Nerdy
"Captain." Lieutenant Commander Data's pale fingers danced across the computer interface of his station. "We are being rapidly approached by a large spheroid object approximately thirty-five hundred kilometers in diameter."
Flash Sentry leaned forward in his chair. "Any life signs?"
After a computer blip-and-bloop, Data shook his head. "Negative."
After taking a contemplative breath, Flash nodded. "On-screen."
After an android keystroke, the viewscreen of the U.S.S. Enterprise flickered on to display a starfield. Off in the distance—growing larger by the second—was an enormous celestial object.
Flash Sentry stood up, adjusting the tunic of his red command uniform. With an authoritarian stance, he approached the screen. "Magnify."
Another blip, and the viewscreen zoomed in on the object—showing craters and maria and powdery trenches galore.
"There're no stars close enough for that thing to be orbiting!" Commander Riker exclaimed, probably kneeling on something in an awkward manner. "What the Hell is it doing way out here?"
"Captain." Counselor Troi stood up and walked up beside Flash. "I am sensing exposition."
Flash's brow furrowed. "Is it hostile exposition?"
Troi slowly shook her head—Mediterranean curls flailing. "At this length into your journey, I don't see what we have to lose."
"Captain." Lieutenant Worf leaned against the tactical station, frowning with emphasis. "I recommend that we go to yellow alert. Arm all photon torpedoes and prepare for a full frontal assault."
Flash raised a casual finger. "Belay that, Mr. Worf. I'm not about to go to war with any moons today. We'll remain understandably cautious, but there's no need for battlestations."
There was a digitized blip-blop, and Data announced: "The object appears to be slowing down, Sir."
"Tell Laforge to go to half impulse."
"Aye."
Another alert—this time more urgent.
"Captain," Worf sounded off, his voice scratchy with caution. "The moon is hailing us."
Flash Sentry folded his arms. "On Screen."
The starfield vanished, and in its place appeared a pale skinned, blue-haired Romulan wearing broad shoulder pads. Vice Principal Luna arched her angular eyebrows and droned: "'Morality Horse?'"
"H-Hey!" Flash suddenly grinned wide, slapping his hands together. "Luna! It's you! Haha! Welcome to the Neutral Zone!"
Troi looked concerned. Data turned around, puzzled. Riker and Worf exchanged worried glances.
"Oh... uh... sorry... ahem..." Flash coughed into the back of his hand. "Too 'Captain Archer' for you guys?"
"I was sincerely hoping that I could finally speak to you," the Romulan-human-equine -woman said on the viewscreen. "It would appear as though things have gotten more complicated."
"Oh! Hold up!" Flash snapped his finger. "Before we take this conversation any further—!" He spun around, fumbling. "I got... uh... uhhhh... I-I got something to show you!"
"Mr. Sentry..."
"Just hang on!" Flash searched around the Captain's Chair. "I left it here somewhere!"
"Captain?" Riker blinked. "Is something the matter?"
"Stay still..." Flash reached up, yanked Riker's beard off his face, then pulled the crank. BRVVVVVVVVV! The beard spun on its chain, and Flash used it to saw the captain's chair in half—then the rest of the bridge entire. The set piece sliced into two, exposing Emperor Palpatine's Tower Interior behind it. Father and son clashed with lightsabers, filling the chamber with noise. Flash walked across a catwalk, reached into a blue British police box, pulled out a face-hugger, ripped it in half, then pulled out a slime-covered diarama of the Crystal Empire. "There we go." He left the lightsaber battle—ducking beneath a sith lightning beam or two—then returned onto the chainsaw'd set of the Enterprise's Bridge. "Check it!" With Dr. Strange fingers, he threw the diarama onto the floor before the viewscreen, enlarging it in midfall. Once it landed, there were miniature fireworks and miniature confetti flickering over a sea of miniature party-goers filling up the crystalline streets. "It's tomorrow! Or—at least—the day after tomorrow! And it's all because I got the band back together!" He smiled. "And—of course—by 'band' I mean a bunch of really well-to-do Ponyvilleans who made the celebrations of Equestrian Unification possible!"
"I am quite aware of unification, Mr. Flash," Luna said.
"Of course you are!" Flash giggled. "You're a Romulan!"
"While I may be garbed in the substance of your fantasies, I cannot pretend to understand them." Her alien brow furrowed. "As it stands, your jocular speech falls on deaf ears. Suffice to say, there is more important matters ahoof."
"You talking about the Supernova?" Flash folded his arms with a lengthy sigh. "To be honest, I was never a big fan of that plot device. I'm not about to get on the hating J.J. Abrams bandwagon, though..."
