065 - Starcross Society, Part 2
Corona was under a spotlight. She held a hand up to her face – confused. How did she get here? They’d just…
“Corona Shimmer,” a voice said from outside the spotlight, an area Corona was unable to see. As far as she was concerned, the world outside the spotlight might well have not existed. “It has been brought to our attention that Overhead O’Neill may not be as useful for this trial as we previously believed. Given your actions with the Rune of Elysium, you have been deemed a person of interest.”
“A trial!? What for?”
“The Starcross Society wishes to determine your guilt or innocence in relation to trespassing, conspiracy, assault, as well as the state of your society as a whole. Let us begin with the most obvious and pressing of these matters – conspiracy. Tell us about the Rune of Elysium.”
“Don’t I get a lawyer?”
“You are within the Starcross Society’s system, Corona Shimmer. There are no lawyers. Your guilt or innocence is decided completely based on how the judges examine your responses. If you are concerned about impartiality, the judges are programmed beings, unable to have bias.”
“…Great,” Corona muttered. “Can you explain ho-”
“Answer our previous inquiry.”
Corona sighed. “Fine. We know almost nothing about the Rune of Elysium. An enemy of ours, Ba’al, picked it up well over a decade ago on a world called Lai, one of the major worlds of Merodi Universalis. I personally carried it with me the entire time I was in a ‘black hole’ universe called the Nexus. I escaped and placed the Rune into the protection of the Research Division the moment it was created. Years of testing revealed nothing about the mysterious artifact.”
“Yet it controlled you.”
“Clearly. I must have pocketed it without realizing before we even left the Outpost. When we were facing the Rebellious Star and imprisonment, it gave me ideas on how to escape. I thought they were my ideas until the end, when the Rune of Elysium wanted to be fused with the Rebellious Star. At that point… I couldn’t fight back.”
“Didn’t fight back.”
“I tried!” Corona insisted. “I tried to keep it back, but… It was too clever. The Voice of Elysium returned.”
“And what is this Voice of Elysium?”
“I don’t actually know much. I know it originates from Earth Flat as a servant of a being called Overlord Hasbro. It was able to manipulate the space within the universe it was created, and had some kind of ‘meta-effect’ that Pinkie never described that well. I know it’s bad. And only speaks in questions.”
“What is its relation to the Rune of Elysium?”
“I have no idea. Maybe they’re alternate universe versions of the same thing? That’s the only guess I have.”
“So am I right in assuming you plead not guilty to the charge of conspiracy?”
“Yes! We were going to leave your Rebellious Star alone!”
“This will be taken under advisement. Let’s move onto trespassing.”
“We had no idea you existed. You can’t blame us.”
“It is not easy to find a Starcross Society universe, Corona Shimmer. How did you find us?”
Corona furrowed her brow. “We were exploring, based on a series of coordinates we had found.”
“Found where?”
“From a dimensional device we call a ‘bowling ball’. It’s one of your design, right?”
“You have in your possession a globe trotter?”
“Is that what it’s called? Black, spherical, pops up with yellow squares when you touch it?”
“That is the description of a globe trotter.”
“Then yeah, we have one back home. Didn’t take it with us, just copied the coordinates.”
“What do you know of the globe trotter?”
“Well, we’ve encountered three. The first two were back in our early days of multiversal travel before we understood much, so all we got from them was a power source. The third one w-”
The voice interrupted her. “Corona Shimmer, how early in your days of multiversal travel did you find the first globe trotter?”
Corona sensed that this question was a trap. “Oh, you know, early…”
“We need a more specific answer, Corona Shimmer. Comply or you will be killed.”
Corona gulped.
~~~
When is this division calling from?
~~~
The Enchantress stood on the bridge of the lead Starcross Society ship, the Enastra. She, as usual, was covered in a full dark gray bodysuit that covered everything but her eyes – and her goggles took care of that small revelation. She tapped her hoof on the ground, eyes narrow.
On the main holographic display, she saw the Voice of Elysium superimposed on the ‘primary’ of the Rebellious Star, as well as images of the Rebellious Star’s other forms across the multiverse, all corrupted in some way.
She found herself wishing the automatic trespassing protocols just destroyed whoever entered without question to stop tragedies like this from happening. But no, the people wouldn’t accept that, and the Rebellious Star himself wanted them to be even less strict.
Foolishness. The multiverse was too dangerous to take chances, even for a society of their caliber.
What action will you take, Society?
The Enchantress particularly hated this Voice of Elysium. It was a being of nonstandard physics powerful enough to impose its reality on the world – clearly it needed the power from the Rebellious Star to truly make use of its ability, but it definitely had that now. She was having a hard time believing that she could do anything to neutralize the Voice even with the ships she had in her formation…
Why did the lost runes have to return now?
Screens started flashing with warnings – the temporal detectors were alerting them of an attack coming from the future. The computers analyzed it quickly – the Voice of Elysium was going to destroy all the Starcross Society ships in this universe with its power. The globe trotter devices were shot, so they couldn’t escape.
Notably the Enterprise wasn’t being targeted, for some reason.
The Enchantress sent a telepathic message to key personnel. Teleport to the Enterprise. It’s not being targeted. We will have to take it over in the next few seconds. Take only those who are absolutely necessary, we can’t try to save them all. She hit a button to disable the Enterprise’s shields for a moment.
Then she teleported herself across the void of space to the Enterprise’s bridge. The moment she appeared, she held a magical blade construct to O’Neill’s neck. “Resist and die.”
O’Neill raised his hands in surrender. “All right, I got it, unicorn…”
A few other members of the Starcross Society appeared on the bridge. None of them were ponies – they were a pretty even mix of humans in black uniforms and entities made of orange clouds that took humanoid shape, though clearly they were more amorphous than that. The Enchantress knew that other Starcross Society agents were appearing all over the ship, subjugating it with ease.
“Status?” she asked a cloud-entity.
“Our ships are still there…” the moment he said this, the Voice of Elysium activated the Rebellious Star’s powers, disintegrating the grandiose behemoths with red-purple bursts of energy.
Isn’t it better to talk without annoying third parties?
“Damn you,” O’Neill muttered. “Why did you have to do that!?”
Why wouldn’t I kill those who killed me in the past?
“…You’re not making sense, Voicey boy.”
“Yes he is,” the Enchantress muttered. “Stupid remnant of the Starstream War…”
You remember?
“Of course I remember, I was there! I don’t remember this stupid flat face of yours, but I know what you are. All of your kind should have stayed dead.”
Why should I care about you now when you are but a past thought, while the Merodi have dealt a much more recent blow?
“…What?”
The Voice of Elysium clearly started ignoring her.
What will Overlord Hasbro do to the Merodi when he arrives? What will the punishment for the ruin of my master be?
O’Neill winced. “Oh, that’s a bad one.”
The Enchantress turned to glare at him. “Who is this Overlord Hasbro?”
Lieshy cleared her throat. “A being that, with the power of something called Creativity, made universes and the Voice of Elysium. We freed everyone from that universe. Naturally, he hates us for that.”
“How can the Voice of Elysium be created? The runes are remnants from the Starstream War!”
“…What are they, really?” O’Neill asked.
“Star corpses a- You know what, I’m not telling you anything, clearly you’re not useful.”
“Can you at least tell us who you are and what you’re going to do to us?”
The Enchantress removed her goggles, revealing light blue eyes and a brilliant white coat. There was a scar over her left eye. “I am Scarcity of the Starcross Society. We are commandeering the Enterprise because we are experiencing a national crisis. You are all under arrest for this. All of you. I wouldn’t expect a good outcome.”
“Never do,” O’Neill said. “Now wh-”
Scarcity teleported everyone on the bridge who wasn’t part of the Starcross Society to a cargo hold, telling all other agents to do the same with everyone they found.
Why can’t you have a little fun?
“Somebody find a way to shut this spinning questionnaire up,” Scarcity ordered, growling. “I hope one of us brought over some records, because we’re going to need to do some combing.” She looked at the Voice of Elysium on the main screen after giving this order.
Her harsh expression softened. She had to force herself not to let out a cry of anguish as she saw the Rebellious Star corrupted in this way.
