Magpie had rarely seen so many ponies in one area before. They packed in so close to one another that part of her worried about the oxygen concentration of the brand-new climate control systems. Dome 3 was the first of its kind, likely the first of many such structures that would one day be erected on the lunar surface. There was no reason to be pushing it so far above its usual capacity.
The stage was directly below the dome’s center, meaning the sky of spun glass was as high as it could be. It was easily a hundred meters up, high enough for a team of pegasus ponies to perform a circular maneuver near the top of the dome. She couldn’t make out the stars through the cloudy glass over their heads, only a faintly luminous blackness. It was night out there, and the touch of it didn’t even reach inside the dome. Moonrise had taught ponies many lessons, and all had been put into practice here.
The crowd in Dome 3’s central square was at least five thousand strong—Silver probably could’ve given her a more precise count, but his grasp of numbers had always been far stronger than hers. You should be the one here representing the past, not me. Silver wasn’t here, or at least not down in the square. The large space was filled with dustpines, a lineage of trees they had been cultivating since the beginning to grow quickly in poor soil. That made the park beautiful as well as practical.
“Ponies of Moonrise, your attention,” said Prime Minister Coattail, tapping one hoof against his lectern. The last smatterings of applause and hoof stomping for the acrobats overhead faded, and one by one attention returned to the stage. Magpie couldn’t see the Prime Minister’s expression, but she could guess. Coattail wasn’t a scientist, but he was a consummate pony-pleaser. He was probably turning things up to eleven right now, making ponies proud to be citizens of Moonrise just by looking at them.
“This is the last time I’ll ever be able to say that,” he joked. “We’ve always known that Moonrise wouldn’t be able to contain us forever. The ancient cavern provided shelter for our ancestors, at a time when they didn’t even understand the dangers all around them. The water served our crops, and helped us produce our air. But every foal must eventually leave their cradle, and venture out into the world. The city of Moonrise is no longer alone on our moon, but will have a sister here in Dome 3. After conferring with the princess, this new settlement will be named Starseed.”
Coattail paused for applause, though they were subdued. That name hadn’t even been in the running for consideration, so far as Magpie knew. The front row of this crowd was packed with engineers and craftsponies, and she could see the frustration and discontent on their faces. Shouldn’t we get to name it? We built it!
Magpie glanced over her shoulder, at an unassuming pony at the back of the crowd. Princess Nightmare Moon had taken many identities over the last few centuries. First a Voidseeker bodyguard of Silver’s, then a persistent secretary of the Prime Minister, until age made her first disguise improbable and she needed another.
But whatever the princess was thinking with her unusual exercise of power, she could see nothing of it on her face.
“I know, I know, you’re upset it wasn’t the choice you made,” Coattail went on. “It wasn’t mine either. But the princess can see further than we can. Nightmare Moon views this first dome as a sapling of a far greater plant, one that grows onward into the stars forever. We live in a solar system with dozens of bodies we can inhabit—distant planets and moons begging for ponies to husband them.”
He walked to the edge of the stage, pointing off into the distance. The dome had a single blemish, and elongated section of tunnel raised just above the surface and stretching to one side. In the distance was another building, though the glass wasn’t clear and it could not be seen. A factory to build their future.
“Ponies who come to live in Starseed will all be working towards that common goal. The princess imagines a day during all our lifetimes where the surface is covered with domes like this one, growing more food than we can eat, or filled with factories and laboratories to invent machines we cannot yet conceive of. But our first steps out into the void begin here today.”
He nodded towards Magpie, stepping aside. This was the entire reason she was up here on the stand, instead of hiding in one of the skytowers around the park to watch with Silver.
She stood up, taking a second to catch herself on her oversized boots. They were more like stilts really, extensions to make her reach the height of these oversized ponies. Apparently it worked, because ponies today always whispered about how pure her crystal bloodline must be, instead of how teeny she was compared to the gigantic freaks that moon ponies had become.
“My name is Magpie,” she said, glancing only briefly down at the podium. One of Coattail’s own speechwriters had put something together for her. It was elegant and graceful and confident—she didn’t intend to read a word of it. “I stood beside the princess when we landed here, many centuries ago. I uh… I haven’t been in Moonrise that whole time. But I’ve been here since Silver Star was elected, and I’ve seen how… Look, the ponies who landed here all those years ago never could’ve imagined what you’ve built. But they always knew we would go back to Equestria one day. They’d be proud that we’re finally doing it.”
It felt like there was plenty of applause, at least Magpie thought there was. She hurried back to her seat, avoiding the eyes of everypony watching from the crowd. Were they still going to be sour about the name? I wonder what their great-grandparents would think about that. We don’t have anything more serious to be upset about than what we call the dome.
That was wishful thinking of course, though it was easy to pretend when she was up here in a city they’d built by themselves on the lunar surface. It was the same great achievement of the ancient Alicorns, albeit far more primitive and less safe to live in.
“For as long as we’ve lived on the moon, we’ve known no difference between our city and our nation. Today, that must change. The place called Moonrise will still be the home to myself and many other ponies, but it will share a larger whole—with Starseed, and other domes we will construct. The name we chose for this city—has not been discarded. From today onward, we will all be citizens of Tranquility!”
