//------------------------------// // 20 - Heroes // Story: Dash to the Stars // by Meep the Changeling //------------------------------// CNS Chebureki 749,573.37 Steller Orbit -- Gruis, Aurigae Sector The Chebureki was a storied ship. She had served in a hundred different engagements, punched far above her weight class when the need had arisen, and won a place in the hearts and minds of millions as a legendary protector. Crimson bolts of plasma streaked through space like a hurricane’s rain. The Chebureki’s shield emitters burned hot and bright, the hull armor around them beginning to glow a dull cherry as the shields demanded more and more power. It was not the first time the Chebureki had squared off against ten battleships. The enemy's crew knew this all too well. Their shots were fueled by a desperate frenzy. The legend was before them and had devastated another gang’s haven only days ago. The Chebureki’s presence in orbit meant death. Her hull was the reaper’s cloak, and her railguns were her scythe. The Chebureki’s six dozen turrets blazed, their barrels glowing yellow from the millions of rounds which the ship was using to turn local space into a zone of shrapnelized gunships. The enemy battleship’s support fleets were melting like a styrofoam cup in acid rain. If only that was enough. The Chebureki’s marines zipped around her hull in flight-pack equipped power armor. The crew served as the first line of point defense, deploying micro rockets and plasma to counter enemy missiles and provide the Chebureki’s own gunboats cover and intercept enemy fighters. Unfortunately, while the Chebureki was a legend, her current crew was not. The Gopniks knew of Chernin battle tactics, but they did not know them in truth. Real marines would have flown around the hull in organized wings. The Gopniks were a disorganized swarm of bees. Properly trained gunners would have already taken down one perhaps two of the enemy's capital ships. The Gopnick’s fire was unfocused and largely impotent, prioritizing the gunboats simply out of fear. None of them wanted to be blasted into space by a torpedo, and none of them trusted the Marines and point defense turrets to do their jobs. The Chebureki was losing this battle. At Velis Prime, stealth and luck had been on the Gopnik's side. Neither of them had shown up to work today. The Chebureki shook violently as a heavy antimatter torpedo struck the shields. Captain Dj stumbled, finding his feet with the practiced ease of a seasoned captain. The few other bridge officers who had been standing were not as lucky, and groaned as they slowly picked themselves up from the deck. Dj turned to his tactical officer. “Damage report!” The officer scanned his third screen quickly. “Port emitter seventeen has shut down, sir! Shields holding at forty six percent and dropping.” Dj grit his teeth and performed some mental math. Twelve minutes… I give us ten minutes before we take critical hull damage. Twelve minutes until we’re dead in space. The captain turned to his helmsman, sparing a moment to glance at the tactical display to check the enemy battleships position. They were still moving to encircle the Chebureki. “Ensign! If Twilight has not returned in seven minutes, make an immediate jump to FTL,” DJ ordered. None of the bridge seemed to reject to the order. Saving adorable ponies was one thing, but even to the inexperienced vigilantes aboard the Chebureki, it was clear they were losing. DJ continued to turn until he had his comms officer in view. “Has V-1X’s link come back online?” “No, sir!” DJ swore under his breath and turned to look at the tertiary tactical screen. He’d watched Twilight and V-1X start to fight their way up to the penthouse. The moment they set foot on the second floor, everything had gone to hell. The last thing DJ had seen was hidden compartments open up to unleash stitched together multi-corpse cyber-zombies on the two before V-1X’s feed vanished into static. In that moment, DJ feared they had been lost. He’d ordered the Chebureki closer to try and cut through any jamming signal that might be the cause of the interference. For a minute, it seemed like that was the case. Then… The storm. DJ’s stomach churned as he looked at the view of the planet’s surface. A massive storm of psionic energy raged over a five kilometer radius around the La Casa Exótica y Magnífica. A rippling purple haze of arcane energies had engulfed the mansion and its surrounding countryside. Within the storm bright blasts of sickly green flames burned intensely enough to be visible from the Chebureki position in orbit using her optical sensors. The smoke from the flames was not black. It did not drift into the heavens. It was pink, noxious, thick, and clung to the air near the ground, seemingly sinking into anything it touched. Though that couldn’t be known for sure. The Chebureki’s sensors didn’t like looking at the pink cloud. Another of the battleships reached its firing position, and unleashed its payload into the fray. The Chebureki lurched to the right as another heavy antimatter torpedo slammed into the port shields. DJ closed his eyes tightly and opened a comm channel to the port side gunners. “All gunners, concentrate fire on the battleships. We cannot afford to allow them to continue launching heavy torpedos!” “Captain!” The tactical officer shouted. DJ swiveled on one talon to look. “What is it?” “I’m reading a massive energy spike in the dorsal shield generator network. That torpedo caused some kind of… Cascade? W— we may lose the dorsal shield quadrant!” The Chebureki creaked and groaned as her shield began to warp and distort due to her shield generators browning out. It didn’t take an engineer to know something critical had broken. The ancient ship’s defenses were finally starting to crack. DJ closed his eyes tightly. So much for my estimate. If this crew had passed the League’s Basic Training course we wouldn’t be in this mess now. Twilight, Pinkie, V-1X, I am sorry. You are lost, but we can still save AJ. We will finish our mission. You will be remembered. DJ turned to his helmsman once more. “Ensign! Begin charging the surf drive. Divert all power from weapons and prepare to jump at my command.” “Y— Y--Yes sir,” came the terrified reply. The captain opened a comm channel with his implant, addressing the entire crew. “All hands, this is your captain. Engage your emergency gravity tethers and prepare for an emergency FTL jump. We are retreating.” DJ walked across the bridge