With the crusaders’ help it had only taken a few days to reinforce the launch ramp. Although Light Seeker was truly curious as to where they had gotten fresh lumber on such short notice and no apparent cost, as an exercise in self-restraint he refrained from asking. And while a half-week’s earning might not have been enough to buy work supplies it was enough to get his new friends a treat as a thank you for the help.
It was saturday morning and Light Seeker sat, staring out over the rolling hills below the launch ramp. They had waited until the weekend for the launch for two reasons. First so they all had the morning free. And second it was the first day with a clear sky scheduled all day since they finished reinforcing the ramp.
“It’s ready.” The voice of a mare declared. That drew Light’s attention to the pegasus with the blue-green coat and tri-colored mane, consisting of red, green and blue, and to a lesser extent the large telescope next to her.
“Thank you Aunt Iris.” Light Seeker said, then turned to the three fillies also with him, “And thank you too. It would’ve been a real pain in the flank to haul the wing pack up here alone.” He gave a bow of respect to his friends. With all the worrying about the extra weight on the ramp it had completely slipped his mind that his dad wouldn’t be helping pull the cart with the wing pack up the mountain this time, but with the help of the crusaders that oversight turned out to be a non-issue.
“I’m surprised my brother’s not here. Especially since he’s the one that told me you were planning on launching today. Is he not coming?” The only adult present on the mountainside asked.
“Life happens, said he was extra busy today and couldn’t make it.” And he was probably lying about it. The colt added in his mind, knowing his mother had stopped watching his wing pack flights as a form of protest against them, and suspecting his father was now doing the same.
It saddened Light Seeker to think he had lost his dad’s support. A part of him knew his father was right, the higher he flew the greater the odds he’d run into an unknown variable that would mess up his plans for a safe flight. Then his eyes fell on Scootaloo and a smile returned before anypony had seen it vanish. He knew somepony was counting on him and that gave him far more drive than his father's mere support ever did.
The colt approached the modified mine cart that would serve as the launch vehicle for his wing pack. The walls of the cart had been cut away leaving only the base, the rocket tubes for the initial acceleration, and a simple frame to support and brace the wing pack now resting on it. The rocket motors were all in place, both on the cart and the wing pack. He had finished prepping them the day before, though he had waited until mere moments ago to set the igniters in place.
Slipping underneath the wing pack Light Seeker stood up and pressed his back against the harness until he heard the click of the latching mechanism on the top of the air tanks lock the pressure suit to the wing pack. Everything was ready, but he felt he wasn’t. Scootaloo had placed her trust in him and he was determined to come through for her. But the realist in him knew there was a real possibility that this flight could end just like his last one. He could go up, fly higher then before and still not find what was driving him to do so, and come down just as blank flanked as before. He had to inspire her no matter the outcome, and as much as he hated speeches this seemed the right time for one.
Light turned to his friends and aunt, though his words were directed solely at his friends. “Crusaders, you’ve helped me more then you know, and this flight is only taking place because of that help. Thank you. And win lose or draw, I think we’ve come far enough to see that if you work your tail off you can make amazing things happen.” His eyes focused on Scootaloo and he added, “Chase your dreams. As you’ve helped me chase mine.”
With that Light Seeker closed his helmet’s visor and locked it shut. A few deep breaths and he could taste the increasingly stale air, confirming that the seals were airtight. He reached back, turned on the air tanks and felt the cold, tasteless air from the air tanks. It wasn’t the fresh mountain air beyond the visor, but it would be breathable. The colt then closed the casing. (Instead of one large air tank Rarity had used several smaller ones inside a casing to streamline the system on his back.) Now everything was ready. He flipped the switch on the modified mine cart.
The rocket motors on the mine cart all flared to life and the makeshift launch vehicle shot down the track with all due haste. As Light Seeker reached the bottom of the ramp he could feel the track groan under the force of the passing launch vehicle. Once the ramp changed the downward momentum into an upward one Light spread his wings and lifted his legs into a flight form. He had less then a second to do so before reaching the end of the track and his next task. The moment the cart left the launch track he flipped a switch on wing pack’s frame before him, and the first set of rockets lit up just as the mine cart’s rocket motors burned out.
Light Seeker and his wing pack shot off, upward while the mine cart fell to its doom. A brief moment of concern passed though the colt’s mind as he worried if anypony was in the crash zone. Once he had perfected the burn time of the rocket cart’s rockets to match the time they took on the launch track he had noticed that they all crashed in more or less the same place. However he wasn’t sure anypony would take the ‘watch for falling rocket propelled mine carts’ sign he had put in the crash zone seriously. Though he figured that the crash zone had the same protection as his hanger, it was in the middle of nowhere so nopony had any reason to be out this way, save him and his friends.
