“A pilot?” Mark’s father gave his shoulder a light punch. “Gonna take after your old man, eh?”
“Take after...no. More like supercede!” Mark rebutted.
His mother brought forth their still-covered meal. “You always did have the sharpest eyes and the quickest wits out of all of us,” she commented with significantly less enthusiasm. “You’ll do fine there.”
“Cobra jock,” his brother mumbled.
Mark was about to stand up to repay his words with his fist, but his mother sensed what he was about to do. “Sit down, cadet. That’s an order.”
“Grrrrhabler,” Mark grumbled.
“What was that, cadet?” his mother snapped.
“Ma’am, yes, ma’am!” Mark replied, deliberately too loud.
“Better.” She placed the dish at the center of the table. “Now, just because I’m a snobby commanding officer, that doesn’t mean I can’t still cook!” She revealed the concoction, and Mark inhaled deeply through his nose.
Chicken quesadilla casserole...my favorite. Mark lept up to take his helping, but the food in the pot had turned to ash, and he was now surrounded by empty chairs where his family once sat, their headwear taking their places. He knew what was coming next.
"Where did they go?" An unfamiliar voice asked.
“They’re...gone.” Mark hung his head. “Soon their coffins will be here, and my Cobra will crash on me, and then I’ll wake up in a sweating panic.”
“Sounds like you have had this nightmare before.” The voice had moved, and Mark heard the sound of a foot coming down...No, wait. Feet don’t make a ‘clop’ noise.
Mark turned from the table to see Luna’s midnight blue figure appear in the dining room threshold, her starry mane flowing. It was enough to send Mark toppling backward over his chair. “Whoa, whoa, whoa...what the actual fuck!?”
“Greetings,” Luna said as she stepped in. “I am Princess Luna of Equestria. I am Princess of the Night, raiser of the moon, and keeper of dreams.”
“Great. Not even here for a night and I’m already having delusions,” Mark thought out loud.
“I assure you, you are not,” Luna replied. “It is within my magic to dwell in the realm of dreams and communicate directly with the dreamer.”
“Magic…” Mark said skeptically as he stood.
“Yes.”
“Now I know I’ve gone insane.” Mark sidestepped Luna, moving out into the empty living room. “Magic doesn’t exist.” He opened the front door and moved onto the wooden deck. “Just sleight-of-hand tricks and illusions that qualify themselves as ‘magic.’” He looked up to the sky.
“Everypony has magic in their own way,” Luna commented. Her gaze joined his. “Might I inquire as to what you are doing?”
“Waiting for my Cobra to come crashing on me so this dream ends. Think I’ve hit my daily allotment of mentally generated talking winged unicorns, which was zero.” Mark thought as he looked back to Luna. “Wait...every-pony?”
“I thought you said you’d have to see the coffins of your family first.”
Mark looked down. “There they are. Right on time.” He pointed off the deck to the four familiar boxes. He pointed back up. “And…here she comes.” The fireball of his Cobra was fast approaching. He closed his eyes and readied himself to be awakened, but the crash never came. He opened his eyes again to see his charred fighter suspended in mid-air.
“Do you believe me now?” Luna asked. Mark turned to see a faint glow surrounding her horn as well as his aircraft. In her levitation she had snuffed out the fires, and moved the hunk of metal gently to the ground.
“No,” he answered. “Now my subconscious is torturing me by making me spend time with my dead family.”
Luna pondered as she looked over the coffins. “Are they, actually? In reality, I mean.”
“Yes,” Mark hesitantly responded, “Yes they are.”
“Oh.” was all Luna could say. There were a few tense moments before she spoke again. “We saw your ship.”
Mark’s head snapped to the alicorn. “Already?”
“You seem surprised.”
“Do you even realize how low the odds are of spotting something the size of the Caprica in orbit?”
Luna thought. “About one in one thousand.”
Mark drew an outline of numbers with a finger, mentally tabulating the numbers. “Yeah...that’s about right.”
“The light may have helped.” Luna’s horn glowed again, projecting an image of what she had seen through Twilight’s telescope. A strobing flash moving across the night sky. “We didn’t know what to make of it at first. I thought it to be a rotating meteor, spinning and brilliantly flashing in the last remnants of the sun. My sister thought differently.”
“I didn’t expect to be found so soon.”
“There is another possibility of your discovery. Do you believe in fate?”
“Of course not,” Mark defiantly answered.
Luna frowned as she closed the image. “Might I ask why?”
“It’s always been my belief that I’m the only one in control of my own actions.” Mark stared pacing. “You don’t want to hear that you have no control when you’re a pilot and your life is literally in your hands.” He stopped. “One miscalculated angle, a hesitation on the trigger, a simple wrong move...and I’m a smear on someone elses hatch. I was basically trained not to believe in fate.”
“Then how do you explain how we found you?”
