Epilogue: Waking
On the dark side of the moon, Stardust trotted through the crags and craters, creating new hoofprints in the dust below her feet. Behind her, the Warframes followed, unsure of where she was still leading them.
Stardust had been moving her equipment here for a few days now and she still had plenty of things back at her workshop to bring over here. The moon wasn’t much in terms of scenery, but she was sure it would be the place the Tenno could learn to thrive and live their lives out. After all, this was where their masters had left some things.
Climbing up to the top of the next hill, Stardust smiled to see the structure that was going to be her new workshop once she had everything in place. Just beyond the hill was a flat plane, surrounded by more hills and craters. Sitting just in the middle, embedded into a larger hill was a structure made of white and gold, its metal not reflecting anything on this side of the moon.
“What is this place, Stardust?” Vauban asked, stopping beside the mechanical pony.
“You will see soon,” was all she said before setting off towards the structure.
Princess Celestia was right when she said there was more to the Tenno than she had told any of the humans. More than she had told the Tenno themselves, but Stardust knew it all, now that she’d been here herself. She was going to be spending a lot of her life here now that she was relocating, so she had all the time she needed to research more of them and their tech.
Stardust smiled at the idea. If somepony had told her she’d be spending time studying machines in another world, she would’ve just laughed it off.
She had been one of Princess Celestia’s students all those years ago. The closest, in fact. She didn’t know how many years she had left to live, but she did know she was going to use what she had left to learn as much as she could here to maybe one day give back to Princess Celestia what she had done for her before her abduction in the Void.
Walking to a tall semi-circular door down a metallic path, Stardust activated the key within her systems, opening the large door and releasing a gust of steam and dust at them. It was dark inside, but Stardust’s mechanical eyes were able to see just fine, so she didn’t need to install lights.
“This is… Orokin, Stardust?” Nyx touched the side of the door and looked up at the ceiling. “They built a structure on the moon here?”
“I believe so.” Stardust nodded. “This structure matches all their other structures in the Void. But this structure is more for you than you know. I think the Orokin actually intended this place for you Tenno to thrive.”
“How so?” Rhino stepped past Nyx and asked.
“Come. See for yourself.”
Stardust continued to lead the way in, first going through two large halls with potted plants on the side and benches in the middle. It looked like it was a place for a large community, but perhaps eons ago.
The next large door led the group into a large atrium with a slope going down to another door, with water cutting the room in half, along with a second floor on both the left and right. After that, was another few more corridors and then another large atrium, leading deeper down into the place.
After that, Stardust and the Tenno found themselves before another large door, but this one had plants growing around it, with the unicorn guessing that it had been a long time since anypony or anyone had been here.
Opening it, she revealed a dark room with light coming down from a hole in the ceiling above, right in the middle of the room where several pods lay, water around them.
“What is this place?” Excalibur looked at the large tendrils of roots that went up and around the walls.
“This… is your home, Tenno.” Stardust trotted in, keeping her eyes on the pods. “I have scanned the place when I started moving my things here. Over to your left, is an obstacle course, just like the one we have back in Equestria. To your right are my labs, where I will continue my research and creations. In front of you, past the center, are your quarters and spaces, where you are free to do as you will.
“What about the pods, the ones in the middle?” Nyx pointed out. “What are these? Are these for our sleep?”
“I believe so.” Stardust nodded. “But you are already using it.”
All the Tenno turned to her and tilted their heads.
“What?” Zephyr asked.
“What do you mean, Stardust?” Vauban walked to the pods to examine them.
The glass was dark, but the analytical Tenno could see a dark shape inside, one that resembled their shape. Vauban put a hand on the glass, then wiped away a light layer of fog on it. What he saw inside forced him to take a step back.
“What are they?” He turned back to Stardust.
Stardust hovered over above the pods and flapped her wings, blowing away the dust and grime. “I discovered them when I first walked these halls. They are connected to machinery in there, linked to something. I believe that these bodies you see here, Tenno, they are you, projected into your Warframes with what I call transference. You are not machines. You are more than that.”
“This is why you brought us here?” Ash asked.
“Yes.” Stardust looked at Vauban’s pod, watching his sleeping form. “You were not programmed. You can choose how you want to live your lives, how to flourish as a new society, how to spend your lives without war.” She turned to the Tenno and nodded at them. “I believe it is time we wake you all from your dream.”
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In all seriousness, I like how this ended. Whether there's a sequel for this or not, I can't wait to see what comes next. Especially after such a cliffhanger
Ah, so The Second Dream wasn't disregarded after all. Well, great story, and it was fun reading it.
I really hope that there will be a sequel, you and A bag of plums are some of the best story writers out their. (Minus Pen Stroke and tom117z as their stories are so good they were made real books.)
great way to end the story. 10/10
8821763
Makes sense. All the names hint their specific skillsets.
