Episode I: Denials
Chapter III: A.R.C.
Have you seen this one?
Which one?
That one. Subject 23.
Yes. What about it?
Do you see how much power it has?
…Yes.
It isn’t even a full-fledged adult.
And…?
Do you think it’s good to have so much power in such a barbaric caste system?
…I would hardly call it a caste system.
Have you seen how much this power can corrupt them?
Of course I have. I’m a historian.
And?
Were we so different?
…
Power can just as easily corrupt us. It has just as easily corrupted us.
Mind what you say.
All I’m saying is that we’ve been corrupted in the past. Power can corrupt anything.
Exactly. And that’s why we deny them.
…
Because they are very, very powerful.
So... We're afraid.
“HahAH!” Gazer yelled as he piloted his never-before tested space shuttle. “Looks like I already got the hang of in-atmosphere flight.” He took a deep breath. “Time to step it up a notch.”
>:/engage shipmode launch|
-ENGAGING ORBITAL LAUNCH SEQUENCE…
The shuttle tilted down, picked up some speed, then tilted all the way up. Gazer focused his mind on powering the converter and doubling the engine rate, along with the levitation coils.
-ALL THRUSTERS ACTIVE.
He hit a button, and the rockets flared up and sent the shuttle soaring up at a tremendous speed. “Yyyyeehooooooo!!” He cheered as he was forced back into his seat. “This is it!”
\v/\V/\v/
Princess Celestia wasn’t doing anything in particular. She had just finished some paperwork, and was about to oversee some project in the Canterlot archives. She was about to get up from her throne when a royal guard came rushing in. “Your Highness!” He yelled. “An unidentified object has been spotted flying up into the sky!” Celestia looked out the window. A clouded object was rocketing straight up.
“Get A.R.C. in the air immediately,” She ordered. “I want to know what it is, and I want it on the ground.”
“Yes, my princess!” The guard ran out of the room and sprinted to the guard barracks. He used his magic to announce loudly, “Attention! This is a code red A.R.C., repeat, a code red A.R.C.!” Several pegasi swiftly put their gear on. “We have an unidentified flying object attempting to leave atmosphere. Identify, ground, and if necessary, neutralize the target. Repeat…” Once the pegasi were all suited up, they exited through a door to a room with an opening roof. They took off flying, and the thrusters on their wings ignited, propelling them up into the air, rocketing towards the unidentified object, one after another.
\v/\V/\v/
Gazer’s body started to ache.
He realized that he had been tensed up the whole time the ship was rumbling upwards. He relaxed a bit, but kept his hooves on the handles. He sighed. “I’m actually going to do it,” he said to himself. “I’m going into space.” Suddenly, there was a loud CLUNK on the left side of the ship. He looked left, and right there, pressed against the port window, was a wide-eyed Crystal Sky in a high-tech full-body suit. “…What?”
“Gazer?!” Crystal said.
Gazer narrowed his eyes. “That glass is soundproof…”
“I’m hacking your comms unit,” Crystal replied.
“Oh… okay.” Gazer looked to the forward window. There was a pause.
Crystal quickly shook her head. “Wh- wa- Gazer?! What’re you doing?!”
“I’m going to space,” Gazer answered, not looking at her. “What’re you doing?”
“You promised me you wouldn’t do anything stupid!” Crystal shouted.
“That I did.”
“And?!”
“A stupid pony would have a reeeaaally hard time with this.”
“You disobeyed a direct order from the princess!”
“Not necessarily.” Gazer looked at her. “She denied the project. I, afterwards, then created a new, personal project, which just happened to be similar. I made it from my own parts, with my own tools, and my own time. And no one told me I can’t fly it in my own personal airspace.” He looked away again.
“Well, I’m telling you,” Crystal said with authority. “By the order of the Ariel Reconnaissance Control, and the princesses of Equestria, land your vehicle and surrender, or there will be dire consequences.”
A yellow light went off on the dashboard. Gazer looked at her. “I’m sorry,” he said.
“Sorry for what?”
He gritted his teeth and inhaled. “You’re standing on one of the first stage thrusters.” He pressed a button and the thrusters disengaged from the ship, quickly taking Crystal with them. She flailed her limbs as she fell back, out of sight. Gazer took a deep breath. “Okay,” he said to himself. “Let’s see how maneuverable this baby is…”
“Sky! You alright?!” Sonic Boomer asked.