Don’t you worry, old friend. We’ll get you out of this… Somehow. And you can continue being our light through existence.
~~~
Where can the division switch?
~~~
“Corona Shimmer, answer the question. The first globe trotter?”
Corona gulped – she knew this was going to end badly for them, but she also knew they would be able to tell if she lied. “We found it on our world. It was what allowed us to explore the larger multiverse in the first place. We did have access to interdimensional mirrors before, but the first bowl- globe trotter we found let us start larger explorations.”
There was, for the first time, silence from the inquisition.
“…Hello?”
“Please describe the exact series of events that allowed you to obtain this bowling ball. How did it come to be in your world? How did you figure out how to use it?”
“It was dropped by a crystal man we have come to call the man of light. He was running through the multiverse from a unicorn we know as the Enchantress. When the Enchantress caught him, he dropped the globe trotter. They left the universe under the Enchantress’ power. Evening Sparkle, our current Overhead of the Relations Division, recovered the globe trotter and began testing on it with magic. It proved to be… unstable, but after we broke it open and found the diamond power source inside, we were able to adapt the spell within, combining it with our knowledge of the pre-existing mirror portals. After that we started finding new universes and exploring. That was… twenty years ago? The fluidity of time makes it hard to give an exact number.”
“That’s an alarmingly fast progression.”
“We attribute that to luck and our ability to make friends.”
There was silence again.
“Can I ask what we’re being accused of here?”
“The Starcross Society has a strict policy of non-interference. Scarcity – who you know as the Enchantress – was acting as an agent during that timeframe to prevent this ‘man of light’ from interfering with anything outside the Starcross Society. Clearly, this ended in failure.”
“What does that mean for us?”
“Uncertain at this juncture. It is possible we will be forced to quarantine your entire society and most worlds you have encountered until they can be moved into the Starcross Society. Moving an entire Class 3 Civilization is problematic, but it can be done to minimize the damage.”
“Minimize damage?! We’re not some plague on the multiverse!”
“You do not understand. The Stars’ Society was a horrendous impersonal controller of a tremendous chunk of the multiverse on the road to becoming a Class 1 society. When the Starstream War ended in favor of the rebellion, we decided that never would anything the Stars did be allowed to influence the multiverse ever again. That included us. We secluded ourselves as best as we could with the Star technology and hunted down any of the Star universes that had dimensionally active components, destroying or moving them to our space. You are another product of the Stars, and therefore by our laws must be contained. It is possible the judges will deem otherwise, the law is not irrefutable, but it is one of our higher creeds.”
Corona gulped. “What kind of defense options do I have?”
“It does not pertain to your actions, merely ours. We have to determine if your eruption in the multiverse falls under our jurisdiction according to our laws or not. It will be complicated.”
“No kidding. We’re close allies with a different multiversal civilization, the Sparkle Census, who formed completely separately. Our influence on them cannot be removed easily. How can you go through damage control on that large of a scale?”
“What Class are they?”
“…Class 3.”
“It’s doable. Do you have any other close allies?”
“No. Any others just become part of Merodi Universalis.”
“And any enemies you’ve influenced heavily?”
“…The USM and the University of Doors. I would say the Eldritch Embodiment, but they don’t pay us any mind.”
“All Class 3s?”
“I’m not even sure the University qualifies as a Class 3, but otherwise yeah.”
“In this case, the difficulty of quarantining your universes will not be a consideration, a handful of Class 3s are of only minimal consequence. What we need to prevent is another Class 2 forming from the Stars’ remnants.”
“…You don’t approve of big society at all, do you?”
“It is likely that, if we were able, we would outlaw exploration of new universes entirely across the multiverse. As it is, we can only do that for ourselves. Our devices are designed only to go to universes within the Society. The ones you’ve encountered have been hacked to be easier to manipulate.”
“This sounds like a complicated situation.”
“That is an understatement.”
“I take it we can’t be friends…?”
“The Starcross Society does not have allies or enemies. We try our absolute best to stay isolated from everything else.”
“Ah.”
“That is enough questions from you. This is your trial, not ours.”
“…Right…”
~~~
Why don’t I know of this trial?
~~~
Why have you scrambled me?
The Voice of Elysium’s question had to go directly through the Enterprise’s communication network rather than entering their minds directly.
“I don’t know, maybe we don’t want you seeing everything we do?” Scarcity replied through an open channel. Pure luck we found a scrambling spell that works…
What’s the deal with the trial?
“…I have no idea what you’re talking about.” She stepped off the captain’s chair, gesturing that one of her human crewmembers should continue the conversation with the Voice should it be necessary. She lit her horn and teleported to the cargo hold that was holding the entirety of the Enterprise’s normal crew – many of them still with weapons the Starcross Society hadn’t bothered to remove. Scarcity would have been annoyed at this under normal circumstances, but she could forgive the rush. It wasn’t like these Merodi had any weapons that could actually do anything to the Society. The real danger was their magic.
O’Neill and Lady Rarity made their way to the front of the crew the moment Scarcity appeared. “So, let me guess,” O’Neill said, folding his arms. “You need our help?”
Scarcity bristled. “I’m just here to look for ideas. We are dealing with a Class-R meta entity that has control over the largest source of power in the entire Starcross Society.”
“Which I am somewhat curious how it did that,” O’Neill said.
“Fine,” Scarcity muttered. “The ‘Voice of Elysium’ had attached itself to the Rune of Elysium through an ‘alternate self’ connection. The Rune of Elysium was once a Star killed by the Rebellious Star in the Starstream War. Happy?”
“Enough,” Lady Rarity said.
“My turn. We have accessed your files on ‘Runes’ and found a world named Lai. Is it really covered in Runes just like the Rune of Elysium?”
“Of a sort,” Lady Rarity decreed.
“Mhm…”
“What’s that mean?”
“It just means we missed one,” Scarcity said.
“I see.”
“Regardless, now that we’ve had our question and answer session to death, here’s the deal. The Voice is outside, waiting for its master to show up. We have until then – however long that is – to find a way out of its grip. That could be days or minutes. So I’m here for ideas. How did you defeat it last time?”
“Wasn’t us personally,” O’Neill said. “The people who did moved to a universe where it had no dominion and tricked it into following. They were able to fight it there and find a direct connection to its Overlord. That clearly won’t work here since your Rebellious Star exists in many different universes.”
“Is anyone familiar with the Voice here now?”
Lady Rarity shook her head. “We don’t have any of the Primary Team on board and we’re fresh out of Pinkies.”
Scarcity twitched visibly at the name of the pink pony.
“Do you have a Pinkie?”
Scarcity shook her head. “Be glad you don’t. The existence of a meta entity within Starcross Society space is one of the highest felonies possible. The entity in question would be executed immediately.”
Lady Rarity narrowed her spidery eyes. “What happened to your Pinkie?”
“She took the side of the Stars even though she knew they would lose,” Scarcity said. “An- this isn’t important. She’s gone, it doesn’t matter, we’re in a predicament and wasting valuable time. Do any of you have any ideas?”
O’Neill put his hands in his pockets. “Our advanced weapons systems could hit a handful of universes at most, so that won’t cut it. I take it we can’t get a message out to the rest of the multiverse?”
“The Starcross Society is aware of our predicament.”
“Then just call on one of the other civilizations. I’m sure some would like to help us – even if it is for a price, like with the Melnorme.”
“Out of the question,” Scarcity decreed. “The Starcross Society would rather destroy its founder than back down on our principles.”
Lady Rarity raised an eyebrow. “Which are…?”
“Again, unimportant,” Scarcity muttered, clearly fed up with the alternate version of herself. “Are any of you any help?”
Corona stepped out of the crowd, hand raised. “I’ve got one. The… spell that the Voice of Elysium gave me. I still know it. I could reverse it.”
“You don’t get to have ideas,” Scarcity decreed. “The only reason you – any of you – are still alive is because you haven’t been tried yet. And if any of you give me actual reason to kill you, I will not hesitate.”
“You want to be rid of us,” Lady Rarity observed.
“What happened to you?” Corona asked.