and sat in the captain’s chair, immediately bringing up holo screens to try and find out what the last torpedo had damaged as he didn’t trust his crew to do the job properly. As his eyes scanned over the readouts from the power transfer network, a bright flash of violet light blinded everyone on the bridge. People screaming in terror as a dozen souls fully believed the shields had failed and enemy plasma was pouring into the bridge. Then the light vanished, leaving behind three limp figures. Twilight was back. The mare was missing an ear, and hundreds of deep cuts all across her body oozed green blood. Her new body could be seen slowly knitting itself back together, and her chest heaved with labored breaths, but it was clear the mare was on death's door. V-1X sat on the deck, her eyes empty and emotionless, even for an android. Her left arm was gone, a tangle of wire and broken struts hung limply from her shoulder socket. Her armor was chipped, scratched, burned, and punctured with a mixture of bullet holes, laser burns, and tooth marks. Between the two of them was a pony DJ had never seen before. She was pink, exclusively pink, a little plump, and floating in a stasis field with true horror, disgust, and terror frozen on her face. DJ jumped to his feet. “MEDIC! MECHANIC!” He roared before bolting to Twilight’s side immediately, unsure if anyone else on the bridge had first aid training. “Twilight? V-1X? Can you hear me? Ensign! GO to FTL now!” Twilight’s remaining ear twitched at the sound of her name. “I don’t know what I did,” the mare whispered, her voice mangled due to her partially cut vocal chords. DJ took off his jacket and began to cut it into bandages with his boot knife. “Shh. You’re safe. Lay still. You’re bleeding badly.” “I don’t know what I did,” Twilight repeated, her eyes dilating. “H— he ate… I don’t… That spell.. I don’t know what I…” Twilight suddenly sat upright and grabbed DJ’s shoulders with her hooves. Their telekinetic grip sent two bolts of pain down the older captain’s back. “I made the world sick! We need to go! I don’t know what I did! I don’t know what will happen!” DJ’s eyes widened. Terror filled him to the brim. No one ever wants to hear the wizard say anything even remotely close to Twilight’s words. “Ensign, where’s that jump!” “Drive charged just now sir! Beginning acceleration in seven… six… five… four—” The Ensign’s attention was drawn to the third tactical screen as the arcane storm flared up brightly, a massive ball of green fire erupted upwards, forming a mushroom cloud that stretched up and out, growing until the top reached above the clouds. The screen remained bright green for three seconds, then faded to reveal a wasteland choked in a thick pink cloud. The battleships encircling the Chebureki broke off their attack immediately, assuming the explosion came from a superweapon they hadn’t seen fire. “Sisters… I did that…” Twilight whispered to herself. “He deserved it. They deserved it! Evil… I can still taste it. There was no good, no harmony! Just… Evil… Bottomless pit… Evil… Celestia, what did I do?” Twilight’s eyes rolled back into her head. The mare slumped sideways and dropped unconscious to the deck. This is our only chance to leave here alive, DJ decided. “Ensign! NOW!” The Chebureki’s engines hummed loudly, the ancient ship shuddered, jerked, deployed her tachyon sales and shot off into the cosmos. Ancient and malevolent eyes beyond the stars followed the ship as it left. Rainbow Dash - 6th of Solar Dusk, 1st year of Harmony 749,573.37 39 Zabiyaka Drive, Iv Damke - Chern, Noctae Sector Iv Damke, the Green City, a sight few ever saw in spite of the city’s wonders. The city was built in the same fashion of all Chernin Cities. Iv Damke was built within a dome hewn from the bedrock. The planet itself provided the means to survive its own chaotic and deadly surface. The land within Iv Damke’s dome was alien. Had Rainbow not been awake when Boris’s shuttle flew into the entrance tunnels, she’d never have believed the city was on Chern. The ground was covered in rich fertile soil, allowing many plants to not only grow, but thrive. There was green grass, trees, flowers, and shrubs laden with berries everywhere Rainbow looked. The top of the dome was nowhere to be seen. The city’s natural radiation shielding lay behind a mixture of holograms, paint, and optical illusions to produce a stunning natural looking sky which, at the moment, featured a setting yellow sun on the western horizon. The sun itself was in truth a massively powerful spot lamp, but its brightness and color made the difference trivial. Plants filled the space between the city’s buildings. Each building was a simple geometric shape, or a series of simple shapes, quite boring in comparison to pony architecture. At least, in shape. Iv Damke was a riot of color. Every surface that could be painted was given a bright cheerful coat of paint, with some buildings even featuring murals or decorative patterns which rivaled Equestria’s large cities. The city’s towers occupied the dome’s center. There was little to them. Tall, squarish, efficient towers built for a purpose with little thought to aesthetics. They were ancient structures, built by the first generation of colonists who had few tools to work with and need of immediate shelter. Iv Damke’s true face lay in the houses which had been built around the city’s core. There were thousands of small houses, each of them with a large yard surrounding them. The towers had yards filled with gardens, but the houses truly made the most of their allotted space. Each garden was truly unique and distinct from its neighbors, even to a pony who knew nothing of plants like Rainbow. Some houses used flowerbeds to make patterns around small groves of trees in truly artful displays of landscaping. Other homes had quite functional looking gardens producing food stuffs, with rock gardens, water features, and small patches of decorative plants to bring a cheerful air to their micro-farms. The towers in the distance were clearly made from steel and concrete. Crude materials to be certain, but quite effective and durable if a touch cold and indifferent. The houses on the other hoof had clear heart put into each and every bit of wooden siding. Rainbow certainly hadn’t been expecting an alien’s house to look like something a middle-class earth pony family would build, but that is exactly what she saw as the shuttle flew through Iv Damke’s streets. Row after row of lovingly