Intermission: Research and Development
In the noon sun of Ponyville a dozen armoured ponies quickly took apart a metal monolith outside the town library, watched over by a purple alicorn that fluttered amongst them. Behind the library was a line of factories, pumping out vehicles as well as a thick black smoke that wafted into the distance. Thankfully for the citizens of Ponyville, they lived upwind.
"Be careful with that!" Twilight shouted anxiously, pacing the air back and forth- carefully watching over everything.
A dozen of Celestia's 'centurions' (Who honestly looked more like they came out of a painting than a proper fighting force- how could they possibly move quickly in all that armour?) were packaging up Twilight's first operational RADAR. A metal grid, on the top of a metal pole. Earlier today she had tested it at low power, and was able to detect a flock of geese flying south. The device was quite simple- it only transmitted and received radio signals in one direction, and could only tell the distance of an object- not its size or height. It was still a huge milestone, and today she was going to move it to the coast. If she could accurately spot the patrolling airships from Baltimare, then it was ready.
They needed this technology now more than ever, Luna had a few days ago informed them all of the loss of the Wonderbolt fleet. That loss meant the enemy was coming here, soon. If the RADAR worked they would have early warning of where exactly they were heading for- the Equestrian coast was huge, knowing specifically where they planned to make landfall could shave hours off the response time, and save thousands of lives.
Spike was already there, having gone on the morning train. His duty was to scope out a position high up, and with a good view of the sea.
Twilight looked solemnly into the distance. Baltimare, it was a name everypony knew, and a name forever marked in history. It's where the war had begun, with the shocking and brutal attacks by the Griffons seemingly coming out of nowhere. The city was a ruin now, just a burnt out husk of its former metropolitan glory. A few of the refugees had returned, but there was nothing left for them there, so they generally just went straight to Filli Delphia, which now had a large slum where the dockworkers lived.
Perhaps after the war they would rebuild Baltimare, but for now it was dead. The perfect place to test a device like this, since it required a significant amount of power to get any real range.
In her pocket was that power- a sliver of Alicornium. The whole kilogram stolen by the Night Guard and used in Manehatten had been recovered, and was at her disposal. Ten grams of it was enough to power a long range radar nearly indefinitely. Whether her design could handle this power remained a question, a question she wasn't about to answer in a populated town.
A pony by the name of Trotsky had become quite interested in Princess Twilight's developments. He was the stallion that had built these factories, and he was the one that had designed the armoured fighting vehicles they churned out. Mass production, something new to Equestria, had allowed him to provide the legion with nearly a thousand light tanks in a month. The designs were flimsy and basic, but until somepony designed better it's what they had. He had commissioned engineers from across the country to provide better, but it would take some time for anything to come of that. His cutie mark was that of a hammer, his original job had been a smith- before the war. When it started he realized production was too slow like this, and designed the first mass producible rifle- now in use by the dozens of thousands. He was able to take a design, and find a way to make thousand en masse, that was his real calling.
He stood beside the library, watching.
"Do you think it will work?" He shouted up at Twilight.
Twilight glanced back at him, and flew down. "Do you think it won't?" She returned, after a moments flight.
"It doesn't matter what I think. You're the engineer, if you're confident enough in your project you can make it work eventually- that's what makes an engineer- never giving up," Trotsky replied.
"Well, I do. It might take time, but it will work," Twilight said.
"Good," Trotsky said, and gestured to the line of factories noisily working behind him, "so when can I start building them?"
Twilight eyed him suspiciously. It was obvious this was a pony after power- he stood to be in control of nearly all of Equestria's industry after the war, and she was no fool.
"As soon as I say, and the designs will remain my own, this project is a state secret Mr. Trotsky, I won't hand it over to you so easily," Twilight replied.
Trotky bowed. "As you wish, the nation is in your capable hooves," He said, and a clanking noise from afield send Twilight hastily flying back to her project.
"For now."
Twilight flew back over, finding that one of the centurions had simply clanked his armour with that of his comrades, and that the radar was all packed up- rather neatly, to Twilight's delight- in a wooden crate. A large wooden crate, about the size of a motorized carriage. That was one of her options for getting the radar moved to Baltimare, the other was much more simple.
"Well, you know what to do now," Twilight said, gesturing to a dozen yokes, all roped up the box.
The group of centurions obediently hooked themselves up, levitating something this large that far would be taxing even for the Princess of Magic, and to be quite honest she liked the small perks that came with power, ever careful not to overdo it.
Having a dozen stallions carry a box for you across half of Equestria? Why not.