This time the cheering was genuine—maybe all the pent-up celebration that had been briefly shelved while everypony thought he’d ignored what everypony wanted. Though Magpie couldn’t help but notice little clusters of ponies who didn’t join in, angry faces who suddenly stood out. But whenever she tried to get a good look, the crowd would shift, and she couldn’t resolve their faces.
Of course you found some way to turn that into a victory, Coattail. He might not know how to do any of the big goals he brought for the city, but where the ancient failures of Moonrise had surrounded themselves with ponies who were most loyal, Coattail chose only the best. It was probably why he was still in office.
“I’ll not keep you all here longer than is necessary,” Coattail continued, once they’d settled down. “We all have reason to celebrate, and the city will provide. As the machinery has yet to be built to inhabit the factory floor behind us, I took the liberty of arranging a party there for the evening. Consider all ration quotas lifted until tomorrow. But be smart, all of you—the Constabulary will still be enforcing injunctions on public drunkenness.”
Ponies rose to their hooves to cheer and clap as Coattail stepped off the stage. He slipped to the back, where a carriage waited with its doors already open. Nightmare Moon joined him, then the doors shut, and they returned slowly the way they’d come, back down towards Moonrise.
Questions from the press would go unanswered today, as they usually did. With the Prime Minister gone, those few ponies who had snuck in from the press corps would have to make do with what they’d seen. “Alright ponies, nice and calm,” called Glossy Bauble, Moonrise’s chief of police. Did that mean he led Tranquility now too? Maybe instead of having a party to make ponies forget about that, he should’ve stayed to give them details.
But answering too many questions is probably how ponies lose popularity.
“Now now, everypony,” Glossy Bauble said. “We’re going to make this nice and orderly. Anypony attending the festivities make a line, and walk that way. Prime Minister says it’s open to everypony here, and your families.”
Magpie watched Bauble closely, as the electric spotlight overhead shone through his face to the cap he wore over his mane. After all these years, Magpie now knew how Penumbra felt to live in a city full of her descendants. At least she could tell them when she saw them, instead of having to guess.
The crowd obeyed, with most ponies drifting towards the open doors behind them. Magpie remained in her seat as they passed the stage, smiling politely but not terribly interested in the party. Food meant something very different to her than it did to these ponies—let them enjoy it.
“Excuse me,” said a voice, loud enough to carry over the general murmur of excited ponies. “Do you have a moment?”
She looked up, eyes widening slightly as she saw the face of the creature who had come to question her. Not a pony at all, though she resembled one. Except she had a beak, and feathers instead of a mane. “You’re a hippogriff,” she squeaked, without thinking.
“I’m a reporter,” she said, voice changing from polite to annoyed. “Solar Wind, Stellar Chronicle.” She flashed a badge, so quickly that Magpie didn’t even get a good look at it. “I was just hoping to ask the Prime Minister a few things. But you know him—you’re at all these functions. Maybe you could answer instead?”
Aren’t you a little young to be a reporter? Magpie probably would’ve turned her away, except for that little voice of guilt in the back of her head. She of all creatures shouldn’t be surprised that things other than ponies lived on Moonrise. There were griffons, now we have hippogriffs. It makes sense. “I don’t work in the Prime Minister’s office. I can’t tell you anything on his behalf.”
She rose to her hooves, wobbling a little in the oversized boots. The presence of this strange creature so close to her was almost enough to make her stumble and fall over, but she managed to keep her balance. Narrowly.
“What can you say about the widely-circulating allegations that Nightmare Moon doesn’t actually exist?”
Her mouth hung open. She stumbled, wobbling backward from her. “W-what?”
“I’ve read about you, Magpie. There are photographs of you assisting with the last eleven administrations, and descriptions of you before that. Mineral ponies are immortal, aren’t you?”
“N-no.” Magpie retreated a few more steps, her rump backing into the now-empty back row of chairs on the stage. This wasn’t an interview at all, it was a battle. The kind she couldn’t fight with a dagger or a gun.
“I used to be, when I was a Voidseeker. Now I’m just aging slowly.” But the more mineral blood a creature has, the slower the age. It was why her eldest children were only recently buried, and several still lived. It might’ve filled her with regret that she hadn’t stolen from the Armory sooner, if only having any foals with Silver now was possible. So far as they had learned, it wasn’t.
She nearly took off and flew to meet Silver in their skytower apartment. She resisted—her curiosity at the audacity of the question overpowered her discomfort, for now. “What are you talking about, anyway? The princess… you mean the one who has ruled Moonrise for a thousand years? Why would she be gone?”
Solar Wind seized on her question, closing in with her pen held in one claw. Anything Magpie said might be on the front page of this “Stellar Chronicle” tomorrow, and there was nothing she could do about it. Except… now that she thought about it, she couldn’t recall the name of that paper. Nor had any of the other reporters stuck around to pressure her, they’d gone into the party, probably to speak with the engineers who had built Dome 3.
