//------------------------------// // II. // Story: The Worlds End // by Alcatraz //------------------------------// When I was on Earth, I took quite fondly to watching My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. I couldn't help but notice that, during my—perhaps too many—viewings of its first two seasons, I noticed how Rarity had broken a champagne bottle over some kind of airship when Fancypants was courting her around Canterlot I was getting lost in thought, as random as it may have been... I gathered up all the equipment I knew Luna and I would have needed, then we headed way to Canterlot via a train, affectionately named 'The Friendship Express'. The seats on the Express all looked like chaise loungers that one would find in a psychiatrists office. Except these were designed for ponies to lay down on because, if they chose to sit on their haunches, and it was a bumpy ride at any point, they would be susceptible to loss of balance and falling off, looking rather clumsy. Almost everypony we saw aboard the express were pleasantly surprised to see a princess among their numbers, not to mention a human alongside her. Normally, Luna would just simply teleport from place to place or fly whenever necessary. Even considering the fact that she can teleport herself, carrying another person with her was rather risky, especially with me, being a human. Riding the train gave us plenty of time to relax, and so we spent that irreplaceable luxury together. However, we avoided talking about the task at hand, with the consensus of not drawing in any unwanted attention. After all, there were ears literally all over the place on the filled cars, and if someone ever did catch wind of our intentions, it could lead to a whole new mess... I sat across a table between the two of us, writing in a journal I bought from one of the stores in Ponyville a while back. It was going to be meant for something, and this journey was going to be its subject of record. Fortunately, I had the sense to bring a pen with me, so I wouldn't have to rely on both a quill and some ink in this situation. And though I didn't use a pen too often, I already dreading when it would run out of ink. I didn't remember if I brought more or not... The notebook was simply bound and made with paper that I had decided looked like pulverized wood compressed between two plates, then dried and finally cut to size to fit inside a leather wallet of sorts. Then again, that's basically the entire process of making paper, but on Earth, the process involves the use of several different types of chemicals. What certainly struck me about the leather is that it had a symbol stamped into the leather tome with the image of a unicorn silhouetted against the moon creating some sort of recessed design that reminded me of Nightmare Moon. It also had a thin strip of leather that could wrap around from top to bottom, holding it all together. It was just a nice little thing to have with me all the time, is all. After a long journey and much thinking about the adventure ahead, we stepped off the train onto the platform. Finally, after a long journey and considerate thinking about our adventure ahead, Luna and I stepped off the train onto the platform below. “Princess Luna!” A familiar voice shouted over the commotion on the station. It was recognizable even to me. She looked up to watch its owner step out of an elegant carriage. Fancypants, simply dashing as always, wore a navy blazer and a captain’s hat perched jauntily atop his head, complete with an embroidered anchor on the front of the hat. He merrily trotted toward her with his customary jovial smile and a twinkle in his blue eyes. I raised a hand up to both greet and show him where we stood, but that was nowhere near necessary, and just merely a force of habit—anyone could spot Luna, the night-blue alicorn, unless it was literally night-time. But even so, their silhouette is recognizable to anypony, especially with a human from another universe standing next to them. "It's so good to see you two!" He bowed at Luna, then shook my left hand. I smiled sheepishly. Shaking hands, or rather hooves, is a tad awkward. "As it is you, Fancy Pants." Luna replied. "Now, are you ready for a glorious afternoon among the clouds?” Fancypants gleefully asked. “Ready, Mon Captain,” I replied, and Luna following the affirmation with a gracious smile. "Oh, so this must be your human companion, if I'm not at all mistaken?" For something as alien as I was, in every sense of the word, princess Celestia had to announce to the entire nation that I was a non-threatening being. Most of the populace acted quite indifferently... "Indeed I am, Fancypants." I nodded at him. "Now, you have an airship to show us?" “Right then, let’s hop to it!" As we approached the open door of the elaborately decorated carriage, Luna gratefully braced herself against Fancypants’ extended hoof and stepped up and into the passenger compartment, while I entered upon my own accord and removed my bags, somewhat organizing them so I would be able to sit down. The compartment was incredibly luxurious, I thought anyway. I wasn't at all surprised either. It's interior was filled to capacity with several plush cushions and various expensive fabrics laying around in a very neat mountain of clutter. Decorative gold filigree and gems were among some of the things to be more neatly exhumed from the impressive pile. Yet another thing to take note of was how, unlike some carriages that were used for taxi services, such as those open to and largely used by the Elements of Harmony, this one was completely closed off in exclusion to the door and two windows opposite from it. “To Canterlot Skyport, Jaqcues!” Fancypants declared our destination after he pulled himself into the vehicle and magically closed the door behind us. There was a miniature