//------------------------------//
// Season 1 Episode 8: "Confessions of an FTL Pony" Part 1 
// Story: Star Trek: Phoenix 
// by Dewdrops on the Grass 
//------------------------------//


STAR TREK: PHOENIX


S01E08


“Confessions of an FTL Pony”
Part One







Weak. Weak and overwhelmed. That’s how I felt when I saw my sister collapse at my hooves, breaking into sobs. “Sunset!” she wailed as she clung to my forelegs. “You’re… you’re alive! You’re alive!”

I slumped down onto my rump, wincing at the touch of concrete on my bare rear. I ran my forehoof through Twilight’s mane, while bringing the other one around to hug her more tightly. I took several shuddering breaths, trying not to cry myself. “Yup. I’m here, sis. I’m really here.”

Gasps and shouts filled the air as more graduates and their families exited the buildings, Those who recognized me shrieked in surprise, while those who didn’t just seemed confused at the sight of another pony. 

“But… how?” Twilight cried. She snuggled into my legs, making me grunt from the pain that caused. “I don’t understand.”

“It’s… it’s a long…” I broke into a coughing fit, my vision swimming as exhaustion rose up within me. “Long story.”

“I’d be interested in hearing it as well, Commander Shimmer,” said Admiral Brand, kneeling down to meet us at eye level as she spoke.

Blinking blearily in confusion, I said, “I’ll… huh? Commander?”

Before Brand could answer, two more voices shrieked at the top of their lungs. “Sunset!”

Amina and T’Lona burst through the crowd, surging forward to grab hold of me. “Oh my god!” Amina cried. “Sunset… please tell me it’s really you.”

My vision swam more, greying out. Darkness beckoned on both sides, closing in like a tunnel. “Yeah Mom… it’s… it’s me… I…”

“Sunset?” Twilight’s voice trembled like a shaking leaf. “Sunset, what’s wrong?”

I fell over against Amina, using her to keep myself propped up. “I… I’m too… it was too…” I let out a quiet sigh, desperately trying to fight off the urge to slip into unconsciousness. “...I’m tired.”

“More like exhausted, honey,” Amina said as she stroked my cheek with one hand. “I don’t know how this is possible, but right now I don’t care. We should take you home right away.”

T’Lona seemed much more doubtful at first. “With respect, Amina, Twilight… we did just witness a Dominion vessel crash into the ocean. Can we be certain this is Sunset, and not a Founder in disguise?”

Amina’s eyes snapped open, her nostrils flaring as she scowled at T’Lona. “What the hell—how could you say something like that?! This is our daughter, T’Lona!”

T’Lona’s face twitched, her fingers curling ever so slightly inward. “I want to believe this too, Amina. I want to believe she has returned. But we must be rational. We must think logically. We are Starfleet officers first, parents second. We must look at this with our Starfleet eyes.”

Amina sighed, then suddenly let go of me and backed away slowly. I flailed as I struggled to keep from falling over, managing to just barely keep seated. “You’re right,” she said, looking at me with a worried frown. “We… we have to be sure.”

“What’re you talking about?” Twilight murmured. “It’s Sunset! Who else could it be?”

Admiral Brand placed a firm hand on Twilight’s shoulder. “Ensign. Back away from her. Now.”

Twilight sniffled, but she did as she was commanded. “B-but, ma’am, if she wasn’t the real Sunset, why would she have wings?”

“It is precisely those appendages that concern me,” T’Lona said, eying me with no small amount of suspicion. “It should not be possible for her to manifest them, when her body lacks the appropriate muscle and skeletal structure to support them.”

Inwardly, it hurt a bit, hearing Mother speak like that about me. But I understood. After what I’d been through the last couple of years, I understood. “It’s… Twilight it’s okay. I’ll cooperate if they want to test me.”

“Good,” Brand said. She tapped her badge. “Brand to security. We have a suspected Changeling here. Have two officers meet me at my current location.” 

“Yes, ma’am.” 

Brand waited till the security officers arrived, both carrying phaser rifles, which they trained upon me at once. She then indicated the entrance to the nearest building. “I believe you should know the way, if you’re who you say you are.”

“Admiral, she can’t even stand, let alone walk!” Twilight objected. “We should be helping her to the infirmary, not making her walk there!”

But no one else was swayed, not even Amina. Finally, after a couple moments of silence, Brand gave Twilight a look, then nudged her head towards me. “Alright. Then you can help her.”

“Admiral? Is that wise?” T’Lona interjected, glancing rapidly between Twilight and myself. 

“It’s fine, Mother,” Twilight said as she rushed back over to me, gently using her telekinesis to lift me up so I was on my hooves, leaning against her. She grunted a bit from the effort, and her doing so let me notice she was a lot buffer than she used to be. “I’ve got her.”

I gave her a weak, shaky smile. “Thanks, sis.”

So, with Twilight’s help, and with weapons trained on us the whole time, I limped forward. The urge to say ‘screw it’ and fall asleep tore at me as we walked. Eventually, we reached the Academy infirmary. There were a few people on duty, none I recognized save for Doctor May, who gasped at my approach. “Am I seein’ what I think I’m seein’?” she said.

“Hey, Doc,” I said, flashing her a quick smile. “It’s me. Sunset. Got time for a walk-in appointment?”

“She claims to be Sunset,” T’Lona added, still eying me cautiously.

“Oh.” May straightened up, her demeanor instantly more professional. “I see. We’re gonna be testin’ her for bein’ a changelin’, then. Right. This way.” She led us into an examination room. “Better take a seat now.”

“And don’t try anything,” growled one of the security officers, a burly looking Bolian with a belligerent bearing. “This phaser’s set to kill.”

“Great,” I murmured as I sat down on the biobed, grateful for the chance to sit again. “Because I haven’t been shot at enough lately.”

Admiral Brand gestured to May. “Go ahead, Doctor.”

“Alright,” May said, popping out the hand sensor from her tricorder. She ran it over my body, taking extra time to scan my wings. Hearing the warbling trill of the tricorder soothed me; I’d missed that sound. “Well, I’m not seein’ anythin’ too unusual, outside of these new wings of course. If she is a changeling, she’s in no condition to fight. I see a series of minor lacerations, along with the remnants of a disruptor blast, more than a few contusions, and clear signs of malnutrition. Nothin’ life threatenin’ though.”

She passed the scanner over my head and back again. “I’m seein’ some differences in her skeletal and muscular structure to account for the wings. She’s a bit taller too, and her horn is longer. And I’m seein’ a lot more of that strange energy.”

“You mean the mana,” I provided. I stretched out my wings, ignoring the glares that got me from the security officers. “Not surprising, since I’ve turned into an alicorn.”

“An alicorn?” Brand inquired.

“It’s what Princess Celestia is,” Twilight answered. “The fusion of all three types of ponies. But… I don’t understand. How is it possible for you to turn into one?”

“Beats me,” I said, shrugging. “I’ve got a few ideas, but that’s part of a pretty long story.”

T’Lona raised a hand. “Be that as it may, we still have not properly tested her for being a Founder.”

“Right,” May said with a sigh. She wandered over to her tools, then pulled out a hypospray and sample tube. “Sorry I have to do this, Sunset.”

I raised a foreleg. “It’s okay. Go ahead.”

She set the hypospray on me and withdrew a sample of blood, then popped the sample tube off the hypo and swished it around. The blood inside didn’t change, didn’t revert to some ephemeral substance or whatever changelings were made of. 

Which of course it wasn’t going to, since I wasn’t a changeling. “Satisfied?” I said with a dry smile.

Amina and Twilight both gave Brand pleading looks, but she shook her head. “I want to believe personally, but I’m not sold yet. Doctor May, is there anything else you can do to test her?”

The other security guard, an Andorion with eyes so narrowed it looked like he’d been born scowling, hefted his phaser rifle. “I can shoot her. We know there’s phaser settings that force Changelings into their liquid state.” 

“Can we please not?” I groaned. “I’m about ready to pass out as it is.”

May considered that for a moment, then shook her head. “I’m sorry, Admiral, but I’ve done all I can in this settin’.”

The Bolian snorted. “Then phaser it is?”

“Wait!” T’Lona threw her arm out in his path. “This is unnecessary. There is one other way we can determine if it is indeed Sunset.” She held up her hand and twiddled her fingers. “I can mind meld with her. As far as we are aware, while Changelings can duplicate physical appearances, they cannot duplicate memory engrams.” She focused her gaze squarely on me. “If you are Sunset, I will know.”

“Ma’am, I don’t like that idea,” said the Bolian to Brand. “If that really is a Changeling she might use that linking crap to mess up the Commander’s head.”

“Unlikely,” T’Lona replied. “I am skilled at defending myself from mental attacks. I will not be so easily cowed.”

Before anyone else could object, I raised a hoof. “Go ahead, Mother. I trust you.”

T’Lona eyed Brand, who nodded, then came forward. She hesitated a moment, her hand shaking just a little as it approached my face. Then her fingers landed, and the connection began. “My mind to your mind,” she whispered. “My thoughts to your thoughts.”

Years of training and meditation with T’Lona had built up quite the defense to telepathic intrusion in my mind, but I deliberately lowered those shields. I allowed her inside. No resistance. 

The touch of my Mother’s mind upon mind dove deep, searching my memories. I let her pull up each one. The first time we met. My first day at Starfleet Academy. The first kiss I ever had, and a few related to that.

