//------------------------------//
// 14: Fateful Moments 
// Story: Empire and Rebellion 
// by Snake Staff 
//------------------------------//

On Serenno, Twilight Sparkle was checking and double-checking her equipment in her characteristically thorough fashion. Fitted body armor? Check. Full-cover black environmental body glove? Check. Face-concealing mask and helmet? Check. Twin DC-17 hand blaster pistols from Clone Wars surplus? Check. Extra tibanna gas cartridges for the guns? Check. Cable gun and matching grappling hook? Check. Smoke grenades? Check. Electrobinoculars? Check. Comlink? Check. Miniaturized wrist computer with her slicing programs installed? Check.

Twilight sighed as she sat down her checklist for the fifth time in the last ten minutes. To all appearances, the shapeshifted alicorn was ready to carry out her first act of true rebellion, to take the first step on the path she hoped would end in her homeworld’s liberation. But on the inside she was supremely nervous and constantly questioning what she was about to do. There were so many things that could go wrong, so many ways that this could end in disaster, not only for her, but for her homeworld. 

The information underground had been ablaze with the very recent news of the purge of the planet Lasan for rebellious activities and the virtual extinction of its native Lasat species. Reliable information on the events that had transpired in the past few weeks was hard to come by, but there were almost certainly no more than a few hundred to a few thousand Lasat left in the galaxy, out of a population that had numbered billions. All that simply because the planet had refused to fall quietly into line. If the Empire knew that she was being backed by Celestia… if they even suspected…

Twilight shivered.

For comfort, she picked up the most recent scroll she had received from her mentor. Just the fact that the magical connection between Celestia and Spike was still working was in itself reassuring.



Dear Twilight,

It is good to hear from you again. In answer to your first question, your friends are all doing quite well, and wish you to know that they have not stopped thinking about you since you left. And Pinkie Pie says she hopes that you’re still taking time to smile.

In answer to your second, no, you are not an aunt quite yet. However, Cadence is presently hospitalized and I give the process no more than a few more days at most. She and your brother are still refusing to test for the foal’s sex, by the way.

Now, as to your final question and your proposed plan, I’m afraid my ability to help is limited. From the situation you have described to me I see nothing evidently wrong with what you propose to do. As I’m sure you’re aware, however, unexpected things do happen, and circumstances can change in a heartbeat. As such, I’m afraid that my advice in this situation is limited to urging you to be careful, and to trust your judgement.

I know I do.


Your proud teacher,
-Princess Celestia




With a slight smile on her masked face, Twilight set the letter aside again and mentally reviewed her plan one final time. Serenno, as she had discovered to her dismay over the preceding few weeks, had largely accepted its new overlords. As long as the Empire treated it with a relatively light touch, the aristocratically-dominated planet had little desire to damage its status and wealth with further association with rebellion. It had been a most disheartening discovery for the young princess.

Of course, simply because the majority seemed to accept the Empire didn’t mean that everyone did. It had taken Twilight some time and no small amount of bribery and computer slicing, but she had been able to confirm from both criminal sources and the Empire’s own databanks that a number of rebel cells were active on the planet. Most were small and tended to avoid confronting occupation forces on the planet, but there were a few with off-world connections and, it was said, influential backers. That was precisely the sort of thing Twilight was looking for.

That had left open the question as to how she was to approach these resistance fighters. It wasn’t as though one could simply knock on a door or fill out a rebel application form. There had to be some level of preexisting trust, or at least some need. She hadn’t been sure what exactly the best way to go about it was. Until, that is, she had gotten word of a rather unique opportunity.

Imperial troops had recently arrested a number of rebels, real or suspected, including a few that were said to be members of one of the cells Twilight had her eyes on. Ordinarily, this would be something she could do little about, but Serenno was lightly garrisoned. The guards at the outpost where they were being held were few in number. And the main computer was almost distressingly vulnerable to outside infiltration.

Twilight knew, because she had already sliced it.

The rumor swirling that some bigshot from the Imperial Security Bureau was due to arrive soon to deal with the prisoners had been the icing on the cake. The alicorn princess had an opportunity to advance her cause, prove her worth to potential allies, and hurt the Empire all in one go. With little better idea of what to do beyond trying again on another planet, she had decided the time had come to take a risk.

She was going to rescue them.



In the sun-scorched deserts of Korriban, in the Valley of the Dark Lords, Princess Luna was embroiled in yet another brutal melee. A tuk’ata hound was barreling towards her from the front, while no less than five of its fellows were circling around to attack her rear. Their previous encounters had taught the pack caution.

They had not taught it sense.

Luna sidestepped the charging Sith hound with an easy grace at odds with her haggard, lean appearance. She drove Darth Nox’s crimson lightsaber blade into the back of beast’s skull as it passed, the weapon easily burning straight through to burst forth from its face. The dark side’s power was fed with every death, and Luna grew only stronger from this exercise. But before she had even pulled the lightsaber from the first hound’s corpse, three more had lept at her from behind.