"Alright colts, to Baltimare we go," Twilight ordered, and they formed a nearly perfect grid over the box as they started off.
Twilight could, however, lighten the load. With a faint glowing of her horn she did, and the centurions visibly relaxed.
Reward the good, disparage the bad. It's what Luna had taught her, and it worked quite well. Celestia had taught her about friendship, magic, and leadership- but it was Luna that really taught her how to lead. Those few weeks in Canterlot prior to the last Summer Sun Celebration had been quite enlightening.
She also learned never to play chess against Luna, she was utterly unbeatable. Even when one thought they had the upper hand against her, it was always just a trap. Luna was a strategic genius- she had after all taken the entire country in a week a thousand years ago, striking with her Night Guard. It was a little bit of oft-ignored history- but important, and Twilight had greatly respected Luna after discovering that fact. Celestia was the greatest peace-time ruler a nation could ask for, and Luna was an unstoppable force.
So where did she fit in?
A dozen hours of flying later, with a short break in the middle to eat some grass and drink from a pond, they arrived at the outskirts of Baltimare. Pausing at the outskirts, Twilight looked towards the city. She was perpetually awed by it, there had never been something like this in modern history. An entire modern city, with tall buildings and rows of small houses at the edge- abandoned. The centre of it was burnt out and ruined, a few of the tall buildings leaned uneasily, and a few were little more then skeletal carcasses of what once was. The evening sun looked down on it all, with an eery silence throughout. The only ponies that really lived here now was a small garrison overseeing a missile base on the outlying island.
Twilight lit her horn, and sent up a purple flare blazing into the sky. A few seconds later a second orange flare shot up from one of the many buildings ahead, and Twilight gestured towards it.
"Onward colts, we're almost there," She said, and they set off on the last leg of their journey.
There was nothing quite like calling a dozen centurions, heavily armoured and chosen specifically because they looked intimidating 'colts', it was a joy Twilight allowed herself as often as possible.
Soon enough they flew over the outskirts, and found the downtown building that Spike had designated. He had become her runner over the last few months, and was as capable as any. In fact he seemed to have become more and more sure of himself as the number of outings increased.
Twilight bade the Centurions hold position, and checked over the rooftop.
"Structurally sound.." She mumbled, looking over the building. It was high, with a view of the ocean, and seemed to be one of the more stable buildings.
"Good work Spike, and you can set that down now," Twilight said, and not a moment later the box lay on the roof.
They looked to her for orders, and she smiled warmly- something Celestia had taught her.
"You have done well, find a place to sleep for the night and liberate some food from the garrison. If anypony complains, send them to me," Twilight ordered.
"Yes ma'am," they said as one, and with a dozen sharp salutes they flew off towards the outlying island.
Twilight turned back to the roof, her box being tenderly opened by Spike- which of course meant each panel was slamming to the ground.
"Careful with that Spike, it cost a good amount of bits to get all this together," Twilight warned, and landed softly beside him.
"I know," Spike said, and loosed the fourth panel, "I helped build it."
Twilight smiled, and started levitating the parts for her machine together. The transmitter itself was basic- no more then a skeletal radio transmitter really, but what it connected to was the important part- a 'vacuum tube' powered device with a glass screen. This was all state of the art technology, thankfully the pre-war boom in television manufacturing allowed for quickly getting her hooves on this screen, it was a little more complicated than those.
Once she had it assembled, she inserted the alicornium rod into the red box at the base of the transmitter. It was ready, all she had to do was crank a handle to angle the transmitter towards the ocean.
A further development was to add a motor allowing it to spin and thus cover the whole sky at once, but that was for later. For now she just wanted to prove detecting of objects invisible to sight was possible.
"Are you sure it's ready?" Spike asked.
Twilight put her hoof on the switch to power it on, beside it a lever controlling the amount of power in the transmitter.
"If it's not, you know what to do, right?" Twilight asked.
"Run?"
"Exactly."
Twilight flipped the switch, and the display came on with a dim green glow. It was marked for distance- with the theoritical maximum being 40 kilometers from the ground. Putting it on a high altitude airship increased that geometrically. It was even feasible to build a transmitter with a thousand kilometre distance, but the effort required for such a thing would require a feasible test of the theory first- it would cost millions to build after all.
"I'm going to run it up to full power, is the patrol where it should be?" Twilight asked.
Spike nodded, staring at the dim green screen. "I asked before, should be about twenty kilometres out now."
