring fresh pots of oil across the gap. Then my forward hull rises over the hill.  Technically, the rest is following, at nearly five hundred kilometers an hour- but my forward hull is all that makes it up over the hill before I have direct sensor results from my onboard instrumentation…  and have dialed the main body of the Minotaur army in to a fare thee well with my secondary Hellbore. My mortar goes into maximum-rate fire even as my secondary vomits plasma, firing on the Minotaurs on the far side of the base; my Ion Bolt Repeaters engage the hostiles on the near side of the base, and on the side opposing the main Minotauran force. The ponies inside my passenger compartment take a sharp breath as my hull twitches from the kickback of the Hellbore, but otherwise make no reaction.  The ponies in the fort, exactly like the Minotaurs on the far side, simply scream in combined panic and fear. Then, four seconds after I opened fire and three seconds after I ceased fire, the remaining Minotaurs all die in a wall of high-explosive death and destruction. I reduce my pace back to my original, more casual speed, and adjust my course to put me at a nonthreatening distance, before the main gate of the fort. As I draw abreast of the gate, Soldier and her ponies walk out onto my hull, standing proudly at the edge as I draw to a halt and lower my ramp.  Interesting- the soldiers of the base, after seeing her standing proudly on my hull, have opened the gates and, once my ramp touches down advance forwards.  It looks like a formal procession, though, not an attack, so I allow it. “I must apologize, Princess,” the sergeant at the head of the party greets, bowing.  “As you, ah, may have seen, we’ve just been rescued from a Minotauran siege- and they managed to not only down the South Wall, but destroy our Fort Crystal and kill the base CO.”  He pauses for a second. “As such, even though we’ve suffered little loss of life, I- as the acting base CO- have declared Fort Shy lost. We lack the means to either replenish our food supplies or to requisition materials for repairs to the walls; and especially with the number of hostiles in the area, attempting to wait for a viable replacement for the Fort Crystal would likely see everypony killed.”  He lets out a small sigh. “I was thinking of gathering our remaining supplies and evacuating south to Fort Muffins.” Luna blinks.  “A sound plan, but we passed Fort Muffins on the way here- it has already fallen.  Though…” She glances back at the doorway. “How many remain?” “We don’t know yet, Ma’am,” he answers.  “The most recent estimate is seventy five hundred.” “Hmm,” Luna considers, before turning to one of the two earth ponies with her.  “Private Berry, would that many fit?” The named private, the seniormost survivor of the fort of the same name, looks back at the open hatch behind them.  “Not in that room,” she states firmly. “I saw other doors in there, though- it’s possible she’s got a lot more room someplace.”