"My chores are done!" announced a young girl with a sharp salute. "Permission to go play?"
"Granted." Laud mussed the hair of his child, fingers landing on either side of her long ears. She had bright cyan hair and vibrant purple eyes. All odd colors, but he had laid with a pony, so that his progeny would bear their marks, perhaps not that unreasonable. She had a tail and tufts of fur, in places, placing her awkwardly between the species, but he knew only love for what was his daughter, and the town of ponies had quickly warmed to her. "Be back in time for dinner."
She dashed to freedom, darting around Spike along the way. "See you later, Uncle Spike!"
Spike waved at her with a little smile before turning back to Laud. "I... wonder if mine will be half as cute."
"More," laughed Laud, his eyes wandering over a map of the region. "In your eyes, they will be the most wonderful thing on the planet, and any that would argue the fact will face your anger." He smirked faintly. "Even me."
"What? Nah." He waved it away with a blush. "Still... um... any foal of Rarity..." He worried his hands together.
"I already forgave you." He looked over his smaller but growing junior. "If there is one thing even a lord should understand, is that a knight's child will always be the most adorable in their eyes."
Spike rubbed behind his head, his blush growing worse. "I still can't believe she said yes... She, um, we get married in the summer."
"As if I'd forget." He clapped Spike on the shoulder, mid-rising himself. "I will be there, of course." For just a moment, he wondered what a dragon-pony would appear as. Perhaps much like his own child? Perhaps something entirely different. They would be a Hawkwood, in the end.
"I still can't believe it." Spike approached a window, his hands behind his back. "She kept her word."
"Rarity does not seem a pony given to giving out promises lightly, or acting against them." He hiked a brow at Spike, watching him fidget. "Besides, her promise was only to give you a chance to woo her."
"And it worked!" He spun on Laud with a huge smile. "I mean... I think part of it is the, you know, idea of a knight, a real knight... Those are pretty rare around here." He rubbed behind his head. "That you officially recognized me... as one, and an adult... I think that helped."
"Let us not muse on the why there. You offered your heart to a maiden, and she accepted it. That is enough to know, and to celebrate. Come, let's patrol the land, and greet our people."
"Sure!" While some knights and some lords might hesitate to enjoy such things, Ponyville was not the usual domain. Going out to see the ponies, wave at them, even shake hands with the few human inhabitants. It was rarely a glum day.
The space around Equestria was busier than it had been before Laud's arrival. "Are you certain this is a good idea?" asked a pony that worked controls designed for hooves.
"It's a bit late to ask that," countered a mare. "You're already in space."
"That's what I regret," noted the stallion with a little smile. "I heard how the first ship turned out."
"Why are you even thinking about this now?" asked the mare over the radio. "It's time to make some history."
"Good history?" He flicked a toggle and pushed, floating through the cabin. "Everything, um, looks as ready as it will ever be."
"Starlight insists, this time, she made just the parts she could be certain of," assured the mare. "That's why it's a lot smaller, and simpler. It'll take you up, and take you back down, and that's all we want."
"And pictures."
"Oooo, yes, lots of those," agreed the mare, her grin unseen but certainly heard. "Get out your camera and get busy."
He buried his snout in a compartment, digging out the big camera more suited to a tripod than being used while floating in space. "They shoulda sent a unicorn."
"I swear to Celestia. You went through months of all kinds of training after passing the entrance exam. It is so beyond the point anypony cares about the butterflies in your stomach! You hold that camera up, shove it against the glass and get to taking pictures!"
"Yes'm." This didn't stop him from grumbling as he got the equipment set up. "Should I use the flash?"
"I... Let me check." She had left the mic on. He could hear her clopping away. "Hey. Flash, should he use it?"
"What? No. Whatever light he puts out won't get where it's needed and won't come back in time for the picture!" responded some other pony farther away.
"Huh, alright!" She replied, her clops coming back closer.
"No flash," he said, not bothering to attach the flash module. "Ready for the first picture."
"Now we're making history." He could hear her dancing in place. "Do it!"
A loud click echoed in the small chamber, then another, and a third. "The world... looks so small from up here," he noted as he took more and more pictures. "Just a little thing... And we're specks on it... Mission?"
"Yeah?" Mission smiled a little. "Getting good shots?"
"Great shots," sighed the stallion, twisting to get another. "Mission... We are small ponies in a very large universe."
"No argument there." She inclined her head faintly. "What brings this up?"
"Mission Statement." The way he said it, it sounded serious. "When I get down, I would like to get married."
She spit take on the mic, setting her coffee aside. "Woah! Hey... we... We are associates." She coughed softly into a hoof. "if you want to try dating, great, but how about we do that first?"
"Oh, uh...yeah." Clicks revealed that he was still doing his job. "Out of film, and things to take pictures of from this angle."
"Fantastic. Come home..." She smiled a little. "I may have a congratulatory peck for your hard work."