The first she caught in a telekinetic chokehold without even bothering to look at it. Luna squeezed and without mercy broke the creature’s neck. And then she rolled sideways across the sands, again relying on the dark side of the Force to warn her of her opponent’s moves. The two tuk’ata landed roughly where the night princess had just been, claws digging deep furrows into the rocky ground. Before they had a chance to continue, the lightsaber embedded in their fellow’s corpse sprang out and cut low. One prescient hound dodged it by performing its own roll across the valley floor, while the other was not so lucky. That one lost all four of its legs, collapsing into the dirt and rocks, howling in utter agony.

Another tuk’ata made to attack the princess from behind while she was distracted, making a flying leap off its rocky perch. The creature could not have known that Luna was not only expecting this, but eagerly awaiting it. These vicious monsters had attacked and injured her without provocation, and killed gods only knew how many innocents – the Togruta escapee was surely not the first. It was good to see them wiped from the face of the galaxy.

Once again, Luna caught her attacker in a telekinetic grip, but this time she did not simply snap its neck. Instead, she flung it backwards with such supreme force as to dash the hound’s skull against a stone monument to a long-dead Sith Lord. Meanwhile, the tuk’ata that had avoided her earlier sweeping cut was beginning to back off, but she had no intention of leaving survivors. Nox’s lightsaber flew forward once again, impaling it through the chest.

High on the rocks above, the one beast that had not engaged rather sensibly turned and ran, nimbly leaping from rock to rock with all the grace of sleek predatory cat. Luna watched for a second, and then gathered her concentration. A wave of Force energy smashed into the rock outcropping, sending fragments flying in every direction and hurling the tuk’ata off. The beast hit the ground roughly, and before it could recover Luna unleashed Force lightning. The supernatural blue electricity coursed through the ancient Sith beast, briefly rendering its skeleton visible. At last, its twitching corpse hit the ground.

With a self-satisfied smirk, Luna called her looted lightsaber back to her. The ancient weapon hovered over her head like her moon orbited Equus as she approached the final, legless tuk’ata. The beast’s howls had turned to meek whimpers of pain as its body began to shut down in response to the brutal amputation. For a moment, the alicorn simply stood over the downed creature, allowing herself to enjoy the sight of justice done.

“For your murder of the innocent,” Luna decreed. “For your unprovoked attack on my person. Die.”

She plunged the lightsaber into the tuk’ata’s chest, instantly incinerating its heart. The beast spasmed once, and then it lay still. Snorting in a satisfied manner, Luna pulled the blade from the carcass and switched it off.

“Well done,” came the sound of the voice she had become so used to hearing over these past weeks. “Well done indeed, Lord Noctis.”

Luna glanced irritably up at the manifesting spirit of Count Dooku. She didn’t like the name he had assigned her, and it galled her that he refused to call her anything else.

“We – I,” Luna corrected herself. “Did as you asked, Lord Tyranus. I left none alive.”

One of the first things Dooku had demanded she do was abandon her old mode of speaking. It caused her to stick out like a sore thumb, he had said, and must be amended. Privately, Luna regarded it simply as an expression of the aristocrat’s high society mannerisms – he simply didn’t like the way her old dialect had sounded. Many of Canterlot’s deceased nobles had felt the same way. She hadn’t particularly enjoyed forcing herself to ditch centuries of ingrained speech patterns, but the rewards were worth such a minor sacrifice.

“I can see that. Your best time yet,” he smiled. “You are progressing well.”

And there was no mistaking it: Dooku’s training was worth it. The deceased Sith Lord knew much of the ways of the dark side, and was sharing his secrets with Luna. Her focus and grasp over the Force’s power had improved substantially, and she was beginning to learn the art of combat premonition – that is, of using the dark side to predict and react to her opponents’ moves before they could make them. Further, he had been one of the best lightsaber duelists in the galaxy during his life, and now that he had no further use for that skill shared its techniques most freely of all.

“It gives me pleasure to enact righteous judgement on these beasts,” Luna said, truthfully. “What am I to do next?”

Weeks spent in the Valley of the Dark Lords had visibly affected the alicorn princess. Her mane and tail still flowed with the dark side’s power, but the rest of her dark fur was dirty and unkempt. She had had no opportunity to bathe or groom herself for weeks, and consequently was visibly weathered and smelled a bit. There was also neither food nor water once her small ration pack ran out – as a constitutional herbivore, she could not consume the beasts she killed – and so Luna was leaner than before. Her muscles had enlarged and grown taut under the physical demands of the harsh Sith training regime.

