Prologue
Ten days.
That was how long Helena stood there, observing the thick clouds of the dark nebula flow past the main screen. It completely covered her field of vision, even if visual contact wasn’t strictly necessary for the search. She wouldn’t usually spend such a length of time awake and outside of cryostasis, but the dangers hidden amongst the clouds weren’t something she would ignore.
The high-density nebula in this sector of space had been a mystery for almost a hundred thousand years, and though there was a multitude of inhabited worlds nearby, its secrets remained uncovered. Ships and probes attempting to explore it were eventually lost, and the gas itself moved in such a chaotic fashion that mapping the safe parts had been deemed impossible, so the people who lived nearby eventually gave up and declared it forbidden space.
The local government, a small empire consisting of a few dozen worlds, had begrudgingly given Helena permission to enter—not that they could have stopped her if they refused. Their technology level was significantly lower than hers, though they could still construct smaller habitats in space and field fleets to keep the sector safe from pirates and smugglers. The gap also meant that they especially coveted the knowledge she carried within her ship, but at least were wise enough to realize how foolish it would be to try and take it by force. Even the most backwater world knew not to anger those who lived in the annals of deep time.
Helena herself was one of the oldest living members of the galaxy, having been born in a time when humanity was confined to a single star system. She was the daughter of a powerful noble house, and at an early age given her own starship to play with. When interstellar travel finally became feasible, due to the perfection of the cryostasis, she had immediately outfitted her vessel and embarked on the thousand year journey to the nearest colonizable star system.
She, however, was never one to settle down. Instead, she continued to another world, then another, and another. Fast forwarding through time while humanity entered a golden age of expansion. One of her primary goals in life had always been to find other intelligent lifeforms out there, but as humankind continued its exponential expansion, it became evident to all that the galaxy was, in fact, a very desolate place.
It took Helena three hundred thousand years to travel across the Milky Way, a journey that to her often only lasted seconds. Her ship searched countless worlds for any hint of intelligent life, but in the end, she couldn't even find evidence that a prior galactic civilization had ever existed. The galaxy was a barren wasteland until humanity came and filled it with life, terraforming dead worlds into green wonders.
But human empires and federations almost invariably seemed to collapse and disappear within a few millennia. The limits of sub-lightspeed travel made it too difficult to hold interstellar civilizations together, and since her old objective was no longer achievable, she had taken it upon herself to travel between the stars, helping the worlds she came across.
Helena did so mainly by sharing technology lost in time, in an effort to better the lives of those who needed it. It was a profession that allowed her to outfit herself, and her ship, through the ages with the various peaks of human ingenuity, and it had eventually made her into a force of nature few could oppose.
Her motive wasn't always altruistic, as another passion was to unravel secrets. The dark nebula she now explored was a mystery she had encountered once before when someone much like herself had gone to an extreme effort to hide something in the depths of space.
That time it had been a hidden moon, which was excavated into a massive treasure vault of sorts. She never plundered it, but simply took a recording of its contents, and left a polite message to whoever owned the place. Among her peers, it was often best not to make any enemies, as their revenge scheme might be something that hits you half a million years later.
Helena blinked.
The cloud density was thinning despite her traveling in the thickest parts of the nebula. It wouldn't be long now; indeed, seconds later she was moving through open space and felt time slow to a halt.
The ship had detected a danger and injected her with a time-dilating stimulant, allowing her mind to work at such speed that time appeared frozen. The screens around her flickered, due to her mind being synced with the ship itself, and displayed the reason she was placed under alert.
She had entered a hollowed out area, large enough to fit a small star system containing a yellow sun with a single inhabited planet accompanied by a moon.
More importantly, she was under attack by tens of thousands of weapon platforms strewn about the system. The ship brought up images of missiles that were already well on their way to impact, and it seemed like she had underestimated the resources of her opposition.
The quality of the weapons nearly matched her own, and it was quite clear that she wouldn't come out of this fight unscathed. The screens were replaced with battle plans that outlined different scenarios for her to choose from, and she spent two hours in dilated time considering which option to pick.