Twilight put her hoof on the lever, and took a deep breath before slowly moving it upwards. She had only ever run it to ten percent before, using alicornium to directly generate electricity was a relatively new concept- the Magnificent relied on indirect generation through boiling water. Twilight had it directly connected to an electrically enchanted stick of tungsten- something nopony had tried, since the risk was seen as too great. She did the calculations, and the metal was probably strong enough to generate the electricity without melting, or exploding, or releasing a huge surge of electricity at everything nearby.
She pushed the lever down all the way, all or nothing.
"That was abrupt," Spike noted.
"It's all or nothing Spike," Twilight said, and carefully watched the red box that contained the alicornium.
Nothing happened there, and the screen became more vibrant as the transmitter started working. Twilight was relieved immensely.
Ping.
"There it is! Twenty kilometers!" Spike exclaimed, excitedly pointing at the screen.
Twilight strode over, and watched it with a great grin.
Ping.
"Fantastic!" Twilight exclaimed, and flapped her wings with enthusiasm.
It was working, Twilight couldn't see the ships out there, watching the coast...
Ping.
...but she could hear them.
Put one of these on the Magnificent, powered by its reactor, and the war would go decidedly differently. Heck, put one on a plane! Put them on islands! Nothing could escape the peering eyes of science!
For ten minutes the pings continued, both eagerly watching, and then they stopped.
Twilight sat, and watched the waves on the screen go out, never returning, as the ships had crossed the covered area. By now the sun had gone down, and the moon was peeking over the horizon. Twilight sat and stared at it. Luna's moon, Celestia's sun, Twilight's...
"Spike, am I good Princess?" Twilight asked.
Spike was rather taken aback by the question, and opened his mouth several times thinking of a proper answer.
"Yes," he replied, and sat beside her.
"How do you know? What have I done that truly makes me a good leader, a good ruler, a good princess?" Twilight pressed.
"You defeated Sombra, Discord, and like, twenty other bad guys. You've averted disasters, made new magic, and you have a pretty good singing voice," Spike said.
Twilight giggled and tugged him close her wing. "I do, don't I? But where do I fit as a Princess, what's my role in all this?" She asked, and gestured to the moon.
"Luna has the night, and she's a warrior. Celestia has the day, and she's a diplomat. Cadence runs an entire Empire... and I have a library," she said.
"Well, it's a really well organized library."
Twilight sighed. "That it is Spike, that it is."
Ping.
"Spike, was that the radar?" Twilight asked, releasing him from under her wing.
Spike waddled over. "I don't th-"
Ping.
Twilight got up and darted over, watching intently.
Ping.
Forty kilometres, something was out there, and the patrol probably couldn't see it in the dark twenty kilometres away.
Ping.
"Spike, get on my back," Twilight ordered.
Spike did so, hestiantly. "Shouldn't we alert the guard?" He suggested.
"There's no time, we'll go see what this is and..." her horn sparked in the night "... deal with it, if need be," She said, and leapt off the building with her dragon mount.
She soared down towards the ground, and sped through the buildings towards the coast with incredible speed. She had gotten rather good at flying, although nowhere near the level of a Wonderbolt. If she knew specifically where this 'ping' was she would've just teleported over, but all she knew was that it was forty kilometers ahead.
She had used her alicorn powers before, and by Celestia she would use them again if it turned out griffons were out there.
"Hold on Spike!" She shouted over the sound of the roaring wind, and flew out over the ocean.
He held on, almost painfully tight, as the water zipped past below. The waves underneath became a blur, and seemed almost like they were cruising over a mirror. Baltimare fell into the distance, and disappeared behind the horizon while the moon rose ahead.
It took around ten minutes before Twilight guessed they were approaching their destination, so she slowed her speed- mindful of the wake she was leaving, stupid pegasi magic giving her a glowing purple trail- and soared upwards. Ahead as she flew a huge black object was silhouetted by the moon. Twilight paused to look at it, it looked like a huge battleship, floating in the sky with a dozen or so smaller ships flanking it on either side. She flew directly towards it, magical power charging throughout her body, sending small purple arcs around.
She approached it, and nearly fell out of the sky when the moon highlighted its enormous central structure, like a huge steel balloon attached to a half kilometre long ship, with it's name in scarred white paint on the side.
H.M.S Magnificent.
She stared at it, confused, and apparently it stared back- a spotlight shone in her face nearly blinding her, and a siren sounded on it followed by dozens of other lights coming to life all over it, and the vessels nearby.