designed, cheerfully painted, obviously custom houses. Rainbow did her best to keep tears out of her eyes as each home they passed brought a fresh wave of homesickness to her heart. The Chernin city didn’t just look like home, it felt like home. Even the care-free meandering way the roads had been laid down reminded her of Equestria. She wanted to get out of the shuttle, take off her helmet, and breathe in the scent of flowers. She wanted to roll in the grass and feel the mana flowing through the world. If Twilight teleported me here, I wouldn’t know we’d left Equus. Rainbow sighed happily. Rainbow scarcely noticed as Boris brought the shuttle to a halt in front of a large four story blue and gold home which appeared to be a log cabin. The logs were decorative, of course. The walls were in truth high tech modular units covered with an artisanal veneer, like every other modern Chernin building. Yet the illusion was so perfect one could go their entire lives without knowing the home’s walls kept the radiation out, ensured the home’s climate remained precisely how the owners wanted it, and provided the infrastructure for a modern home’s amenities. The yard was well kept, as one would expect. It’s design mixed practicality with pleasure, featuring herb gardens, fruit trees, and berry patches separated by large grassy patches for recreational activities and radbathing. Dash put her hoof against the window, desperately wishing she could go outside and take a nap in the apple tree growing on Boris’s front la— “Wait, WHAT!” Rainbow snapped as her eyes took in the apple tree in full. “Ey?” Boris asked, looking down at Rainbow from halfway to the shuttle’s cargo hatch. Rainbow turned her head and pointed at the tree. “That’s an apple tree!” “Da!” Boris said with a smile. “My papa planted it when I was a smol Bor—” The Chernin man stopped mid sentence as Dash’s recognition and surprise registered in full. He took a step forward and dropped to a knee to look the little pony in her eyes, going as far as to push his aviators up to stare directly into Rainbow’s eyes. “You mean to tell me you have these trees on your homeworld?” Boris asked, his voice deadly serious. “Have them?!” Rainbow snapped, her wings flaring from a mix of emotions she couldn’t fully understand. “One of my friends farms them! She makes her whole living on nothing but apples and apple products, and there’s just an apple tree on an alien planet!” “How old is your species?” Boris said calmly. “At least three thousand years?” Rainbow nodded. “Uh, yeah. Easily. Princess Celestia is around that old. I think. And there’s tens of thousand of years of stuff before her and—” Rainbow cut herself off and wordlessly reached into her bag, her hoof touching the bracelet she’d stored there. “No… No we’re older. A lot older!” Boris nodded slowly. “How much older?” Rainbow shrugged her wings and took out the bracelet, turning it so Boris could see the silver and copper band. “I don’t know… But, when Penny and I went into the geode we found… I found a pegasus’s skeleton. It was wearing this. I took it so somepony could use magic to learn about… I mean, we found first race remains and my own people’s remains! So—” Boris gently set a hand on Rainbow’s shoulder. “I believe you. That bracelet, it looks like one of their artifacts. You are older than Chern…” Boris looked off into the distance for a moment before returning his gaze to Rainbow. “Let’s keep this quiet, okay?” Rainbow sputtered. “But! But our planets share trees! There has to be some link—” Boris shook his head. “Nyet! It could be a false alarm. It could be a similar fruit. We’ve had this happen many times. But, none of my people have ever gotten to explore the K3. Not officially, and searching for our ancestors is official business. Our scout fleets are not allowed inside. “But… That tree’s seeds came from the same world we did, Blue. If it originated on your world, then…” Boris trailed off and rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “May I please have a copy of your medical data? I know you used an Autodoc. I would like to check your DNA. If we share ancestry, this is a huge day for my people.” Rainbow nodded immediately. I don’t care what he thinks. I’m not stupid, I know what an apple is and that is totally an apple!  “Yes! Of course. How long will it take?” “To be sure? Ey… Few days. We’ll want to run the test several billion times. After four False Reunions…” Boris shook his head slowly and with a mental command sent Rainbow a data release consent form. “Fill that out. Maybe something comes of it, maybe not. Either way, you get to meet new relatives today!” Rainbow pressed the virtual accept button, and a copy of her genome was immediately emailed to a Chernin medical lab in Cheeki Breeki for AIs to read and notate. The slight mental strain of using her implant distracted Rainbow from Boris’s last sentence for a split second. Once the words registered in Rainbow’s mind, she blinked and tilted her head to one side. “Huh?” Rainbow snorted. “Oh, yeah we did that blood sisters thing.” Boris nodded. “Da. Did, did you cut your wrist? Ey! Sorry, I mean leg.” Rainbow nodded, frowning slightly. “Yeah…” “And you let your blood mix?” Rainbow nodded. “Mhm. We did it right. None of the silly foal stuff. She saved my life from a giant death robot!” Boris pursed his lips. “Blyat… Uh, so… Penni told you that’s um, a legal contract, yes?” Rainbow’s blank stare and pert ears were the only response Boris needed. “Ah, okay,” he stood up and cleared his throat. “We take blood oaths seriously. You mixed blood with my daughter, so you’re my daughter now too. That was an adoption contract.” Rainbow blinked several times, her left ear flopped down in confusion while her right remained at attention. “T--That was legal?” Boris grinned. “Da! Welcome home, Blue!” “B--But I have a dad already!” Rainbow protested, her wings rustling against her sides. “Now you have two,” Boris said excitedly. “And I have a brother. I always wanted one, but mama only wanted one.” Rainbow’s jaw dropped slightly as the enormity of what she had done hit her like a moving truck. “I— I— I just… I just merged my whole family… Legally… With… Oh…” Rainbow’s ears drooped sadly. Boris laughed and gently pat the top of her head. “Is no problem, Blue. Come, you need to meet everyone, then we need to drink and swap stories! Then, we talk business.” Rainbow looked up at Boris in confusion. “Business?” “Da,” the former Stalker’s voice became