Mark smiled. “Luck.”
Luna gave a dissatisfied sigh. “Have I at least convinced you you’re not having delusions, and that I actually exist both in reality and in your dream?”
“Not really.” Mark cocked his head, “But I’m starting to warm up to the idea.”
“At least we have gotten that far.”
“I suppose I should introduce myself.” An image of the Caprica’s bridge flashed through Mark’s mind, and after Mark blinked, they were both standing on its deck. “I’m Marcus Frude, captain in the Solar Space Defense command, recently reassigned to the Type 271-BXR carrier known as the Caprica… and lone surviving human in the universe.”
Her eyes went wide with sudden shock. “My next question was concerning why I could not dreamstride with the others on your vessel,” Luna said as she looked around the bridge.
“There are no others.” Mark had noticed the change in scenery, but it hadn’t registered until then. “Wait, how’d we get to the bridge?”
“I may be here, but this is still your dream.” She walked past equipment and readout monitors, giving them all curious glances. “We may go wherever you please.”
“Well then, allow me to unofficially welcome you to the Battlestar: Caprica.” He did an open-armed bow. “Allow me to show you around.”
“I am sure there will be plenty of time for an official tour later,” Luna said as she held out a hoof to stop him. “I am merely here this night as a messenger.
“On behalf of the Princess of the Sun, the Crystal Princess, and the Princess of Friendship, we wish to extend to you an invitation in good will. So long as you bear no ill-intent toward us, the other Princesses, or any of our subjects, you will be welcome here. Should you bring harm to any colt, filly, or foal, you will be brought to justice.” One thousand years of rule and this is what she sends me to say. Luna mentally scolded her sister. But I suppose there is no edict for first contact.
Mark nodded. “I understand. I come here seeking to do no harm. I only wish to…” His formality left him as he fought for words. “...I dunno. Rest, I guess. Been fighting for so long I forgot what peace was like.”
“Right before I turned eighteen, I enlisted with the SSDC. Typically they don’t accept anyone below that age, but my mother was an admiral, and she pulled a few strings to get me into basic training quicker. That was six years ago, by my calendar. Before then, my father, mother, brother, and sister had all fought the colonial insurrectionists, and those people had been popping up regularly for some twenty years. I had just received my wings when the Dridens began their march across the colonies.” Mark sighed. “They managed to kill ninety-seven billion people in the span of four years.”
The scene changed again, now having moved to the port flight pod. “I...I cannot even begin to conceive your heartbreak and sorrow for the loss of your people.” Luna stepped up beside Mark. “But know you have found a place of refuge and safety. I will ask no more questions tonight.”
“Thank you...for your hospitality.” Mark looked out through the force field to the countless stars. “Wish I could have brought more.”
Luna let the uneasy moment pass. “Though, if you would indulge us, my sister and the other Princesses are very eager to meet you.”
“As am I.” Mark swung his attention back to Luna, pushing back his gloomy mood. “I can be down tomorrow. When would be the best time to make my grand entrance?”
A journal appeared before Luna with a puff of blue smoke. “My sister will be having day court all day tomorrow,” she said as she looked through her notes.
“Alright. I’ll come down with my assistant to get our clocks in sync.”
Luna cocked her head in confusion. “Assistant? You spoke that you were alone.”
“She’s… special,” Mark blurted, not knowing how to adequately describe Des. “You couldn’t reach her with your… what was it? Dreamstride?” Luna nodded. “Can’t do that with her because she can’t dream.” Luna raised a suspicious eyebrow. “I’ll explain tomorrow.”
“Is there anything you need us to do before you arrive?”
“Couple things. First I need to know where to go.”
“Oh, of course.” Luna projected a map. “We are here, in this city.” She gestured to a city built into the side of a mountain. “It is known as ‘Canterlot.’ This is the city that we were in when we spotted you.” Luna pointed to another town, not far away.
Mark quickly memorized the map. “Okay. That terrain looks to be fairly unique. I’ll have my assistant map it out. Also-” Mark made the mental image of a Cobra, and after a blink, it appeared on the deck “-I need you to make a landing zone that can accommodate my aircraft here.”
“How big of a space do you need?”
“A circle no more than twenty meters in diameter.” A red ring formed around the Cobra. “Try to match that. Also might want to put a sign up that reads ‘Beware: Blast zone.’ I don’t want to cook someone.”
She observed the enclosed space. “An area like this will most likely have to be outside the city.”
He shrugged. “As long as it’s flat, it makes no difference to me.”
Mark stirred under the glow of the blue LEDs of his clock. 22:42. “Wow...that seemed longer than it was.” He ran his hand over his short hair.
“Trouble sleeping again, captain?” Des materialized by his bunk.
“Quite the contrary,” he answered in an almost cheerful tone. “We’ve been contacted.”