I saw a brief blush suffuse Mother’s cheeks. So I deliberately shifted the connection, to show her the memories pertaining to the battle. I saw her expression darken, worry touching her face.

Mother broke the connection with a sudden snap. The corners of her mouth quirked up slightly. “It’s you,” she breathed. “It’s Sunset.”

“Really, huh?” the Bolian grumbled.

“Ooh, sorry buddy,” I said, grinning cheekily at him. “No target practice for you today.”

Amina and Twilight burst into fresh tears and collapsed onto me. “It’s really you!” Amina cried.

I wrapped one foreleg around her and the other around Twilight. “Yes Mom, it’s me. I promise.” 

The Admiral gave me one last cursory look, then nodded. “Stand down, security, you’re dismissed. Commander Shimmer, I’ll give you some time with your family, but I want to see you at my desk for a debriefing within two hours, understood?”

“Yes ma’am,” I said.

Smiling, she replied, “Good. Oh, and Shimmer? Find yourself a uniform.” With that, she and the security officers left.

“I suppose I should be givin’ you some space as well, then,” May said. “But before I do that, if you don’t mind, I’d like to give you somethin’ that’ll help you stay awake.”

I nodded enthusiastically. “Please. I honestly don’t know how I haven’t passed out yet.”

May nodded, then picked up a hypospray. She keyed in one medicine, reached forward and gave me the shot, then picked out another and injected that too. “There. I’ve given you somethin’ for your malnutrition, should help you feel a little better, along with a mild stimulant.” She looked me over. “I’d like to treat the rest of your injuries, but… I’ll wait. I’ll be right outside if you need me.” She stepped out and allowed the door to swish shut.

Only then did T’Lona approach me with a look of genuine contrition. “Sunset, please… forgive me for doubting you.”

“Mother, it’s fine. You did the right thing.” I beckoned her forward with one foreleg to join the hug. “Now come on. I haven’t seen any of you for years and I miss you, damn it.”

She closed the distance in a hurry, joining the embrace. She took care to place one hand on my shoulder, and let me feel the sorrow, the worry, and the joy she felt, even if she didn’t show them on her face.

We huddled together for some time, everyone holding onto the others with every bit of strength they had, as if this would all disappear like a mirage the moment they let go. Finally, Amina and T’Lona managed to release me and stand up again, though Twilight continued to bury her face in my chest. “We truly believed you were deceased,” T’Lona said.

“So did I,” I replied. “Maybe I was, at least for a while, till… well, it’s a long story. It might be better if I told it to you at the same time I was telling the Admiral. Besides… I could use a shower. And a decent meal. You know what they have to eat on those Dominion ships? Not a damned thing.”

Amina let out a quiet, happy laugh. “I think that’s reasonable, sweetheart. There should be some bathing facilities in the infirmary. While you’re in there I’ll get you a new uniform. With the right number of pips.”

“Yeah, about that… Commander Shimmer?” I questioned, raising up a hoof.

Twilight finally disengaged, backing up so she could look up at me, her eyes shining bright. “Captain Picard gave you a posthumous promotion to Lieutenant Commander.”

“Oh.” I blinked, a small smile pulling at my muzzle. “Well that’s neat. Hope they don’t take that away now that they know I’m alive.”

“I doubt it, sweetie,” Amina said. She ducked outside, then returned after a moment. “Doctor May’s going to show you where the shower is. We’ll meet you in my office afterwards so you can eat something.”

“Sounds like a plan.”









About ninety minutes later I stepped into Admiral Brand’s office legitimately feeling like a new pony. Who knew that a long shower with actual hot water and a double-layer grilled mushroom and cheese sandwich contained as much restorative power as the essence of magic itself?! I filed the thought away as I brushed down the wrinkles in my new uniform. Still wasn’t sure about the grey shoulderpads, but the colored collar was nice. And, well, the extra pip. That felt pretty good.

Having to stick my wings through slits though? That was annoying.

Brand wasn’t the only Admiral present either. There were two others, one a short, balding human man with a grey mustache, the other a severe-faced human woman with blond hair tied up in a bun. “Commander Shimmer,” Brand said, “these are Admirals Nakamura and Nechayev, representing Starfleet Operations and Intelligence. They requested to sit in on your debriefing.”

“Shimmer,” Nacheyev greeted. She eyed my family, her eyes going cold. “Is it really necessary for the others to attend?”

“With respect, ma’am, I’d like for them to stay," I replied. "It’s a long story and…” I glanced over to my family, “one I’d rather not have to repeat too often."

"Certainly," Nakamura said. "Alynna, it's fine. They're all Starfleet, if you're worried about secrecy."

Nechayev gave Nakamura an icy glare, presumably because he used her first name, then she relaxed her posture. "You're right. My apologies, Commander Shimmer. Please, everyone be seated."

Fortunately, part of the large office space was set up to host meetings, so there was enough room for all of us to sit. She’d also thoughtfully provided a large pitcher of water and glasses. We’d need those. “So, sir, ma’ams,” I said once we all sat down. “How would you like me to begin?”

“From the beginning, Commander,” Nechayev answered. She propped up her elbows on the table then steepled her hands. “The last record we have of you is on Stardate 48650.0, when the Enterprise stardrive was destroyed. How did you survive the warp core breach?”

“To be honest?” I replied, frowning. “I’m not sure I did.”

Everyone shot me a confused look, though only Twilight blurted a “Huh?” before being glared into silence by Amina. Nakamura arched an eyebrow at me. “Care to clarify that, Commander?”

Before I answered, I took a moment to fetch myself a glass of water. “Well, sir, it’s a little hard to explain. How familiar are you with the abilities my sister and I are capable of?”

“We’ve all been briefed,” Nechayev answered, glaring impatiently.

“Understood. So yes, I used my magic to try and stop the breach. First I tried to weld the ruptured coolant pipe, like I did to resolve my Academy psych test. But the pressure was too great for the weld to hold. I tried venting the excess power through the EPS conduits, but the entire grid was already burned out. I considered attempting to fix the interlock but there wasn’t enough time left. So I was left with only one last ditch option; to drain the warp core itself and convert it to magical energy.”

Twilight’s jaw dropped. “Wha… you… you did what?!”

“Ensign,” Nechayev began.

“No, wait, Alynna, let her speak,” Nakamura interrupted, raising a hand. “She is the only other one who understands these abilities intrinsically.”

Casting Nakamura a grateful look, I turned to Twilight. “Twilight, remember how we practiced changing magic into electricity, the same way the electric power lines in Canterlot work?”

“Yes, I do. So you must have reversed that process, then—” Twilight gasped. “T-That’s not just inefficient, that’s incredibly dangerous!”

“Oh yeah,” I replied, nodding. “You’re right about how dangerous it is. It’s… well, let me put it this way: with the energies I was absorbing, I probably wouldn’t have lived even if I didn’t have a warp core about to explode in my face.”

“This is all interesting, but please get to the point, Commander,” Nechayev said.

“Yes ma’am.” I took a sip of water before continuing, “I knew that absorbing the energy wouldn’t stop the breach, but I hoped to slow it down, to buy more time. And it worked, but not nearly enough. The Enterprise saucer was still too close.” I cleared my throat a bit and took a deep breath. “So I did something else that would’ve killed me anyway: I used the power I’d already absorbed to create a shield around the warp core, and then started absorbing power again to reinforce the shield. In other words, I was going to use the core explosion itself to contain it for as long as I could.”

Nakamura and Nechayev exchanged a look. “That would explain the reports we received,” Nakamura said. “According to the sensor logs of the Enterprise-D saucer, the warp breach shockwave failed to breach the stardrive’s hull for thirty-five seconds before the stardrive finally succumbed. You succeeded, Commander. The saucer survived, and was towed back to Earth with no additional casualties.”

Somewhere deep within me, a weight I’d held for two years finally released itself. “Thank goodness,” I breathed.

“That explains the core breach itself, but here’s what I don’t understand,” Nechayev said, leaning forward to stare at me. “How did you survive?”

“Well, like I said, ma’am: I’m not sure I really did,” I said. “Here, let me explain...”









Two Years Ago…

At first, my world was white. White-hot pain, white in my eyes, white everywhere I could see or hear. The world even tasted white, as if whatever caused this leached into my senses. The only other thing I heard was my voice whispering, “Twilight, I love you.”

And then just as suddenly, it all faded away. The pain, the sound, the sights, all went black. Empty, like a void. I felt nothing on my hooves, or my rear, or anywhere else.

I was certain I’d died. None of us know what death is truly like. And truthfully, I’d never been much of a believer in my people’s concept of an afterlife, an endless land of eternal sunshine, rainbows, and open fields. No, I expected my existence to simply cease the moment that warp core exploded.

Yet here I was. Aware, awake, and somehow alive. Maybe.

“Hello?” I called out. Then I blinked in surprise at how clear my voice sounded. I remembered screaming my throat out while absorbing the warp core’s energy, yet my voice sounded clearer than it ever had before.

So, after some amount of time—minutes? Hours? Days?— I dared to move, to stand up. I couldn’t see what I was standing on, except when I took a step. Each step was accompanied by a tiny blip of light at my hooves, just enough that I could see something ripple under me, as if I was walking on water.

“Helloooo?”  I called out again. No response came, so I picked a direction and walked. “Hellloooo?”