like ice as he squat down to look Rainbow in her eyes. “Someone hurt my little girl’s friends. There is business to attend too.” The pure terror Boris had plunged her into with a single word was beyond anything Rainbow had experienced. Part cold fury born from injustice, part calculating assassin's unfeeling professionalism, part fatherly wrath, and part psychically conveyed intent. Flashes of memories accompanied the word. A hundred tyrants dead in their beds, their sheets slowly turning crimson. Thousands of soldiers, guards, pirates, and thugs walking down dark streets, entirely unaware of the danger mere centimeters behind them. Criminal cartels crumbling as their members fled the invisible stalker hunting them like mice in a cage. All of the flashes held the same emotions. Pride, accomplishment, satisfaction, and justice. All of these things had been done by someone who loved to do them, and felt each assassination and covert op was not only justified, but rather simply what a good person should do. They were the emotions of a good man who was proud to serve his country, or as he saw it, his family. The weight Boris put on the word business stayed with Rainbow as everyone left the shuttle. It consumed her. On the other hoof, Rainbow’s feeling of helplessness died with that word. Her quest was over. Boris would put an end to this. He was a man of immense means, skill, and experience, and with that one word. Business… Rainbow shivered. The door to the log house swung open with a welcoming creak, snapping Rainbow out of her spooked stupor while revealing a tall muscular Chernin woman. She looked like Penny, only with leaf green hair instead of pink, two feet taller, and built like a woman who loved bodybuilding enough to abuse testosterone just enough to develop a large muscular frame. In spite of this, the woman carried a feminine air with her which complemented her purple track suit, freshly-stained white cooking apron, and motherly smile. “Penni!” She exclaimed, her eyes seeming to glow as they looked on her daughter's bulky-outdated power armor for the first time in centuries. Penny awkwardly shuffled her feet. “Uhhh… ” Penny’s brain screamed in panic as it desperately tried to read the social cues her mother was presenting, eventually settling on the best course of action being to ask. “H— Hi, mama. Is soup ready?” Pan and Jo winced while Rainbow facehooved as the three beheld a true critical failure. Penny’s Mother laughed and walked over to Penny, wrapped her massive arms around her armored daughter in a mighty bear-hug, and lifted her off the ground. Effortlessly. “I missed your silly-head,” she said before setting Penny down with the grace and ease one would use to place a glass on a dinner table. Jo’s CPU locked up for several moments as she tried to understand how the organic had just lifted several tons in a casual hug. The ponies didn’t even blink. I wonder if she could beat Big Mac at leg-wrestling? Rainbow mused. Jo raised a hand, unable to put on a facial expression while her cores crunched through calculating the odds of Krypton not being a purely fictional location. “She just lifted three-point-six-three-five-six-nine-three-four-six-two-one-three-nine tons!” Pan nodded and looked up at the android in confusion. “Yeah, and?” The purple tracksuited woman turned around and looked Jo up and down for a moment. “I’d give you a hug too, but with that damage… Oi,” she reached out to shake hands and smiled. “Call me Sasha.” Jo shook Sasha’s hand with a wince. The structural damage she feared didn’t come, and her hand was released without even the slightest of compression fractures. “Nice to meet you,” Jo managed to whisper while her cooling pumps hummed with quiet terror. Pan reared up and held out his hoof to shake. He’d been hugged enough by excited earth ponies to know his ribs didn’t like that at all. “Nice to meet you too, Miss Slovaki!” Sasha ignored the extended hoof, and hugged the ever loving crap out of the little stallion. Pan squeaked, gasping for air before he was released. Sasha smiled down at Pan and laughed. “Oi, blyat… If I had known there were little unicorn people out there to date…” She turned and gave her daughter a playful look. “Is this one as nice as he is cute?” “Da, mama,” Penny answered almost robotically. “I’m being playful, friendly and accepting, sweetheart,” Sasha explained without even a hint of annoyance. “Oh!” Penny exclaimed with a smile. Sasha turned towards Rainbow. “And this is my new little girl, ey?” Rainbow’s wings flared as the massive woman opened her arms for a hug. “Wing bones!” Rainbow yelped. Sasha’s face fell into a deep dark hole of despair. “N— No hugs?” Rainbow felt like she was staring at a puppy she had just kicked. “Just… Be careful of my wings please.” Sasha’s smile returned and Rainbow found herself wrapped up in a very ginger hug. “Nice to meet you,” Sasha said before suddenly glaring up at her husband. “Rainbow!” Boris’ eyes narrowed. “Nyet! Is Blue!” Rainbow smirked and gently pushed against Sasha’s chest with her hooves to convey her desire to escape the steel cage she found herself in. “Either is fine. I’ve accepted the nickname.” Sasha gently set Rainbow down. “I look forward to getting to know you. But I won the boxing match, and get to talk to Penny first. I’m afraid you’ll have to put up with Papa’s war stories while your sister and I cook.” Rainbow rubbed the back of her head awkwardly. Oh no… They really do take it seriously, don’t they? “Y--yeah, okay,” Rainbow said her tail flicking behind her. Pan frowned. “Um, what do Jo and I do?” Sasha reached down, picked Pan up, and set him on Penny’s left pauldron. “You come with us, young man! A mama needs to know her daughter’s heart inside and out.” “I would like to listen to the war stories,” Jo said, taking a step away from the woman who clearly was the product of some kind of radioactive spider bite. Boris cleared his throat to get the android’s attention. “I’m sending you a map of the house, Jo. Go to Workshop Two. I had the house build the parts we discussed at the station. Feel free to install them and build anything else you might want.” Jo’s core temperatures spiked with excitement. “Anything?!” “Anything,” Boris said with a nod. Jo’s face stretched into a slightly unhinged grin just before she sprinted into the house giggling like a young AI in a properly organized database. Sasha shook her head slowly. “She’s going to use all of our feedstock you know.” “Da,” Boris