door with an equally small knob on it directly behind the place Fancypants' seat across from the bigger door. He used to communicate with the driver, opening it whenever he wanted to say something. But it was shut for now. "Right. Now, it's time to get down to brass tacks." he started off. "I've received word that you wish to use service of one of my airships, but might I ask what for?" I looked at Luna with a questioning glance, and she gave me a simple nod. Fancypants looked at the two of us with curiosity written all over his face. Luna gave me the cue to let him in on our intentions. I pulled out the very map that I first used to get around Equestria with. It was a complimentary gift from the Golden Oaks library. The whole thing was very large and even more detailed; it easily stretched my entire arm span. After I found the exact section I was looking for I folded the map in half twice in two different lengths needed for the pointing out our visionaries of explanation, specifically the north west portion of the whole top of the map. Fancypants borrowed the map, grasped with his sky-blue magical aura, took it close to his face and scanned it over. The map then lowered. He stared at me and Luna for an awkward amount of seconds, considering his assumption. Then he started darting his eyes between us, still fathomed by the possible reality. "The Breach?" He slurred with a raised eyebrow, blatant disbelief in his voice. "Correct," I confirmed for him. I folded my arms together as we got to starting a discussion. "We will pay you handsomely for the services provided of course, and any losses that might incur, knock on wood." "While I appreciate your concern for the possibility," He cleared his throat. " ahem, there are some things you should know, Princess." Suddenly, during a very unexpected stop, some of the carriage's weight came thrusting back as I slumped about two feet forward due to the stop. Fancypants was the first out the door, opening it for Luna and I. Then, without saying a word to us, he led us into a large building a minute after getting out of the carriage. It reminded me heavily of an Air Force base. One out of many garage-style roller doors at a far end of the building was half open, with an emblazoned number '1' only partly visible, There was also a copious assortment of equipment on the walls and scattered around some unnamed projects. Also, as we were being led inside the building, I was able to see the base of one of the his airships tethered to the workshop floor with thick, heavy rope. When we were actually inside, I couldn't help but marvel at three specific airships inside. The one on the far right, hanger three, was completed, and it appeared that the centered one, inside hangar two, was as well. But down a the the left end sat the construction of a third, inside hangar one, still in the process of construction. At its rear lay a large wooden crate. Seeing as how the rest of the items were out and being used, I assumed that the box contained the balloon that was to be fitted at a later point in time. The layout of its interior construction brought the immediate image of a pirate ship. I found it rather common to think of such a thing, but hear me out: The front of it had a spoked steering wheel attached to a column in the middle of the platform, and it looked like the forward area had various instruments used for navigation. On another note, if somepony followed through the door at its rear, they would find what looked like a communal area. It felt largely unfinished, but I could have been wrong. A staircase at the back of that room went into the bowels of the ship and, down in the bottom, there was what could have been a tubular boiler among two smaller round chambers, with even smaller doors containing viewing ports. "The airship that you recall, Sir Human..." Fancypants broke me from my observations for a moment. "That was merely a prototype. It had a wood boiler and a water feed, much like a steam engine train. But it was only capable of being neutrally buoyant which, given the goals which I was trying to shoot for, was greatly counterproductive. So I just simply put it into storage—and that's what you're seeing here." He explained his experiment with a wave of his hoof, indicating the three massive ships in their garages. "Now these..." he began again." Thank to a huge advancement in technology, we managed to find a way to enchant peculiar gems to provide a continual flow of heat and water to the boiler to provide the means to power the flight systems." Fancypants made it all sound like a place, probably like a nuclear power plant back on Earth, that would use uranium rods to super heat water to run a turbine, distributing outputs of electricity to its users. It got me a little uneasy, to be honest. All that pressure, hot water, not to mention possibly unstable gems... He then lead us over to the ship in the middle of the second, wide-open hangar. "This will be your transportation. You will be accompanied by a navigator to pilot the ship and work the instruments, and an engineer that will maintain the ship. So, you understand all of what's at stake here, not only being this airship?" "We understand, Fancypants." affirmed the Princess. "And rest assured, nothing ill will become of your crew or your precious ship." "Thank you Princess. Now, I must ask of you and your friend to accompany me to the office for the usual tedious paperwork routine. Oh, but only after you've had a chance to put your things in the ship of course! And feel free to have a look around as well!" With a suggesting nudge and an excited smile, Luna and I briskly walked up a cold metal gang plank that lead up to the operating room for the ship, through a door halfway up its side. Our new surroundings were breathtaking, and I was pretty sure the feeling was mutual