"I speak of your unnatural presence here in Equestria, Mr. Flash," Luna said. With the grace of living liquid, she walked forward and phased through the viewscreen. Once she was standing inside the partially-demolished bridge of the Enterprise, she had morphed back into a vice principal human in a pantsuit. "They know that you are here, Mr. Flash."
Flash froze in place.
"I speak of the Princess of Friendship. Her allies." Luna gazed down at him. "Soon—even my sister."
Flash squirmed. He looked off towards the starry distance above.
"It is only a matter of time—very precious little of it—and I will no longer afford the luxury of keeping your location secret. To do so would only serve to undermine the special interest of those whom I am loyal to."
"Sunset Shimmer..." Flash Sentry grimaced. He was hugging himself by this point. "She must have told Princess Twilight." He gulped. "How long have they been searching?"
"For the past day at least. Ever since the Princess' business elsewhere in Equestria had ceased." Luna paced about the teenager. "Locating you is now a top priority, and I've no doubt that Twilight will be enlisting the help of Celestia. In turn—Celestia will turn to me. I cannot lie to her, Flash Sentry. Not after the history we've been through."
Flash nodded. "I understand."
"Then... you will cooperate if it is willed by the Princesses that you come out of hiding?"
"Sure. Totally. Just..." Flash fidgeted. "Not right away!"
Luna sighed. "Mr. Sentry..."
"I-I-I've got so many things to do!" He pointed at the crystalline dioarama before them. "The celebration! The organizers need me! The stewards of the Crystal Empire need me!"
"You are not of this world, Mr. Flash. Just as magic does not belong in your home, you do not belong here. The nature of this situation cannot be ignored."
Flash gaped at her. Blinking. "You mean... you mean I've got nothing left to do here?"
"... ... ..."
"That was the big deal, right?!" He stepped towards her, trembling. "You s-sensed that I had something to do in this world! A-a-and I thought I was done with it before! But it turns out I wasn't! And I'm glad that I found out! Cuz I'm doing so much to help with the Unification and the ponies of Ponyville and... and—"
"Do you honestly believe your destiny lies in a place where you weren't born?"
"You know that it can't be over yet!" Flash chuckled hystericall, running a hand through his hair. "I just... I-I just gotta see how many more lives I can touch! I gotta keep going! I mean... who's going to help the Equestrians and the Crystal Ponies stay at peace with the Diamond Dogs or... or—"
"Flash..." Luna rested a gentle hand on his shoulder. "Has it occurred to you that you're looking in the wrong place?"
He bit his lip.
She gazed calmly, thoughtfully at him.
"I... I just have to do a few more things... that's all..." He stammered, backing up from her. His voice was breathy. Anxious. "I'll find what my purpose is here! I-I promise you! I just can't spend it all sleeping!"
She calmly said, "If all you do is keep moving, you'll never find the time to discover—"
"We'll see about that!" He reached a computer station and slammed his palm over it. "Computer! Activate Self-Destruct Sequence! Authorization: boogers!"
Majel Barrett's voice crisply replied: "Please enter a countdown timer."
"Right the Hell now!"
POWWWWWWWWWWWWW!
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I think Flash is underestimating just how much Luna has done for him. She is literally keeping information from the other princesses so that he may have the time he needs to center himself—but all he has done is spread himself out more.
My reaction to the beginning of this chapter:
1. Look at the calendar
2. Get confused that April 1st isn't for another two weeks.
3. Wonder if it got posted early by mistake.
4. Realize that it's a dream and impulsively feel annoyance because of all the pointless dream sequences I've encountered.
5. Skip forward until I notice the bolded "Morality Horse?" and then check to see whether I need to rewind to get enough context to make sense of things. (I didn't.)
Seriously, though, starting a chapter with a dream sequence tends to annoy readers when either they're reading as updates arrive and momentarily forget where the previous chapter left off (this case) or the previous scene didn't make the context clear.
That annoyance tends to become habit which can go off prematurely in a case like this because, when Luna isn't in play (eg. in every other fandom and in original fiction), dream sequences are a very low return-on-investment thing to read. Their non sequitur nature harms the sense of immersion as the reader stops to think about whether they missed something. Their relevance to the rest of the story can usually be summed up perfectly well in a single paragraph. They hit like someone accidentally slipped a page from an unrelated story in. All in all, they come across as the self-indulgent vocal flourishes that singers often insert into their covers to show off their voice at the expense of trashing the pacing and/or atmosphere the song was designed to build.