chuckled. “Is okay. I have the factory working on Penny’s new suit, and we have yet to measure Blue.” Boris turned and squat down for Rainbow. “So… Want to go to the livingroom and split some vodka? You do one shot and a story, then I do one shot and a story.” Rainbow smiled. “Sure. I’ve got a lot of stories about my friends. I think you’ll want to hear them.” Especially since we need to talk business... Sasha led Penny and Pan inside, immediately launching into one of the most “mom” lines of questioning Rainbow had ever heard in her life. She’d never received one herself, but she’d been at friends houses when their mothers had gone into the whole “how have you been, sweetie?” spiel, and her dad had done the same thing any time she’d been out for a few days with friends or camping. Rainbow shook her head and smiled slightly. It’s good to know some things are the same everywhere… Like apple trees, apparently. Boris nodded to Rainbow and walked inside. The ex-Stalker closed the door behind Rainbow, giving her only a few short seconds to take in the brightly lit interior. The house’s floors were made from a dark wood, with crimson carpets filling most of the floor space. The walls were unpainted but decorated with a herringbone pattern of black and white wooden panels. Much like the yard, plants were everywhere. They hung from the walls and ceiling, were placed in pots on the floor, tables, shelves, and even on the edge of staircases. Interestingly the plants here served to highlight the house’s more advanced technology. They served as markers and decoration for sensor nodes, camera lenses, shield emitters, and other wonders of the civilized world. Boris nodded to Rainbow as he removed a pair of plasma casters from shoulder holsters and hung them up on a rack next to the door, only to exchange the hand cannons for a significantly larger pair Rainbow couldn’t help but notice were engraved with the text: “Wrong house, cyka!” The new guns left noticeable lumps under his jacket. They made Rainbow just a little uncomfortable. “You can take off your helmet. My house is fully shielded,” Boris said like someone who hadn’t just equipped a pair of anti-tank handguns. Rainbow frowned, hesitating for a moment before realizing her suit could simply check that claim for her. A quick environmental scan showed the area was safe. Rainbow retracted her helmet with a thought and shook her head to pull her mane free from the suit’s neck. Boris whistled then shook his head. “Oi, blyat! We need to replace Penny’s camera drones too.” Rainbow blinked. “What? Why?” Boris pointed to Dash’s mane. “They get your colors wrong, Blue. I thought your hair was, uh… less saturated, and matte.” Rainbow blushed slightly. “Oh… Uh, well I haven't exactly gotten to shower today so, my mane is kinda… It does that.” Boris raised an eyebrow. “It looks better as it gets dirty?” Rainbow shuffled her hooves and elected to not explain how leaving anti-icing oils on her fur and mane were considered bad-hygiene if it wasn’t winter. “Uh, we should… Talk.” Boris nodded. “Sure,” he said before leading Rainbow down the hallway and to a room on the right, his study. Boris’s study was a small room. It was barely big enough to fit two large comfortable chairs, a desk with a computer console built into it, and the three weapons lockers which occupied the wall to the left of the door. It was lit with holographically simulated candles, giving it a dark and mysterious, yet comforting feeling. The walls were covered with seemingly random items secured on shelves by gravity tethers. Old combat knives. Scraps of armor. Grenade pins. Flags. Uniform patches. Small statues and other exotic baubles. Trophies taken from operations which were especially memorable. The way the trophies were laid out reminded Rainbow of the anti-hero Crimson Tide’s bedroom from Daring Do and the Undersea Terror. It put her at ease. Not because she felt safer around a dangerous man who liked her, but because her subconscious thought the room was cosplaying. Boris took a seat in his large olive green leather armchair and gestures for Rainbow to take the other. She flapped her wings to take the air in a short “jump” and let herself plop down, discovering the chair to be extremely comfortable. “Drink,” Boris insisted. Rainbow looked up to find a large glass of vodka a few decimeters from her face. She winced. “I shouldn’t.” “It’s tradition,” Boris said as he pulled his facemask up just enough to take a sip from his own glass. “We talk business with a drink, or we don’t.” Rainbow frowned for a moment then took the glass. “So lying is harder, right?” “No, so you’ll say what you really feel.” Rainbow nodded and slugged the glass back in one smooth motion, then slapped the empty glass down on the arm of her chair. Boris blinked. “Heh! Crazy cyka. You’ll feel that like a brick to the eye.” Rainbow shook her head. “No. I’ll be fine. I always need a whole bottle to feel it.” I’ll probably get a bit of a buzz off that glass, but nothing big, so... Whatever. Boris smiled and sat back in his chair. “So, I believe we were talking about how you don't think you’re a hero earlier, da?” Rainbow sighed and facehooved. “I'm really not. Do we have to do this again?” Boris nodded. “We do. We do! I’m going to make you a suit of armor, you don’t see yourself as a hero. It means you feel you have shortcomings. Things you cannot do on your own. Things I will build into your suit.” Rainbows’ ears perked. Her lips curled upwards slightly. “Oh. Well, I guess that’s okay then. It’s just…” Dash sighed and looked down the floor. “Heros are foals stuff. My friends taught me that.” Boris leaned forward. “Excuse me?” Rainbow shrugged her wings. “Well, they are, you know? I used to do the whole hero thing for fun and because ponies needed help. Foal fell in a well? I’d fly her out. Earth Pony visiting a pegasus's house fell through the cloud? I’d rush over at top speed and catch him before he hit the ground.” Boris raised an eyebrow. “You would? As in you don’t anymore. Why? Did you injure something?” Rainbow shook he rhead. “Nah. I’m even faster now than I was then. It’s just… Well, ponies started to love me. I had a fanclub, everypony recognised me even if I didn’t know them. It was awesome!” Rainbow sat back in her seat and smiled. “I think that’s when Pan’s sister started to obsess over me. At least, I think Scootaloo is his sister. He said she’s orange and has uh, well, runty wings. I only know one filly like that. Point