between us. The bow of the ship was lined with dials and knobs, and some other unidentifiable devices. They curved the tables around the room in a semi-circle all the way back down to the door. Sitting in the middle of the room lied wheel itself--again, reminiscent of the stereotypical wheel from a pirate ship. The room itself went back around six or seven feet, and there was a set of gray double doors towards the starboard side, that of which was a third of the way along the wall. And even further along that direction, there was a single door before the rectangular room curved again. I planned on exploring the ship a bit more, but I wasn't sure which way I even wanted to go, then upon a vague and uncertain instinct, I opened the single door and walked through its base. Quite unexpectedly, there was a corridor leading down a few meters with a bend off to the left. I'm an annoyingly curious individual, so I couldn't help but want to explore every inch of the vessel as quickly as possible. But the majority of it could wait, for now, anyway. As I rounded the corner at the end of the hall, however, the area we found ourselves in was more open and plain, but one of its features was a large table that folded down on the starboard side of the room, big enough to seat four. The staircase directly its right ran adjacent to the table,and went below deck. The atmospheric ambiance of the room was bleak-- just plate metal riveted together, and no decorations whatsoever. Rarity would probably have some sort of mental breakdown if she saw how bland this is. Finally, after taking the spiral staircase down, Luna and I were introduced to the sleeping quarters. Just seeing the two pairs of bunk beds made me feel exhausted. I looked down at Luna, but by the time I did, a flash of light signaled me that she had disappeared telepathically. When I looked forward again, an acoustic pop in the air led her to appear again. She was laid on one of the bunks and eyed me like a cat watching its prey. The reason she gave me a soft chuckle was because she knew I had been beaten to the top bunk. For a regal princess, she sure had the humor of a six year-old child, not that I'm complaining or anything. It's actually very adorable. I felt an expense of weight finally relieve itself from my arms as I unloaded our baggage. I set some of it under the bunk Luna and I chose to share, and the rest on the set of beds we would not be using. Then, promptly, we went back out to join Fancypants in his office, retracing our steps. The paperwork there was indeed tedious and redundant , but it was for insurance purposes after all. Because the ship was brand-spanking new, he requested a monetary deposit, as security against any and all damages. I tried offering something I wouldn't end up missing dearly, but almost everything I brought into Equestria had strong sentimental value, as they were my only physical memoirs of Earth. Luckily, Luna was already prepared with a bag full of gold bits she had retrieved from one of her bags I was carrying earlier. What I found strange was that, when I watched 'Friendship is Magic' on Earth, I understood they only had a single coin to use for any purchase, or any amount of currency, really. But... There was no question about it: I was sorely mistaken. There were large numbers of gold, silver, copper, and other financially valued coins, each bearing different denominations. There were ones, twos, fives, tens, and twenties, among larger values. The thing I found irritating was that I was unknowingly lugging around a heavy bag of coins, and also, how I found myself fishing around for the right ones, whenever I needed to buy something. Fancypants was blatantly more than pleased upon comprehension of both the coins' values, and Luna's insistence to take extra collateral. He happily gave us the option to stay overnight in the ship to help with preparations and such. He also offered us residence at a comfortable inn nearby at his expense, since Luna intentionally and gratuitously insured his airship. We accepted his offer for the inn, so he escorted us to a cozy little place about thirty minutes away from his shop. The Inn felt very inviting and homey, with creature comforts and all. Fancypants told us that, once all of our preparations were ready for the trip, we could leave anytime at midday tomorrow. A lazy part of me later suggested to Luna that we could sleep in and have a light breakfast followed by a decent lunch for the trip, and the time in-between then could be spent gathering more incidentals for the trip. The only hitch with that, though, was the fact that she had to lower the moon in the morning so Celestia can make way for the sun, and that would be around six in the morning. So we decided we would get to sleep early. Then, after getting that extra rest we wouldn't have gotten otherwise, we could go and look around Canterlot. It was mutually decided that we would stick with the latter plan. The beds in Equestria were all manufactured for the comfort of the resident ponies and not for humans. But it wasn't at all a bad thing. To fit a human, they would need to be bigger to allow for the larger body size, but the fact that they didn't fit me meant that I could stretch out to my hearts content. When I stayed in the Canterlot castle with Luna, during the first month of my new life in Equestria, I often watched Luna raise the moon in the evening and then lower it the next morning, and so on. And sometimes, after she raised it in the evening, we would spend a good amount of time out on the dais that her bedroom opened out onto, and we would just gaze up at the stars. Something that could probably explain her love for the night was that, when I was raising Luna on Earth, she had developed a fascination with them, fueled from watching too much Doctor Who. But I really couldn't blame