“You’re denying the obvious truth, then? This ‘princess’ used to be seen by ponies all over the city. In the oldest records in our library, there are accounts of her taking visits from anypony who wanted to speak to her. She was cruel and terrible to her visitors, harshly punishing anypony who asked questions she didn’t like. But then things changed. Now she lives in a hard vacuum, in a palace surrounded by guards that no one can visit?”
She leaned in closer, slitted eyes fixed on Magpie. It might’ve worked to intimidate an earth pony, but being undead for hundreds of years had eroded away any ancient instincts of self-preservation. “How many ponies think that?” she asked, raising an eyebrow. “That the princess is… what’s your theory exactly?”
“Dead,” Solar supplied. “Probably during the revolution, but maybe long before that. Nightmare Moon loved nothing more than ruling over us, and she just gave it all up. That doesn’t seem consistent with her character, does it? It’s a convenient lie to keep us obedient.”
“No.” Magpie folded her wings, feeling less intimidated by the moment. Her old instincts expected attack, saw that beak and those claws, and had good reason to fear. But Tranquility wasn’t the same place anymore. Ponies didn’t kill their superiors when they wanted a promotion. “Her rule is basically a formality, Solar Wind. The princess gives advice to whoever is the Prime Minister, that’s all. She’s wise, so she’s great at answering questions that regular ponies wouldn’t even understand. But she doesn’t do anything. If she died tomorrow, ponies would make some worse decisions, but we’d keep on with our lives. She doesn’t hold in the air anymore.”
“A convenient excuse,” Solar said, undaunted. “But you’re still describing a nation built on lies. Every Prime Minister enters that palace for the princess’s approval. She signs all our laws. Why won’t you just admit Nightmare Moon is just a name you can use to get away with unpopular decisions? The princess wanted to call this place Starseed, instead of the name we voted on. It wasn’t Coattail’s fault!”
Magpie raised an eyebrow. She nearly called for Glossy Bauble right there—but that would probably just play into this bird’s delusions. Authority wasn’t the way to convince her, but maybe some simple truth would be. “The princess isn’t dead, Solar Wind,” she said flatly. “The princess has illusion magic so powerful, she was at the opening today. I suggest you stop spreading this information around, or she’ll probably have to visit you in person. Nightmare Moon has grown softer over the years, but there’s still nothing that matters more to her than caring for her ponies. She won’t be happy about someone trying to dismantle their government.”
Magpie turned and stalked off. It took concentration not to fall over with her oversized boots—but she had weeks of practice now, and she managed. If she expected Solar Wind to follow her all the way home, yelling more accusations, at least she was disappointed there.
Dome 3 wasn’t like Moonrise—it hadn’t grown haphazardly around natural formations and whatever need the city felt strongest at the time. It had real streets, wide enough for carts to move in both directions at once. The princess herself had insisted on that design, explaining that they would eventually build machines that were fully automatic, moving ponies and supplies around without intervention from them. They built this first dome with a future they could not yet touch in mind.
The skytowers were finer too, built with Lunarium and steel instead of stone and ceramic. Instead of gradually narrowing structures with oversized bases and thin tops, these tapered only slightly where their tips met the glass of the dome.
But Magpie didn’t feel much like taking the stairs. She took off, gliding up the glass facing of the building, past balconies and clear windows. The dome was built mostly for insulation and strength—skytower windows were far weaker by comparison, weak enough that they could still be clear.
As she flew, Magpie had a commanding view of the city, and everything taking place below. Mostly it was celebrating ponies, though she could help but notice little clusters moving away from the group, towards the airlocks. What could anyone want to do there? She didn’t follow or anything, she wasn’t a constable anymore. And after using that tactic against the old regime, protecting every access to vital supplies was one of the few purposes their military still served.
But there wasn’t much to see yet, just a bunch of nearly identical empty rooms. The great innovators and engineers of their time would soon move into Starseed, but not quite yet.
Her own home waited at the top, at a balcony already decorated with banners and flags from gravity disc tournaments both ancient and modern. Magpie didn’t care much for sports, but her children often did. Either that, or joining the Constabulary.
“I thought you’d decided to celebrate without me,” Silver said. He lounged near one wall, where he would’ve had a clear view of the ceremony down below. His body was almost completely covered with a cloak, right down to mirrored glasses over his eyes.
“You could’ve been down there,” she answered, hurrying up beside him and briefly touching her head to his. There was a faint impact as they met, but not painfully. Despite what she was made from, only the princess had ever damaged her. “Nopony remembers us anymore. Or… well, almost nopony.” She was a hippogriff, technically.
“Moonrise has a great leader,” Silver said, turning back to look over the balcony. “The one they chose.”
She rolled her eyes. “You don’t have to lead anything anymore, Silver. But you could still be part of it.”
He flipped his hood back, and his face caught distant spotlights from the party far below. Even close enough to practically touch the dome, there was no light through it. The dome was painted black, after all. “I am, helping from up here.”
His horn glowed, and something lifted from a low table beside him. A dark bottle. “I made some arrangements, Magpie. We can have our own party.”