Epilogue
With access to the computer, Luna was able to pull up the ships libraries. One of the most important things Luna had learned was that the gates could be locked down to prevent use. The first thing she studied was how the locking system worked and how to lock the gate. She brought up access to the local gate and initiated a lockdown, but she also learned that the locking system had a fatal flaw. Gates didn't have any form of faster than light communication, in order for a gate to be able to communicate with another gate, a node first had to be activated. The node was opened just enough for an identification code to be sent through. Then the receiving gate would either open the node entirely, or disconnect.
It would be trivial to send a spell through the node that would trick the receiving gate into accepting any identification code. Even a first year student at the Royal Academy could write such a simple spell. With this knowledge, the ponies could lock their gate down, but use any Chk'rain controlled gate that they wanted.
She and Celestia brought Twilight, the rest of the Elements and hundreds of other ponies up to the ship. Nearly two years went by while ponies studied and read all that they could about the Chk'rain.
Ponies stared to replicate Chk'rain technology. It would be a while before they could make their own ships, but clean fusion reactors to replace coal power were already being built.
Ponies had slowly begun to convert the the Tck'Wrath to suit their own needs. New pony size furniture was installed, adjustments were made to the control structures to make them easier for ponies to use. The ship itself was rechristened as the Manehattan in honor of the fallen city.
The always studious Twilight Sparkle spent more time going through the ship's library than any two other ponies combined, it was she that discovered the history of the Chk'rain empire.
Twilight brought up a file on the command console and motioned for Celestia to come over.
"Look here Celestia, it says that the Chk'rain have conquered 11 other species. Based on the description, it looks like they are using those species for slave labor," she said gasping.
She and Celestia continued to read the document. The more they read the worse it got. Trillions of slaves, billions slaughtered in horrific wars of conquest. There were no words for this injustice.
"We have to help them Celestia."
"That would mean leaving the system Twilight," Celestia pointed out.
"But what about all those slaves? You saw the report, how can we sit by while these monsters murder billions" Twilight said sniffling.
Celestia reached over and nuzzled Twilight.
"I am not saying we should not do it, I am saying it is not a decision to be taken lightly. It would mean abandoning our safe haven and going to war with the Chk'rain. Luna and I cannot possibly be everywhere at once, and one of us would have to remain here, to keep everything running. That means sending regular ponies in ships. Ships that would have to fight the Chk'rain fleet. Even with assistance from Luna or myself, many ponies would die."
"Oh" Twilight said, she hung her head and let out a few tears. It still didn't seem right.
"I am not saying no Twilight. There are many bad reasons ponies have gone to war in the past. For land, for power, for the gods, or even for money. War is a terrible thing and it is often best avoided. Sometimes, though, something comes along that even the terrible price of war is not too high of a cost. Something like fighting for freedom. Being willing to put your own life at risk, especially when it would have otherwise remained safe, for the freedom of others is an admirable quality," Celestia said, drying Twilight's tears.
"I understand, but I still think we should help them. Just thinking about it though, it's such an enormous task. Where would we even start? The Chk'rain control so much space, so many star systems. Even if we can duplicate their ships, it will take us decades just to learn how to build the infrastructure we need to build ships. Then we'd have to actually build up a fleet, which would be at least another decade and then spend years fighting to reach the core of their empire," Twilight said.
Celestia brought up the screen again and quickly skimmed a few sections.
"Here, we would start here." Celestia said, indicating at a section of text on the screen.
"The Heliosians?"
"Well, first off they are the closest to our own system. Just six gate jumps away. Second, they were recently conquered, they may yet retain the will to fight. They are the most advanced of all the races the Chk'rain have conquered. They have an understanding of Chk'rain technology and experience in space that far exceeds our own. Lastly they have a colony with shipyards, which could be used to accelerate our industrial capacity far faster than we could alone."
Celestia paused to bring up some more information in the computer. She read a few pages of text and then turned to Twilight.
"Twilight, I think you are right, not only will we help these beings, but we have less than a year to prepare."
"What? We can't build ships that fast."
"We will send the Manehattan."
"Why so quickly?"
"Because in just over one year, gateships will arrive at the Heliosian colony system. The Chk'rain will then gate in and wipe out the last of the resistance."
"Once we learn how to fly it, the Manehattan should be able to handle the small fleet that this report says will be sent. Then again, there is no guarantee that Chk'rain won't change their plans. They do not know what happened here, they may divert more ships to the Heliosian assault, if they are fearful of losing again. That is why either I or Luna will accompany the Manehattan on this quest," Celestia said.
"We need to spend the next 11 months training a crew for this ship, that will give us enough time to launch it, and arrive at the Heliosian home system just in time to smash the Chk'rain fleet before they jump to the colony and destroy it."
Twilight started pulling up computer records. She pulled up a datasheet on the Heliosians system and started skimming it for information on the species.