her. In my own way I found the cool night sky to be highly serene and beautiful. Now that I think about it, she still had the Sonic Screwdriver toy I got her one year at Christmas, as well as the old blanket she slept with in her bed too. When the morning rolled around, I followed my normal, simple morning routine. I opened my dreary eyes, only to be assaulted the abnormally bright sun coming through a window at my right. I covered my eyes and became adjusted to it underneath my hands and the first thing that came to mind was my journey with Luna, our organized plans, and literally everything in between. At that point, all I did was groan and feel lazy, laying in bed a little longer. It meant leaving the comfort of that warm bed, but it was going to happen in time anyway. Luna and I needed to get up and get moving. First on our agenda, both chronologically and thrust by our growling stomachs, was breakfast. While my usual meal would comprise of meat, almost entirely. However, the consumption of flesh and the act of 'savagery' was extremely frowned upon in this society. Everyone got their dietary needs from whatever they were able to grow from the ground and the trees, including dairy products such as milk, eggs and cheese. I questioned how I could get by without the taste of a delicious steak once in a while, but found myself experimenting with other substitutes nonetheless. At one of the roadside cafes that dotted the streets of Canterlot, I went with a choice of poached eggs on toast with sauteed tomatoes and capsicum to boot. Then later, I realized neither of us had brought any soap or shampoo with us, so Luna suggested we stop a specialty store that sold scented soaps and related products. Apparently, she shopped there a lot of the time for her sanitary needs, and that would explain why her mane and coat both smelled of a combination of blueberries and blackberries all the time. I just simply opted for a single bar of lemon scented soap, but it also came with a little cloth bag that was meant to put it in. It fit snugly inside of it, but there was also a plastic case to hold it into stop the soap from getting on everything else. It was really a pleasantly clever design, I thought. Going further down the list, we needed to stop by the Royal Archives. Fancypants did say that everything would be ready at midday, and we could leave at any time after that time, so we had some extra time. I remembered that there was a 'Star Swirl ' wing, and that's where Luna and I found ourselves immediately lost in. We spent the good chunk of a single hour trying to fish out any more books or articles that might have have any more information about The Breach. But to my disappointment, there wasn't anything to be found. But we did find the remains of spare time we had left, and our decision to leave for our trip on the scheduled time was of further importance. Eventually, we retraced back to Fancypants' shop. I called a Pegasus taxi to fly us there as quickly as possible. Fortunately, all Pegasi-driven taxi's come with seat belts, because without them, I would have probably fallen off, save for Luna, who could fly. We walked back into hangar, ready to depart on our rented airship. As we walked the platform, we saw Fancypants farther ahead of us. He looked as if he was prepared to see us off. "Welcome back, you two! Everything is all prepped and ready to go. There's food, drinking water, and many other provisions." he happily stated with a cheery smile. "Oh, there's also a hot shower on board too, if you didn't notice that before!" Honestly, that was an extremely liberating thought. I didn't know how long the trip was going to be, so it was very comforting knowing that we wouldn't start to reek anytime soon. "The crew has been informed of your destination and are ready to depart when you are!" "Wonderful, Monsieur Fancypants!" Luna happily exclaimed. "Let us depart this very instant." "Ah hah, you two must be eager! I wish you the best of luck on your trip, and with... Heh, whatever your goal may be!" Walking up the gang plank for the second time in two days, we stood in the control room and looked out the viewing windows at the proceedings ahead of us. With a jolt, the ship suddenly began sliding out from the hangar accompanied by the sound and sight of mechanical whirring, the small conduits tethered to the platform with ropes. It took the platform several minutes to fully extend out, but when it did it, the whole thing came to an abrupt halt. "Inflating the balloon!" called the engineer. He magically threw the double doors open and enthusiastically threw a nearby lever, setting several mechanisms in motion. I could see through the window of the housings that contained the blue and red gems. They were iridescent, their faint glowing hues indicating they've begun to serve their purposes of providing heat and water to the ship, electricity too. Then, located somewhere on the ship, large metallic bangs were heard, followed by the nostalgic sound of balloons rubbing together, telling me the gigantic balloon was being filled up with purposely fed gas. As exciting as the whole process was, the length of time it took to prepare the ship for departure was somewhat anticlimactic. I just knew that I would be glad when the ship takes off and our adventure can finally start. At long last, after almost thirty excruciating minutes of waiting for the balloon to fill, we were finally ready for takeoff. Back outside, I saw the ropes that were keeping the ship to the platform suddenly glow with magic, then the ropes began to slack, one by one. I just had to watch, with how excited I was as the ship finally lifted off from the platform. The ground below us... It was getting smaller and smaller. "Well Luna," I started. "No time like now to get cozy. There's telling how long this ride is going to be..."