Advances in science and magic had detected the Anomaly – a star in the heavens that was unlike all the others in the night sky. Intense research had only served to deepen the mystery. Although Equus had a vibrant space program, going forty-two light years to investigate had been considered impossible until now. The Cosmic Lotus program was born, and over a hundred crew-members of multiple species were sent into the void to discover the unknown. After a journey of years, what they would find would both amaze and terrify them.
The prequel to this story is the "Ad Astra" arc in the story – "Life, Love, and Death in the House of Path".
This will be a crossover story with my "Chakat Universe".
Chapters (43)
⬅
The crossover we've all been waiting for!
This will be cool to read with a lot of OCs from different people on this site. With the multiuniverse involved, I wonder what will happen? Many things can happen in the multiuniverse, including somepony who watches over the timelines of each universe that makes up the multiuniverse. If you want to have a random space pony, you could use my Ponysona Gargon.
Wait, THOSE chakats? This will be interesting!
Hope they don't run into the League first. But seeing them react to Neal Foster would also be entertaining.
8207574
Which League is that you are referring to? Ive only the slightest familiarity of Chakats universe.
Let the Journey to the Star begin
This is going to be one hell of a ride.
I'm looking forward to witnesing history.
PS: MY OC IS IN THE STORY!!!!!
Nice. Finally. FINALLY! The story all us old Chakat fans have been waiting for. Yesssss!
I will be looking forward to the next chapters!
Found one goof:
For the majority of the voyage, their will only be a basic crew awake
their->there
"Thanks everyone, Ill be sure to make it a smooth ride. All systems are showing green Captain. Lets hit it"
First blue 'ling aethernaut yay
Lookin forward to the adventure :D
Yay space
8207693
League of Non-Aligned Worlds. Slavers, basically, also very heavy in mental conditioning and genetic engineering. Anthros are all considered slaves. So....
8207693 League of non align worlds. very pro slavery.
8207693
To get a very good idea of how bad the LNAW can be, read 'Leanna's Tale'. Be advised; while it is just as explict on the sex end as the rest of the Universe, there are darker aspects in the story that may be troubling.
Yay for being a Medic!
Glad I could provide a character for you to use, Goldfur ;3 seeing as your stories are the ones that really got me to actually come to Fimfiction and start on the path towards where I am today as an author, I'm glad I could give back a little!
I just realized, there really should have been a diamond dog on the crew, or at least as part of engineering, because having pawhands would be useful for fixing stuff with ye' olde wrench.
HAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Redbear not gonna like this
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAH
8211824 Too bad for him. Hopefully I will get to rub it in his face when I'm in Texas in August.
8211829
I Know Neal already know where Equuss is. H
He just doesn't want to admit it.
Purple Point is so much fun
I realy love how detailed you are in your storys.
Another good start and story-telling Goldfur can't wait for the next chapter.
Absolutely amazing! I am literally giddy with anticipation of seeing what the next chapter will bring!
Hehe Purple Point sounds like fun
And seems to have 'knowledge' of many languages, oh boy!
8225263
Just to note, Purple Point is NOT a linguist by trade, he is an engineer. He does have an eidetic memory, and he has heard a lot sailing in the merchant fleet. A whole lot. A whole lot of nasty. Better believe he's fun!
Yipes!! Stripes!! Fruit Stripe Gum!!
"Where were you hiding that?"
"You really don't wanna know."
"Give me that accessory!"
*PEW! PEW!*
Captain Jack Harkness from the "Doctor Who" episode "Bad Wolf"
8225178
We do have 40yrs to cover. That said we might have a few slices of more mundane life but Goldfur doesn't tend to leave people hanging in that regard. of course for the Crew it will be a much shorter period
Purple Point must be fun to play poker with.
8226478
Few play poker with him more than once. He's a cutthroat poker player. That's how he made the bits at sea to put him through Canterlot U.
Wow! Well there they go. I like Purple Point and his swear words. I can't wait to see what happens next chapter!
Hmm, I like that Skye Path girl, and our sailor engineer
Ancient Threstral curses, now where would one go for those?
8227633
Why, by running into (and over) an ancient thestral, of course! It was an accident, he wasn't looking where I was going!
I was wondering if the time distortion effect would have been brought up. Guess ponies didn't do enough testing to figure out Light and Time and Space get weird when you get close to the speed of light.
On the plus side, the trip will only take 10-ish years for the crew. Still 40-ish for Equus, but eh, at least the crew will get back 30 years of life and only at the cost of 4 decades of fashion and music. Rarity For You is probably going to be upset at that though.