"Twilight, what's go-"
"REMAIN IN YOUR CURRENT POSITION OR YOU WILL BE FIRED UPON"
Twilight encircled herself with a purple magic field, and covered her eyes from the glare of the spotlight to look forward. A dozen black figures were approaching fast from it.
"It's the Magnificent, Spike, but Luna said it was destroyed..." She said, and braced for the word possibility- Spitfire a traitor?
"FOLLOW WONDERBOLT FLIGHT WING, DO NOT DEVIATE FROM THEIR PATTERN"
Twilight was quickly surrounded by the figures, and one of them flew directly at her- but seemed to slide in the air, nearly falling out of the sky when it came closer.
"T...Twilight?!" A familiar voice stammered.
"Rainbow Dash!?"
The black figure continued forward, and then became bathed in the light of the spotlight with her. Rainbow Dash, in full flight armament with huge guns pointing out from under each wing. A figure Griffons had taken to calling 'The Painbow'.
"Follow me Twilight, we can talk when we're aboard," Rainbow said, and beckoned she follow.
Twilight nodded and took her tail, while Rainbow mumbled something into her headset.
"PRINCESS ARRIVING ON DECK"
Twilight grinned and relaxed, dropping her purple shield and following Rainbow around and over the back of the ship. Even from out here it was obvious it had gone through hell and back- there were dozens of holes all over it, including a much larger hole where it looked like a pair of guns belonged. Most of the holes appeared to be patched up by... doors.
Doors, doors welded all over the side of the ship like some bizarre abstract painting.
"Rainbow, Luna said you were lost, from the looks of it she almost seems right," Twilight noted.
"You should see the other guy!" Rainbow said giddily, and winked back at her.
"We won Twilight, Spitfire is going to be glad to see you," Rainbow said.
Twilight realized something at this moment, which was a confusing thought- she had never actually considered Rainbow to have been lost, despite the fact she knew full well her friend was on the fleet. She had been so caught up with her work she hadn't thought about it. She wasn't sure if she should feel bad about this, or what exactly.
So she was happy enough to just be glad she didn't need to deal with that eventuality at the moment.
Rainbow flew onto the main deck, and quickly directed her wing to go wherever they were to go with a quick waving of her hooves. She landed with Twilight, and Spike slid offer her back- and kissed the Magnificent's deck.
Twilight wasted no time and tackled her friend with a hug, sending her and that weapon clattering to the ground.
"It's so good to see you!" She exclaimed, holding the rainbow maned mare tight.
"It's.... good... to... see... you... too..." Rainbow gasped.
Twilight giggled, and released her. "I guess I don't know my own strength."
Rainbow undid the clasps to her weapon. "I'll say," She said, and then spotting something came to attention and saluted.
"Ma'am!" She addressed, and Twilight turned to look down the deck.
The deck was lit by spotlights, or what could jokingly be called a 'deck'. It was more like a jagged length of metal with broken boxes littering it, one would have to be careful of their footing up here. Then she looked at Spitfire herself, limping towards her.
Her jaw dropped, Spitfire did not look well. An arm hung in a sling, heavily bandaged. Her uniform was torn in several dozen different places, and even in the bright spotlights her coat was clearly less vivid than usual. She limped over, and nodded to her subordinate.
"At ease W.C Dash, you're dismissed," Spitfire ordered.
Rainbow lowered her salute. "Thank you ma'am," She said, and mumbled something into her headset.
"I'll see you later Twilight, I'm in barracks seven if you're still around," she said, and departed down the deck.
Twilight smiled, and looked back to Spitfire. She came to attention when she noticed her glance.
"At ease Spitfire, this isn't an official visit," Twilight said, putting on Celestia's patented 'disarming smile'.
Spitfire sighed, and shifted where she stood. "I'll say it's not, you aren't even supposed to know we're out here," She said, and stepped aside for a giant earth pony to collect that gun.
"Why not? What is going on out here, you look like you've been through hell," Twilight asked, watching Spike out of the corner of her eye poke at a bag full of trail mix.
Spitfire sighed, and beckoned Twilight follow her down the deck. "We won Princess, but it came at a price. We lost a lot of good ponies on that island, and almost lost it all because of some damn bat named Archer," she said.
Twilight's eyes flickered with fire for a moment, which Spitfire noticed.
"So you've met?" She laughed.
"You could say that, but why did Luna report the fleet lost?" Twilight asked, feeling Spike speed to her side.
"Apparently you're having some problems with the Night Guard, so Luna has had us coming back on radio silence. We've gotten a few one-way radio updates, and she thinks we're going to arrive a week from now," Spitfire explained.