“I’m fine,” replied Crystal, regaining her balance. Four metal cylinders fell from the cloud of smoke. “But he’s not giving up easily. We’re gonna have to ground him.”
“Understood,” Sonic said. “Wing 5, take up top!” One of the pegasi increased his thrusters and flew up, past the shuttle. “Wing 4 and 6, flanking positions!” Two more flew to either side of it. “2 and 3, tri-pincer move, upward approach!” Crystal, Sonic, and Wing 2 moved to a triangle formation underneath the now-clearing cloud. “On my mark- 3, 2, 1, mark!” The three pegasi shot straight at the shuttle from three different angles.
Gazer saw the blips on the radar suddenly close in on him. He calculated which direction would be best to evade them. The pegasus ahead of him wasn’t quite lined up. He left his right side open. Gazer activated the levitation coils and temporarily charged the engines up to 300%.
>:status engine
-298% POWER
-OVERDRIVE
-195% HEAT
He rolled right and shot upward while pitching slightly up. The leading pegasus tried to compensate, but was too slow. Gazer blew right past him.
The three pegasi closing in on each other quickly changed course and circled around. “Wing 6! Wing 6!” Wing 5 shouted. Wing 6 shot upwards after the shuttle, which had strayed into his line of sight.
Gazer saw him coming, and quickly rolled left, followed by a leftward yaw, causing the pegasus to miss. Knowing he drifted back into the range of the others, Gazer quickly rolled more left, then did a hard pitch up, evading the entire crowd.
“Formation!” Sonic shouted. The pegasi quickly followed the shuttle.
Much to their surprise, as they attempted to move to the new location, Gazer rolled right and did another yaw, passing the pegasi and returning to the original position. He reduced the power back down to 100%.
>:status fuel|
-STAGE 1 THRUSTERS: [DISENGAGED]
-PRIMARY THRUSTERS: 73%
-AUX FUEL: 100%
It took a while for the pegasi to compensate. The blue and white sky began to darken. They were getting dangerously high. “We’re running out of time…” Wing 2 said with concern in her voice.
“Wings, surround!” Sonic ordered. The pegasi moved quickly until they surrounded the ship. “Scatter! Hit him from all sides, don’t stop moving, and don’t let up!”
Suddenly the pegasi started flying in random directions, some straight at Gazer, some in the opposite direction. “Uh-oh,” Gazer muttered, “welp, this’ll be good.” Gazer broke out into a series of evasive maneuvers, dodging the incoming pegasi left and right. They tried coming at him from all angles, even directly head-on. The prototype was being pushed to its limits. The horn clamp started to spark with every barrel roll, and Gazer started to get light-headed.
The sky got even darker, and little sparkling stars started appearing. A beep went off inside Crystal’s helmet. “Dang it,” Sonic said. “Dang it, dang it!” He sighed. “All Wings, fall back.”
“But sir-” Crystal started.
“Fall back! We can’t go any further. If we do, we won’t be able to make it back alive.” Several pegasi cut their wing engines and started dropping out of the sky. “We’ll… just have to let this one go.”
“What?! No, we can’t-”
“Fall back, Sky! That’s an order!” Crystal hesitated for a moment. She was the last one pursuing the ship. She stared at it, then looked away and dropped down.
\v/\V/\v/
Gazer watched the last blip move off of the radar. They obviously weren’t suited for outer space. Gazer smiled to himself and relaxed. The last of the blue sky faded away, revealing the shining stars woven in the black sky. His smile slowly faded. “Well, I’m officially an outlaw,” he whispered to himself. “I don’t know why Celestia would outlaw… this. But she did.” He sighed. “So… this is my dream.” He gazed out the forward window. “To see the stars up close.” He looked out the starboard window, at his home planet, above the stratosphere, for the first time. “…Alone. I can never go back home. Never have friends, family… I’ll never get a chance to actually use my invention to help society. I’ve accomplished my dream.” His expression turned sad.
“…Was it worth it…?”