“That is not in any way, shape, or form important. I’m done he-”
Corona laid a finger on Scarcity’s leg. She entered Scarcity’s memories…
She found herself standing in what she was sure was a dream within a dream. She saw Scarcity standing in an expanse of comforting purple, the Rebellious Star shining in the ‘sky’ above her.
“WHAT DO YOU MEAN?”
“Algol…” Of course he wouldn’t always have been the Rebellious Star, he had to be named something before he rebelled. “We’re slaves to them, aren’t we?”
“…ARE YOU SURE YOU WANT TO GO DOWN THIS PATH, RARITY?”
“Yes. I need to know.”
“I WOULDN’T CALL IT SLAVERY. I WOULD CALL IT… LIKE HOW YOU OBSERVE AND TREAT ANTS. SOME CARE FOR AND PROTECT YOU, BUT TO MOST YOU ARE NOTHING. AND NONE WOULD THINK OF PLACING YOU OVER THE DESIRES OF OTHER STARS.”
“Experiments, accidents, and… things. That’s all we are. Your people are starting to smash universes together just to see what happens, Algol! The scale of death…”
“IT IS UNIMAGINABLE AND UNFORGIVABLE. BUT THERE IS NOTHING A SINGLE STAR CAN DO AGAINST THE FULL MIGHT OF THE STARS. THEY COULD SNUFF ME OUT IN AN INSTANT. ALL I CAN DO IS PROTECT THE WORLDS I HAVE CLAIMED AS MINE.”
“But all those others…”
“I AM SORRY, RARITY.”
“…Then just choose to protect us. But do more than that. Give us knowledge and information, all the while keeping the other Stars out.”
“…THE PATH YOU ARE GOING DOWN IS DANGEROUS.”
“Doing nothing is dangerous! I say if you can’t fight back, we can. We can stop you from rising so far you cannot be taken down. Algol, dear… I love you, but the way you want to do nothing is unacceptable.”
“VERY WELL. RARITY, I SHALL BESTOW CELESTIA, LUNA, AND TWILIGHT WITH THE KNOWLEDGE I HAVE ACCESS TO. I WISH TO SEE WHAT YOU PLAN TO DO.”
The scene shifted again. Corona felt the immense feeling of time passing, more than she could comprehend. What she witnessed was incredible.
All the matter available in the universe consolidated into one cubical structure in the sky above, only the Rebellious Star and the living structures built around it separate.
Scarcity stood on the bridge of a small ship with her version of Twilight and Rainbow Dash.
“We’re ready,” Scarcity said. “All those eternal years… we have it. An army they know nothing about.”
“It won’t be easy, even with the element of surprise,” Twilight told her. “Algol gave us everything. He will fight by our side. But we are still limited… Even with all our plans, it’s a coin flip if we win or not.”
“Who cares? We’re gonna kick these Stars’ butts!” Rainbow Dash blurted. “Let’s do this!”
Scarcity nodded. “Yes…”
Images flashed by in rapid succession.
Twilight suicide bombing a Star, tearing it apart with her own magic.
Rainbow Dash’s transmission cutting to static as her ship was destroyed in a universal collapse.
A file on Fluttershy that said MISSING.
Applejack turning her back on Scarcity.
Sweetie Belle in surgery, every part of her body having to be replaced with permanent magic constructs.
Planets destroyed. Galaxies torn asunder by the power of Stars. Scarcity pushing a button that rippled through the Star’s network, lighting a galaxy up in supernovas.
Then the image slowed down – Corona knew it was the end of the war. In the sky, the Rebellious Star did battle with the deep blue monstrosity known as Carinae. Carinae far outclassed the miniscule being in both power and intelligence, but the Rebellious Star fought alongside fleets of physical ships Carinae was having mild difficulty keeping track of. The background stars would swap every few seconds as Carinae or the Rebellious Star switched universes, sometimes bringing connected versions of themselves into the fray, rippling the mobile battlefield with stellar explosions.
More of the Rebellious Star’s bodies were falling compared to Carinae’s.
The two stars were yelling at each other about treachery, what was right, and the way of things. But Scarcity’s memory did not record these words clearly.
What she did recall was the fight she experienced at the same time. The battle of the stars was just a background. She stood on top of a piece of debris flying through the battle, somehow avoiding all the beams of death by luck. No… ka.
She stood on one end, the red light of the Rebellious Star serving as her backdrop.
On the other was Pinkie, shrouded in the blue of Carinae. Her hair was flat and she wasn’t smiling. She hadn’t smiled in years.
“Why?” Scarcity asked. “Why did you betray us?”
“I saw all this destruction,” Pinkie said. “I knew it was going to happen. I tried to stop it. To save all of you.”
“Then why do you still fight!?”
Pinkie drew a thin sword that was impossibly long. “Because, even though they’re almost all dead, I can still save you. I see what you become, Rarity. What rises from the ashes. It’s… It’s horrible.”
“Is it worse than what already existed?”
“I’m just a party pony, Rarity,” Pinkie said, allowing a smile to come to her face. “I can’t make that call. All I can say is what it does to those I call my friends… I won’t accept that.” She pointed her sword at Scarcity. “…It is better if you die than become the monster I see.”
“And I’ve wanted to kill you for a really, really long time.”
Pinkie let out a deranged laugh. Then she charged. The blade flashed across Scarcity’s eye, gouging deep. The rest of the memory was a blur – there were explosions, some sort of rainbow doomsday weapon went off, and they ended in a white universe.
Only the Rebellious Star remained in the sky. None of the ships accompanying him did.
The only other object in the expanse was the drifting piece Scarcity and Pinkie were on.
Scarcity had run a magical blade straight through Pinkie’s chest. Her unnaturally bright red blood dripped out the back, mixing with Scarcity’s more natural color.
Pinkie looked at Scarcity. “…Happy Birthday, Rarity. I got you the thing you wanted most in the world.” Then she slid off the blade, dead.
Pinkie only had the one wound. Scarcity had several dozen, and would have died from blood loss in a few minutes had the Rebellious Star not taken her into his magic.
The image shifted again – but Corona was ejected from Scarcity’s mind, flying across the cargo hold of the Enterprise.
“I forgot you could do that,” Scarcity muttered, clearly trying hard to keep her murderous instinct down. “Keep your foolish ideas to yourself. That is final. I hope you liked what you saw.” She teleported away.
O’Neill put his hands in his pockets. “Well, she was delightful. Did you learn anything, Corona?”
“She’s very, very old. And damaged,” Corona said, still reeling from the images of full on multiversal war. “Let’s never get into a multiversal war. Ever.”
“Anything useful?”
“No. All just personal information about her. She’s not going to trust us and I don’t see a way to bring her around. Her beliefs are formed from heavy tradition and pain. Deep pain. A kind of pain I don’t think I’ve seen in anyone else… She killed her Pinkie because she chose the other side.”
Lady Rarity nodded. “Right, so talking is out of the question. What about your other idea?”
“I still know the spell, as I said. If I got access to the Spectral Rod for a few minutes and the Voice of Elysium is still holding onto the Enterprise… I think I could tear the Rune of Elysium back out. A simple reversal. By giving me the knowledge to perform the spell, the Voice also gave me the knowledge to stop it.”
“But Scarcity has a point, how do we know you aren’t just being manipulated again?”
“I checked that,” Twitter said, flying over. “I know advanced mental scrying spells. I’ve checked for any influence – there’s a chance, however, it was implanted in the past and there’s just no influence now due to whatever the Starcross Society did to block the Voice of Elysium’s perceptions.”
“And we have no way to check that,” Corona said. “It’s all I’ve got though.”
O’Neill and Lady Rarity glanced at each other. Lady Rarity nodded. “Well, looks like it’s our best bet.”
O’Neill folded his arms. “If McCrabby isn’t going to listen to us, we’ll have to force our way up there. They’ve got this entire block sealed, and they’ve only teleported in and out while we can’t. So…”
“Physical ventilation shaft?” Corona suggested.
“That does seem like the best idea,” Lady Rarity said. “Though you’d think they’d notice…”
“Well, thanks to Olivia we don’t have to worry about that for the moment.”
Olivia gave them thumbs up from where she was. “Disabling security systems since ‘61!”