" Heliosians... First and only class 1 race discovered... Put up resistance at a scale never seen before.... First time in history a Chk'rain ship was lost to enemy action... Species is highly adaptive and able to assimilate new technology at extremely fast rates... blah blah blah... Oh look here's some information on their system," she said, reading aloud.
"Heliosians live on the 3rd planet from their sun, it is orbited by a single moon. In the Heliosians' common tongue the name of this planet is..."
"Earth."
Also LikedSimilarAuthor
- CORACK · 3.6k words · 29 49 · 1.9k views
- CORACK · 4k words · 31 1 · 707 views
- computerneek · 27k words · 53 2 · 1.6k views
- computerneek · 92k words · 143 9 · 3.8k views
- The A I · 3.9k words · 86 3 · 1.6k views
- TheGradualGhost · 12k words · 76 6 · 2.1k views
Stats
Page generated in 0.133 seconds
Total duration
889 users online
505,941 hits today, 2,244,100 yesterday
FIMFiction
My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic Fanfiction
Designed and coded by knighty & Xaquseg - © 2011-2024
Follow & Support Us
Support us
SubStar
Chat!
Discord
Follow us
Twitter
MLP: Friendship is Magic® - © 2024 Hasbro Inc.®
Fimfiction is in no way affiliated with or endorsed by Hasbro Inc.®
Sequel!
Now!
6810104
Sounds like you liked it.
If so, I'm glad you did.
I don't promise anything anytime soon, but I do have some ideas, and I had fun writing this, so it is likely I will write more in the future.
6810277 Make it as soon as possible!
6811002
Excellent story, I need more
High Good
So the conquerors are about to be conquered
Really good story, and a very logical conclusion. There are a few, but glaring errors in spelling and grammar--not many, but they do stand out. If I can and you don't mind, I'll PM you in a few days with suggested corrections.
Since it seems you might do a sequel, here's something to keep in mind:
I saw you posted this entire story in one shot. It's okay to have your stories completed before you begin posting, but I suggest you publish a chapter one at a time every few days to give readers a chance to see the new stories unfold. There's a lot of competition from new stories and stories getting updated, so it's important to let as many readers know there's a new fic out here. Otherwise, your stuff gets buried and pretty much lost forever until someone doing a random search stumbles across it, like I did.
Also, in the sequel, be sure to post a link back to this story, as well as edit your story here with links to the new stuff coming out.
So far, it's looking good. You've got a good start to a Ponies In Space series. I'm looking forward to the continuation.
6825001
Stargate certainly came to my mind when thinking about how to do FTL. Other sources of inspiration include the jumpgate system in Freelancer and the gate travel in John Ringo's Troy Rising series and various other games and books I've read.
6826027
Thanks for the comments! I certainly won't complain if you PM me a list of errors. I've already gone back and fixed a few but a 2nd set of eyes is always better. As to your suggestion of releasing chapters over a period of a time, I like it and agree. This being my first story, I was pretty excited to get the whole thing posted and then quickly realized how fast it would fall off the new story page.
I will pretty much confirm that a sequel is planned and I will be sure to link both the sequel back to this story and throw a link to the sequel in the description of this one. It will, however, be some time before anything shows up. I've got another story that I'm currently outlining that will likely go up first, and I have yet to decide if I want to do the sequel for Into the Black in one part or two.
You've earned a follow with this story. I don't often do that
6910873
Thanks very much, I'm glad you enjoyed the story.
Where is the sequel?!?!?!
7001537
They were taken by Luna down to Equus. There will be more info on what happens to them in the sequel.
7001584
I'm still working on another story, After the Nightmare, right now. When I'm done with that, I will likely start work on the sequel to Into the Black.
7003031 Okay!
What about Tirek?
7007470
Celestia didn't wait for Twilight to deal with Tirek, she went after him before he could get enough power to become a threat. He's back in Tartarus.
A grand lesson on why one does not mess with the Princesses.
If I might make one suggestion, there is a bit of an 'infodump' issue, particularly in Chapter 3. I'm not sure I'd call it a problem, exactly; more a matter of taste. I think the story would flow better and engage the reader a bit more if the information were provided more organically? Describing the events of the interstellar journey from the ring's perspective, or have characters referring to things in-context. It's good to have everything worked out (and it's a pretty keen space drive setup, too
), but you don't have to tell the readers everything, either. 
7052642
Thanks for the comments!
I definitely don't disagree with you on the infodumps, part of it is that this is the first thing I've ever written, and part of that is this story was heavily inspired by sci-fi books I've read that are rather infodumpy (if that's a word
) so it is what I was going for.
I'm still really new at this and I need to figure out a good balance of enjoyable infodump and boring wall-of-text infodump. Hopefully I can tie it down in the sequel.