He shook his head. Now was not the time to let his mind wander he had a mission he needed to focus on. Light figured it had been about a minute since takeoff so he flipped the next switch and the second set of rockets came to life. The colt frowned as he counted off eight seconds of overlap before the first set of rockets burned out. His timing was way off.
When the time came for the third set Light Seeker only counted off two seconds of overlap, better but still not what he wanted. By the fourth set he had found his rhythm again, only counting off a half second of overlap. At the sixth set a smile graced his face. His previous wing pack only had five sets of rockets, so it stood to reason that he would pass his pervious altitude record with this set.
By the seventh set of rocket motors something felt off. Was the sky getting darker? It should have been early morning, it had to be a trick of the light or something. By the eighth set there was no denying that the sky was getting darker, Light Seeker even glanced around to see the sky below him was still as blue as always but the sky before him was dark as dusk. This both concerned and excited the colt. He hadn’t expected the sky to change color like this and that made this one of those unforeseen variables. On the upside he hadn’t expect this and that meant there was something truly different about this flight that he hadn’t seen on any of his past flights. Maybe this was a sign that he what he was looking for was up here after all.
When he lit the ninth set Light Seeker was sure he could see the stars coming out. There was no way he’d been up here all day so that begged the question, was it always night this high up? Did day only exist near the ground?
About two thirds of the way through the ninth set’s burn Light Seeker felt ‘it’. His wings told him that all of a sudden the only resistance was coming from the stiffness of the pressure suit. He tested the feeling by twisting his wings a little, then more, then full on deflection, thin air or not he should’ve been sending himself into a wild spin with his wings at these angles but he was still flying straight as could be. He had expected the air to keep getting thinner the higher he went but he hadn’t expected it to end. The sky had a limit. And he had passed it.
As powerful as that revelation was the one that came moments later was even stronger. As he was distracted by the feelings in his wings Light Seeker’s eyes adapted to the darkness that now surrounded him and that’s when he saw ‘it’. The darkness had become a sea of stars, and not just stars but colorful clouds of reds, oranges, yellows, greens, blues, and purples. Nebulas, stellar clouds that the colt was sure he’d been told could only be seen with a telescope. Yet the heavens stood fully displayed before him, a mere pegasus foal, looking with nothing to aid his eyes, and it was a sight unlike any he had imagined. This was the realm of the stars. It’s like the greatest fireworks finally ever, frozen in time. He thought to himself.
Two powerful revelations had come to Light Seeker and yet the moment refused to cease amazing him. Once more he felt something. He had been so distracted staring out at the heavens before him that he hadn’t noticed the ninth set of rockets had burned out several minutes ago. It was a feeling that any pegasus knew, even earth ponies and unicorns who rode a decent roller coaster could claim knowledge of this feeling. That feeling at the arch of an ascent, that briefest of moments between when you ran out upward momentum and when gravity yanked you back down when the body felt weightless. Yet this moment wasn’t fading, the colt realized he had been feeling it ever since the rockets stopped providing thrust and yet gravity didn’t seem to be in any hurry to yank him back down.
Down, the thought made Light Seeker look down at the world below him. The world consumed his view and yet it seemed small. He was so high up that even his pegasus eyes couldn’t tell the difference between rolling hills and grassy plains. Both were just green. He couldn’t even tell where the cities were from this high. And yet seeing all of Equestria and the oceans beyond both coasts at once held a special-ness all its own even without being able to see the details he knew were down there.
Then something else caught his eye. Just beyond the horizon of the world Light Seeker spotted the moon. Once more the time of day came to mind, it was early morning and yet he could see a sliver of the moon. A glance at the shadows the sun was painting on the wing pack confirmed he was right to think it was still early morning. Curiosity got the better of the colt as he glanced to the light’s source. He instantly regretted the decision as he shut his eyes and looked away from the sun. In the back on his mind a memory of a flight lesson he’d received from his father played itself as if to scold him.
“Ideally you never want to look at the sun. But every now and then you’ll find yourself having to fly east or west at sunrise or sunset. Flying blind is an act of suicide so you can’t just look away, the trick is to look at the mountains or some other point on the horizon near the sun and use that to keep yourself on course instead. Oh and if you know you’ll be flying into the sun beforehoof take some sunglasses with you, it’s not much but they do help.”