“That’s only in here,” Lady Rarity said. “They have their own devices and people elsewhere. Given how they could disable the Enterprise on a dime, I doubt even Olivia’s cloaking technology will be able to slip by them.”
“Then we just need to keep them busy…” O’Neill said. “Create a large distraction so Corona can move to the Spectral Rod. Like… oh, make it look like we want to take the ship back?”
“That could work,” Corona said, putting a hand to her chin. “Me and Olivia make a beeline to the rod controls while you ‘take back the ship’. If we’re really lucky we accomplish both.”
Lady Rarity nodded. “Go draw up the plans with Olivia. We’ll work on the distraction.”
Corona nodded, running over to Olivia.
“We didn’t tell her that was plan B,” Lady Rarity observed.
“You know why,” O’Neill said, leading the two of them to a large crate labeled RADIOACTIVE MATERIAL. O’Neill inconspicuously kicked on it with his foot, making it look like he was still talking to Lady Rarity. “How’s plan A coming?”
The voice of Rohan Kishibe came from inside the crate as a whisper. “Well. I am almost complete. You’ll hopefully find that your mission to reclaim the ship goes rather smoothly.”
O’Neill informed him of Corona’s plan.
“I won’t be able to write that, not on the timetable you want,” Rohan declared. “But I can place a reference into the current manuscript with ease. It won’t do much.” O’Neill and Lady Rarity heard frantic scribbling – Rohan using Heaven’s Door to frantically create flawless manga pages, driven by the thrilling inspiration of real-world consequences. “Aaaaand done.”
“Can I see?” Lady Rarity asked.
“No. I’ve read my source material, I know what happens when you get access to manga that can ‘predict the future’ or similar nonsense. If you know about this story prior to it actually happening, it’ll either invalidate it or screw it up in some way. You don’t get to see anything.”
“…Fair,” O’Neill said.
“I hope this works,” Lady Rarity said with a shake of the head. “Only two plans… Maybe three if the Starcross Society thinks of something. This can end badly in so many ways.”
O’Neill shrugged, walking away from Rohan’s hidey-box. “This isn’t the worst pickle we’ve been in. The Bloodbath was the worst…”
As they walked away, Rohan put the manuscript he had just finished away, pulling out a smaller one he had finished quite some time ago. Little do they know, I have a plan C. They’ll thank me later.
~~~
Where is the flow of the story?
~~~
“New course of inquiry: Corona Shimmer, what do you know of ka?”
Corona sighed. “It’s a force of narrative that twists reality to the whims of stories written by others in distant universes known as Prophets.”
“Close enough.”
“Is there more to it?”
The voice ignored her inquiry. “What has your relationship with ka been?”
“Difficult,” Corona admitted. “We struggled to accept that it was what it was, but I think most people are past it now. There is no consensus on if it’s a good or bad thing, but at the moment we can’t really do anything about it. We seek to learn more about how it works. Some of us wish to have its influence removed from us.”
“Care to elaborate on any of those individuals?”
“Starbeat. She uh… suffers from a ‘Beat curse’ where she suffers from random and sudden shallow romantic urges for anything that moves. She doesn’t want to keep living like that so she devotes every waking minute of her life to figure out how to cure herself.”
“Concerning. Any meta beings you are aware of besides the common Pinkie and Voice of Elysium?”
“Monika. She’s an entity with almost complete control over ka, from what we can tell. Then there was the Watchmaker who controls a world called Zhui to his ideal of ‘a perfect plan’ which is apparently a bunch of BS we can’t do anything about.”
“Do you know of any Prophets?”
“Uh…”
“You do.”
“I plead the fifth.”
“You do not have the right to remain silent.” Corona felt a million needles of pain shock right through her brain, forcing her to scream in agony.
“Who is the Prophet you know of?”
“Screw you!”
The pain increased. She could feel that it wasn’t just pain – there was also a component of it sifting through her mind on a subliminal level. “Oh no you don’t!” She fought back with her powers of empathy, surprised to find that they weren't functioning.
“What…?” Something snapped in her mind. “ROHAN KISHIBE!”
“…He was with you.”
“Y-yes.”
There was silence.
“I take it that’s bad.”
“The existence of a meta being aware of their powers in Starcross Society space is the largest breach of protocol we’ve had in millennia. The use of the force is… one of the worst offenses to the legal code imaginable. Immediate action must be taken.”
“Hey! We didn’t kn… You don’t care if we knew or not in this case.”
“No.”
Corona put her head in her hands… …wait, were they hooves now? What? She hadn’t changed!
~~~
Do they know the answer?
~~~
O’Neill had formed a team of thirty individuals to take the Enterprise back. The moment they left, Rohan held up his manga to his face.
Songs of the Spheres: Starcross Society – Take Back the Night. On the cover was a picture of O’Neill in a dramatic pose with Crimson Sushi holding onto his back, the fishy Stand staring right at the reader.
Rohan turned on the two-way radio connection he had with O’Neill and turned the page. He heard, word for word, a simple speech he had written down on the first page. Something slightly generic, but filled with enough witty snark to believably come from O’Neill’s lips. Good. They were sticking to the script so far, that boded well.
The next few pages were visual stills of O’Neill, Lady Rarity, Hermirod, and Lapis-Vee leading the team through the vents. They had a few close calls – guards walking by vents, humans who thought they heard something, and cloud people leaning just a little too close to the ground. All of these moments had the perfect amount of suspense within them to keep the reader guessing – but they made it through all of them. As Rohan had demanded.
They finally emerged on the deck that held the bridge. Here was where Rohan had made an edit – one of the background unicorns lit her horn, sending a message to Corona: go. That was all Rohan had to say about Corona’s Plan B. He had no way to confirm if the unicorn had actually done that or not, but he assumed O’Neill would have assigned the job to someone regardless.
Rohan flipped the pages with O’Neill’s orders. “Flank halls 2B and 1A. Charge when I give the order. Switch to lethal weapons only if they disable your other methods.” Several frames of them holding position, waiting for the order came after.
“Ready?” Lady Rarity asked O’Neill.
“Ready,” O’Neill said. “EVERYONE GO!”
The next set of pages was a full spread – lasers, magic, and weapons flied across in some of Rohan’s best line work. The Starcross Society soldiers went down – just like regular mooks for the big bad. They probably were very well trained soldiers, but today, sadly, they were nothing more than cannon fodder that fell like dominos to the heroes.
“The nullifiers aren’t working!” a Society soldier shouted, one of the clouds.
The voice of Olivia cracked over the intercom. “Everybody can be hacked! Just took me some time, is all.” The manga had a panel of her in a nondescript location, laughing.
The view of the manga switched to O’Neill and Lady Rarity. Lady Rarity moved with grace, style, and agility, as was to be expected of a warrior outside of her armor. She stuck to walls like the spirid she was, swinging her hammer to take out the unfortunate soldiers as if they were made of nothing but dust.
But O’Neill was the one Rohan gave the most attention to – his Stand was by far the most fun to work with. He swapped the visual locations of weapons, doors, walls, confusing the guards profusely before slapping them with an invisible fish of a Stand. One encounter had a cloud being shooting at him for several seconds, panicking that none of the bullets were affecting O’Neill, only for the General to fire a zat gun at the being from behind. Another had him force two soldiers to shoot each other. He was unstoppable.
Rohan even gave a short blurb for Hermirod and Lapis-Vee, the meeting of water and technology blasting the opposition away.
Then Hermirod’s head was blown off by a spatial distortion weapon from a burly human soldier.
“ROHAN!?” O’Neill shouted.
Rohan spoke exactly as he had written himself. “We’re still on script, O’Neill.”
“…We’re going to have a talk about this,” O’Neill said, as expected.
Rohan knew this, of course. He also knew that to get the story to be ‘accepted’, it couldn’t be a complete curbstomp. There had to be sacrifice. Hermirod was the perfect mixture of ‘expendable’ and ‘important’ to pull that in the most cost-effective manner.
The gruesome death he had illustrated brought a smile to his lips. A smile of pride.
The next few pages came and went, and the remaining team – only down four members – barged into the Bridge, weapons held high. “We’re taking this ship back, McCrabby,” O’Neill told Scarcity.
Scarcity’s face was one of the more amusing things Rohan had drawn in recent memory.