is, my friends didn’t like how the whole fandom thing was making me feel. “I kind of got egotistical. They’d question me on something and I’d be like ‘I’ve done this a dozen times, I know what I’m doing’, stuff like that. I got a swelled head.” “They were upset you took pride in your heroism?” Boris asked flatly, a hint of disgust in his voice. Rainbow pursed her lips. “I wouldn’t put it like that…” “Then how would you?” “Well,” Rainbow put a hoof to her chin in thought. “I craved the attention. You know, the love, respect… I got from doing hero stuff. It made me act like somepony more important than I was.” Boris nodded. “You felt more important than someone who saves lives every day with the skills they built up over their lifetime?” Rainbow blinked. Her mouth opened slightly. “I uh… I never thought of it like that… No? I guess?” She shrugged her wings. “Look, I— I got too arrogant, okay? I was already a bit arrogant because of how fast I can fly and just… I needed to be taken down a peg.” Boris’ eyes narrowed. “What did your ‘friends’ do to teach you this ‘lesson’?” Rainbow squirmed in her seat as she thought back to the Mare-Do-Well incident. It wasn't a good memory. But it was an important one. After all, she’d taken their lesson to heart. “They created a costumed hero and switched places so they could all use their talents and powers to be a better hero than I could ever be. Like, Twilight used her magic to solve one problem, then she’d switch with Applejack who would use her strength to stop another. “They kept that up for a few months, took care of every single incident I’d normally handle and just… Did it better. Way better.” “Of course they did, they were a team,” Boris pointed out. “Are you saying they told you it’s better to be a part of a team than act on your own? That’s a good lesson. Sounds like they taught it… incorrectly, blyat.” “Uh, not exactly. They showed me,” Rainbow sighed. “They were so much better that they won over all of Ponyville to the point where nopony even thought about me anymore. That hurt, a lot. Especially because I was still trying to save people when disasters happened! It’s just, they could be in more places, and Twilight can teleport so they always got there first. “I was depressed for like, a week before I decided to call ‘Mare-do-well’ out so I could try to prove to myself that I was better than her. Or see if… I wasn't, and if I deserved to be forgotten…” Boris steepled his fingers. “Go on…” Rainbow frowned and slumped in her seat. “That’s about it… They made their point. Showed how I couldn’t appreciate other heros because I had to be more important… They showed how they didn’t get any credit because they were anonymous which made them better, like morally, and personally since the public wouldn’t feed their egos. Told me that a real hero shouldn’t brag about it… I should just do things because they are right and not talk about it, and be okay when other ponies take the spotlight.” Rainbow looked up at Boris, a tiny part of her heart yearning to know she hadn’t been a bad person during that phase of her life. “B— but, I mean... I saved a whole bus of ponies from going off a cliff! That’s something worth bragging about, right?” Boris took a deep breath. “Let me get this straight. You performed heroic acts for the personal thrill and because they were the right thing to do. You then, rightly, took pride in your service to your community and as anyone who loves what they do does, you talked about your work with your friends. A lot, based on how most people are.” Rainbow nodded, and Boris continued. “Your friends, because your boasting was an annoyance, went to extreme lengths to ensure you couldn’t do something which brought you joy, created a persona specifically to one up you, steal your work, in the process probably abandoning their friendship with you to focus on the mission, leaving you alone, depressed, and forgotten by the community you loved enough to risk your life to save time and time again. “Even worse than that, they ensured that same community obsessed over someone who was actually intentionally stealing your job, thereby taking away your sense of self worth and sending you into a depressive episode. “Then, when they revealed it was them, they shamed you into believing heros shouldn’t take pride in who they are and what they do. Especially not you, a person who can fly faster than sound and create a real bolt of lightning, who selflessly rushes into danger to try and save the day.” Rainbow nodded. “R— Right. It’s about the group, not me. That’s why I’m not a hero. Because if I was, I’d be doing the wrong thing. I should be helping my friends instead. Just, quietly.” Boris took a deep breath and held his head in his hands. “And you want to save these people from pirates, because… ?” “Well, they are my friends,” Rainbow said meekly. “Are they?” Boris asked with a disgusted sneer. “You bothered them a bit too much by talking about your accomplishments, and instead of simply telling you you were being a bit of a mudak, they spent months psychologically torturing you into compliance with an elaborate scheme.” Rainbow opened her mouth to speak, but no words came out. She closed it, leaned into her hoof for a moment, then closed her eyes tightly. “W— well, you’re not wrong. But they are not really bad people. Even if they did hurt me like that… Intentionally. I have to save them. Because they are in danger and don’t deserve that. So… I did. I came out here. I got help. There’s a whole battleship out there looking for everyone, and they found Twi, and Rarity, and Fluttershy already. I didn’t save them, but that’s okay. I helped. That’s what a real hero does.” Boris leaned back in his chair and poured himself another glass of vodka. “When you get home, are you going to talk about the part you played in this?” Rainbow shook her head. “No. That’s wrong.” Boris sighed. “Ya gotov posporit', chto eti shlyukhi dazhe ne znayut, kak sil'no oni slomali tebya.” Rainbow frowned. “Uh, that didn't translate.” “Don’t worry about that,” Boris said as he stood up and squat down to put his face directly in front of Rainbow’s. “Here’s what we do. After dinner, I am going to measure you for a suit. We’re going to get all the kit you could possibly want, and then we are going to find your remaining ‘friends’. You are going to save them, then we are going to go celebrate. Vodka, semechki, hardbass, everything. We are going to tell everyone what you did, and for who you