Still nothing, save for the occasional echo. “Great. I’m alone, in a dark void,” I murmured to myself. “I’m sure this won’t drive me insane.”

So I kept walking, and walking. Without anything save the lighted ripples I had no way to keep track of time. I didn’t even grow hungry or thirsty as I walked, so that didn’t help either. 

Eventually, though, I did spot something in the distance. Some sort of light. Small at first, but it grew brighter the more I walked, so at least I knew I was heading towards something. It changed as I drew closer, too, multiplying from a single white light to a multitude in all different colors and shapes. As the light grew in intensity I could finally make sense of my surroundings, such as they were. An endless corridor, sprouting off in two directions, one back the way I came where it opened up into the endless ‘room’ for lack of a better word. The other continued forward into the lights.

I ignited my horn and used it to enhance my voice. “Helloooo?! Is anyone there?!”

But still nothing. No response. Just the echo of my own voice. 

Frustrated, I decided to sit down. Not to rest, because I didn’t feel the need to, despite however long I’d been walking, but just to do something different.

Using the opportunity to examine myself, I saw that my body showed no sign of injury or abnormality. No uniform either, as if it had been burned away. “Well, now what?” I said. “Is this it? Is this all I get? A big huge void with a bunch of lights? What the hell kind of afterlife is this? Hellooo?!”

If this was my afterlife, it wouldn’t take long for me to go mad from sheer boredom. As it was, I amused myself by watching the lights, seeing how they undulated. I did notice curiously when three shiny ones, like rainbow sparkles, suddenly appeared out of nowhere and swept about at high speed. They grabbed a fourth one, one a dusky grey that looked sickly and pale judging by how it flickered on and off, and then just as quickly disappeared.

“Wonder what that was about,” I said. Then I shrugged. Not like it mattered. Even more bored now, I decided to get up and walk towards the large collection of lights. As I approached, the corridor ahead of me seemed to decline downwards at a steady grade, as if I was walking down a ramp. 

Eventually, the lights grew and grew until any sign of the dark void faded away entirely, replaced by lights in every direction. Colors and shapes swirled around me in every direction, forming a tunnel of pulsating light in front of me. Every so often one would vanish, disintegrating into nothing, only to be replaced by another. “What am I seeing?” 

I abruptly stopped when I noticed the floor begin to slope back up again. Not ready to abandon the lights, I turned around and returned a fair ways, till I was reasonably sure I was in the middle. Tentatively I tried to run my hoof through the lights, only for it to pass through without effect. “What are you?” I asked.

No response. “Oh come on!” I shouted, stomping a hoof on the ground. “This is ridiculous. Obviously I’m somewhere but I don’t know where here is!”

Then I blinked, sighed, and smacked myself in the head with a forehoof. “Oh my goodness. Duh, Sunset.” I summoned up my magic and began flipping through all of the navigational spells I could remember. The first one I tried was a simple compass spell. I summoned up the needle and watched it fail to spin at all, completely useless.

I rolled my eyes. “Okay, okay, so that didn’t work. Let’s try this then.” This time I used a variation that focused on using the stars in the sky, like an astrolabe, to get latitude and longitude. Why I bothered, I don’t know, because all it gave me was a headache. 

“Fine. Third time’s the charm?” My horn lit for a third time. This time I’d use something more experimental. One of the more advanced spells I learned prior to leaving Equestria used thaumic fields to form a sense of direction. I’d been tweaking it off and on to use subspace fields instead, similar to the sensors starships use while at warp.

The instant I unleashed the spell my head exploded with pain, like another warp core had breached inside of my own head. I screamed and fell over, covering my eyes, curling in on myself as the pain raced through me like lightning. I instinctively tried to cancel the spell, but it refused. Like a jammed open valve, the magic continued to pour forth unheeded. So I had to perform a risky maneuver and cut it off on the inside, before it reached my horn. This is something every unicorn knows how to do, but we almost never do it, because it can lead to head injuries, or in the worst case, fatalities. I strained desperately then managed to cut it off, leaving me huffing and puffing on what passed for the ground.

After several moments, I tried to stand, but my legs refused to cooperate. I teetered over till I crumpled onto my side again. It took another moment of heavy breathing and strained motion before I wrenched myself up into a sitting position.

“What the hell was that?” I murmured as I glanced around at my surroundings. Tentatively I reached up and tapped my horn, but it seemed unphased, despite the pain. “It’s almost as if… wait a minute. Am I in subspace?”

If I was it’d explain a lot. The corridors I was seeing could be gravity wells, hence the up and down ramps. The lights could represent the energy patterns on a planet, like geothermal activity, ocean movements, and so on. Meaning the area I was in was likely the planet we’d been orbiting: Veridian III.

“Was it the warp core breach? Did that knock me into subspace?” I raised a hoof to my chin to scratch at it. “But why would that happen? I was inside the shield. I should’ve been vaporized!”

Then I glanced down at my unmarred body and frowned, my heart sinking. “Unless I actually was vaporized.” Faint memories of subspace mechanics lectures resurfaced, and the never fully disproven stories of uncontrolled antimatter explosions leaving literal imprints of their victims in their wake, like subspace ghosts. The thought left me shivering despite the unnaturally comfortable temperature around me.

Despite the darkness of that thought, I started pacing back and forth, trying to think. “But… if that was the case, why would I feel anything at all? I haven’t been hungry or thirsty, but I feel pain. I can think.” Stopping in place, I ran one hoof down my leg. “I can feel the sensation of touch. Hell, I’m breathing, though who knows what. So that doesn’t make any sense.”

I resumed pacing, looking about at the lights around me. “So let’s think this through, Sunset. If I can breathe, talk, and feel pain, I must be real, in some way. Somehow I was blown into some kind of subspace domain.” Then I stopped again, my head cocking to the side. “Heh, guess if I was still in Equestria when this happened I would’ve thought I’d been taken to some kind of astral plane, or ethereal realm or something. What was that quote from Sherlock Holmes that Twilight liked so much? If you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, however—”

Sunset, why are you talking to yourself so much?

“Well gee, me,” I said aloud, rolling my eyes. “Maybe because I don’t have anyone else to talk to?”

You’re going to drive yourself insane.

“Shut up,” I growled. Shaking my head to try and clear the annoying thoughts, I resumed pacing. “So, let’s forget about how I got here. Let’s focus on how I can leave. If I’m right, I’m in some layer of subspace. But it’s got a leak; otherwise I wouldn’t be able to perceive normal space in any way. And if normal space can leak in, that implies I can get myself out. But how?”

You’re thinking too hard, Sunset. This isn’t about subspace or warp fields. It’s about magic.

“What?” I frowned, glancing around at my surroundings. That wasn’t me talking to myself. It was something else. “Who’s there?”

You’re here because of magic. You can use magic to leave. You just have to use it.

Snorting, I replied, “I tried that already and nearly melted my head off, in case you didn’t notice.”

That’s because you’re approaching this like a unicorn would.

My frown deepened, wrinkling my brow. “Of course I am! I’m a unicorn, duh!”

Are you?

My heart skipped a few beats. “What are you talking about?”

Accept it. Accept who you are.

I shook my head, utterly nonplussed. “I don’t understand. I’ve never not accepted who I am. I’m Sunset Shimmer. I’m a unicorn. That’s who I am.”

Yes. But you also know you can become more than that.

“What?” I breathed. “More?”

Remember the mirror. Remember the reflection you saw.

“What could you… no. No way.” I shook my head furiously. “No, that’s impossible. I don’t… it can’t be. I don’t deserve it! I never deserved it! That’s why I ended up on Earth to begin with! Because I don’t deserve it!”

It is time… The voice grew quieter and quieter. ...you are ready…

“No!” I slapped both forehooves to the sides of my head as my whole body shook, my heart jackhammering in my chest. “It’s not possible, I don’t… I don’t deserve this. I don’t! I can’t be a… I can’t be a… an alicorn?”

The instant I said that word, my magic flared all around me, swirling like an aura, blazing like fire. Heat filled my body, so hot it was like being dipped in molten magma. Then it pulled in from every part of my body till it focused on my back. I floated up in the air, looking all over in panic till everything went white.

And then I was falling, screaming like crazy as I plummeted towards a canyon full of sharp rocks. In my panic I squeezed my eyes shut, tensing up my whole body, until something on my back shifted.

A pair of wings unfurled, catching the air, slowing me down hard enough to knock the wind out of me as they altered my angle of descent, before I gently glided down to the ground, collapsing into the dirt near the edge of the canyon.









“Hold on a minute there, Commander,” Nechayev said, holding up a hand. “What you’ve just explained sounds completely ridiculous.”

“It is a little hard to believe, honey,” Amina added with a respectful nod to the admiral. 

“Maybe it is ridiculous,” I replied, “but it’s also what happened.”

Nakamura frowned at that. “No one is accusing you of lying, Commander. But you have to acknowledge this sounds hard to accept at face value. For that matter, you still haven’t explained what you meant when you said you didn’t survive.”

“Sir, if I may,” Twilight spoke up, a tentative look on her face. “I… might have an explanation.”

He sat back and gestured with his hand. “Go ahead.”

Twilight nodded, then focused on me. “Sunset, how much did you remember reading about Princess Celestia’s past?”

“Not a lot, to be honest,” I shrugged. “I know that she wasn’t born an alicorn.”

Twilight pursed her lips, tapping her chin with her hoof. “Do you remember the legends of how she ascended?”