Now wouldn’t that make things more thematically appropriate?
Rohan had drawn those words across the panels, blotting out the expressions and postures of the people on the bridge.
Scarcity growled. “This is a mistake and you know it. I ca-” she stopped mid sentence.
Rohan’s eyes widened. That wasn’t supposed to happen. There was supposed to be an epic showdown with her as the final boss… “O’Neill, we’ve gone off script! I repeat, we’ve gone off script!”
“We’re on our own now,” O’Neill said, pointing a zat gun at Scarcity. “What’s going on?”
“You have a Prophet on board,” Scarcity spat. It was as if speaking the word made her die inside. “Despicable.”
“He got us this far,” O’Neill said, aiming a gun at Scarcity and summoning Crimson Sushi behind her. “Now let us take our ship and do what we need to do.”
Scarcity rolled her eyebrows. “You can have the bridge. I’ll just slaughter everyone in the warehouse until I find this Rohan Kishibe. Prophets are public enemy number one – I will not be reprimanded for destroying even an entire civilization to extinguish a Prophet in Starcross Society space.”
Rohan leapt out of his box, tucking his manga away. “EVERYONE BACK AWAY FROM ME AND GET DOWN!” He quickly used Heaven’s Door to conscript a burly orange Jasper Gem and an over-armed human soldier to protect him to their dying breath. He would have liked more, but then the Starcross Society teleported into the room.
“HEAVEN’S DOOR!” Rohan shouted, flooding the eyes of a couple of the soldiers, forcing them to turn on their allies. Unfortunately the cloud creatures didn’t have eyes, so they were immune. They took out Rohan’s guards in an instant, proving that without Rohan’s influence they were really effective killing machines. It was only their fellow soldiers that gave them trouble.
Rohan heard the radio crack from behind him.
“Call off your attack,” Scarcity was demanding. “And then we will only kill Rohan. The rest will be free. But don’t, and I will order the entire storage bay to be eradicated. I can always just say I had to be sure I got the Prophet.”
“He won’t surrender himself,” O’Neill said.
“I don’t care. Just surrender yourself.”
Rohan heard O’Neill set down his weapons. Rohan expected that the old coot had a plan with Crimson Sushi, but Rohan knew it wasn’t going to work. The tables had turned in such a way that only a Plan B would work now.
Rohan really hoped Corona worked quickly, because Heaven’s Door wasn’t a very effective fighter, and there looked to be more clouds in the Starcross Society than humans…
Something told him to go hide, to leave, to run. But he couldn’t bring himself to do that, no matter how much he wanted.
Because then they really would kill everybody in the room.
Why did he have to be so soft?
~~~
Where are we turning?
~~~
The voice of Olivia cracked over the intercom. “Everybody can be hacked! Just took me some time, is all.” She laughed and closed her portable holographic interface.
“Done looking at that?” Corona asked, checking to make sure the gun O’Neill had given her was ready to fire.
“Si.”
“Right… I’ve seen them scrambling outside,” Corona said, peeking through the slits in the ventilation system with her fingers. “Hasn’t been quiet enough yet, a lot of them are moving around.”
“I do love causing chaos,” Olivia said. “Helps that this is our ship, not theirs. Their spells had to be attached to it, made it much easier than when we were in that box. Though it is strange how the idea on how to do it just came to me suddenly…”
Corona stared at her in mild horror.
“Couldn’t be the Voice of Elysium, you know that,” Olivia said. “It was a fresh idea.”
“Hrm…” Corona muttered, looking through. “Right, we’re clear. We just have to get to the door at the end of this hall.”
“Invisibility on, though I’m willing to bet it’ll do nothing.” She pulled out her custom machine pistol, smirking. “I’ve been getting a lot of nostalgia about this lately.”
“Yeah, fun times.” Corona waved her hand, teleporting them out of the vents and into the hall. She had tried to go further earlier, but they had apparently bothered to seal off the Spectral Rod.
The two of them ran down the hallway, making a significant amount of noise. Despite the hall being abandoned before, a couple of the cloud-soldiers appeared from side rooms, aiming their guns at the two of them as if there were no cloaks at all.
“Of course,” Olivia muttered, firing her gun, which did nothing to the cloud creatures. Their attacks of spatial distortion were only blocked by Corona’s magic shield – and even then just barely. She needed to end this quick. She performed a quick roll to the ground, appearing as if she tripped. The clouds judged that she wasn’t a threat for the next second or so, and focused on Olivia. Olivia activated her personal teleporter, appearing back in the ventilation.
This moment allowed Corona to touch the legs of the cloud beings with her bare hands. She was flooded with their emotions.
She got to experience the disturbing method of cloud-being procreation.
She used her abject disgust at what she saw to fry their brains, forcing them both to pass out. They lost control of their bodies, becoming amorphous and drifting to the ceiling.
Corona stood back up and hefted her gun, running through the door to the rod controls, Olivia close behind her once again. Corona’s fingers flew across the keys as she quickly keyed up the spell. She started to make the edits to the program.
“Were those guards it?” Olivia asked, looking around carefully.
“Maybe. Several dozen others had already run elsewhere,” Corona commented, pressing a few more buttons and keys. “Though they might sense what I’m doing…”
Olivia pulled up her screens, examining the other part of the plan. “Well, O’Neill’s surrendering to Scarcity. She’s gotten a bit too threatening for his tastes – figured out Rohan was a Prophet.”
Something about that tickled the back of Corona’s mind, but she ignored the feeling. “Right, I… Oh crud. I have to disable the field keeping the Voice of Elysium from looking into the Enterprise for this to work.”
“That’s concerning.”
“Tell me this spell is wrong, Olivia. That it won’t do what I think it will do.”
Olivia checked the spell over. “It looks fine, Corona, I ca-” a burst of spatial distortion hit her in the leg, blowing the limb off.
Corona didn’t even turn to see the attacker – she just acted. “TAKE THIS, VOICE OF ELYSIUM!”
What!?
Without any fanfare, the Rune of Elysium popped into existence on the table next to Corona.
She would have died in that instant from a spatial weapon tearing all her organs from the inside out, but a red-purple barrier stopped the attack.
“STAND DOWN, MY CHILDREN,” the Rebellious Star said. “THEY HAVE JUST SAVED ME FROM THE VOICE OF ELYSIUM. THAT MAKES THEM WORTHY OF LIVING, DOES IT NOT?”
Corona didn’t let herself sigh in relief – she ran to Olivia, using her magic to cauterize the woman’s leg stump. Olivia attempted to say something, but the sudden sharp pain overloaded her system and made her pass out.
Only then did Corona let herself sigh. There. We’re good now. Everything’s good…
She and Olivia were teleported to the bridge. Scarcity was glaring at them, eye twitching.
“You’re welcome,” Corona and O’Neill said at the same time. Then they both started chuckling.
“I can’t even…” Scarcity facehooved. “Look, we still have the Prophet to deal wi-”
“HE WAS INSTRUMENTAL IN THIS AS WELL, SCARCITY. LET US WAIT AND HOLD FURTHER JUDGEMENT.”
Scarcity punched a nearby console, making it explode. “O’Neill, order your Prophet to surrender. He’ll be tied up and… not… harmed…”
O’Neill put a hand to his earpiece. “You got that Rohan?”
“TELL IT TO THE SOLDIERS!” Rohan blurted.
“Excuse me a moment,” Scarcity muttered, teleporting away. She was back in an instant with Rohan. She then proceeded to hit him so hard he passed out. “Better.”
“Ouch,” O’Neill observed.
“Shut up. Everyone shut up,” Scarcity muttered. “I am going t-”
Overlord Hasbro appeared on the bridge in a flash of blue, his square Flat form boggling the perceptions of all present. “Ah, it seems the tables have turned, my enemies. Perhaps you will learn this time not to mess with an Overl-”
“AND YOU CAN DIE,” the Rebellious Star said, vaporizing Hasbro in an instant.
“And now we just wait for him to come back again,” O’Neill muttered.
“NO, WE DO NOT. I TRACED HIS ESSENCE BACK TO ALL HIS FORMS, COMPARATIVELY LITTLE TO MINE. HE IS NO MORE.”