(Hence, my advice for future situations like this is to put the transition from character falling asleep to dream starting within a chapter, rather than on a chapter boundary, to minimize the chance of the reader taking a break and forgetting the context.)
That said, A+ for the creativity of how Flash retrieved his diorama. If dream sequences had insane crackfic creativity (like pulling off Riker's beard and using as a chainsaw) more often and got to it quickly, I wouldn't mind them so much. (Which suggests that my main problem with dream sequences is that authors allow their appeal to slump relative to the rest of the story.)
You write the tripiest dream sequences.
Hey, that question can easily be asked of Sunset Shimmer. If she can stay in Canterlot High, Flash Sentry can stay in Equestria, as far as I'm concerned.
I believe that this shall go in ways I don't expect. I love it!
8800865
THANK YOU!
I don't know with how Sunset Shimmer is doing in the Human world, and the fact they aren't you know, actively going after equestrian Magic there; it seems rather silly for Luna to be acting like Flash being here is some kind of grave issue she must lie about to everyone. I mean we know it can't be that the two Flashes can't meet or something because Twilight and Spike met their counterparts.
I get it's shitty he just ran off and told no one what he was doing. And it's sure not the best thing to do but it feels silly that everyone would try to send him back against his wishes once they knew he was fine.
Interesting dream, I am most curious that Discord didn't show up XD
I feel for Brad though, poor guy feels like he finally found a place he belongs and now he's getting the carpet pulled from under him. All the while Sunset gets to live in humanland full time and she somehow "belongs". (I love sunset to pieces, I just feel this is a wee bit hypocritical)
8800865
8800928
Yeah, gotta second these.
Unless they work out some deal at the end of this. I mean I can see not wanting him to totally abandon his family and stuff in his native world, but he should have the option at this point to at least visit.
I can't help but feel Luna is being very hypocritical here. Even if she's right about Flash, the arguments she's using lose a lot of weight considering they've been perfectly fine with Sunset Shimmer remaining in the human world, and that was even before Equestrian magic problems started cropping up.
8800959
Yeah, that is the extremely shitty part about what he has done. He has a family and friends back in his world and they are likely very worried. What he did to them was shitty and he needs to go back to address that for sure. Flash sure isn't completely blameless in this whole ordeal.
8800967
This, absolutely this. If magic doesn't belong in the human world why was sunset not forced to return? Even with the excuse of "to manage magic over there that is already there" then there's still no excuse to not keep Flash on this side of the mirror.
What I like most about this, is that Flash fully acknowledges (sorta) that he is full on running from what he KNOWS he needs to actually deal with.
That said, I am curious if the OTHER mirror from the comics is canon to this. The one they had to shut down because the two universes were gonna fuse/collapse. Otherwise, like the others are pointing out, Sunset may have to return as well if Flash's presence really is a big deal.
Other than Flash being on the run from his issues and that in general being emotionally unhealthy, why does he have to go back?
8800981
What friends? That's part of the problem. Maybe he does have friends in Canterlot High, but they certainly aren't as friendly and forthcoming as the ponies have been, with little expectation in return.
And his family is having a noisy, argumentative divorce if I recall correctly. Sure, he does need to go back and address them, but he deserved to take some time off and away from his issues, to clear his head.
Thing is, it's not quite clear if he is clearing his head or just trying to desperately embrace not dealing with his life for as long as possible, even becoming a bit manic in the process with the lack of sleep (and now he'll avoid sleeping to extend it even more). This isn't really healthy for him, but at the same time I think he should have the chance to experience Equestria in the same way Sunset is experiencing the human world. It's only the unresolved issues that make it inevitable that he'll eventually return (unless this story goes in a weird direction akin to the ending of The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe), but if he'll be forced back or barred from returning to Equestria is another matter altogether.
8800865
That's hilarious, I never thought about it before but you have a point.
I understand the lesson Flash is supposed to learn but Sunset does kind of ruin it.
The only way sunset told twilight that flash was there is that somebidy saw him enter, so sunset was contated, and in turn contacted twilight, the other option is starlight, she could have mentioned a pegasus who appeared out of nowhere inside the castle, was yellow with blues mane, had shield cutie mark and appeared not to know much and talk nonsensical things, those are the only ways that they discovered him.
8800865
And it goes double for the Dazzlings.
8800967
Exactly!
I kept waiting for Flash to throw Sunset out there!
How come her destiny is in the human world? Why can't his destiny be in Equestria?
I get where the author is trying to go with this, but the fact that Sunset has spent years in the human world kind of throws a wrench into the lesson.
Let's not forget the Dazzlings who have been there for centuries.