“I think,” said Dooku. “That it is perhaps time to return yourself to the Imperial Academy. Sidious’ servants will be wondering if you have died.”

“Let them wonder,” replied Luna.

Dooku frowned. “Remember what I told you,” he said. “You cannot bring down the Emperor from the outside. You will need-”

“To join the Empire’s ranks, I remember,” interjected Luna. She did not particularly like that part of Dooku’s plan, however much sense it made. Getting close to Emperor Palpatine would be neither simple nor easy, and for anyone outside the Empire’s highest tiers would be all but impossible. That didn’t mean she was happy with the idea.

“Yes,” he said, looking slightly irritated. “And do not interrupt me again.”

“Yes, Lord Tyranus,” Luna answered with some reluctance. Some sycophancy was required to placate the Sith Lord’s ego, even in death. “But why now?”

“Because,” Dooku looked up and away from her. “I sense there will soon be an opportunity there,” his eyes narrowed. “A visitor is coming.”



Twilight ran a diagnostics check on the Harmony for the third time. It was absolutely imperative that if something went wrong – or worse, if she were captured or killed – that the ship be ready to make an immediate and hasty exit. Spike, despite his protests, had been ordered to remain on the ship and make a break for it if she did not return within a certain period. Whatever happened, she did not intend to take her dragon friend down with her.

“But Twilight,” Spike objected once again. “I can-”

“No buts,” she answered firmly. “You’re staying with the ship, and that’s final!”

“But I can help!” he protested. “Like back in the Crystal Empire! Or in that other dimension! I can be a part of this, I know it. If you’ll just give me-”

“Spike,” Twilight knelt down, her transformed blue eyes meeting his. “It’s not that I don’t have faith in your abilities. Celestia knows that nopony knows better than I how capable you are.”

“Then why can’t I come with you?!”

“Because we can’t afford it,” she said. “If something happens to me, somepony needs to tell Princess Celestia about it,” she paused. “And somepony needs to carry on our mission.”

Spike swallowed a little. “You mean that?”

Twilight gave him a small smile. “Of course I do. You’re the bravest, smartest, kindest dragon I’ve ever known. There’s nopony better for this.”

“I…” Spike sighed. “Alright.”

Twilight hugged him. “Thank you, Spike.”

The two held the embrace for a few seconds before Twilight broke off to finish dressing. A rather baggy flight suit concealed the black environmental body glove she wore, while her pieces of armor, helmet, mask, and weapons were packed into a rather innocuous travel bag beneath a number of perfectly ordinary pieces of clothing and hygienic supplies. All of this had not been cheap, particularly on the black market, but the anonymity they offered was worth the price.

Breathing carefully to contain her continued nervous twitching, the polymorphed alicorn walked nonchalantly out of the docking bay, left the spaceport, and strode down one of Carannia’s many boulevards for distance. Eventually she reached the forested edge of Serenno’s capital city. A good distance into the beautifully-preserved deciduous forest in the height of its summer greenery was a mid-sized speeder. Stolen, Twilight remembered with a slight twinge of guilt. Any vehicle she used couldn’t be registered to her - she wasn’t prepared to risk even a false identity of hers being connected with rebellion. Not yet anyway.

As Twilight shed her flight suit and affixed her armor plates, helmet, and mask, she failed to notice a certain small purple dragon secreting himself underneath one of the speeder’s rear seats.



Twilight peered through her electrobinoculars at Imperial Outpost FS-523. Located a good distance into one of the Serenno’s many forests, where “polite” society wouldn’t have to bear witness such things as the torture and murder of dissidents, it was little more than a series of connected prefabricated buildings. Prisoners were usually held here in interim, far from anywhere they could hope to run to. Guards here at present were limited to two dozen troopers from the Imperial Army, plus around half that many support staff.

Sensibly, the forest around the complex had been cleared of all cover to a distance of fifty meters, meaning any attempted escapees or stealthy approachers would have to run a gauntlet of fire with absolutely no protection. It would be little more than a turkey shoot. But fortunately, it wouldn’t come to that.

Twilight’s masked face turned to her wrist-mounted computer. The facility’s main computer was an older model without any serious modifications, and had consequently proven easy to slice. One armored glove fingered a button that had been set to trigger the base’s emergency lockdown – and ignore all internal override attempts. The bulk of the Imperials would be sealed behind their own blast doors in an instant. They would need at least a few minutes to cut through the durasteel or purge the computer of her little additions. More than enough time to get the people she had come for.

Twilight hesitated. This was it. Her first real act of defiance against the Galactic Empire. From then on, there would be no going back, whatever happened. She didn’t have to do this. She could call off the mission and abandon the prisoners to their fate. She could leave this planet and wander the galaxy, or even go home. All she had to do was turn around right now and live the rest of her life knowing that she could have fought back, but chose not to.

She pushed the button.