Light Seeker opened his eyes and even looking at the inside of his helmet he could tell he was snow-blinded as everything had been reduced to shadows. Beyond the visor he could only see the brighter stars now. His flight lesson had taught him not to look at the sun, but even back then he looked anyway. So he was no stranger to the sudden snow-blindness that came from the mistake. He also was no stranger to a way to fix it. He closed his eyes again and admired the red circle in the center of his vision. The gift the sun burned into his eyes, he waited and soon the circle begun to shrink, leaving a green one in its wake. The green circle too, gave way leaving a blue one in the middle of the darkness of inside of his eyelids. Finally the blue circle gave way leaving only more darkness.
Light Seeker opened his eyes once more and found the sea of stars had returned. As had the nebulas, however, the colors of the celestial clouds were dulled some. Light knew that even his little trick couldn’t completely cure snow-blindness and it would probably take all day before his eyes fully healed. With a heavy sigh he lamented the diminished splendor of the celestial display before him, though it was probably for the best.
With the scene around him no longer so mesmerizing, his mind took note of a problem that hadn’t existed in his past flights. His air system only had one hour of air. In the past he’d only spent a few minutes flying above safe altitudes and then a few more falling back down to a safe altitude. Up here however, gravity still didn’t seem to be in any hurry to drag him back down so if he didn’t do something he might actually be up here longer then he had air for. The thought of coming all this way, of touching the realm of the stars only to suffocate up here was hardly appealing to Light, so he looked around to see what he had to work with. He gave a quick prayer of thanks when he realized he still hadn’t fired the tenth (and last) set of rockets on his wing pack. Now if he could just get turned around.
It took a few minutes of squirming and a few tactically executed kicks, but Light Seeker managed to get the nose of the wing pack pointed back down and more or less aimed at central Equestria. He flipped the last switch, the rockets flared to life, and the feeling of weightlessness gave way to one of acceleration.
It took a moment but the world below him began to grow and Light Seeker smiled to himself. He had touched the realm of the stars and in doing so he found what he had truly been looking for, understanding. With his own eyes he had glimpsed the true nature of the heavens and came gained a small understanding about the nature of the world around him in the process. The irony of it wasn’t lost him either, his name was ‘Light Seeker’ and that it turned out the light he sought wasn’t the field of stars he had seen but the light of wisdom he had gained contemplating something new because of them, the thought made the pegasus grin.
Light felt the tug of gravity start to add its power to his acceleration. Then a red flag popped up in the back of his mind. Something was wrong yet he couldn’t place it. Glancing around didn’t help any either, as nothing seemed out of place on the wing pack.
A memory flashed in his mind. A lake, his first time diving and making the mistake that many young pegasi made. Diving into the lake from higher and higher until he finally hit the water too fast.
Where did that thought come from? And how is that relevant? There isn’t even any air up here, forget water. Light Seeker thought to himself still pondering the source of the uneasy feeling.
The answer came a few moments later when a sudden pain washed through his body as if he’d just smashed through something solid. Like a tower of rocks or something, he wasn’t sure, as he didn’t make a habit of crashing through solid objects.
Not that he had time to think about it, as immediately after the unforeseen impact fires started flaring up all around him. One of the things working with rockets had taught him was that unexpected fire plus rockets equaled very bad things. Acting on reflex alone his hoof shot out, sliding open a panel next to the ignition switches, revealing a small hoof-pedal. He slammed his hoof against it as hard as he could and every rocket mount point released from their attachment points. The spent rockets fell away behind while the four that were still lit shot off ahead of him, spiraling out of control before the outside heat cause the casings to fail and the unspent portions of the motors to explode outright.
Not that Light Seeker noticed that either, as his mind was focused on the flames still licking around him. With the rocker motors away there wasn’t anything flammable left on the wing pack, save himself, but fires were still flaring up all along the leading edges of the wing pack. The air friction was brutal as he desperately tried to hold his body inline… Air! The time he had spent in the realm of the stars had been short but he had already accepted the uselessness of the wings still folded to his side. But that one thought reminded him he had something to work with. He opened his wings and with a few desperate flaps rolled forward until the upper metal wing was on point for the decent, turning it into a makeshift shield.
Flames still licked around the edges of the makeshift shield, but only for a few seconds before the air friction had slowed him down some. Light Seeker used the time to contemplate the last few seconds trying to understand what had just happened. Then he laughed as the pieces fell into place in his mind. The warning his mind had given was right, just as hitting the surface of water too fast made it act like a solid, hitting the surface of the sky too fast had done the same. After that, realizing that the excess air friction was so hot that it was igniting the air around the wing pack was an easy guess. Not so easy was figuring out how he’d come down so much faster then he’d gone up. It took a while but the pegasus eventually realized it was all about air resistance. Rockets could only push air out of the way so fast so it provided a speed limit on the way up, but the realm of the stars had no air so nothing stopped the rockets from accelerating infinitely.