Don't get me wrong I still like the story. I just find it odd that Flash can't stay in Equestria for a few weeks, meanwhile Sunset gets to make a whole new life in the human world.
Interesting that Flash remarked on being "too Captain Archer", because he's sure going out of his way to be Sam Beckett.
8800865
Your so right. I would of blew up at luna calling her a hypocrite. She maybe "helping" somewhat but it seems to be half assed helping.
Ponies being protective of each other and accepting of others (ponies at least), I have to say, his new friends likely won't care who or what he used to be. That being said, the mane six might find rebellion on their hooves if they show up with irons to drag him away.
I wonder how much it says about me that what few dreams I tend to remember are made of recognisiable chunks of what I remember from real life with little variation.
I mean, going through a nondescript door on the inside corner of a wall to find a richly decorated church hallinside ? thats a combination of a kitchen supplies warehouse in Queensbury I visited two years ago and the main church at the top of the hill. The wallpapers probrobably from my front room.
Maybe I need to get enough sleep that I have time left enough to dream.
Sadly, it feels like Flash is doomed to make dumb mistakes when explaining or not even bring up important points, such as the one everyone brought in comments like the fact that Sunset's destiny is in a world she wasn't born in and she can stay here, yet apparently no one else is allowed to have a destiny elsewhere?
Flash is a geek, he spouts references but even though he is a teen it feels like he should be... smarter than he is. I can only hope that shortskirts is planning to address this issue in some way and not just ignore people pointing it out.
It’s really gonna suck if, and/or probably when, Flash 2 has to go back to the EQG world. I mean, he’s kinda bucked either way, since he has relationships in both worlds now.
8800967
Yeah, a lot of people rightly are pointing this out. I'd also like to add that there's a distinct possibility that flash would outright live a happier, more productive life in Equestrian, and after Sunset, no one really has the moral right to deny him the chance to try. I do get that to move on he has to come to terms with his old life, but forcing him back into the same life that caused his despair seems unethical
8800865
It's a good argument. Why should he be forced to leave when they have one of their one living in his world? All the magical artefact they dumped there? The monsters? He could argue that they should pick-up their own trash before berating others about .
Destiny is what you make of it, not the other way around. It should be Flash decision to continue on is journey or not. And while Luna have authority on the dreamscape, if Flash cross the border of Equestria, the princesses will have no authority to pursue him.
Yes, Flash accepted that Luna have to give away is position, it doesn't mean he have to wait there! Beside, shouldn't she only be able to locate him when he is sleeping? Well... using this method at least.
I hope Flash escape. This story is too much fun for it to finish this way. I find is outsider view of the world quite interesting so I hope he get to see more of it.
Ah, I love dream sequences. They're brilliant.
"What the Hell is it doing way out here?"
It was never going to remain a secret forever, particularly when it involves an apparent runaway teenager. Too many people know about the portal now.
Never been a fan of the 'you don't belong here' arguments myself.
Were Luna to come to me in my dreams and say that, my first response would be: "I belong wherever the damn well I please!"
That being said, I could see making an argument to allow him to stay if it was pointed out to his parents he was safe, and closer than expected. But the problem with 'portals to another world' settings is that they tend to exist in a vacuum. Just imagine how the authorities would react with solid proof of a dimensional gateway, and free transit.
No formal treaties or regulations on passing between worlds?
The bureaucracy would have a meltdown.
Flash is doing well in Equestria, but he's leaving a hole at home. Incomplete education, worried acquaintances, panicked parents. That would red-flag authorities before long, and it would be a mess.
Now, if he could get permission to go back and forth freely... Maybe, just maybe he'd have a way to take a load off without everyone he knows freaking out.
Weeell... Considering that Equestria has an apparent history of dumping their problems into another universe, while Braddy Boy here is solving problems in Equestria by existing, getting our favorite Bradster to leave would more or less be counterproductive to everyone’s interests.
The Mane 7 in the Equestria Girls world did nothing about Flash’s problems, so it’s only natural he sought a solution—unlike our pal Sunny Bun...who pretty much tried to use hormonal teenagers as an army to invade Equestria...
Pffft! Its too early to say if he had outstayed his time of healing and introspection. He’s livin’, lovin’, and memein’ and laughin’—I mean, not like Flash’s workaholicism and his ability to fart memes and nerdy references could end the world!
...then again, he did enlist Derpy.
Since everyone and their mother has pointed out Sunset doing good in the human world, I'm just going to thank you for making Flash perform the Picard Maneuver.
8802820
And massively hypocritical, but then, that's a bit of a persistent problem for this show wherever the interests of Celestia's golden girl are concerned.
Why you got to be so suicidal!