A flurry of information ran up and down Des’s figure, making her glow bright enough for Mark to shield his eyes. “I received no radio band frequencies or any other type of communications from the planet.”
“I wouldn’t think so.” Mark stood, reaching under his bunk. “Think I found the source of that mysterious power you were detecting.”
“Try me. I’ve scanned the planet literally hundreds of times and I still can’t come up with a solution.”
“Magic.”
Even without saying a word, Mark could almost hear the skepticism that she felt. “Are you going crazy?”
“Hope not. We just got here.”
“What’s your favorite food?”
“You know I don’t play favorites.”
“Fair enough,” she replied as Mark’s code words registered. “So what did the mysterious voice in your head have to say?”
Finding the spare tablet he was looking for, he brought up a blank page and withdrew its stylus. “It said we are invited to the surface.” Mark hastily drew what he could remember from the map Luna showed. “I need you to find a geographic match to this drawing.” He held out the tablet facing Des, and she touched the pad with her holographic hand.
“I’ll see what I can…” she stopped. “I’ve already found a match.”
“Where?”
She touched the tablet again. “When we first arrived, on that dark side, that’s the first landmass I scanned.” The screen flicked to a map, showing the landmass overlayed by Mark’s drawing.. “Eighty-seven percent match.”
“Eighty-seven?”
“You suck at drawing.” She smirked.
“Touché.” He gave a small grin as he studied the new continent. “It should be…” He zoomed in. “Here. A city built into the side of a mountain.”
“Oddest placement for a city I’ve ever seen,” Des observed.
“Indeed. Second only to New Orleans.” Mark switched the tablet off. “Wake me at oh-five hundred. I’ll start prepping my Cobra in the morning.”
“Think arriving in a Cobra is a good idea for first contact?”
“Good point. Better take the Hopper.”
Mark awoke next at four fifty-nine. Much to his relief, the rest of the night’s sleep had been dreamless. “Des, cancel the-”
He was interrupted by the sudden blast of old country-western music. “YOU AND ME GOIN’ FISHIN’ IN THE DARK!”
“Des!” Mark tried to shout over the music. “Shut that shit off!”
The quick transition from loudness to silence left Mark’s ears ringing. “It’s oh-five-hundred, captain.” Des said over the audio.
He gave the speaker in his room a death glare. “I noticed.” Mark scowled as he stood. “Hard to believe people actually listened to that garbage.”
Since his transfer to the Caprica, Mark’s mornings had fallen into a routine: Stand, stretch, make bed, lavatory for piss and shower, quarters for uniform, address the duty pilots at zero-six-thirty, mess hall for morning chow, speak with Commander Mandkea, and fly. The absence of others on the ship had left his mornings quite lonely, since there had always been others with which to shoot the breeze.
Now there were just the echoing slaps of his bare feet against the plating, no meetings to attend, and the empty lounge where he ate. “Hey, Des,” he started with a mouthful of bacon. She materialized seated across from where he sat, “Where are we in relation with that continent?”
“We just passed over it,” she answered as she watched him eat. “What are you going to do when the bacon runs out?”
“Do not speak of such a horrifying prospect.”
“Maybe you can get some of those creatures down there to magically conjure some more.”
He finished the rest of his breakfast in one big bite. “If that’s the case, we didn’t find a new planet, we found Heaven.” They both had a laugh. “Hey, I’m actually going to go down in my Cobra, after all.”
“I still think that wouldn’t be wise,” she said as she shook her head. “When they start asking questions about it, what will you say?”
“The truth,” Mark answered as he stood. “These...ponies...have opened their door for me. I think it’d be only fair to them for me to fully disclose myself.”
“Why don’t you take a Hopper with a payload of nukes down then?”
“I want to tell them this is a warship, not make them empty their bowels right away,” he explained, placing his plate in the auto-wash. “I’m heading to the flight pod and transferring the survival gear to my Cobra.”
“Captain, there’s something else,” Des continued as they walked. “We aren’t sure about the microorganism environment down there. I would suggest that you keep your flight suit on during the entirety of your planetary excursion.”
“Acknowledged,” Mark said with a nod. “I’ll bring back soil, air, and water samples.”
The flight decks used to be the center of life of the Type 271 series of Battlestars. There always seemed to be some craft landing, another taking off, someone barking orders. There was always the bustling noise and mess of the standby deck, with a flurry of repair techs scurrying from ship to ship, preparing them for their next sorties. Mark first noticed the distinct lack of noise as he slid down the access ladder. The deck was picked up, and all Cobras and Hoppers were aligned in their respective spaces; an unusual sight considering the past year that they had been on the run. He walked the deck until he came across the fighter bearing his callsign, “Shocker.”
“Feel fortunate the Dridens left the cores primed, or you’d have a real short trip,” Des said.