Another interesting chapter. This truly was a project involving all of Equus especially those with magic
8233937 Its not a surprise we've only theorized about it mostly and done a few tests. At very small fractions of the speed of light. Humans ever get close to that and I'm sure the Universe will have at least one or more surprises for us.
Oh horse feathers.
I'm just waiting for some sort of warp bubble to be created and for the CL to hit Warp speed and catch a bit of attention from ...
possible onlookers
So you could say that some of us *all of us* are stretched out .... Ugh, I had a fun pun going but lost it
So besides you other story universe is there any other space age civilizations?
That's pretty hilarious that the first time they discover time dilation effects is when they encounter them in person! That's a society with access to a pretty hefty power source.
Fridge logic says maybe they shouldn't have made their maiden test of their super-fast propulsion system with a flagship full of 100? of the world's best individuals. Sending one test pilot on a test flight might have been a better idea.
But hey, that wouldn't be nearly as entertaining (or in as keeping with the OP MO). 
ETA (two weeks later): I just finished the Ad Astra series (yay!). I admit, I guess they did do some testing. Clearly not enough though.
*SQUEE!*
I'd donate if I could, but at the moment I am dreadfully broke. That should be remedied relatively soon, I hope.
8234304
One of the things that I consider to be most important when writing a story is to remember that ponies are not humans. They think and do things differently, and even when drawing on other cultures, they are still going to make assumptions or fail to think of things that we might consider obvious. Having magic is both a boon and a curse because when they can do something with magic, they might fail to realize the full ramifications of classic physics. Therefore there has never been the Equian equivalent of Einstein to figure out significant things like the effects of relativity. they've just scaled up what they already knew about space flight.
This is why full impulse is 50% lightspeed. Every 10% of lightspeed takes an exponential increase in power to achieve. Up to 50%, that curve isn't that steep. Past 50%, and that curve goes UP very fast.
With their knowledge of portals and teleportation, I figure the Equestrians are more likely to figure out Gate travel before Warp drive.
This is really cool. Great job. I am kinda wondering how they are supposed to slow down effectively at the destination if it took so much energy to speed up. Guess we'll have to wait until then.
I know enough about relativistic physics to follow an argument, but not enough to really comment about it. Nuclear physics is a different question entirely. One heck of a tale, Goldfur. My hat's off to you. (Of course, I'm not WEARING a hat at the time, but that's irrelevant). Eagerly awaiting for more.
Also, in two points about midway through the chapter, you had Wandering saying something when it should have been Destined, about the time Destined found the temporal anomaly in the acceleration.
8234800
Thanks for pointing out those errors. Fixed now.
As for relativistic stuff, although I knew most of this, I definitely got it a lot more accurate entirely due to Airy Words, otherwise I would have had to describe things in more general or vague terms. If ever I need nuclear physics, I'll come to you instead.
"Maneuver" is one word, not two.
I hope they don't hit anything en route. If they planned their shielding for impacts using classical Newtonian physics to calculate the forces involved, even small relativistic velocity impacts will probably go through the shields and ship like a bullet through a watermelon. Or worse, like a rocket propelled grenade through a watermelon. *winces*
8234337
And not having a Professor Cosmic Constant, they missed one of the logarithmic/exponential issues with relativity and time dilation in the most amusing way possible.
8240196
Although that detail has yet to be highlighted in the story, their shield is designed to deflect rather than block, and extends enormously far in front of them. Still, it's a good thing they have a small star to power it!
8240416
I imagine Doctor Whooves helped.
Well, that was an unexpected chapter. Expected physics, got biology.
Also, alicorns are weird. And alicorn magic is weird.
Also... ponies are being paid in space? Are they being paid by the hour or on salary? Also, is that Equus or Cosmic Lotus-relative work time? Earn 40 years of pay in 10 time-dilation years! 💲
Didn't I warn everypony that Point is an absolute cutthroat poker player? Across the table, there are no friends. Away from the table, yes. Across the table, no mercy! Next victim! *shuffles cards with a flourish*
8247098
I like to play with words with more than one meaning.
As for pay, they might have gypped if paid by the hour - spend 44 years away but only get paid the part of the ten plus years that they weren't in hibernation! Seriously though, they will earn a specific amount for the mission irrespective of the various quirks they may encounter.
8247231
Oh, I've noticed. Not that MLP doesn't do that with titles for episodes as well.
But yeah, I just will assume they'll be paid big piles of bits for "Hazard Duty". It's the sort of Bonus Pay the US Navy gives Submariners, because subs be dangerous, yo. And a starship is just a submarine... IN SPACE! 🚀
Also... I think I need a scorecard or maybe a family tree with House Path. So many cogs in the story now, and I'm not even counting Whirring Cogs.