Her ship always recommended her to pick the safest option, to destroy the platforms and remain in space until her vessel could self-repair, but Helena felt extra bold today. Scans of the planet's surface revealed a pre-industrial civilization, and it had been a long time since last she visited such a place. What she decided upon next would likely cause widespread panic, but there wasn't much she could do to prevent that now.
She selected the option that would set her on a collision course with the planet, then removed the time-dilution serum from her system. Less than a second of real time had passed, but now everything happened at once. Hundreds of gunports opened from hidden locations beneath the hull of her ship and returned fire. Counter-batteries and missiles fired relentlessly in every direction, but she only frowned at the explosions filling the screen and turned to walk away towards her living quarters.
The massive ship shook and trembled under the assault, as entire sections were ripped apart by blasts strong enough to pulverize most other vessels; a fact that didn't bother her in the slightest. She had already predicted the outcome of the battle, and any superficial damage could be fixed in due time. The only thing that interested her was why someone had gone through such an effort to keep a single world hidden away.
It took ten minutes to reach her quarters, and she didn't bother with slowing down time when deciding on what to wear. It was always best to dress simple when visiting primitive worlds, something that would allow her to blend in with the local populace. She grinned and chose an elaborate white dress that swept the floor with dramatic, elegant long sleeves, pearl accents, an empire waist, and a beautiful artistic pattern.
Another direct hit violently shook the ship, but she pointedly ignored the twisting and groaning of metal and instead made practice swirls in her new garments. The look she was going for would likely pass her off as a young noblewoman, and the chaos and confusion would make it easy for her to infiltrate whatever government ruled the small planet. It was reasonable to believe that whoever created the world still resided on the planet, or more likely was awoken from cryostasis due to her involvement, but she was confident that she could handle herself.
The dress she wore brought back long lost memories of when she last visited a medieval world, one where she could dance and sing all night in taverns like a young fool without any worries in life.
She barely took note as she whistled a tune from an age long gone, or how much added spring there was in her steps as she danced down to the hangar bay.
This was what she lived for.
“Don't touch that,” Keeper snapped, once again cursing his choice of successor. The brown and black unicorn stallion in front of him was middle-aged, yet still as clumsy as a colt fresh out of the stable.
“Sorry, Keeper,” the stallion said while using his magic to levitate the pendulum back to its original position.
“Don't touch that with your magic,” Keeper growled, then interrupted the stallion's concentration by flinging a hoof at his horn. “It could be dangerous to interact with ancient relics using magic. Have you learned nothing in school?”
The stallion only snorted in response, and Keeper now knew it was time to find another apprentice. Sadly, the stallion had been far from the first pony to be negligent about the job as Royal Caretaker of Ancient Artifacts. It was as if the job description only catered to those who wanted a position where they could slouch in an office chair, or hide in the corner and read magazines about the latest celebrity scandal.
Keeper mostly liked it for the ominous black robes with silver lining.
“It's just old junk,” the stallion mumbled, using his hoof to return the pendulum to its glass container on the shelf. There were a few more to inspect before their round was complete, and it was considered by most to be dreary work, measuring the magic level of each artifact to make sure whatever enchantments they once possessed wouldn't activate again.
Keeper was one of the few who enjoyed the routine and didn't mind the fact that they were over a dozen stories beneath Canterlot Mountain. The smooth stone walls and the dull red carpets lining the cold floor took a few decades to get used to, but once you did, you didn't feel quite at home without the musty air and burning torches.
“Can't you show me the third level instead? This place is so dull,” the stallion continued while inspecting a small pyramid in the next glass container. The readings on his portable magic analyzer showed that the magic contained within was unchanged since their last inspection. “Why did anyone even bother enchanting a cheap pyramid tourist prop anyway?”
“Who knows? It was Daring Do who bought it from a street vendor, near the statue of Somnambula I believe. The clerk claimed it helped with fertility if you placed it on your nightstand.”
“Does it work?” the stallion asked, now inspecting the thing more curiously.
“Doubtful,” Keeper replied, then urged the stallion to hurry up by flickering him with his tail. “Half of the artifacts here claim to do something similar.”
“What about visiting the third layer?” the stallion insisted and motioned further down the row of shelves. At the very end was an ornate door that shimmered with the full spectrum of various magical barriers, behind which the most ancient of artifacts were stored. Nobody alive knew what their actual purpose was, only that the magic within was foreign to ponies, and that the artifacts themselves were ageless.