7054240 Hey, it's pretty darn good for your first story. Kudos!
Infodumping does tend to be a thing in science fiction a lot, yeah. I mean... you get all these cool ideas, they need explaining!
7054319
Thanks!
And yep, it does. Just gotta make sure my explanations are entertaining
This was pretty good. Somewhat technorambly at times, which I'm forgiving for making an effort to be scientifically accurate (who measures space maneuvering in numbers of G's of acceleration? Not enough people, that's who).
More? Because I'd like to see more.
7232337
Thanks, I'm glad you enjoyed it.
I do really want to work on the sequel, but I'm hitting a bit of a block on how I want it to start, so right now it's on hold.
Unrelated: Nice Seraphim Chrysalis avatar, I would be a bit worried with what she would do with an ACU.
Great story. Loved it.
Now I just have to wait for the sequel.
7835225
Glad you liked it
I'll be getting to that sequel someday
7836062 SIR THE CONNECTIONS ARE FORMING AND HOLY #### THIS IS BAD FOR ALL INVOLVED, additonaly luna and celestia are op and you need to make twi so op no one can oppose her. then LET THE BATTLE BEGIN. discord whip me up some popcorn for the fire works
The style of this story was gloriously similar to the classic blood-and-thunder of golden age science fiction. I will now proceed to follow you like some soulless parasite and feed upon the fruits of your labor--if that's OK with you.
7938271
I have no complaints if you wish to follow me.
7938489
I would love to see a sequel to this. You had great scifi galaxy-building. Plus dat epilogue tease.
7944212
I'm glad you enjoyed the story.
Right now I'm working on The Right Man in the Wrong Place and it's sequel (I had to break it into 2 parts due to length and a few other reasons) when I'm done with those, Into the Black's sequel is next on my list. I have no plans to abandon it
8085034
Telegrams are mentioned (but not shown) in a few episodes. The first example I can think of is one of Pinkie's songs
I can't think of any examples of a radio, I wouldn't be shocked if there was one in some episode somewhere and I just missed it.
There are wireless headsets in a few episodes, Viva Las Pegasus and Stranger than Fan Fiction off the top of my head, in addition to the goats you mention in Putting your Hoof Down. Besides that, we've seen regular wired microphones (which oddly enough tend to look like old fashioned microphones even though the wireless ones look modern) hooked up to speakers.
That being said, at no point does the show dive into how these things work. They could be technological or they could be magical, or they could be some sort of combination of the two.
We actually do see a screen, we just can't see what's on it. There are two other arcade machines in that scene (and a claw machine) facing the camera and they both have what appears to be glass screens. Based on the design of the cabinets, I think it's unlikely they are mechanical. The simplest explanation is they are electronic, but again they could be magical, or a mix.
Yeah, pretty much any time we see high technology in Equestria (which is become more frequent as the show goes on) it could potentially be a magical version instead of pure technology. There's no definitive way to tell (though we can occasionally make guesses, for example, there's a chainsaw in Princess Spike and it sounds like a gas powered chainsaw. If it was electric, either by way of battery or magical battery, it would sound different)
7944801
Excellent, I look forward to both sequels
This is a really good story, I very much enjoyed reading it
8130223
Glad you enjoyed it.
I will get to the sequel... eventually.
8147342
Thanks!
8130223 He will probably sequel the story when he is done with "The Right Man in the Wrong Place..."
8147492
Could always gather a posse to poke you with sticks
8147553
Close.
I'm going to finish The Right Man in the Wrong Place... and it's as of yet unnamed sequel. Once both of those are done, I'll circle back to Into the Black's sequel.
8147638
8147884 That sound kind of counter intuitive
8147884
Fine, we'll ply you with Smarties candies and Reeses peanut butter cups and doses of your drink of choice (non-alchoholic)
Or I can just read your future chapters since I am all caught up as it is
Whichever comes first
A fantastic read my good sir!
A sequel would be much appreciated. 
8301735
I'm glad you enjoyed it.
I'm planning on writing a sequel to this after I'm done with the sequel to The Right Man in the Wrong Place, though right now my work schedule has kind of put writing on hold for a bit.
8301884
).
No worries! The stuff you write is great, and well worth the wait (uh... I think I just pulled an unintentional Zecora
Great story. I was wondering if you read Van Vogt's "The Monster" short story, it isn't that much resembling your fic but some moments look really similar.
8319295
I'm glad you enjoyed it!
I have not, but I just read the synopsis on Wikipedia and it sounds like I should.
I enjoyed reading this. I look forward to the sequel.
8335779
Glad you enjoyed it. I'll get to the sequel... eventually.
8335877
Lol. I was literally just checking up on this to see if you had started one yet....
8619447
Oh, that’s nice.
8335877
Can eventually be within the next 2 years?
8662879
I hope so!
8662917
What about 1 year?
8663900
I don't want to make promises I'm not sure if I can keep.