Some months and a great many lightyears later, Nova was sitting in the captain’s chair of the illustrious science ship the HSV Observer, lightyears away from civilization, regarding a planet that no living being had ever visited.
Or at least no living being that she knew.
The planet revolved on the big, expensive viewer in front of her in that leisurely fashion planets tended to favour and Nova idly cast an eye over the initial readouts appearing on the minor screen integrated into the arm of the chair. Looking at them, she felt she could have just guessed what they were, really.
“Oh hey, another barren, lifeless hunk of ice and rock that - that’s great.”
She slumped in her seat, profoundly glad that not only had the Hegemony seen fit to install a pony-optimised chairs for her, the captain, but also that is was incredibly comfortable. This took the edge off her disappointment, and the delightful drink she had on-hoof also helped, but she still felt bitter.
“Whoever said space was dull and full of nothing?” She said, slurping. The straw was a riot of curls. Unnecessary, but amusing. It had been a ‘You’re going on a science adventure!’ parting gift and had involved science in its manufacture. We all adore this synergy,
“I am detecting a certain level of sarcasm,” said Xide. She glanced up at him. There were blinking lights she could see studded across his surface, but that didn’t really tell her a whole lot. Apparently they did mean something - a Gorf would likely have known immediately, as would have Princess Twilight - but not to Nova. Not yet at least.
“You have sensors for that?” She asked.
“Yes. It’s called a basic level of awareness,” he said. Nova sunk deeper into the chair somehow.
“Hah,” she said. She slurped her drink some more, this time more aggressively, hoping that perhaps if she did it loudly and angrily enough the universe might hear and oblige her with a planet that wasn’t mind-numbingly uninteresting.
Xide was the Hegemony’s representative on the vessel, an observer. Despite the Hegemony having been the ones to construct the vessel in the first place, technically speaking Xide had no actual authority. He was just there to offer advice and moral encouragement and suggest what the Hegemony might think of as the best possible resolution to whatever issues arose.
What this would work out as in practical terms remained to be seen. Nova trusted the Hegemony would stick to its word given that they had never been anything other than entirely forthright, but she also wondered how it might react if they found something really, really interesting.
Not that that seemed especially likely at that moment...
At this point up came bounding Blithe Spirit, Nova’s nominal second-in-command. Really, Xide was probably the one who was actually second in command in terms of knowing what should be done on the ship - probably first in command if push came to shove anyway, though this he’d deny. But technically speaking Blithe was next in line.
What Blithe lacked in leadership qualities he made up for in sheer, unalloyed enthusiasm.
“Isn’t this exciting! Another planet logged!” He, sounding as though this was the single best day of his entire life. Sullenly, Nova looked over to him. She didn’t turn her head, she just moved her eyes. Anything else would have required too much effort.
“It’s not that exciting,” she said.
Blithe seemed to find this an honestly surprising answer. He even blinked in shock.
“Oh, it’s not? I think it is. You should have seen some sort of the ice formations around the equatorial regions! I could show you, if you like?”
Nova found herself being menaced with a datapad. She eyed the pad, then looked back to Blithe again.
“No thanks, I’d like to maintain some sense of mystery,” she said.
Nova’s tone and delivery finally managed to penetrate the fug of positivity that Blithe carried with him in much the way a planet carried an atmosphere and he for the first time realised how miserable his Captain appeared to be.
“You look bored,” he said.
This sort of statement of the bloody obvious got under Nova’s skin and she glared, though she didn’t move any more than she had before, and remained slumped.
“I am bored! We haven’t seen anything in weeks! It’s just dead planets! Scratch that, not dead, dead would imply that there had been life! We don’t get that! Not even planets with ruins! I haven’t seen one alien ruin! Just rocks! And ice formations.”
“We found a gas giant ecosystem last week,” Blithe said.
Nova had quite forgotten about this. Remembering it stopped her in her tracks, her mouth open in preparation for continuing to rant. She closed it, composed herself, and then spoke with more composure:
“That’s true. Alright, I’ll admit that was pretty cool. But that was one thing. I don’t know, I was just expecting, you know, a bit more. I was kind of hoping to get something I could lord over Gravy with when I saw him next. “
Gravy being Nova’s rather unfortunate nickname for Gravitational Constant, the second-best student of Princess Twilight and long-time personal friend of hers. At the time, his not being chosen while she got to go on the ship had seemed a coup for her and a bum rap for him. Now? Not so much.
“Isn’t he at the Central Science Institute on Hazaria?” Blithe asked. He was friends with Gravy, too, though not in quite the same way. Certainly, he could not even begin to comprehend Nova’s need to get one over on the poor sod. It just wasn’t how he was put together or how he understood the world.
On hearing this point Nova waved a hoof under Blithe’s nose. He went cross eyed and took a step or two backward.
“He is! And I thought me getting a field assignment would give me the leg up. Made him jealous. But not now. Now he’s having a whale of a time. Getting involved in all sorts. He says they’re even working on trying to pin down and translate an extragalactic signal they found. Extragalactic! Can you imagine? And here I am. Scanning rocks. And gas. And ice.”
“This is important stuff, Captain,” Blithe said, pouting.
The sad look on his face cut Nova to the core, but then Blithe could always do that. Seeing his joie de vivre dampened even one iota was like shivering in the shade when the sun went behind a cloud. Grunting and setting her mug down again Nova wriggled out of her slouch and sat up straight, pushing back her mane.
“No, I know it’s important it’s just - ugh - important things don’t really ever feel important at the time, do they? They just kind of feel like boring, thankless work.”
“That might be the point. Hard work is often required for desirable ends, and success is never guaranteed,” Xide said, reminding both ponies that he was kind of technically still a part of this conversation.
“He’s right,” Blithe said, pointing to the synth with a hoof. Nova grunted, feeling ganged up on.
“Ugh. Again. Why can’t life be easy and fun?” She asked, folding her forelegs across her chest.
“That’s a very good question. I am sure the Hegemony has people on that,” said Xide. She glared him.
“I can’t tell if you’re joking or not.”
“Yes,” he said.
She decided to just let it rest there and sunk into what she hoped came across as sullen silence.
Xide made her uncomfortable. It wasn’t that he was synthetic - that didn’t bother her - it was just the way he floated silently everywhere being completely inscrutable and unreadable, or at least unreadable to her. If anyone hung around doing that it would make her uncomfortable.
And the tentacles, of course. Couldn’t forget those.
Gorf had tentacles, too, and those also made her uncomfortable the few times she’d actually met one, but there weren’t any Gorf on board so it wasn’t an issue right now. Xide was, so his were. They just made her skin crawl beneath her coat. She couldn’t help it.
“How many other planets are left in this system?” She asked.
“Uh…” Blithe said, consulting his datapad, but Xide answered first because he didn’t have to consult anything:
“Six,” he said. Nova sighed and slipped from her seat, flopping forward onto all-fours.
“I’m going to bed. You have the bridge, Blithe. Wake me up if anything happens.”
“But-”