"Of course, this raises the question of how you know we're out here," she added.
Twilight grinned. "Spitfire, what do you know about radio waves?"
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Nice chapter, also it is nice to see how twilight worries about what is her position in all this or what can she do to set a goal for herself. As right now other than Research and Development and dabbing into different fields, she doesn't necessarily have something all to her own. But i guess that is who she is in that she can do several different things and pull strength from her friends and family cause ' Friendship is magic' //shot
4261745
Thanks, as always.
How are you feeling about my characterization of Twilight? I've got here as a sort of half-Luna almost, with the friendliness of Celestia. Like, she clearly enjoys power- but she's not a jerk with it. I really have to have her meet First Class soon.
Pictured: Twilight
4261763 I think you did good, I always thought Twilight would be that middle ground between Celestia and Luna. Never as good as them as they are the prime aspects of their respected fields but that leaves them not as flexible as Twilight is. So she makes the perfect mediator.
4261781
I find it uncanny how often we are on the exact same page.
do you live in my desk
4261793 Does it come with a Fluffy Pillow and strawberry smoothies xD?
4261796
These can be provided on request.
we went though this story and it may not be up to our tastes it is a good story but we ask try wright something that is light hated that is not connected to this story still good job the one who love war and a little darkness will love this
4269361
Desk of Ambassador Wildcard is much lighter, you might enjoy that. Thank you for the comment.
4269379
I know but its like I said its connected
4269541
It's previous to this story, and it's connected in the same way an episode of the pony show is connected to the others. It's just set in the same universe, and has some overlap.
I remember having a bunch of minor criticisms about this story, particularly in the early chapters, but now that I'm all caught up I can't remember any of them anymore. Ugh. Oh well.
There's only two things I remember, and, unfortunately, they're both just boring spelling mistakes. One, the spelling of forty is "forty", not "fourty". There's no "u"—not in American or British or any other type of English. This came up a lot in " A Burning Phoenix", which is why I remembered it.
Two:
The way you're using it, it very much is a typo. "Leftenant" is an alternate spelling of "lieutenant", in the same way that "colour" is an alternate spelling of "color". Therefore, you can only use one of them. If you use "lieutenant" first, then "leftenant" is now a typo (again, in the same way that "color" becomes a typo if you previously used "colour"). You use both in the same story. That's wrong. Pick one and stick with it.
Now that that's out of the way, the story itself? Fantastic. It's, admittedly, breaking off from being a MLP story to just being a war story, and a number of characters are a bit OOC because of the new roles they have to play, but when considered in isolation, I love it!
Really, be proud, because this is awesome work.
I burst out laughing at this. Wildcard's getting a bit shafted lately. I hope he gets more screentime soon, because he's still the character I'm by far the most invested in.
4300911
I love, I love feedback, thank you.
But four has a U in it! English is really dumb sometimes, I caught onto that typo eventually though, far too late.
Nope, using both. Wonderbolts use Left and marines/legion use Lieut. It's a representation of how old the Wonderbolts structure is compared to everything else. They use an old commonwealth style, everyone else uses the American style.
Wildcard will get some love soon, I'm living a power fantasy vicariously through him after all.
4301036
I see where your misinterpretation comes from, but that's not how writing works. You're still thinking of it as two different words. It's not. It's the same word.
Imagine this. Let's say you're writing a novel, and you're describing two characters. One of them is American, and the other British. When you describe the American, you say that he's wearing "a red-colored shirt". When you describe the guy from Britain, you say he's wearing "a blue-coloured suit" (note the "u" in "coloured").
Do you see why that's wrong? You don't change the spelling the narration uses depending on the nationality of the sentence's subject. That's not how writing works.
I can't force you to change your mind, but please understand that what you're doing is objectively incorrect.
4301154
Left is pronounced differently than Lieut, so despite your criticism being correct- I'm still rolling with this. Although a point has been made elsewhere that I should stick to this differentiation within dialogue- so you're right.
Solution: Leftenant in dialogue, lieutenant in narration and otherwise. Problem solved, thanks for pressing me on this.
4301234 Yup, that's good. I forgot to mention that I was only referring to the narration in the first place—"leftenant" in dialogue is absolutely fine because it's no different than writing out AJ's accent, if ya know wha' Ah mean.
(You can get away with a lot of other crazy things in dialogue, for that matter.)
Celestia had taught her about friendship, magic, and leadership- but it was Luna that really taught her how to lead
the conciliator and the battle mare