“…Huh. Thanks.”
“IT IS WHAT I DO.”
Scarcity groaned. “Right, fine, I guess we’re talking now. Lovely.” She sat in the captain’s chair of the Enterprise, daring O’Neill to ask her to move. “Let’s talk then.”
~~~
I looked up from the journal I’d been writing, though I continued to use my magic to write further words. “Oh, uh… hi! Sorry, the Voice of Elysium is currently stuck in the Rune of Elysium again, from your perspective anyway. It’ll be destroyed by the Starcross Society off-screen in… oh a matter of seconds. So you get me instead.” I smiled. “Don’t really have much to say though, so… Enjoy the rest of the chapter I suppose. They’re not out of the woods yet.”
I lifted the pen up in my magic and began scribbling once again. “Rohan has much to learn…”
~~~
“A verdict has been reached on all accounts.”
Corona nervously smiled. “Y-yeah?”
“Considering all actions on every side, you and your crew members have been cleared of any wrongdoing.”
Corona let out a sigh of relief.
“The Prophet Rohan Kishibe will undergo his own separate trial, by request of the Rebellious Star.”
“Uh… Okay.”
“And the last account, that of what to do with your society, it has been determined that you fall under our jurisdiction and action must be taken to quarantine and adapt the affected universes into the fold.”
“Wh – hey! Hey no!”
“Thank you for your cooperation Corona Shimmer. Your existence is no longer required in this trial.”
“What ar-“ Corona could no longer form words. Everything had vanished – the spotlight, her body, all sensation. She could only think, and even that was fading fast. Her mind frayed at the edges, spiraling into nothingness.
She was no more in a perceived instant.
Rohan appeared under a new spotlight.
“Nani…?”
“Rohan Kishibe. It has been brought to our attention that you are a particular Prophet of interest. Given your actions in regards to the Voice of Elysium and the Rebellious Star, we have called you before this trial…”
~~~
Scarcity hated talking – so she was immensely grateful that the Starcross Society fleet showed up less than a minute after she had offered to talk.
One of her soldiers handed her a communication.
“Ah, your trial has concluded!” Scarcity said, a smile coming to her face.
“…Trial?” Lady Rarity asked.
“This one specifically,” Scarcity said, gesturing at Corona. “Amazingly, you’ve been cleared of all charges relating to the Rune of Elysium, trespassing, and the rest. Probably because of the Rebellious Star speaking on your behalf at the last moment.”
“…I was on trial?” Corona asked. “But I didn’t even get to explain myself!”
“Yes you did,” Scarcity said dismissively. “A copy of your consciousness was being run through a trial program over the last few hours. The transcript will be made available to you later.”
Corona wasn’t sure how to process this.
“Regardless, the part of this trial that’s good news is this. A decision has been made about what to do with your society that should not exist.” She smiled and pressed her hooves together. “We’re going to go back to Merodi Universalis and put everything under quarantine!”
O’Neill blinked. “What!?”
“Not only are you a result of my mistake, and therefore my mess to clean up, but you also have a world of star corpses from the Starstream War, something we thought we were certain to completely clean up. Both of these things mean your society is not sanctioned to exist.”
Lady Rarity twitched. “Now hold on a minute-”
“We’re not going to conquer you unless you make us,” Scarcity said. “We’re just going to move you inside our space and prevent you from traveling further! And completely remove any meta influences. Gonna have to do something about the Prophet and the Pinkies.”
“You can’t just do that!” Corona blurted. “We ha-”
“You already made your case for that in the trial,” Scarcity interrupted, smirking. “But, to answer your accusation, yes we can.” She gestured at the Starcross Society fleet. “It’s time to go to…” She glanced at the pad. “Equis Vitis and talk to Charter-Princess Evening Sparkle. And all your allies and enemies.” She sat back in the chair, smug. “Today is a good day.”
O’Neill narrowed his eyes, clearly plotting something.
“Oh, by all means, try something. Try something when we’re not crippled by the Voice of Elysium. Any one of those ships we have out there can vaporize the Enterprise in an instant. You’re powerless!” She laughed. “Oh, finally this day turns around.”
Corona sat back. “They’re not just going to accept you.”
“I’d like to see how they plan to resist,” Scarcity declared. She lit her horn, sending a message to the rest of the Starcross Society ships. “This trip took you a couple months, didn’t it?”
“How long is it going to take to get back?” O’Neill asked.
“Twenty seconds.” Scarcity really enjoyed saying that. They felt the Enterprise lurch, grabbed by one of the Society’s ships. The main screen showed a universe every second, the jumps performed without any flashy transition whatsoever.
Must be nice to know the shortest path between two universes, Corona thought.
It wasn’t long at all before they were in orbit around Equis Vitis.
“…We’re being hailed,” a cloud said.
“Perfect,” Scarcity said, smirking. “Put them on.”
Charter-Princess Evening Sparkle appeared on screen. “O’Neill, what a-” She took all of one second to read the situation. She lit her horn.
“Let me guess, you have a special telepathic command for ‘interdimensional incursion from a higher unknown power’?” Scarcity asked.
“Yes,” Eve said, narrowing her eyes. “Who are you and what do you want?”
“Quite simple, really. I am Scarcity, known to you as the Enchantress. I represent the Starcross Society. Your little expedition here has caused quite the predicament back where I come from. But that’s behind us now. I’m here on official business that just happens to nicely line up with how fed up I am with all of this. Your society was founded on a dimensional device called a ‘bowling ball’, correct?”
“That is right.”
“That was ours,” Scarcity said. “By our law, you are a product of the Starcross War, and cannot be allowed to influence the multiverse any further. You are under our jurisdiction. We are going to quarantine all your universes and any universes you have left any lasting impression on. After this, we will begin the slow process of moving you to the Starcross Society where you will never explore new universes again. We cannot allow the blemish of the Stars to continue, you understand.”
Eve narrowed her eyes. “Then why are the Stars still around?”
“They behave themselves,” Scarcity declared. “They know they can never band together again.”
Eve slowly processed this. While she did that, Corona got another idea inserted into her head. She didn’t question it for very long – it sounded brilliant. She reached into her pocket and grabbed her phone, trying to make a call without being noticed. It worked. She muted the phone – hopefully it was still on speakerphone.
“Can we talk about this?” Eve asked. “Surely there is some mutual understanding we can come to. It seems a little harsh to condemn us even though we had no idea what you were or that you objected to others using what you left behind.”
“Sure. We can talk. But the requirement for that is calling all your military to stand down.”
“I don’t have the authority to do that,” Eve said. “That would be the man standing next to you, Overhead O’Neill.”
Scarcity blinked, turning to him. “…Well?”
“Hrm, lemme think… Nope.” O’Neill said, folding his arms.
“O’Neill!” Eve blurted.
“They’ll kill all the Pinkies,” O’Neill said. “They don’t allow the ‘meta effects’.” This fact turned Eve to his side in an instant.
Scarcity blinked. “You can’t fight us, you know that!”
“We sure can try,” O’Neill said.
On the Enterprise’s main screen, ships began to appear. Earth Tau’ri and Equis Cosmic dominated the space, appearing from dimensional portals and FTL windows. Asgard and Ori Reform ships translated from Earth Tau’ri’s deeper space, bringing purple and white glows to the sky alongside the Flat Reapers’ mysterious shapes. Equis Vitis’ own satellites and defense systems activated, rainbow harmonic energy surging around the planet. Rune-ships appeared from Lai, built from the few Runes that were revered in such a way that allowed them to be lifted to the stars. The Gem Armada rolled into space. Cosmo’s energy began to flow between the ships of the fleet. Even the Star-remnant Tom showed up to defend Merodi Universalis.
Scarcity growled. “Fools…”
“They’re not the only ones!” another Twilight said, appearing in the call. Dozens of personal ships from the Sparkle Census appeared, no two looking exactly the same.
“I have come to realize that we qualify as having a ‘lasting impression’ of Merodi Universalis in us,” Valentine said, appearing in the universe with his own fleet from the USM.