Freed from his pondering Light Seeker noticed a sound that shouldn’t be there, mixed in with the rush of the wind around him was a subtle hissing noise. For once on this disastrous decent he wasn’t surprised. The fact that the unexpected fires had burned small holes in the pressure suit wasn’t all that unexpected and if anything he was pleased at just how well the suit had held up considering fireproofing wasn’t something they had tried for when making it.
Regardless, Light Seeker held himself motionless for a moment to see how his body felt. He couldn’t feel any of the symptoms he remember the last time he’d been hit by depressurization sickness so the leaks must not be that bad. But leaks in the suit meant he’d be draining the air tanks faster than intended and the worry for not being at a safe altitude when they ran out renewed itself. He rolled into a proper dive to help speed his decent as best he could and aimed himself for the patch of green he figured was the hills north of Ponyville.
At first Light Seeker stayed in a steep dive to make sure he got to a safe altitude quickly, but as time went on his body reminded him he was in pain from hitting the sky. So he started pulling out of the dive a little, worrying more about landing more or less at the north edge of Ponyville. That’s when something else felt wrong. The wing pack’s weight was dragging him down. And that made no since, at the speed he was diving the wing pack should be more than supporting it’s own weight.
A glance at the wings and Light Seeker’s helmet took the hit that prevented his hoof from reaching his forehead. The wing pack had been built to take the forces of super sonic flight but not the conflagration that he ran into reentering the sky, using them as a makeshift heat shield had warped the wings and ruined their aerodynamics.
He tried his best to slow his fall but nothing was working. He gave up on the wing pack, it could fall to its doom without him. He slid his forehoof behind his back and kicked the release latch. Nothing happened. He kicked it harder. Still nothing, so he twisted his neck around until he could see what was wrong. Another boot-covered hoof struck his helmet as he realized the same heat that had warped the wings had warped the release latch, leaving it jammed.
“You threw the air at me like a brick wall! You lit me on fire! You threatened me with depressurization! Haven’t you tried to kill me enough today!?” Light Seeker shouted his frustrations out. “Relax Light, you got this, I’ve got…” he looked at the ground and gauged his altitude and speed of decent. “…Three maybe four minutes before I hit the ground. Plenty of time to think of a way out of this.”
* * * * * * *
“There we go.” Aunt Iris said. Finally pulling herself away from the telescope’s eyepiece and immediately writing down the setting numbers on the various knobs she had been manipulating while watching the flight.
“What’s happening! Can we look now?” The crusaders asked.
“He finally started coming down. One second.” The mare stalled the young ponies for a moment as she finished writing down numbers. Then twisting one of the knobs added, “Given how far away the focus point is it’ll probably be impossible to find him again but feel free to look.”
Apple Bloom and Scootaloo jumped in front of the viewing lens and jockeyed for position for a moment before Scootaloo backed off, letting the earth pony filly peer through the telescope first. Sweetie Belle walked over to Iris and examined the math being worked out on the paper. “What are you doing on here?”
“This?” Iris responded, “Oh, from the setting on the dials I can work out how far away from the telescope Light was and with the angle I can work out how high above it he was before he turned around. Then it’s just a matter of adding the altitude of this mountain we’re on and we have his total altitude for the flight.” She let lose a sharp whistle, “Would look at that. That’s more the double his previous record. Almost triple even.”
“Is that him?” Scootaloo asked.
“Couldn’t be, you’re not even looking though the telescope.” Iris dismissed the filly.
“But it’s suppose to be clear today, so wouldn’t those dots and line way up there have to be him?” She insisted.
Iris followed the filly’s gaze to the sky and with a bit of a squint she was able to notice four dark dots and an equally dark line between them. Dark dots, dark line, black smoke, very unlike the white smoke the colt’s rockets had made on the ascent. “No…” the mare whispered before bolting into the sky.
“What’s go’n on? What was that all about?” Apple Bloom asked, startled by the adult’s sudden departure.
“I don’t know but I think she thinks Light’s in trouble.” Sweetie Belle guessed.
“Then what are we waiting for crusaders? Let’s go!” Scootaloo shouted, helmet ready and already waiting on her scooter for her friends to get in the wagon.
“Do you think we can even get there in time to help? The path coming up here took forever.” Sweetie Belle asked.
“No time for that. Stay low, stay still” Scootaloo commanded as she pushed them forward.
“Wait, the path is that way. You’re not…!” Sweetie Belle never finished her question.