I nodded. “I remember one of them. It said that when she learned about the way the unicorns used to raise the sun, she tried to do it herself.  And in the process she used up so much magic so quickly, her body vanished like ash in the wind. Everypony assumed she had died..”

“And then, later that evening,” Twilight picked up, “she descended from the sky, aloft on a pair of great white wings.”

“And that’s why so many ponies in the olden days worshipped her as a goddess,” I finished. “Because that’s what they thought she’d become.”

T’Lona arched both eyebrows at us so high they disappeared into her bangs. “What you’re describing is a form of reincarnation. Cultures throughout history have believed in such a concept, and indeed some still do. But I must point out that scientifically, such a thing is impossible. When you die, you are dead. You cease to be.”

“That’s what I thought too,” I said. “That is, until I floated down to the ground with these on my back.” I spread my wings out and flapped them. “Look, I don’t know what really happened. Maybe I died, went to the afterlife, and was kicked back as some kind of higher being. Or maybe my magic preserved my consciousness in subspace and reconstituted my body, and everything I thought I experienced in that void was just a hallucination. Whatever the case, I’m here, I’m alive, and somehow I’m now an alicorn.”

The three admirals all exchanged a look, then Nechayev nodded to me. “Very well, Commander. When we’re finished here, I’d like you to submit yourself for testing, both medical and otherwise. I would like to know to what extent you’ve been altered, and what it means for your future in Starfleet.”

I blinked at that. “Um, ma’am, please don’t tell me you’re suggesting I won’t be able to continue my career.”

Nechayev’s stare turned arctic, cold enough I shivered in my chair. “We will have to see, won’t we?”

Swallowing, I bowed my head. “Yes ma’am,” I murmured, trying to keep anxiety from filtering into my voice.

Showing no sign of sympathy, Nechayev resumed steepling her hands. “Please continue, Miss Shimmer. What happened next?”

Just under the table I felt both Amina and T’Lona lay their hands on my back, showing their support. I glanced at them, and both gave me a subtle nod, as if to say, We’ve got your back. “R-right, well, like I was saying, I glided down to the ground…”









The taste of dirt filled my mouth, earthy and gross, moist from recent rains. I coughed and spluttered, spitting it out, wriggling my tongue to try and get every last speck off. Then I looked up at my surroundings. 

I’d landed next to the canyon I saw from above, right in the middle of a copse of trees. Not too far away, a field of what looked like grass spread out in the opposite direction of the trees as far as I could see. The trees around me were deciduous, full of large leaves green with life. The scent of fallen rain and foliage filled my nostrils. My ears scanned around, but I heard no animal sounds nearby. I did, however, notice a small buzzing insect, something resembling a cross between a house fly and a beetle.

Shifting my legs a bit didn’t produce any immediate shocks of pain, so I slowly stood and examined myself for other possible injuries. I did a double take when I saw my wings, furling and unfurling at my sides, the feathers the same shade as my coat. Hesitantly I bent around and sniffed at them, then tried biting at it for good measure, only to yelp in pain. “Ow! Okay, it’s real. Got it.”

Out of curiosity, I stepped towards the edge of the canyon, only to leap back when some dust crumbled at the edge. A single glance down told me I didn’t want to be anywhere near it. There was a silvery line of water curling its way at the bottom, but those rocks rising up all around would shred me if I fell. I shivered at the thought. Dying once was bad enough. I wasn’t keen on repeating the experience so soon.

So I trotted out into the field of grass, spotting plenty of other trees scattered around in the distance. It reminded me of the lush valleys that cut between the Appalachian mountains in North America. Sure enough, in the distance I spotted a range of mountains looming over the landscape, with towering peaks crested with snow. The sun rose high in the sky, about what would be noon on Earth, the skies blue and free of clouds, save for the occasional ball of puff. Despite the high sun there was a chill to the air, just enough to suggest local spring had only just begun. It was idyllic. 

“I could really use stellar cartography right now,” I said. “Because this has to be Veridian III, right? The sun’s too big in the sky… I think.”

I ran through a few facts in my head, what I knew of the planet. Veridian III resembled Earth in many ways, approximately one hundred and sixty million kilometers from its sun, with a similar axial tilt, about twenty-four degrees, rotational period approximately twenty-eight hours and surface gravity approximately .98 G. So, a little cooler, slightly lighter gravity, but all in all, pretty similar.

“Too bad it’s not Veridian IV,” I said as I passed by a pair of large trees, their branches swaying in the breeze. “They’d have shelter, food, everything ready to go, even if it wasn’t industrial.” Then I sighed. “And assuming I could justify bending the Prime Directive.”

I stopped when I spotted the first animal I’d seen: some kind of bird-like creature with large, leathery wings and a pointy beak. It opened up its jaws, unleashed a sound similar to a crow cawing, then dove at the ground, coming up with what I guessed was a rodent of some kind, which continued to wiggle and squeal despite the teeth embedded in its side. “Ouch. Glad that’s not me.”

I moved away as quietly as I could, lest that creature decide it was still hungry. I ran through my survival training in my head. I knew I’d need shelter, and soon. Given how cool the daytime was, it’d likely plummet to near freezing temperatures at night, which meant I’d run the risk of hypothermia. Potable water and food would do me no good if I froze to death first.

And communication. Not for the first time I wish I’d somehow kept my communicator. Without it, I had no way of signaling a starship in orbit. “Not that anyone would even be looking for me,” I murmured, my face falling. “They all think I’m dead. If any of them survived, for that matter.”

That thought—that my efforts had been in vain and I was truly alone on an empty planet—tore at my mind, and the sheer emotional weight of what I’d just been through threatened to spiral out of control. Even if I could miracle up a way to reach someone, the odds of a ship passing through this system were—

“No,” I ordered, stomping a hoof into the dirt. “No. I’m not doing this. Focus, Sunset. Focus on survival. You can worry about rescue later.”

So with that in mind, I kept my eyes on my surroundings, searching for somewhere I could build some kind of shelter. I had no shortage of building materials, judging by all the trees. And while I had no traditional tools, my horn was versatile. It’d be hard work, but I could use it like an axe, or a saw, or a knife, or any number of other such things.

Normally I’d need a rest—not to mention a drink of water—after a good twenty minutes or so of trotting, but I found my new alicorn body capable of going for a full hour before I heard the rumbling of water nearby. I rushed forward past a line of trees and spotted a winding river at the bottom of a steep incline. A number of animals were drinking from it, including a large six legged beast with razor sharp fangs and cold, calculating eyes, with a muzzle like a fox and ears like a wolf. Its ears perked up as it glanced over at me, despite the distance.

“Oh great,” I murmured. “Local predators. Fun.”

I readied to defend myself, and decided to spread my wings out to their furthest extent to make myself look bigger. The beast sniffed the air in my direction, then backed up a few steps before loping away at an impressive rate, scaring a few other creatures that resembled deer and elk. “Yeah, that’s right, you’d better run,” I said, grinning. I knew it’d be back, and if I wasn’t careful it’d make a meal of me in the nighttime, but it was fun to scare it away nonetheless.

After a short time I walked over to the river, sniffing at it cautiously. I knew a spell or two that’d let me test its potability, so I ignited my horn and went to it. “Damn it…” I frowned, sighing at the results. There was something nasty in this water. I’d need to filter it. Which I could do with magic, but not for any great quantity, not without risking exhaustion.

At least, it would have been before my transformation. Maybe my alicorn magic could go much further? I planned to test this eventually, but not yet. Too risky.

Still, it let me get a small drink, so I went ahead and purified some water, then slowly sipped it out of my magic till I’d drunk it all down. Thirst quenched for the moment, I proceeded to trot down the river about a kilometer or so, getting the lay of the land. Good thing too, because the river emptied into a large lake that spanned the horizon. The lake itself sat in a depression, with raised hills all around every bit of shoreline I could see, possibly formed from some kind of impact crater, or volcanic activity. 

I could see quite a few more creatures drinking by the lakeside, ranging from small rodents to a few that seemed distressingly similar to ponies, despite being six legged rather than four. I spotted a number of larger creatures as well, including an extremely strong-looking one that resembled a saber-toothed tiger. 

“Right, I should probably settle away from the lakeside. Too many animals.” I backtracked along the opposite side of the river, until I spotted a small breakaway in the hillside I hadn’t noticed before. Not quite a cave, but just enough to provide dry cover from the elements, and seemingly easy to defend too. “Perfect.”

I got to work immediately, first going for loose branches from many of the nearby trees. I used some strong reeds to lash the branches together, forming a roof-like block. It wouldn’t hold for more than a couple of days, but it’d hold long enough for me to start crafting sturdier supports, adhesives, and the like. Once I had it prepared, I propped it up with a couple of thick branches that I sunk into the ground, then covered it with leaves and such for insulation.

After that I tentatively tried to rest under it. It wasn’t much better than lying on the open ground but it kept me dry. 

That settled, I went about collecting the materials for a fire. Carrying the rocks and splitting the thicker branches for kindling took far longer than I would have liked, but mercifully my horn made lighting the fire a simple task.

By the time I’d finished with all this, the sun sank low on the horizon, coloring the sky in shades of oranges and reds. As much fun as seeing my namesake was, it’d also grown much colder, and that was before the sun slipped fully behind the mountains. I briefly considered going for more water, or even some kind of food, but I decided it was best not to risk it, not without having any idea what kind of nocturnal animals prowled the area. 