“Figured they’d be too stupid and forget about that,” Mark answered as he made his outside physical inspection. “Is she still fueled and loaded?”
“Yes, sir. Expecting to shoot anything?”
“You know me,” Mark said, strapping on the rest of his flight gear. “Always like to be prepared.” He slipped a mobile storage unit for Des in his pocket before climbing the flight steps and sitting in his cockpit. “Coordinates loaded?”
“Aye.”
"Prep for carrier-style launch," Mark said as the glass hatch shut around him.
"Aye, aye." Mark heard the sounds of hydraulic clamps coming down on his Cobra's landing gear. Three consecutive snaps told him they were in place. "Clamps are on and locked. Moorings are detached and retracting. Moving the Cobra into position." The craft lurched forward toward the flightway.
“Preflight checks,” Mark ordered, reading the checklist from the flight manual as they moved. “Navigation, go. Propulsion, go. Maneuvering thrusters, go. In-atmosphere aerial fins--" The retracted sections of the Cobra's wings extended, prompting Mark to give the foot pedals and the flight stick a test “-- operational. Targeting systems, online. External ordnance, none. Kinetic ammunition, loaded, cocked, 'n locked. Cargo, standard planetary sample collection kit.” He pressed a button to retract the wings once again.
Des moved herself into the Cobra's computer. “Carrier launch is now automated. On-board A.I. is standing by. Ready when you are, captain.”
Mark nodded. “Okay. Let’s start this shindig.” A flip of a switch and Mark heard the fighter power up.
"Engines primed," Des said. "Five seconds to launch."
“Roger.” Mark leaned back into his seat, bracing for the G-forces. “And... pop goes the weasel.”
The clamps propelled the Cobra out of the hangar, clearing the bow before the maneuvering thrusters pushed the craft away from the Caprica. The Cobra pointed its nose to retrograde, and the main engines lit, beginning its descent into the atmosphere. An expectedly bumpy twenty minutes later, Mark broke through the troposphere and beneath the cloud layers. “Look at that, Des,” Mark said in awe, gazing upon the new landscape. “It's so...green.”
“Simple housing, wooden construction, dirt roads,” Des scanned as they flew over a village. “They’re barely out of the stone age.”
“Oh, be nice. They’re obviously somewhat evolved if they’re able to make first contact. Besides,” he saw a glimmer on the horizon and turned toward it, “look at that building there. That has to be made out of something special.”
Mornings were Twilight’s favorite time of day. The air was cool and clean, the morning birds were singing, Celestia’s first light was coming over the hills, a strange contraption was heading toward her castle at a frightenly high speed. “Wait, what is --” Twilight began to say from her favorite reading pavilion, observing the odd shape when it flew right overhead. The roar of the mechanical beast was enough to make Twilight’s ears ring, and the vibration sent a few books from their shelves. “Wha…”
“Think that scared the shit out of them?”
"Either that, or you woke their dead," Des replied
Mark chuckled before bringing his head to a shining light in front of him. “That must be our destination up ahead. City built into a mountain.”
In his travels that had brought him to most of the colonial planets, Mark had never seen such a spectacle that was Canterlot. The city reached out from the mountainside plateau, great golden and lavender spires jutting into the morning air. He passed overhead, viewing the cityscape. “Safe to say we’re not landing inside the city wall,” he said to Des. “I’m going to swing around, see if they put out the LZ like I asked.”
Mark made a large loop, coming back around and slowing to look for his landing zone. He spotted a large flat grassy area that seemed to have a distinctive red circular outline. “Okay Des, get ready for a bump.” He was on final approach when he saw a pony in shining armor, a spear somehow slung over his back, standing just outside the perimeter. Mark heard the grind of landing gear coming down, and a fairly violent thud as his Cobra finally touched down. “Oof!” he exclaimed. “I’m starting to lose my touch.”
“Well it’s been a year since you’ve had to land on a planet surface, so I’m not surprised,” Des said into his ear.
“Ready to transfer?” Mark asked as he plugged in the portable storage unit to a component receptacle.
“Transferred,” Des shortly replied over the wireless.
Mark placed the unit back in his zippered pocket. He waved his hand in front of the camera lens on his helmet. “Are you in on the optical uplink?”
“Aye. I have a visual.”
“Good.” Mark looked off the side of his fighter to see a small gathering of ponies. Some had horns, some had wings, others had neither, all in a variety of different hues and colors. There almost kinda...cute. What appeared to be soldiers kept them from coming close. A glimmer caught his attention from a spire, and he witnessed a gleaming flying carriage coming down, being towed by four of the flying types.
“Mark, you okay in there? Your heart’s going about a kilometer a second.”
“Yeah,” he huffed out. “I’m just a little...nervous.”
“Hey, one giant leap for mankind, right?”
“Pah,” Mark scoffed as he hit the button to open the hatch. “You mean one giant leap for me.”