8821575
And then there's the Sybaris Prime.
8821849
Sybaris Prime? Tell me more!
8845549
good point.
This was a great story. One of the best, but, I can't expect any less from the Bloodlines stories and authors.
9223629
Sorry for replying so late, but yes, in our Warframe crossover, Celestia is the Lotus.
This was a great final arc. It ties up all loose ends from finally defeating the invaders to The Stalker finally getting his personal peace.
Home Run here was a delight especially the jokes about him and Adagio and also him keep being left in the dark about the events of Leap of Faith. Speaking of which, it was nice to see Velvet again if only a little bit in this arc. And that Derpy in a mech cameo!
Sunset was a blast here especially when she gave the two Queens a choice to resolve things peacefully rather than bloodshed. Shows how far she's gone when she had the decency to give them a choice and chance to change. It is still better than not at all. And its nice to see the friendship of Sunset and Gang with the Mechas
Also love the subtle nods to Leap of Faith and perhaps Servant of the Queen which I look forward to reading next.
I may not know much about Warframe but that doesn't stop me from enjoying this tale. Thanks for writing!
-MixMassBasher
10052494
With a whole bunch of hidden stuff.
Thanks for taking the time to read all our stories as of yet! It's been a long journey, and it pleases us to know you have been entertained. Expect more to come...
Being honest, when I started this story, I was not feeling it. I didn't like Home Run, and I felt the writing wasn't amazing. As the story went on, my opinion slowly did a 180.
I still don't care all that much for Home Run but the writing seriously improved as the story went on, and I really became engrossed in the world. The references to the other stories were amazing, and even as someone who only has 20ish hours in Warframe (as hard as I tried, I can't get into the game) the story was still tons of fun to read and wasn't difficult to understand.
Good stuff.
Hmm. My opinion is not as high as it was the first time around, but I did find the story enjoyable nonetheless. Actually, I did enjoy Home Run's character a lot more this time, he still felt a little plain, we don't really dive into his personal life beyond baseball, and that could've use expanding, but I still found him much more interesting then the last time.
The first arc was by far the weakest, there were some points where it was genuinely hard to get through, the writing just wasn't at the quality I wanted. By the second arc, while I found the character of The Stalker to be a little underwhelming, it was a vast improvement and kept me engaged. I did enjoy the scene of him finally feeling at peace after the years of seeking revenge.
Sunset was well handled, her gaining magic, while rushed, was still a pleasant surprise. Really my only issue with her was that her abilities gained from the events of Leap of Faith were rarely addressed. A blanket statement about how the Warframe wasn't letting her use Eagle Vision or something would be nice and not make me feel like she was nerfed. The part where she tried to give mercy to the queens was great as well, and her turmoil of letting The Stalker deal with it was amazing as well.
Once again, this universe does a great job of referencing stuff from the source material without alienating people unfamiliar with the source. I don't have a lot of time in Warframe but I found the story easy to understand, and based off the comments, you did a good job adapting the source material as well.
I would've liked more from the queens but meh.
Overall, a good story, could've used more work but what is there is enjoyable.
Onto The Lost Connection!
The next one in my journey across Bloodlines, unfortunately will have to wait until after a break. This time for a different reason though! I've recently gotten into Warframe (60 hours in the past two weeks, please send help) and I want to be able to experience this story to its full potential, so I'm planning on waiting till I get further in the story before starting this one, do you know up to what point in the quests I should be up to for all the references to make sense? I'm currently working towards playing The War Within.
Either way, excited to start this soon, see you then :)
Tomorrow 👀
11134879
I think this was written before the quest with the Grineer queens was put in the game proper, so it's not really lore changes as much as it is good guesswork. Honestly it's quite impressive that the author managed to land this close to the mark without much concrete in game help.
The operators are a thing!? Holy shit, that's crazy
I'll write up my formal thoughts when I get to my PC later but I loved this a lot more then the last time. It was so much fun.
Alright. I've got to say, this story reads a thousand times better when you've played Warframe. Knowing what it's referencing, even without complete knowledge of frames and weapons, makes everything so much easier to swallow. The beginning is still probably the weakest but the story definitely improves as it goes on. There's pacing issues I'd say, the second arc having the best pacing for the most part aside from Duality, she was rushed in my opinion. Home Run really grew on me this time, he still starts off a blank slate and while he doesn't exactly grow exponentially from there, the introduction of things like his family and his crush on Rainbow Dash make him feel a lot more human. The Warframes are also all great, giving them a personality was the right call for sure. Nyx was my favorite, along with Ember.
It's seriously faithful to the game, aside from one change to the lore, which according to another commenter might have to do when it was written, so I can't even be that upset about it. This was all around a great time.
8826790
I GET THE REFERENCE NOW!