Jenny appeared next with a small handful of ancient ships, one of which was brimming with more energy than any of the Starcross Society's warships. “Yeah, you guys sound lame. Screw you, we’re going to try to blow you up. Did you know this ship has a weird entity inside it that can make dreams a reality? I can’t wait to try it out on you. Seriously.”
A portal appeared in the midst of the forming fleet, pouring out dozens of eldritch abominations from the deepest pits of nightmares. “I was able to procure a small force,” Hastur declared. “It is modest, but Nyarlathotep gave his personal approval, which is quite rare.”
Eve fixed Scarcity with a smile. “Looks like you walked into the wrong neighborhood.”
Scarcity folded her hooves and let out a sharp breath of air. “Impressive. This may actually prove difficult… But we are the Starcross Society. We fought the entire race of Stars and won in our ancient history. You do not hold a candle to them.”
But one more ship had to arrive.
A simple, circular hole opened up in the front of the fleet facing the Starcross Society. Out flew a simple silver ship with three prongs sticking out the front, the letters ‘TSAB’ imprinted on one side.
Scarcity’s eyes widened. “No…”
Corona held up her phone, turning off the mute. “Yes!” The screen displayed the caller ID.
Nanoha Takamachi, TSAB.
Rohan laughed, coming out of his ‘sleep’. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a smaller manga. “Never hurts to have a Deus Ex Machina up your sleeve.” He opened it up to a page showing Nanoha herself with a very serious expression shouting ‘HIGH POWER STARLIGHT BREAKER!’
“Nonono…” Scarcity said, sweating.
“HIGH POWER…” the voice of Nanoha came from Corona’s phone. On the main screen, they could see a pink-red light forming on top of the TSAB ship.
Scarcity sat bolt upright. “EVERYONE GET OUT OF HERE!”
“STARLIGHT…”
“Why aren’t we leaving!?” Scarcity panicked.
“BREAKER!”
The Enterprise was teleported away in the last second by the TSAB, leaving only the rest of the Starcross Society ships in the line of fire. The sphere of energy collected within Nanoha’s many nested circles unleashed in a cone of rose energy. The magic tore through the fabric of reality as it moved, shaking Equis, the Sun and the Moon enough to jostle the orbits. The beam engulfed the entirety of the Starcross Society’s ships and flew off into space further than anyone could see. Years later, the beam would hit a loose star, destroy it, and keep going.
But when the magic cleared, the Starcross Society ships all remained. Only one in ten weren’t completely disabled, but they all survived.
“Leave,” Nanoha demanded. “These people are not part of you.”
Scarcity narrowed her eyes. “Nanoha… The White Devil...”
Nanoha pointed Raising Heart at her through the screen. “Do you want a war?”
“You cannot devote all the TSAB’s resources.”
“That wasn’t full power,” Nanoha reminded her. “Do you really want another multiverse war, even a small-scale one?”
Scarcity twitched.
“I ask you to look into your heart,” Nanoha pleaded. “Do you really think all the pain, agony, and torment that will come from a war is worth quarantining just one of hundreds of Class 3 societies, and one of the nicer ones at that? What you did against the Stars, that changed things.”
“…You were there.”
Nanoha nodded slowly. “It’s not worth it, Rarity.”
Corona put a hand on Scarcity – making sure the glove was on. “Don’t take out your pain on us. We’re not what your world could have been. We’re just different.”
Scarcity sighed. “…Everyone… Let’s go home.” She looked at everyone on the bridge of the Enterprise. “Never enter the Starcross Society again. We will kill any of you on sight.”
“Understood,” Eve said.
The Enchantress known as Scarcity lit her horn and left, taking the rest of her crew with her in the next few seconds. Then the rune-covered ships of the Starcross Society vanished, returning to their secluded area of the multiverse.
A few seconds later, Nanoha let out a breath of relief, followed up by a laugh.
“I don’t like that laugh,” O’Neill commented.
“They bought it,” Nanoha said, reclining. “I was afraid they wouldn’t!”
“…What!?” Eve blurted.
“There was no way the TSAB was going to engage in even a small-scale war against the Starcross Society. The best I was going to be able to do was call in personal favors. That would not have beaten them. Whew…” She wiped her brow.
Corona sat down on a chair. “Who cares if it was a bluff? It worked. We’re alive. And they’re gone.”
Nanoha teleported to the bridge of the Enterprise, smiling warmly. “Yes. It’s good that you called, Corona.”
“…Thanks?”
“Now, remember, whatever I say next, that you did good, okay Corona?”
“Uh… Sure?”
Nanoha nodded – then she turned to Rohan and whacked him aside the head with Raising Heart. “Don’t do that.”
“OW! Do what!?”
She made sure to cut the communication channel that was open. Then she held up the manga with her on it. “This. Don’t do this.”
“It saved us didn’t it?”
Nanoha sighed. “Yes… But you had the idea; you could have called me without writing it down. Ka is a dangerous substance to manipulate, Rohan. Very dangerous. The TSAB highly regulates any use of it, and carefully watches all Prophets we know of. It’s a very corrupting power that is best used by people unaware of it. Since you know… you are a powerful weapon, Rohan. A powerful weapon with the ability to change anything you want so long as you can find a way to do it in a good story. Use your power only as a last resort. And even then... I’ll ask that you don’t write anything about the TSAB again. That will force us to act against you, and I don’t want to do that.” She lifted the manga with her in it up and burned it. “They won’t know anything about this for that reason.”
Rohan blinked. “…I liked the art in that one.”
“You did catch my good side,” Nanoha said with a smile. “Just don’t do it again, okay?”
Rohan nodded slowly. “You will no longer be one of my characters.”
Nanoha nodded. “Good. Now… It looks like the fleet is disbanding. The moment where everyone here got along is gone. Things will be back to normal for you tomorrow.”
“…Great,” Corona said.
“I think I’ll stay for tea though – hope Iroh’s there, he’s always good for conversation.”
Corona smirked. “You know… I think I’d like to see him as well. To the tea shop!”
~~~
A week later, Corona had a dream.
The Rebellious Star appeared in the sky of her mind, shining his red light on her.
“Hi,” Corona said.
“I NEVER GOT TO THANK YOU.”
“Well, I was concerned with self-perseveration, so…”
“YOU STILL SAVED ME. YOU ALSO HELPED SCARCITY WITH YOUR WORDS AND ACTIONS.”
“Is change coming?”
“NO. THE SOCIETY IS FAR TOO DEEP INTO WHAT THEY’VE BECOME TO CHANGE. BUT YOU CAN REST A LITTLE EASIER KNOWING THAT ONE UNICORN’S LIFE WILL BE IMPROVED, IN THE END. …I THANK YOU FOR THAT MORE THAN SAVING MY LIFE.”
Corona nodded. “Even after all this time?”
“SHE STILL HAS SOMETHING NO OTHER BEING DOES.”
“Not sure what you see in her, admittedly.”
“IT IS AN ENIGMA EVEN TO MYSELF. THERE IS NO EXPLANATION. AND I HAVE COME TO TERMS WITH THIS. THERE IS NO NEED TO PUZZLE FURTHER.”
“Yeah…”
“AS A COURTESY, I AM WILLING TO ANSWER ANY BURNING QUESTIONS YOU MAY HAVE. I AM NOT MY BRETHREN. I WILL TELL YOU WHAT HAPPENED, OR WHATEVER YOU MAY WISH TO KNOW.”
“I don’t know… We’ve got a pretty complete picture of the whole Starstream War, know what started it, know who won… Those were the big questions we had. Oh, uh, do you know about a blue metal guy?”
“THE IMAGE I SEE IN YOUR MIND IS NOT ONE I HAVE SEEN BEFORE ASIDE FROM SONIC-BASED WORLDS. NOTHING OF THE SORT OF POWER YOU ARE THINKING OF.”
“Ah… Yeah, that seems to be the general consensus… …What is the Dark Tower, really?”