did it, and you are going to drink it all in.” Rainbow shook her head. “But—” “Nyet!” Boris snapped. “You have been wronged— I— I can’t even…” The Stalker reached up to the wall and took a small glass eye from the shelf. “See this?” Rainbow nodded. “This eye belonged to Klavis Jalin,” Boris said as he rolled it in his hand. “He liked to use mind control to force people to have children, then rape those children to death, then watch the parents commit suicide after he removed the mind control. I slowly lowered him into a volcano. I can still hear the pop and sizzle of the fat boiling out of his bones. It warms my heart every time I feel sad.” Rainbow’s tail stood up in alarm as her mind all to vividly imagined death by lava. Boris set the eye back on the shelf. “When I came home, I didn’t get a metal. Stalkers… That evil man... I was never sent to kill him. Understand? He’s dead, I killed him, I work for my Tzar, but she never gave me any orders. I got nothing. Officially. Did I brag about the monster I slew? Da! I went to my friends and showed them the headline. We went to a bar and had kavass, chebureki, blins, and danced the night away. A hundred girls gave me a kiss. Why? Because I am the hero who took a great evil from the galaxy. “Your friends being annoyed by you bragging is one thing, them making you unable to enjoy being a hero? That’s another entirely. Heroes shouldn't be belittled, they should be remembered! My Tzar wont remember me, not legally. There is no record of my service. But the people? They know me. They remember me, like any community of good people should! They know Boris! I lived up to my namesake and am almost as celebrated as he was in his time. “Do I brag? Ey, sometimes. Have I earned that? HA! A million times yes!” Boris stood up and pointed at Rainbow. “What’s the most heroic thing you’ve done?” Rainbow’s wings twitched uncertainty. “Um... I… Well this one time when I was little, Fluttershy fell from Cloudsdale. While falling she accidently knocked out the rescue team sent to catch her, so I dove down and saved them all. They almost hit the ground, but I was able to get a hold of all four of them and make the turn just before we would have hit the ground. It was like, a three kilometer fall. Nopony can survive that.” “You carried four people to safety? At once?” Rainbow nodded. “Yeah. It was pretty hard to catch up to them.” “And you were a little girl during this?” Rainbow nodded. “Well, filly, but yeah.” “So you, as a child, carried three adults and your friend to safety,” Boris nodded, thoroughly impressed. “Udivitel'no! Blue, we’re going to celebrate.” Boris turned around, opened one of his weapon lockers and took out a bottle of vodka with a gold and silver inlay. Rainbow blinked. “But, that was years ago?” “So?” Boris demanded as he shoved the bottle into Rainbow’s hoof. “I’m going to tell mama we’re going out. Dinner isn’t for hours yet. We’re going to the Hundred Rads, and you’re going to get a meal fit for a king.” Rainbow raised her hoof. “But—” Boris shook his head. “Nyet! Heros should be respected. Da, da, you did let things go to your head a little, but you shouldn’t stop because of it. You just need to be a little humble, not self deprecating! Not everyone can face danger like you or I do. Think, Blue! If they could, how would any evil person ever do anything for more than a few minutes? How would people need saving so often if everyone could be a hero?” Rainbow froze. Boris was right. Not everyone could be a hero, even if they wanted to be. Then… I— I am… “I am special…” Rainbow whispered. “Da! You are. If you want to save your so called friends, you need to embrace that,” Boris said as he ducked out the door. A half second later, Boris poked his head back into the study. “Ey, so… It may take mama a while to let us go to the bar. She may say no… If so, we go later! That first race bracelet you found? It’s a trophy. You should wear it and be proud of what you did. Okay?” Rainbow nodded, her tail flicking confidently behind her. “Yeah. I should!” Boris smiled. “Good! I’ll be back soon. Hopefully we can go out.” Boris ducked back into the hallway, and Rainbow reached into her saddlebags. She slipped the ancient bracelet out and turned it over in her hooves, lost in thought. He has a good point… I guess maybe I did take their words a bit too seriously. Rainbow reached her hoof over the smooth crystal embedded in the bracelet. The small stone twinkled and shone with an inner light, betraying an enchantment lurking within the gemstone. Rainbow nodded to herself. “Never really liked jewelry, but I should at least see what this is. It is for a pegasus after all.” Rainbow slid the bracelet onto her right foreleg. The stone twinkled, and the silver and copper shrank slightly, gently fitting themselves to Rainbow’s fetlock. Rainbow’s face scrunched with annoyance. I swear to Luna if that’s all this does I am going to— Rainbow yelped as the bracelet reached for her flight magic and drank hard from her arcane reserves. The slight shimmer in the gem grew brighter and brighter as it burned through her magical reserves to recharge. Rainbow held her leg up as she tried to pull the bracelet off, but it wouldn’t budge. The gem’s glow became blinding. The room around Rainbow began to dim until suddenly Rainbow was plunged into pitch black nothingness. Rainbow whimpered. Not only did she feel like she had just flown two back to back marathons, but the darkness around her felt bigger than the room. She didn't feel like she had been blinded, she felt like she had been transported. “H—Help?” Rainbow stammered. As if conjured by her words, green letters shimmered into existence in front of Rainbow. They were alien letters and alien words, and yet she understood them perfectly well. The words appeared near the bottom of her vision and scrolled upwards, vanishing into the nothing. Emergency Power restored. Current charge: 0.002% Searching for remote power source… Sol — Offline M.A.W. IV — Destroyed M.A.W. V — Offline M.A.W. III — Destroyed M.A.W. II — Standby Mode Active Accessing M.A.W. II… Aborting standby mode... Attempting power transfer... Alert! Enemy occupation detected! Aborting transfer… Resuming search… M.A.W. I — Online Checking for hostile signatures in M.A.W. I… System is safe. Attempting power transfer… System charging. Whatever printed the words into the nothingness before her began to endlessly display the bracelet’s power level as it rapidly climbed towards a hundred percent. Rainbow took the moment to look down at her leg. She could see herself and the bracelet in spite of the blackness now. The bright glow in the gem began to swirl and sparkle, changing from white to blue. The light shrank slightly, moving inwards to the center of the gemstone, forming a tiny bright ball of glowing light from which small tendrils of energy leapt only to plunge back into the glowing orb. Rainbow squinted at the gemstone. “Wait! Is that a bucking star?!” The scrolling numbers stopped, a new message wrote itself in the blackness for Rainbow to read. System recharged. Checking wearer’s biosignature… Unknown! Checking wearer’s thaumaturgic aura… Unknown pegasus detected. Hello! Are you the next of kin of: Lady Cassandra Higgins Rainbow shook her head. “N— no. I found this bracelet in a cave. I took it from um, well I guess that would have been her. Body. I’m sorry! I just..  