Instead, I set about using the few branches I hadn’t been able to use for the lean-to as sharp sticks, sinking them into the ground at an angle just in front of the entrance to my shelter. It’d be enough to ward off a few things, at least. I considered adding some magic to it, like some kind of alarm spell hooked to a rock, in case something crossed the line, but I decided that might be too much magic invested.

So I settled in for the night, falling asleep beside my campfire. Only once during the night did I awaken, when I thought I heard a predator poking around. I stayed up for a good hour, looking out at the darkness, terrified, before I finally settled back to sleep.

The next day I discovered a trail of dried blood on the ground not far away from my shelter.

Despite this worrying sign I continued to focus on basic survival needs. I improved my shelter by adding several more racks of branches, using them to form something of a wall and roof, while leaving room for my fire to vent its smoke. Filtering water continued to be a problem. If I filtered all my water by magic I’d exhaust myself, so I had to invent a different means. So I decided to try and make clay pots, figuring I could use those to boil water, store it, and even cook food. After some experimentation I figured out a way to speed-dry clay. It took a massive toll on my magic reserves in the short term, but in the long term would hopefully be worth the investment.

Food was my next task. It wasn’t until my third day on the planet that I decided to try my hoof at finding some sort of food. I needed it badly. My use of magic left me weaker than I would’ve been otherwise, and my wings added caloric needs, even if I hadn’t made much use of them yet. As appealing as the idea of flying was, I didn’t want to try until I was in a much better place, survival-wise. Better to stick to what I knew.

And I knew I needed protein. I’d tried to eat a bit of the grass in the area, but not only was it disgusting, it left my stomach twisting hard. A bit of magic checking later proved that stuff wasn’t going to do me any good unless I cooked the hell out of it. Maybe I could make some grass tea or something.

There were needles in some of the coniferous trees that dotted the opposite side of the river. The trees also produced plenty of pine sap, which I could make use of for glue. The needles weren’t that edible either, but like the grass I could probably make a tea out of them.

With no edible vegetation nearby, I knew I’d be forced to fish. Or worse, hunt. A pony like myself, we could eat plenty of fish, but the thought of eating any other sort of meat tended to make us pretty sick, since most other "meat" on our world has a name and you can talk to them. Well, that, and we could only stomach so much fat. Despite that though… if I couldn’t get fish, I’d have no choice. Either way, I needed some protein, fast.

Fortunately, I had a whole lake to choose from for fish. I’d fashioned a couple of spears from sticks with sharpened stones tied to them. And I’d used some reeds plus a bit of magic to weave a basket, so I could hold my catch. I had nowhere to store anything, so I’d have to eat what I caught… and I’d only gone fishing once during survival training. I hoped I could remember how to clean it properly.

Of course the other problem was that I had no boat. So I’d had to wade along the shoreline, or swim. I didn’t fancy my chances at swimming, not with two unfamiliar limbs. And while on a good day I could use my magic to find and catch the fish without even trying, I was really feeling the loss of calories at this point. My horn was noticeably weaker. It would be too costly to use my magic this way; without being able to store excess, I’d use more calories than I’d gain back. 

So I waded into the water by the lakeside, and remained as still as I could. I knew I’d scare the fish off for a while and indeed it took over half an hour before I spotted anything of reasonable size come near me.

A decent one, maybe a quarter of a meter, showed up before too long. I’d be pretty satisfied with that. So I raised my spear and thrust… way too soon. Not only did I miss, but my spear caught on a rock and snapped in two, worthless. Cursing, I threw away the broken spear, got my spare one ready, and waited some more.

Then I saw it. A huge one, maybe half a meter long. That would make a fine meal. My mouth salivated as I held my spear in my magic, ready to thrust. 

“Patience this time,” I whispered. “Patience is key.” 

It came closer, swimming so slowly. My magic grip strained, shaking.

“Stay patient...”

Finally the fish came close enough to touch, and I threw the spear!

And it sailed right into the fish’s center of mass. It squirmed, bleeding like crazy as I hefted it out and above me. “Ahahaha! Gotcha!” I cried. The poor thing thrashed and fought to return to the water even as I slowly trudged my way onto shore and headed back towards my shelter. When I returned it was still wriggling, so, out of a fit of conscience as much as practicality, I smashed its face in with a rock.

Then I took the sharpest piece of flint I’d found, the one I’d set aside as a knife. Digging out the guts and spinal column was nasty, and I probably wasted a bit of the meat in the process, but at that point I had to conserve as much magical energy as I could.

But I still had plenty to eat. I popped it over my fire and roasted it. I’d found a small amount of rock salt in the back of my little not-cave shelter, so I used that for a bit of seasoning. If I’d salivated before, oh the smell of cooking fish left me drooling in anticipation. My stomach snarled, clamoring for something to digest. The wait was sheer agony. 

And then it was ready. I tried to eat the fish slowly. I did. But as soon as I took the first bite, I fell upon it like the starved beast I was, tearing it apart. It was the single most delicious thing I’d ever eaten in my life. With the sun setting and my stomach full, not even the hard floor kept me from falling asleep quickly.

The next morning I awoke with what felt like more energy than I knew what to do with. I considered exploring further away from my encampment, but a brief inspection of my shelter told me it needed further reinforcement if it was going to survive for the long term. I realized I had been damn lucky to have seen no rain yet. 

So I set about making a few better tools to start with. What I wanted were metals, copper if nothing else. That proved easier said than done though, and despite magic’s ability to shortcut smelting it, finding enough raw ore in my surroundings proved so difficult it’d take a very long time before I could have my first tool. So instead I decided to hone the ones I had, and went about chopping down my first tree. Reasoning that my sheltered area would suffice for a proper cabin built around it, I tried my best to carve logs into even planks. 

Magic made this easy, but like always, heavy use of it drained my energy. I wasn’t sure why; even with regular food and water aboard a starship or on Earth, I’d never found my magic draining like this. But for all I knew something about Veridian III drained it faster. Or maybe I just needed to practice with it more… I’d noticed my spells were more powerful than they used to be. Maybe I was using far too much power with each one and not even realizing it.

“Did you ever have this problem, Princess Celestia?” I wondered. “Did you ever try to warm up your tea and found yourself melting your tea set or something? Figures. Now I could use her advice…”

Of course, planks wouldn’t do me much good without something for screws, but I had that handled, sort of. I used some scraps to fashion a set of wooden pegs. Still not the most sturdy, but it would last far longer than branches lashed together with vines, and be far more water tight.

And good timing too. I’d just finished putting all this together, complete with a sealable hatch I made using pegs to keep it shut, when I heard the telltale rumble of thunder in the distance. Oh did it rain. It beat a steady tattoo on my roof. Thunder boomed, loud enough to force me to slap my ears against my skull just to keep the noise out. Thankfully, my work proved itself good enough, and only a little bit of moisture leaked through. And as I waited out the storm, I went ahead and marked down the passage of the day with another line scratched into the rock wall. I’d been on Veridian III a week.

I awoke to clear skies the next morning and went on a small expedition away from my shelter. I journeyed further to the north, across the river and towards the mountains. I wanted to see if there was a chance I’d spot some surface deposits of metals. Hematite, malachite, chalcopyrite, cassiterite would be great if I wanted bronze… bauxite would be nice if I had some way of electrolyzing the aluminium, but even with magic that process would be far too intensive for me to get anywhere with it. But since Veridian III was uninhabited, there was a good chance of discovering easy to access metal deposits. If I could just make some metal tools… I’d really start to get somewhere.

Luck was with me, because less than two hours after I started my journey, well before I reached the mountains, I spotted something promising. “What is that?” I said as I peered closer. “Is… is that?” I tested it briefly with my magic, then giggled in delight. “It is! Native copper, what a find.” After a brief examination of the deposit, I opted to use my magic to scoop it out of the ground. It was either that or spend days with a makeshift pickaxe made from stone.

I returned to my shelter carrying as much native copper as I could carry, grinning gleefully all the while. I dropped it all in front of my stone furnace, the one I’d put together when I fired my pots. Now that I had this metal I could smelt it and start making some proper tools, at least once I could make the molds.









“Your ingenuity is most impressive, Sunset,” T’Lona commented, giving me a proud nod. 

“Yes, yes, I’m sure it’s lovely to hear every last detail of how you survived the planet,” Nechayev said, sighing. “But we have already spent several hours on this debriefing.”

“I’ve been gone for two years, ma’am,” I replied, trying to keep the growing ire out of my voice. Although she’d been aboard the Enterprise many times while I was on its crew, I’d never stumbled across her, and I wish I’d remained ignorant. She was thoroughly unpleasant to deal with. “With respect, there’s a lot of ground to cover.”

“Very true,” Nakamura said, nodding. “And I would be most interested to read all the details. However, she does have a point. You may want to summarize and move things along.” He glanced down at the PADD in front of him. “Perhaps after a quick meal break.”

No one protested that, not even Nechayev, so I followed my family back to my Mom’s office. As soon as we were inside, Amina sat down at her desk and tapped a button on her console. “Ma’am,” I said to her. “Permission to speak freely?”

Amina gave me a flat look. “I already turned off the cameras, sweetheart. Go ahead.”

“I’d like to smack Nechayev in her stupid face,” I growled as I stomped my way over to the replicator. “Grilled havarti cheese on sourdough with plain tomato soup and coffee, black.”