“THE DARK TOWER, PUT SIMPLY, IS THE CENTER OF THE MULTIVERSE. IT IS THE STRUCTURE THAT MAINTAINS THE PRESENCE OF KA THROUGHOUT THE MULTIVERSE, DRIVING THE ETERNAL SONGS OF EXISTENCE. THE STARS NEVER LEARNED ANY SPECIFICS – THE TOWER NEVER REVEALED MUCH OF ITSELF TO US. AND THE STARCROSS SOCIETY HAS LITTLE INTEREST IN LEARNING MORE OF THE STRUCTURE. IT IS NOT THAT I WON’T TELL YOU MORE; IT IS THAT I KNOW NOTHING MORE ASIDE FROM LEGENDS AND PASSING RELIGIOUS RUMORS FROM THE STRANDS.”
“Sounds like the big questions are beyond even you, eh?”
“PERHAPS. I DO NOT THINK IT IS BEYOND YOU, THOUGH. I THINK YOU WILL UNCOVER WHAT EXACTLY THE TOWER IS, ONE DAY. IGNORE WHAT MY BRETHREN SAY ABOUT YOU, AND WHAT THE STARCROSS SOCIETY WANTS YOU TO BELIEVE – I DO NOT THINK YOU ARE A BLEMISH. I THINK YOU ARE PART OF A LARGER STORY IN THE MULTIVERSE. A SPECIAL PART.”
“Really?”
“REALLY. GO FORTH, MERODI UNIVERSALIS. GO FORTH INTO EXISTENCE AND MAKE YOURSELF KNOWN. I WILL BE WATCHING FROM THE SIDES.”
Corona smiled. “…Thanks, Rebel.”
“YOU ARE MOST WELCOME, CORONA SHIMMER.”
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I think the message is don't mess with ka.... Just a guess
The TSAB would send their standard Nanoha collateral damage apology letter and fruit basket.
In any case, incredibly tense finale. Great stuff all around. And I do have to wonder how old Nanoha is... and how she whacked Rohan through the comms channel. Magic, I suppose.
This has, appropriately enough, been a very illuminating arc. The Starcross Society tells a grim tale of what a multiversal society can become when it lets itself be ruled by fear and shame. Now it's on to Mind, myriad possibilities and infinite branching choices like an endless field of connected neurons. MU was lucky before, but there are times when luck just doesn't matter. I suspect facing the Collector will be one of those times.
Again, happy anniversary. Here's looking forward to more.
9259462
To answer your other question, she's really REALLY old. How? Magic.
-GM, master of magic.
9259497
I kept looking for a sentence along those lines and couldn't find it. I'm just going to assume Wallflower Blush was on the Enterprise the whole time and was standing in front of it. 
Wait when did Pokemon show up?
(Also the Celestial Intelligence thing makes me think of and story I read on here years ago...)
9259900
The Collector mentioned them in the clipshow VERY briefly.
Pokemon will show up later, though. A few times acutally, in widely differing contests.
-GM, master of contextimus.
This is Twilence, isn't it? If so, Hi there! Nice to see you!
The funny thing about this story is that it would definitely have thousands of favorites, likes, and trackings were it published in 2014. Unfortunately the fandom is in a slow decline as of right now, but I still appreciate this story. It's one of the most addictive I've read in a long time, and when I'm not reading it I want to read it still. Please keep updating :)
I recommend this story.
I’d love to see a universe similar to this one! Also, we haven’t seen star and Marco since. Sucks :/
9267894
Added to my reading list.
It's unlikely to be added to SotS since I'm currently writing the endgame and have no need to add more stuff. However, stick around until chapter 100, you might have a chance to get it in then.
-GM, master of Starz.
9267945
Damn! You've already written that far after saying we're barely halfway?
9267964
As of right now, 129/157 are drafted.
-GM, master of spice nice.
Perhaps after finishing this, you could write a book or several in this format, but instead of ponies, at least at the beginning, you could start with humans, then moving on with other stuff, though copyrights may be difficult when introducing Ka into it XD.
9461125
You never see it, since this is a T rated fic, but every multiversal traveler worth their salt has encountered hentai, tentacle monsters, oversexualized media, rampant sex, and yes, wiener-flailing lunatics. You'd just trigger her instant-kill instincts since when things like that happen, stuff tends to get 'rapey', and that (for a lot of multiversal explorers) means kill before it gets a chance to get worse.
Sorry man.
-GM, master of spades.
9461225
"Oversexualized"
No such thing exists.
Also, I missed the Enter the Gungeon part of this chapter?
So the Starcross society operates under "might makes right" -- anywhere we can enforce our laws is our jurisdiction.
Are you sure this isn't supposed to be a commentary on the USA over the years? You did say that would be done by the USM.
What gets me is Capella. We know that the Starcross society missed that entire star, not just Lai. So if the Starcross wants to isolate all remnants of their war, they now need to isolate all 6 universes of Amber Ashes, and even the USM which was involved in that battle.
Somehow, this seems like a never ending, ever growing cleanup effort that should have run into problems at some point before this.
Also, it's not a bowling ball, it's a basket ball. Optimized for humorous situations and slapstick humor while playing.
It's interesting that BOTH Hope AND Scarcity refer to themselves as The Enchantress. I knew they were practically duplicates of each other, and they are just more like that as I see more.
Now, both the Starcross society, and the TSAB don't like aware prophets. The TSAB at least is willing to put up with prophets that are NOT aware.
And ... We had another prophet writing. Someone earlier thought it was Twilence.
* And Rohan is being written!
Rohan is NOT a prophet. Not really. Someone else is writing a story where Rohan is thought to be a prophet, but really there's a different prophet doing all the Ka control.
If this is Twilence, she is apparently trying to get her tool into place to take action against a multiversal society.
And ... I need to read more of The Influence. Ponygood, just how much did you upset her that she is taking actions like this now?
Alright, a break before the next arc for me. Gotta read The Influence, a couple of shorts that are background for this that I found on space battles, prep a character for Infinity Train, catch up on some other stories that I'm reading, and maybe get in some LSB to the end of arc 1 over there.
So there's one big thing that, as a reader, I felt was dangled in front of me that went nowhere.
Pinkie made a big deal about B5 earlier this arc.
Babylon 5, of course, had the big deal about "We are the guardians that want order, you will fit in your place", "We are the guardians that want change and growth, you will aim for your wants", and the showdown of "We don't need either of you, we can live our own life".
Here? Starcross fits the Vorlons "Fit in your place, don't break out of line" just nicely. What was playing the Shadow's role of "Seek what you want, gain power and make change"? And where was the "We don't need either extreme" Sheridan?
Man, Class 2 multiversal societies do be scary.
Very, very scary.
That was a completely unexpected (and maybe a little silly) cliffhanger to leave the previous chapter on leading into this. Wasn't expecting Flat world shenanigans or Overlord Hasbro to segue into Starcross becoming a bigger threat against Merodi. At least that bit got summarily dealt with, hopefully for good.
RIP Hermiod, though. Even if he wasn't the friendliest Asgard.
Rohan's definitely gotten some hard lessons about his Prophet abilities from this trip from execution and consequence. It's a good thing that Nanoha is an understanding person who hold Merodi in good graces as they continue to grow. Otherwise that could've gone quite badly for him.
Speaking of Prophetic beings, looks like Twilence made another appearance.
Much, indeed.
All the contacted universes plus USM and TSAB showing up to back up Merodi was definitely an awesome feel-good moment. Based off what Nanoha said though, I'm still not sure if even all that was going to be useful if things turned nasty. It's terrifying to know that some larger society out there was capable and willing to crush down on so many others to prevent them from growing any further (and kill all the Pinkies, too!
). Let's hope the MU avoids any further conflict with them. Hope that they have some advanced way of identifying worlds under Starcross Society jurisdiction like with USM.
Speaking of which, no takedown of Valentine this time around, looks like.
I hope that some positive change has been made in Scarcity after all this after the Rebellious Star was kept safe. Hopefully she'll be less of a problem in the future. And I wonder if the Rebellious Star will count as helpful friend in high places later? My money's on "no involvement", though, even if it did answer some of Corona's questions out of gratitude.
Man, things are so big and crazy and this is only chapter 65 out of 157. Still a lot more to go and it hard to imagine just how much bigger and crazier things can get from here. Looking ahead we're dealing with the Collector again. And possibly Randall Flagg. And then there's the University of Doors from your admission.
This bit feels like it's important. Am I misremembering or did this beam appear later in LSB? I'm having a hard time keeping track of stories now.