I thought this could tell me how ponies were in space millions of years ago. I didn’t mean too—” Words cut Rainbow off. Beginning new user setup! Standby for bloodline assessment… Performing bio-scan… Rainbow yelped as a tingling electric buzz raced from the bracelet across her entire body. Sending user data to Faust for analysis… Standby… Bio-data has no link to any existing knighthoods. Initiating Arcane Virtue Assessment... Rainbow frowned. “Wait, what do you mean virtue—” The darkness in front of Rainbow twisted and morphed as a solid object made itself manifest from the darkness. A stone wheel containing an arcane circle in the shape of a star. The outer rim of the circle was engraved with eight different virtues; honesty, compassion, valor, justice, sacrifice, honor, spirituality, and humility. The engravings in the circle began to light up, glowing different colors as the text reported the process’s progress. Then the outer rig began to spin slowly around the stone sigil. Assessment started! Honesty — 67% Compassion — 80% Valor — 100% Justice — 53% Sacrifice — 39% Honor — 82% Spirituality — 20% Humility — 50% Score — 491/800 Average virtuousness — 61.375% User scored perfectly on test 3. Current User status — Acceptable. State your name. Rainbow blinked. “I uh… R— Rainbow Dash. What are you doing, who are you?” The stone wheel twitched, then shrank and flew into the gemstone bracelet, melting away and leaving only the glowing arcane symbol behind. The symbol fit around the miniature sun, letting the star replace the central white ring. Activating primary systems… Primary systems active and on standby. Beginning arcane boot sequence… Opening thaumaturgic links... Honesty — Online Compassion — Online Valor — Online Justice — Online Sacrifice — Online Honor — Online Spirituality — Online Humility — Online Arcane systems active and on standby. Rainbow shivered, the fur on the back of her neck stood up as she felt an impossible wave of power rush through her. The sensation was identical to when she was wielding the Element of Loyalty, though far more powerful, and most importantly, she was in total control. No other voices whispering in her mind, trying to make the power do this or that. This was all hers. Greetings Rainbow Dash. You have been selected by the Astral Knights to defend your community against all threats seen and unseen. Remember: Honesty is respect for Truth. Compassion is Love of others. Valor is Courage to stand up against risks. Justice is Truth, tempered by Love. Sacrifice is Courage to give oneself in name of Love. Honor is Courage to seek and uphold the Truth. Spirituality is to seek Truth, Love and Courage from one's own self and the world. Humility is the fusion of Truth, Love, and Courage. This vessel shall serve as your steed, your armor, and your badge of office. Wield it well, and arise, Sir Rainbow Dash, Knight of Valor. The darkness vanished, leaving Rainbow staring at the still glowing bracelet on her wrist. It’s arcane sigil glowed brightly within the crystal. The impossible power still flowed through every fiber of Rainbow’s being. Whatever had happened in the darkness had been real. Rainbow blinked as the last two sentences completely occupied her mind. “Wait, what?! Was I just knighted? The hay do you mean by vessel?! You’re a bracelet!” A small text box opened in Rainbow’s vision. Somehow she could tell this wasn't from the neural implant in her head, but instead came from the bracelet on her wrist. Receiving incoming transmission from: Default, SYS Admin Faust, SYS Genesis “Uh…” Rainbow gulped nervously. “P— Put it through?” The textbox widened to fill Rainbow’s view, showing her the interiors of two ancient starships. Two pony-like figures stood in front of the clean white metal and rounded crystal bridges. They were holographic projections, not flesh and blood ponies. The one on the right was a stallion. He had dark orange fur, hazel eyes, and a shimmering turquoise and navy blue mane. The one on the left was a mare. She had white fur, a “lived in” brownish orange mane, and pale blue eyes. Both were alicorns. “Hi, so… You had better sit down,” the stallion said with a sad inflection and a frown. “You broke an ancient treaty by activating that starship,” the mare said with an understanding and sympathetic smile. “It’s okay. We know you didn’t know any better.” “Yeah, don't worry. Just uh… You need to get filled in one some stuff,” the stallion said with a nod. The mare nodded twice. “Yes. Also, which colony are you from and why weren't you taught about the War in heaven and why you must never every reactivate any of the Star Lord’s military relics or cast any of their battlemagic?” Rainbow’s wings drooped limply. Treaty, what? “I uh… I’m from Equus. Y— You know, the planet with the little sun that orbits it.” The stallion sputtered, his wings flaring in what Rainbow knew from experience was total panic. “Terra’s temporal stasis field failed?! Wait, ponies survived the attack?! SHIT! The treaty has been expired for— Faust! Fill her in, I need to check the defense grid.” “Of course, Default. Take your time and do it right,” Faust said calmly. “They haven't attacked yet. We clearly have time.” Default’s projection vanished from Rainbow’s view. Faust cleared her throat. “So… Rainbow, was it?” Rainbow nodded. “Y— Yeah. What’s going on?” “There was a war in heaven once,” Faust replied. “It just flared up again. Your world is in grave danger.” Rainbow smirked and shook her head. “Heh… Yeah, it already is.” Faust raised an eyebrow. “Oh? Why don’t you tell me what’s going on.”