\v/\V/\v/
Sonic Boomer entered the throne room, still in his suit, but with his helmet tucked under his left foreleg. His A.R.C. team followed. Princess Celestia was sitting on her throne, with a worried look on her face. Once he approached the princess, he bowed his head and said, “Your Highness… I regret to report that the unidentified object was a space shuttle, and that it was able to leave atmosphere, despite our best efforts. We were exiting the atmosphere, and I gave the order to retreat. I take full responsibility-”
“Who was it?” Celestia asked. There was a pause as Sonic looked at her, confused. “Who was in the shuttlecraft?”
“We believe it was Dr. Star Gazer Cosmo, Your Majesty,” Sonic replied.
Celestia was quiet for a while. Then she narrowed her eyes and looked at Sonic’s team. “You gave the order to retreat to all of your team members?”
“Yes…” Sonic replied warily.
She looked at him. “Then where is Crystal Sky…?”
\v/\V/\v/
Gazer cut the engines.
He just wanted to remain in orbit for a while. To look over what he’s done, what he can do, what he wants to do, what he should do, what he will do, and most importantly, what he is doing. Even in space, he continued to do what he did best.
Star Gazer gazed at the stars.
Star Gazer- gazer of stars.
He considered going to the moon. Just to finish what he started. But he decided against it. He decided to just float. Maybe I can change her mind, he thought. Maybe I can find valuable resources in some asteroids or something, then bring them back, and prove that it really is a good idea. He frowned. Wait. I don’t have the proper mining equipment. And I can’t go back to get any. He crossed his forelegs. One thing still bothers me, though. Why?! Why would the princess go through so much trouble to keep me out of space…? Why would I have to be forced to break the law just to test my new prototype…? I just don’t understand it.
He sighed and sat there for a moment. His peaceful silence was interrupted, however, when a blip appeared on his radar. It was coming from below him, and it was coming up fast. He powered up the engines, but he knew he wouldn’t be able to move in time. He braced for impact. There was a CLUNK and a large shudder throughout the ship. Then came the noise of a steady clanking sound, slowly making its way up toward the front of the shuttle. Gazer just remained sitting there, frozen, listening. Then Crystal’s face popped into view of the port window. Gazer looked at her. Her expression had changed from angry to… sad.
“Star…” she said quietly over the intercom. She only called him ‘Star’ when she was getting intimate.
“Crystal…?” Gazer said, now concerned. There was a long pause.
“Star… You need to land this thing. Please.” There was no more authority in her voice. She had gone from demanding to pleading.
Gazer shook his head. “No. I can’t do that.”
“Star, please,” she begged. “You need to. You can’t do this. I can’t let you do this. Please…” She had gone from pleading to begging.
“Crystal, I can’t. I just can’t.” He looked away from her and folded his forelegs again.
“Star Gazer, if you ever trusted me at any point in your life, please trust me now! You really shouldn’t do this!” The desperation in her eyes had grown. Gazer looked at her with narrowed eyes.
“Only if you give me a good reason,” he said demandingly. Crystal said nothing. She just looked at him. After a while of silence, Gazer looked away again.
“…I can’t make it back to Earth on my own,” Crystal said finally. Gazer glanced at her. “I wasn’t supposed to go this high. If I start descending now… No matter what I do, I’ll be falling too fast. Gazer… I’m stuck up here.”
Gazer shook his head, eyes widened slightly. “That’s not fair.”
“Gazer-”
“That’s not FAIR!”
“-Please. If you stay out here, I’m going to die. And there’s no way for me to enter your ship.”
Gazer stared at her. Tears began to fill in his eyes. “Why are you doing this…?” he asked weakly. Crystal said nothing. Gazer thrusted towards her and shouted- “WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS?!” Crystal winced at his shout, and tears began to fill in her eyes as well. “Why does the princess want to keep me out of space?! Why?! WHY?!”
“I think we can answer that,” Came a deep, clear, male voice out of nowhere. Gazer looked around in all directions, then checked the intercom. Then he looked at Crystal, who slowly turned her head to the direction the ship was facing. Gazer looked out the forward window. Many stars had disappeared into blackness. Then two symmetrical glowing green eyes opened out of the void. Then another pair. Then another. And another. Soon the void had dozens of eyes glaring out from it.
Right at Star Gazer.
"...Oh."