He returned the smile, though neither could see the other. "With pleasure, ma'am." The first pony astronaut began the work required for him to come home to those who missed him.
Gregor spread his hands, and there were polite bows of heads, but also hooves gently clopping the ground. The ponies were not ones for moments of silence, but his parish had grown. "Thank you all for coming today. May you all walk in his light."
One pony advanced as most people returned to their daily lives. "Sir?"
"Father," Gregor gently corrected. "What can I do for you, child?"
"I appreciate you takin' the time and all." He rubbed behind his head. "But ya ain't my father."
Gregor blinked at that. "Not biological, this is true." What madness of biology would allow him to be the father of the large red pony before him, he did not consider. "But I am a guider and protector."
"Mah father done gone long ago." Big Mac sat slowly. "Ah appreciate yer stories plenty, but ya ain't much a guide fer me. Um, do appreciate them. Mostly good stories."
One thing that set ponies apart from humans, they had no immediate fear of clergy and their power. There was one of no particular importance, telling him that he was of no importance in return. It was... rude in some ways... "I am new to the ways of your people," he confessed instead. "But the wisdom I bring is quite old and, I am glad to report, still quite relevant. These are struggles we all bear, human or pony."
"Maybe." He stroked his chin, hoof brushing fur. "But we ain't the same. Mah sister complains a lot 'bout the farm makin' ends meet." He leaned forward a little. "But if we all work hard, the ponies of the town? They wouldn't let us go under none. They like our apples. They like us. They wouldn't let us go under."
"Your people are kind," he agreed without hesitation. "It is a point of merit."
"But it makes some ah yer stories not work quite right." He inclined his head. "We ain't the same. Not sayin' yer bad or nothin', or we can't be friends, 'cause we are."
"But we aren't the same," finished Gregor. The stallion nodded lightly without further words. "I... see..."
Big Mac seemed satisfied with what he had said, rising up to his hooves. "Look forward to the next one. See if ya can't find one more fer us, or a violent one. Those are fun." He tipped his hat and trotted out back to his own business.
"You took an interesting path."
Celestia sat up straight, looking around her room that seemed empty. "Who is that?"
"I go by many names," whispered the voice in her left ear. "And will go by many more," it finished in her right, coming formlessly to her. "We have acted long in partnership, hoof to hoof."
There were precious few that could fit that. "Harmony?"
"Harmony. Destiny. God?" proposed the voice, drifting across the room. "It matters little. You and yours will have to rise to this challenge of challenges. The door to the garden has been flung open. You had a chance to crash it closed, but instead you welcomed the outside in."
The voice seemed suddenly closer. "I should not be surprised. This was your nature. This was what I encouraged."
"We will do our best," she assured, sitting up tall. "Already we are gaining equal footing."
"But will you be equal with them?" asked that formless female voice. "In many ways, you are their superior. My little ponies, to stand equal with them would make me quite sad."
Celestia's ears danced, her own terminology turned against her. It was a hint of how high the voice thought of itself over all ponykind. "What would you have us do?"
"Be ever yourself," bade the voice. "Do not reach to be equal, instead grasp their shoulders and bid them to rise." The voice lifted in the air with that word. "The universe must know brightness again, or it will all learn well shadow. There are many of them to few of you. Rise, and bring them with you."
The voice rose ever higher, seeming to fade into the ceiling, the voice gone. Celestia was left with a soft frown, and many heavy thoughts. "Guards?" One poked his head in. "I would like to speak to my sister. Is she awake?"
There was much to discuss, and to plan.
"Where do you think you're going?" Bon Bon had a hoof out in the way of her child. "Ready to get into more trouble?"
"I'll be good," she promised, stomping in place, her tail swaying agitatedly. "Mom, Dad said I could go."
"The orders of one parent do not override the others." Bon Bon smirked. "Lucky you, you have three of those."
The foal groaned piteously, for she did have three mothers, each with their own opinions. "I'm just gonna go play. I did all my chores, promise!"
"Except... one." Bon Bon coiled on herself and grabbed something, flinging it at the girl's feet with a wooden clatter. "Pick that up, and make me get out of the way."
It was a wooden sword. The girl grabbed it in her hands, taking on a fighting stance as Laud or Spike had done in the past. "Any rules?" She was suddenly quite serious.
"No striking your elders across the face," instructed Bon Bon, drawing her own practice sword in her teeth. "And if either of us gives up, the other wins. Simple as that. Oh, if you're knocked out, you gave up."
"Fair e-nough." She lunged for her mother with the last syllable, only to be turned aside with a loud clack of wood against wood. The fight was on, but both were smiling. As much as she might complain, she rather enjoyed sparring with her mother, and having a mother cool enough to want to spar. Few other children could claim the same.
She was a symbol of the meeting of humanity and ponykind, but she was only the first, far from the last.
The sky would brighten, or darken, with the coming of ponykind. Only time would reveal which it was.