“A cheese sandwich? Again?” Twilight questioned, giving me an amused look.

I set my platter down and started eating without preamble. “You try going two years without cheese. Or tomatoes. Or coffee.”

“I don’t blame you for wanting to smack Nechayev,” Amina said as she got her own meal. “She’s… well, there’s a reason she’s never been number one on anyone’s favorite admiral list.

“Nevertheless, Sunset, it would be wise to keep such opinions to yourself,” T’Lona said. “I do not know how much you remember of manners or Starfleet procedure after more than two years stranded.”

“Mother,” I groaned, “I think I remember just fine, thanks.” After taking a bite of sweet, delicious cheese and bread, and swallowing it with an equally delicious gulp of hot coffee, I added, “Okay, maybe I’ll need a quick refresher on a few things, but I don’t think I need to start over as a new cadet, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

“Assuming they don’t turn you into some kind of lab specimen,” Twilight growled, scowling into her mashed potatoes. “That made me want to smack her.”

“That won’t happen,” Amina declared with her full authority. “I’ll fight it. I’ve got plenty of pull, and you’ve got a lot of friends who’ll throw their weight against it too, if you contact them. I know the senior staff of the Enterprise-E will be thrilled to hear you’re alive.”

“Especially Commander La Forge,” Twilight added.

I paused, my sandwich halfway to my mouth. “Wait, why him specifically?”

“He um, he came to tell us about your death personally,” Twilight answered, her expression glum. “He even said he considered you a friend.”

“Oh.” My cheeks filled with warmth, as did my heart. “I… wow. I didn’t realize he cared about me that much. I mean, we were colleagues, sure, but…” I stared down at my food, then pushed it aside. “Mom, do you mind if I record a message to send to him, right now?”

She gave me a knowing smile, and moved away from her terminal. “Go right ahead, sweetie. Just try to make it quick.”

I nodded, turned to the terminal, cleared my throat, then said, “Begin recorded message, for Commander Geordi La Forge, chief engineer, U.S.S. Enterprise.” I waited to see the little flashing recording light before continuing, and made sure to smile. “Hello sir. It’s me, Sunset Shimmer. Yes, it’s really me. I’m alive, and I’m on Earth. It’s… a long story. With a lot of details.” I deliberately opened up my wings so he could see them on the video. “As soon as I have everything written down, I’ll send you a copy. You deserve to hear it. Listen, I know this message is going to raise more questions than answers, but I figured you deserved to know I was alive as soon as possible. I’m going to reach out to plenty of other people, but… I also wanted to thank you. Thank you for telling my family personally. That means a lot to me. And if what you said to them is anything to go by… I’d like to consider you a friend too. End recorded message.”

I stepped away from the terminal and let Amina take over. “There. I’ve sent it off,” she said. “Now hurry and finish your food.”

“Yes, Mom,” I giggled.

Once we reconvened, Nechayav wasted no time in saying, “Miss Shimmer, while your survival on Veridian III is impressive, I believe we should try to move on. Only the necessary details. What we all really want to know is how you got aboard that Dominion ship and why it crashed.”

“Alright, ma’am. I’ll try to condense the rest as much as I can,” I said. “So, after the first two weeks, I’d gotten a handle on basic survival needs, but I knew I’d have to do more if I was going to have any real hope of rescue…”








The wind ticked my feathers as I gently glided over the lake. “Woah, take it easy, Sunset, come on,” I muttered as I experimented with a few flaps. As I turned, I grinned, a sense of triumph filling me. “That’s it. That’s how I--woah, oh crap oh crap oh crap--” 

Splash!

I’d flapped one too many times and sent myself into a spin, plummeting into the lake. I splashed my way through the water till I reached the shore and collapsed onto the mud. “Uuugh… stupid pegasi make this look way too easy…”

It was a month into my survival that I finally tried to fly for the first time. I decided I’d do it over the lake, since if I fell, I’d plummet into water, and I’d long since verified that there wasn’t anything similar to a crocodile or alligator or other lake-born predator that’d swallow me whole if I struggled to swim back to shore. I also made sure to take off the clothes I’d made, so I didn’t get them wet. I’d fashioned a few things for warmth from some of the local plants that I’d spun into fiber. They weren’t very tough, but they didn’t have to be.

The first few times went about how you’d expect. My wings seized up and I crashed into the lake. But after a while, I started to get the hang of it. It would take a couple more months of practice, but eventually flight became second nature to me.

When I wasn’t practicing my flying skills, I was working on expanding my shelter for the long haul. I used my magic to carve into the hillside, to give me extra rooms. One I converted into a smokehouse. Another room became a larder for storing foraged foliage. This would be especially important for the inevitable winter season, whenever that might occur. But another, I turned into a workshop and forge. I’d managed to gather plenty of metals, enough to create a proper metal furnace and cast steel. It wasn’t super high quality steel, nothing like what could be turned out by a proper society, but it was more than adequate for my purposes. It gave me a set of sturdy tools that let me conserve my magic usage.

“Now I know why colonists love industrial replicators so much,” I grumbled as I set aside my final finished piece. “Unicorn me never could have done this. My magic circuits would have fried a long time ago.” I reached up and tapped the end of my now significantly longer and pointier horn. “Guess it’s a good thing I became an alicorn after all, huh?”

It also allowed me to rebuild my shelter from wood into something more akin to a proper house, using clay bricks and makeshift mortar. Within a few months I’d gone from basic survival to real forward progress.

By the end of autumn, I’d struck what I thought was paydirt. Electricity, proper electricity. It was generated through a water wheel on the river, using copper wiring spun by my magic and the most crude, basic turbine I could make. It was awful and unreliable, but it worked.

Unfortunately, it also wasn’t enough. 

What little it generated would barely power a few lightbulbs. Not that I could even make any, as the tungsten and other rare and heavy metals I’d need were far out of my reach. 

Worse still, before I could find some utility for what little power I could generate, winter shut me down for a good amount of time. The climate so far had been so reasonable I hadn’t taken much notice when the temperatures fell below freezing a few times during late autumn. But winter was a whole other story. Not only did it freeze the river and the lake, It snowed, and heavily at that, keeping me indoors much of the time. I found ways to use my time wisely, but my food stores ran very low.

Finally, I had no choice. I left my shelter, a steel tipped spear carried in my magic. I’d long since decided the best animal to take down, one that was as different from a pony as possible. I also knew where they stayed in the winter, so sneaking in was easy. Getting one by itself though, that would be tricky. These were large animals, larger than me, and I didn’t fancy my chances if I had to fight one off on the ground.

So instead I created a distraction, used that to isolate one, and took it down easily with a single blow to the heart. I whispered quiet apologies as I carried it back to my shelter. I had a spare room I’d made for things like this, the dirty tasks, and I had a rack already prepared for it. Butchering this animal… I hated it. I loathed the process. The fish I could stand, because I ate fish all the time back on Equus. But this meat… I knew in my heart that whatever meat came off this animal would likely taste as awful as it was to look at.

Unfortunately, I was all too right on that point too. I threw out the organs immediately. They were too risky to even think about eating, plus they smelled absolutely horrid. I tried to trim as much excess fat  as I could before smoking the meat, but what was left was more than enough to twist my stomach into knots every time I ate it. I still got enough nutrition to keep going, but I spent much of the winter on my side trying to keep my insides relatively calm. What energy I did expend was used to construct a bed from spare wood and to reuse as much of the animal I slew as possible. Its hide made for a nice blanket to keep out the winter chill.

I was much happier once spring returned and I could fish in the lake again. And as the weather warmed up, I became healthy enough to go on excursions again. I had a thought in mind, a hope that somewhere on the planet there were some advanced resources lying around, just waiting for me to use them. 

Soran’s launch site.

I remember someone beaming down to the surface just before we battled the Klingons, so I knew Soran’s launch site was here. “But where is it?” I asked myself. “For all I know it could be a short trot away or on the opposite side of the planet!”

But it was still a hope. If his launch site was still intact and if he had materials there I could work with, I might be able to make a subspace radio. It would still be horrifically crude, and unless he had something I could turn into a signal booster it’d never reach orbit, but it was worth a try. Otherwise I’d have to commit to years and years of effort to manufacture an alternative, and that was unacceptable to me.

I spent the first few weeks of spring gathering up plenty of fresh fish and other supplies, which I portioned out to make traveling rations. I planned to forage along the way if possible, but I’d be spending most of my time traveling in the air. It was much faster than hoofing it, and by now it was as natural to me as walking. Given I was heading into unfamiliar territory, I’d look to rest on clouds whenever possible.

Then I set out on my first expedition. Using my astrolabe spell, I determined my latitude and longitude. I was much further south than I had expected, deep in the southern hemisphere. That suggested I needed to go north, as logic dictated that setting up a launch site as close to the planet’s equator as possible would maximize Soran’s chance of success. 

I traveled north, passing into warmer climates with each new day. Every so often as I traveled I used a spell to locate advanced materials in a manner similar to a tricorder, especially in places with limited visibility. It was mana hungry, so I couldn’t use it often.

Finally, on the seventh day, I hit the sea. The smell of salt in the air, the ocean waves crashing along the shore, the fine white sand beach… if I hadn’t known better I would’ve sworn I was on a beach in Hawaii or southern California. It was beautiful, and a part of me wanted to stay here, where it was much warmer, and likely easier to forage. But knowing I’d have to set up my shelter all over again convinced me to go back instead.

