//------------------------------// // Awakening II // Story: Equestria's first warp drive // by CCC //------------------------------// It was almost twenty-four hours into the journey back to Equestria, when Twilight Sparkle woke up again. She was lying on a soft mattress, covered by some sort of blanket... it felt wrong. It was too light and too warm to be her blanket. For a moment she idly wondered where she was and whether anypony would mind if she slept in for five more minutes... ...and then memory rapidly returned. Three days awake in pursuit of their goal, a legion of bipedal Nightmares, Nightmare Sweetie Belle, a burst of rainbow light, somecreature trying to get into her mind, repelled by Luna... Twilight's eyes shot open, and she clambered to her hooves. Somehow, the too-light blanket tangled around her legs, and she fell to the side, bouncing on the soft mattress. “YOU'RE AWAKE!” yelled a familiar voice from slightly above her head. A moment later, a pair of scaly arms wrapped around Twilight's neck. Twilight looked up, and saw Pinkie looking down, a wide grin on her face. She reached out one foreleg to hug Spike back. “Pinkie? Spike?” she asked. “Is everything okay?” “It is now.” said Spike, quite firmly. “Everything's perfectly-perfect!” said Pinkie, starting to bounce up and down. “Rainbow's sparring with Var'aQ in the hold, the Crusaders and Sunek are taking Rarity and Applejack on a tour of the ship, you're on a mattress on the floor in the forward observation deck, Spike's hugging you, I'm telling you where everypony else is, Fluttershy's the last one who's still asleep -” “Not anymore.” said a very quiet voice, from behind Twilight. “- Flim and Flam are exploring the ship on their own – making an inventory, they said – Sarah's gone down to one of the rooms to have a nap, David -” “Stop.” said Twilight, holding up one hoof. “Varrak? Sunnek? Say-rah? Who are these ponies?” “Oh, they're not ponies.” said Pinkie. “They're aliens!” “Are they the ones who kidnapped the girls?” “No, silly! That was Pog and Frem. They're tied up in one of the holds, and somepony – well, actually, somealien – makes sure to keep an eye on them, all the time! Sunek set it up. He's nice, he reminds me of my sister.” Twilight mentally began to prepare for an alien as energetic and exuberant as Pinkie Pie. “Then where did these aliens come from?” she asked. “Weeelllllll... you know the Nightmare got hold of the Crusaders and then we blasted it with the Elements?” asked Pinkie. “Yes, Pinkie. I was there.” “Well, they were aliens that had been caught by the Nightmare earlier! And when we freed the girls, we freed them, too! Which is good, 'cause it turns out that flying this thing is super-duper complicated, but lucky some of the aliens already knew how to fly a ship like this, so we're going to be back in Equestria in just two days! Oh, and talking of which, Celestia wanted to talk to you when you got up! After breakfast.” “Celestia's here?” asked Twilight, suddenly realising that she was by no means presentable – she probably had a terrible bedmane, she hadn't had a bath in far too long, and she had only the vaguest idea of what was going on. “No, don't be silly!” said Pinkie. “Not even the Princesses can teleport that far. But they've got one of those magic window talky thingys on the bridge, which is a really weird name for it 'cause it's not actually a bridge, it's really just the place they steer the ship from, and I don't know why they call it that because there isn't any water underneath, I checked, and there isn't a parapet to lean on and watch the traffic from either, which there normally is on a bridge if it's a bridge over a road, only there isn't any traffic to watch either, only this really really big magic window thingy...” Twilight's stomach growled. It was the prolonged, angry growl of a stomach that hasn't had anything put into it in the last twenty-four hours. Pinkie gasped. “Breakfast!” she said. “You've got to come have breakfast! Come on, I'll show you something neat!” “Yeah!” said Spike. “This is cool!” She dragged Twilight and Spike to an alcove in the wall. Pinkie frowned at it for a few moments, then picked up a coin – a little larger than a bit – from a small alcove and put it in a slot on the side of the machine. It fell in, there was a clatter and a couple of rattling noises, and then the coin dropped back into the alcove that Pinkie had taken it from. At the same time, Spike pressed a few buttons labelled in alien script. Twilight sat down and stared, vaguely hoping that this had something to do with breakfast. Hopefully, there would be coffee involved. There was a faint humming noise, and then a plate of hay and a bowl of oatmeal porridge appeared, apparently from nowhere. Twilight blinked, and stared. “We can make it do water, as well,” said Pinkie, “but those are the only buttons Sunek showed me.” “Where does it come from?” asked Twilight. “How does it get there?” Spike shrugged. “I dunno.” he said. “Teleportation?” Twilight frowned at the basic breakfast. She levitated it out of the alcove and put it to one side. “Do that again,” she said “I want to take a closer look this time.” Her horn took on a faint glow. “Sure!” said Pinkie. She picked up the coin, dropped it in the slot, while Spike hit the same series of buttons again. There was a shimmer, and another bale of hay and bowl of porridge appeared; apparently identical to the last set. “...it's not teleportation.” she said. “There's no hint of spatial twisting or another endpoint. It's almost as if it's being... constructed. Out of nothing. But that's... not scientifically possible! You can't construct something out of nothing! You have to construct something out of something! My breakfast is not scientifically possible!” Pinkie shrugged. “You should probably eat it before it gets cold.” she suggested. “Cold porridge isn't very good.” Twilight's objections were drowned out by the grumbling of her stomach. But before she even took a bite of her porridge, she noticed something else odd. “What's this spoon made of?” she asked. “I dunno.” said Pinkie. “Sunek said something about long-chain polymers or something...” “Did somepony mention breakfast?” asked Fluttershy's quiet voice, from behind Twilight. “FLUTTERSHY!” yelled Pinkie. “YOU'RE AWAKE! You're the last one! Now as soon as you've had breakfast and Twilight's spoken to Celestia, we can have our Alien Party!”