“She is.” Apple Bloom stated with an odd calmness, as the wagon followed the scooter over the edge of the plateau they had been on. She joined her unicorn friend in dropped to the floor of the wagon and bracing themselves as best they could, then she joined her friend in screaming.
If Scootaloo had the presence of mind, she would have realized that she’d never tackled a hill this steep on her scooter before. If she had the presence of mind, she would have realized she’d never been down a hill half this steep towing her wagon and friends. But she didn’t, she had become a creature of pure focus, and every neuron in her brain was firing to achieve one goal. Get down this hill to intercept and help the falling Light Seeker anyway she could.
Her mind mapped out a course down the hill, felt every spring of her muscles to read what her scooter was telling her. Using her wings to correct every minor mistake before the scooter bounced again and add thrust as she shot down the hill with a skill unmatched by anypony. And unknown to everypony, for she was too focused on her goal to notice what she was doing and the only other witness were too scared out of their minds by the semi-controlled roller coaster ride down the mountainside to notice either.
It wasn’t until the slope smoothed out and the resulting loss of speed that Apple Bloom felt safe enough to sit up and yell at her pegasus friend that the scooter riding filly realized just how reckless the decent was. Scootaloo promptly apologized and then immediately started flapping her wings again, resuming her attempt to ‘be there’ for Light Seeker when he landed.
Despite their best efforts to guide Scootaloo, Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle frequently lost sight of the dot in the sky they were trying to intercept and it wasn’t until it was low enough to find with a glance that they were able to set a true intercept course.
* * * * * * *
Their best efforts left them arriving at the crash sight several minutes after they had seen the wing pack disappear into the surrounding hills and issue the sound of a thunderous crash. When they did arrive they found a sundered heap of broken and twisted metal and the lone somber figure of Iris sitting beside it staring into the sky with seemingly empty eyes.
“Is he…?” None of the crusaders dared finish the question, as if not saying the logical guess would somehow make it not true.
“Not here.” Was the response they got.
The crusaders’ ears perked up at the unexpected answer, “What do you mean?”
“Look for your self.” Iris said, as she gestured to the wreckage.
Among the twisted metal the fillies spotted the remains of the pressure suit and despite looking a little scorched and impaled by what used to be part of the wing pack’s frame it was in relatively good shape. More importantly it was empty, with no sign of the pony that should’ve been in it.
“I intercepted the wing pack a good minute before it hit the ground, but it was already empty. I can only assume that he bailed out sooner. But I couldn’t find him in the sky nearby so I figured this was the best place to wait… well speak o the devil.” Iris perked up as she tacked on the last line.
The crusaders followed the mare’s gaze and spotted a whiteish pegasus figure gliding their way. A round of cheers went up reveling in the wave of relief everypony on the ground felt.
“I did it. I reached beyond the sky. I touched the realm of the stars. It was so beautiful.” Light Seeker said, somewhat breathlessly, as he landed beside the crusaders’ wagon.
“And ya earned your cutie mark!” Apple Bloom exclaimed.
“Huh? Oh, so I did, didn’t even notice,” Light giggled as he twisted himself to see the symbol on his flank. Sure enough, a dark blue shield had formed a fitting shade of blue for the night sky. In the shield was the white silhouette of a flying pegasus surrounded by three colored stars. One white, one yellow, and the star in front of the pegasus silhouette was orange.
“Are you alright? What did you mean ‘beyond the sky’?” Aunt Iris asked, truly concerned by the scorch marks on her nephew, and his odd choice of words wasn’t helping her concerns for his health.
“The sky has a limit, it just stops once you get high enough,” the colt explained, sounding weak and his balance was starting to sway ever so lightly.
“That shield looks just like ours! Well the color’s wrong but the shape is dead on.” Sweetie Belle commented.
Their shield? Light Seeker thought and as if in response a memory flashed in his mind. The memory of a scooter being set beside some crafts. He turned to leave the clubhouse and the memory froze as he ran out, allowing him to notice what he had missed the first time, three capes hung by the door each baring the symbol of a blue shield with an adventuring pony silhouette. Light smiled, the crusaders were right, the shape of the shield was a match to the one he didn’t even realize he’d seen.
“Seems fitting to honor the ponies that helped me achieve my destiny. But I think I’m going to need your help one more time.” Light said, clearly becoming dizzy.
“Of course!” The crusaders beamed with pride, not noticing the colt’s state at all.
“Can you take me to the hospital, I think I’m going to pass out as soon as this adrenaline rush fades.” Light Seeker said as he collapsed into the wagon, making good on his threat to pass out even before he finished falling.