It took me another week before I was ready for a second trip. This time I headed east, however I hit the ocean after only three days, this one cooler and much rockier than up north. And again, not a trace of a launch site, or any advanced materials for that matter. 

I took more trips every week or so throughout the spring and summer, each one in a slightly different direction. I did my best to create a map of the land, using my feathers as quills and, much to my chagrin, parts of additional animals I hunted as both ink and parchment. Every time I had to take one down, I found myself whispering an apology, and a request for forgiveness.

Maybe it was silly of me, but it helped keep me sane. 

Halfway through summer, I began to despair that I was right after all, that Soran’s launch site was on some other continent on the planet entirely. It would be completely impossible for me to make any kind of trip across the ocean too. I’m not too proud to admit I spent more than a few nights crying myself to sleep over the frustration.

Once it began to feel like the waning days of the summer season were upon me, I embarked on a series of trips to map out the one area I hadn’t explored in detail yet, a large desert that took up a good chunk of the northwestern corner of the continent. It took a lot of water each time I searched, and the sheer amount of heat radiating off the sand dunes meant I could only search for a part of the day.

But then, on my fifth or sixth trip, my detector spell went off right as I flew over a nondescript hill. When I looked down, I broke into ecstatic laughter. “I found it! Hahaha! I actually found it! I can’t believe it.” 

At first glance it wasn’t much. A series of metal catwalks, one of which was little more than a twisted pile of wreckage in a deep gully. From up above I could see a set of metal stairs leading to an elevated outcropping, though much of it had been turned into a crater. I swooped down for a closer inspection. “Crater’s way too fresh to have been here long. This must’ve been where the launcher itself was set up.”

But as I examined the place, I realized that someone from Starfleet must’ve been here to clean up, because much of it had already been picked over. What was left was mostly scraps, along with some half-crushed equipment racks and storage containers. 

As I flew up to the highest crest, a glint of something metallic caught my eye. “Oh? What’s this?” I gently set down in front of what had to be a makeshift grave formed of stones piled up and over a body. Stranger still, there was a single marker, an old-fashioned late twenty-third century Starfleet pin. I snatched it up when I first saw it, squealing in delight for all of two seconds before I realized it was just a piece of fancy metal, with no circuitry. “Damn it,” I muttered as I placed it back. Then I cast my eyes down on the grave. “Sorry to bother you… whoever you are. Rest peacefully.”

I continued my search, feeling more and more hopeless with every passing minute. And then I found a panel on a wall, inside some sort of cage. At first, I couldn’t figure out a way inside. The access hatch had been sealed up, leaving me flustered. “Wait… maybe… maybe it’s time to use it, Sunset.”

It was a teleport spell. Back in Equestria, teleportation was rarely seen or used, save for Princess Celestia and some of the court mages. I left before she could teach it to me, but I knew it was possible at least. And while it wasn’t exactly the same, the principles of transporter technology were similar enough I eventually derived a spell matrix to mimic the effect. It was one of the most mana hungry spells I had, so demanding I hadn’t ever been able to properly cast it as a unicorn. But as an alicorn, I had all the energy I needed. I’d tested it numerous times, so I knew it could work. But I hadn’t wanted to use it unless I had no other choice. “Don’t think you have any other choices now, Sunset. Let’s just get this over with.”

I focused my magic, seeking out my destination. Mana flowed into my mind like a quiet stream now, not like the tidal wave it used to be. I closed my eyes and let my mind's eye see for me. I could picture my destination now, every centimeter mapped out to the last detail. 

A mere thought altered the flow of magic, compacting the matrix and feeding it more and more mana. I could feel the spell's pulse as it flowed up the deep spiral path toward the tip of my horn, finally coalescing into a glowing ball of pure energy.

I took a deep breath and released the spell, and my whole world seemed to dissolve in slow motion. Mere seconds later I found myself standing inside of the cage, exactly where I wanted to be. “Yes!” I cried, pumping my hoof. I turned to examine the panel. “Okay, let’s see… oh no.”

The panel wasn’t lit up, and when I examined it, I saw why. The guts of the computer behind it had been ripped out. All that was left were touchpads, screens, and little else. But while it was useless as a computer, it was a literal goldmine of valuable resources I could make use of.

After ripping out every useful component and carefully loading up my pack, I scoured the rest of the area for anything else I could use. The sun was unbearable by that point, but the small amount of refined dilithium I found in a crate half hidden by a boulder made it well worth the effort. With the sun going down and my energy waning from exertion, I began the trek back to my shelter.

Once back, and after some time spent resting and restocking my food supplies, I started work on trying to assemble a radio from the components I scavenged. It wasn’t easy. None of the circuitry I was using was designed for this purpose. It took a week of constant fiddling before I finally had a crude subspace receiver. It wasn’t any good for transmitting, but that would take far longer to create, because I had none of the tools and had to use my magic in such a finicky, focused way, meaning I could only spare so much energy each day towards it. Still, it was better than nothing, so I switched it on, and waited.

”Great,” I sighed after a few moments. “Just static. At least it’s something, even if it’s just subspace background noise.” I considered leaving the radio on constantly, but I knew the materials I’d used to make it wouldn’t stand that kind of constant use. Instead I decided I’d check it for one minute every hour of the day.

The next few months seemed to pass in a blur. Every day was the same routine: eat, sleep, fish, work on the transmitter while listening to static. It wasn’t long before the static sounded like talons scraping on a chalkboard.

One of Princess Celestia’s favorite phrases was “friendship is magic.” At the time I thought it sounded a bit corny, but with each passing day I felt the loneliness, the isolation, close in on me like never before. I began holding entire conversations with my family as if they were there with me. I had to think even Belle would call me crazy at that point.  

The straw that broke the dragon's back came a few weeks later. I had just returned to the cave after what had been one of my most difficult days yet. Thanks to a weather pattern that seemed to have skipped most of autumn and jumped right to the threshold of winter, many of the plants I had planned to forage had already died or gone dormant. On top of that, a steady and bitterly cold rain left both me and the wood I had gathered soaked to the core. Even magic couldn't seem to wring all the water out of my mane. "Ugh. Yuck!"

Tired of futilely squeezing my hair, I looked at the meager pile of vegetation I had accumulated and sighed. "I'll be lucky if I can keep these things alive, much less start an indoor garden to grow more." The prospect of yet another winter surviving on barely drinkable grass tea and questionable animal meat irked me to no end.

I trudged over to the far wall, which had become a calendar and notepad of sorts, accumulating scratches and scrawls all over. But it was then, as I began to etch yet another day onto the wall, that it hit me. "How long has it been anyway?" I stepped back and began counting the lines. One by one, then group by group, the total quickly climbing right along with my blood pressure.

"T-Two? Two years? I..." I stumbled back and plopped down on my rump, as if the weight of time itself had just knocked me over. I glanced down at the flint 'chalk', then at the wall. The etchings felt more like pieces of me that had been tacked to the wall. Each line marking not the passage of time but another wound to my sanity, to my very soul.

"Two.... Celestia-damned... years!" I lashed out at the flint with my magic and crushed it like a bug in my telekinetic grip. "Ha! Look at this power. So much power! But for what?" I spun on my hooves and stared at the rest of the cramped cave I'd survived in for so long.

"Oh, I know! Cutting wood! Pulling grass! Skinning animals! Fantastic!" I kicked the pile of damp wood next to me and snorted. "If only Celestia could see me now! The Princess of Logging!"

The sound of thunder from outside caught my ear and before I could think twice I raced outside, right into the driving rain. I flew up to the top of the rock outcropping and looked to the gloomy sky.

"Why? Why this? Why me?!" Rage burned through me now, warring with the tidal wave of grief and despair to send me over the edge. Magic surged into my core so fast my whole body seemed to radiate arcane energy. I channeled it into my lungs and screamed. "Where are you, magic?! Answer me!"

A clap of thunder and another blast of ice cold rain mocked me in response. "I just want to go home!" I wanted to scream again but all the anger, the rage, it collapsed like an exhausted star, and I slumped onto my side, where my tears joined the falling rain. “I just want to go home…”

Winter arrived not too long after my breakdown, trapping me inside nearly all the time. My mood was still dour at best, but completing the transmitter kept me mostly sane. Finally, after weeks of failed attempts, I got it working and stable. I had no idea how far it would reach or for how long but I leapt at the chance to get a message out.

"To any ship in orbit of Veridian III, this is Lieutenant Sunset Shimmer, please respond.”

Nothing but static met me.

“To any ship in orbit of Veridian III, this is Lieutenant Sunset Shimmer. I’m a Starfleet officer stranded on the planet, requesting rescue. Please respond.”

Still no answer. I tried it for a while longer, then set it aside and sighed. I’d expected this result, but it didn’t make the heartbreak any easier to swallow. "Okay, I need a break before I break something myself."

A few minutes with my thoughts and a cup of 'tastes suspiciously like nettles' tea later, I had begun to sort things out. I hoped. "Alright, I have a working receiver and a working transmitter. I don't know how much range either has, but I also don't have a reliable way to test that either, since I can't be in two places at once. What I need," I said between sips of tea, "is a second set of ears.”

So, I set to work creating a second receiver. I used nearly all of my remaining scavenged materials doing it, but owing to previous experience I got this one operational much quicker than before. To test the entire system, I waited for a day with decently clear skies and a light breeze. I set the transmitter near the sealable hatch to my shelter, since it often squeaked on breezy days, then began to fly away at a slow pace with the original radio. By my estimates I made it about fifty kilometers before the signal stopped entirely and I could no longer hear the squeaking noise on my end. "Good, but not nearly good enough," I grumbled as I flew back to the cave.

Out of both ideas and materials, I could only see one possibility left, and it was a hell of a bleak one. As soon as the snows melted and Spring felt imminent, I began to prepare for another trip to the desert.

The way I saw it, the remains of the launcher were the only thing of interest on the planet, and the trilithium Soran had tried to use would surely leave a radiation signature strong enough to be spotted by most any passing ship. Logic dictated then that the best place to put the transmitter was there.

“Now I just need a real message to transmit.”

After some trial and error, I found a way to infuse a few remaining bits of circuitry with some magic, giving it enough energy to power the device and trigger a repeating message. The night before I planned to leave, I recorded what I was sure would be my final message to the stars.

“To any vessel in orbit, this is Lieutenant Sunset Shimmer. I am a Starfleet officer stranded on this planet for over two years. I have left this transmitter where it is most likely to be discovered. I have a receiver radio which will allow me to hear any transmissions you send, but I will not be able to reply. My coordinates are as follows.” I then listed the position of my shelter. “I will be listening for any response transmissions for one hour each day at local noon. Please. Help me.”

One day, midway through spring, about a month and a half after I first set up the radio, I sat down for my daily ritual of lunch and listening to dead air. Not that I was paying much attention. Somewhere inside me my heart had started to give up any hope of rescue. I’d be stuck here for the rest of my life. That thought depressed me more than any other, enough to start considering whether… whether it was worth trying to stay alive anymore.

As my mind entertained dark thoughts and I lifted a piece of fish up to my mouth, I heard something. Something other than static, something that sounded like a word. I froze, staring in mute wonder at my radio. For several moments, I heard nothing other than the usual static, and the brief bit of hope soaring in my chest started to die away again.

But then… more words. “...received...signal...listening…”

I whooped for joy, bouncing out of my chair. “Someone’s found me!” I cried. “They found me!”

“...assist...stand by...transport…”

“Hahahaha!” Joy flooded my being. I picked up the radio and took it outside with me, flying up to stand on the hill atop my shelter. “Yeeeeees! Haha!” As I waited, I couldn’t help dancing and singing to myself. “I’m finally going home!”

Then I heard the wonderful musical chime of transporter beams. I halted in place, ready to speak with whomever arrived… and then my jaw dropped in sheer horror.

Five Jem’Hadar troopers pointed their disruptor rifles at me. Ugly, reptilian like, with grey skin and so many ridges and bumps their whole body looked like a weapon. I’d only seen their faces once, in records from the destruction of the Odyssey a few months prior to being stranded, but I knew who they were. Foot soldiers of the Dominion. Enemy of the Federation.

Oh I was screwed.








“Commander Shimmer, I’ve stretched my imagination a lot over the past few hours, but what you just said is patently absurd. Do you really expect us to believe that a Dominion ship went to the middle of nowhere Veridian III, and happened to beam down to the one spot on that empty rock that had your tiny radio on it?”

“Yes, I do, Admiral. Because that’s what happened,” I replied. “Believe me, I had no idea at the time why they would’ve thought to come to Veridian.”

“But you did find out why, later on,” Nakamura pressed. 

I nodded. “Yes, sir. I’m getting to that as part of my explanation.”

“Are you really just taking all of this at face value, Mamoru?” Nechayev interrupted. “We have no way to verify any of what she’s said, much less trust it.”

Brand arched an eyebrow. “Ma’am, we already tested Shimmer for being a Changeling. She’s not.”

Nechayev shook her head. “Be that as it may, that still doesn’t mean her information is accurate by default. To be honest, I find much of her story difficult to believe. She somehow managed to turn leftover parts of a computer display into a functioning subspace radio, all without a flux coupler or a hyper-spanner or any other modern tool?”

I rolled my eyes so hard they may have hit the back of my head. “Oooh yes, how in the cosmos could a Starfleet Engineer ever work their way out of a seemingly impossible technical challenge?”

“Commander!” Nechayev barked, shooting up out of her chair. “You are out of line!”

Nakamura held out an arm between us, giving Nechayev a flat look. “Enough, Alynna.” Then he fired the same look at me. “Likewise, Commander.”

Sitting back down, he continued, “I think a little bit of agitation on the Commander’s part is understandable, given what she’s been through. That said, I do agree with the spirit of Admiral Nechayev’s argument at least. If you were in our shoes, Commander, I suspect you’d have some of the same doubts we do.”

I took a deep breath, and glanced at my family, all of whom gave me the same supporting look. Then I returned my gaze to the admirals. “I understand, sir. You’re right, I wouldn’t believe all of this myself if the situation were reversed. But like I said before, send a ship out there. You’ll see it’s all true.”

“Which we probably will, especially if there’s Dominion activity in the area,” Nakamura nodded. “Commander, you’ve been away for too long to be aware of this, but… we’re on the brink of war with the Dominion.”

“And we just fought one with the Klingons,” Brand added with a sigh. “While we’ve managed to restore our alliance with them, it may be too little too late. We’re severely understrength, and the Dominion has sent a full fleet through to their allies on Cardassia.”

“What?” I gasped, my eyes bouncing back and forth between the three admirals so fast they hurt. “How’d we end up at war with the Klingons? I don’t understand.”

The three admirals all exchanged a look, then Nechayev answered, “If your story proves to be sincere, and we determine from your medical testing that you should stay in Starfleet, we’ll brief you.”

Frowning, I replied, “Permission to speak freely, ma’am?”

“Denied,” Nechayev replied with a cold glare. “Continue your debriefing, Commander. That is an order.”

It took all my patience not to scowl at her, but I managed to avoid it. “So… as I was saying, there I was, surrounded by several Dominion soldiers. One of them approached me immediately and shoved his weapon in my face.”










The cold metal pressed against my forehead froze me in place. “Bah. Stupid animal,” growled the Jem’Hadar solider as he glared at his surroundings. “Where is the officer?”

“I’m right here,” I replied, while inwardly trying to decide if I could bring up a shield in time to prevent the disruptor blast from blowing my brains apart.

Fortunately for me, the Jem’Hadar had some trigger discipline, because rather than squeeze off a shot in surprise, he took a few steps back and trained his weapon on me carefully. “You?” he questioned.

“Yes, me,” I said, spreading both my forelegs out. “Lieutenant Sunset Shimmer, Starfleet.” 

As I moved all five soldiers tensed up and jerked their weapons towards me. “Stay still!” barked the one who’d spoken before. “Do not move.”

“Okay then,” I said, resisting the urge to shrug. “You got it.”

“Good.” He looked at two of the others and pointed down the hill towards my shelter. “Fifth, Sixth, go and investigate. If you find any other Starfleet officers, take them prisoner.”

“Yes, First,” said one of them.

“You’re not gonna find any,” I said as two of the hulking soldiers hurried away. “I’m here alone.”

The First eyeballed me. “I doubt that, judging by this,” he said, jerking his weapon towards my radio, which I’d dropped on the ground. “This planet is uninhabited. Surely you don’t expect me to believe you built this alone.”

“I did, but hey, if you don’t want to listen, that’s your business,” I replied nonchalantly. Inside my mind raced at a million miles per hour, desperate to find a solution. Falling back on my snark was the only thing keeping me from screaming in fear. I did not survive two years on this planet to be killed by a bunch of Jem’Hadar thugs! 

He chuckled at that. “We shall see.” He looked me up and down as if I were a piece of meat. “I am First Rinak’tlan. You will accompany us to our ship. The Vorta will want to see you.”

“Sounds fine to me,” I said with another casual shrug. “All I was asking for was to be rescued. I’d appreciate it if your ship could give me a ride back to Federation space.”

He laughed outright. “No. No, I don’t think so. You are now a prisoner of the Dominion. Assuming the Vorta lets you live, you’ll be taken to a labor camp, there to spend the rest of your natural life.”

Oh screw that. “So, not gonna lie here,” I said, “but I don’t think I like that idea. Any chance you could reconsider?”

“Were it up to me? No,” Rinak’tlan replied, his fingers tapping the barrel of his weapon quite deliberately. His amused grin slipped. “But the Vorta will decide. Perhaps you’ll be lucky and he’ll take pity on you. But I doubt it.”

The Fifth and Sixth returned. “No sign of any other Starfleet,” reported one of them. He glared at me. “She was alone.”

“Interesting,” Rinak’tlan said, nodding. “I wonder, how did you build any of this then, Shimmer?” He looked me up and down, then laughed again. “You have no hands.”

I gave him my biggest shit-eating grin. “Magic.” 

He scowled, all signs of amusement fading. “Do not test my patience. Perhaps in your pitiful Federation they allow someone as weak as you to become an officer, but in the Dominion, you would be put to work like the beast of burden you resemble.”  He reached for a communicator. “First here. We have found the Starfleet officer and taken her as a prisoner. Beam us up.”

As my world faded around me, I steeled my resolve. I expected a rescue but got captured instead. But I was leaving this desolate planet for a ship. Probably one with warp capability. Which meant I still had a shot to get home.

My journey wasn’t over yet. Not by a long shot.