“I suppose it's time you saw it,” Keeper said, and made his way toward the door with his assistance in tow. “But if you touch anything you'll be fired on the spot, are we clear?”
“Crystal.”
“Good,” Keeper said, haughtily. In truth, he hoped the stallion would do something inappropriate so he could fire him with a good conscience.
They stopped side by side next to the door, and Keeper loosened the key around his neck chain. There wasn't anything improper about him showing his apprentice the third level, but Celestia might question his decision in their next briefing.
He turned the golden key hard to one side, then unceremoniously pushed the door open with his forehooves. Magically fueled torches responded to the movement and burst alive, illuminating the oval room with six different display cases in each of the corners.
“It's a lot smaller than I expected,” the stallion said, and took a careful step into the center of the room. It was impossible to see what each contained, as they were all covered by a thick, dark blanket.
“There were only six of these items ever found,” Keeper mused, and moved to remove one of the covers. It contained a black helmet decorated with strange symbols that obviously wasn’t meant to fit on a pony. “These were considered ancient long before Equestria's founding, yet they remain in perfect condition without a single trace of rust.”
“Has anypony ever figured out their purpose, or who made them?” the stallion asked, then turned away from Keeper.
“Not yet,” Keeper said, and continued his lecture. “Magic behaves wildly in their presence, and even great wizards like Star Swirl the Bearded had no clue what to make of them. But they’ve been dormant for as long as ponykin-”
It was then Keeper noticed the red pulse coming from behind him. He suddenly felt the hair on the back of his neck stand on end, and turned slowly on shaking legs to find his apprentice stand in front of a display case, a blanket in his hoof.
He was facing a floating white orb the size of a buckball. It seemed to be observing his apprentice through unseen eyes, while radiating red lights across the room every five seconds or so.
“Get away from it,” Keeper snapped, with a throat so dry he could barely get the words out. But the stallion was too paralyzed to move.
Suddenly, a small hole opened at the front of the orb, and it sent visible blue wavelengths all over his apprentice's body. Keeper could only gape as the magic the artifact projected made the stallion’s skin translucent.
“Subject scan complete,” the orb said, in perfect Equestrian, then turned its attention to Keeper. “Warning, hostile vessel detected near outer rim. Defense systems insufficient. Catastrophic failure imminent. Full access required.”
Keeper didn’t know what the orb was talking about, and he needed to alert the guards.
“What vessel?” he asked while slowly inching his way towards the exit.
The orb continued its focus on Keeper and flew past the petrified apprentice to hover right in front of his muzzle.
“Unknown configuration,” the orb said and rotated once in the air. “Scans indicate unknown weaponry beyond the defense perimeters ability to counter. Planetary evacuation is advised.”
“What weapons?” Keeper tried to back away from the orb, but the thing followed him closely. He needed to send word about this to Celestia, but the sphere distorted the air around it, and he knew how dangerous it was to use magic in its presence. Still, he took a gamble and activated his horn.
He sent his magic forward until it latched onto his apprentice, who remained stunned, and tossed him across the room. He had meant to move the stallion towards the exit while the orb was pre-occupied with him, but the orb's presence interfered with Keeper's control, and his apprentice was launched head first into a wall. The stallion was unconscious before he even hit the ground.
The orb ignored the crash and instead addressed Keeper.
“Current location unknown,” it said, then spun around, with what Keeper figured to be its front, towards the exit. “Authorized personnel required.”
Keeper still didn’t know what it was talking about, but an idea came to mind.
“I can take you to our highest authority.”
The orb, which had been about to leave, swung around again. Being stared at by a featureless white ball was profoundly unnerving.
“Proceed.”
Celestia drew the covers up to her neck and shuffled around until she found that perfect sweet spot in her bed. She had been afraid that her sleeping habits would change after Starlight Glimmer temporarily swapped her cutie mark with her sister's, but nothing so far was out of the ordinary.
She adjusted her nightcap to hang behind her face and was about to pull her sleeping mask over her eyes when the doors to her bedchamber barged open.
“Princess!” a guard shouted, and ran all the way up to the edge of her bed. “We have a situation.”
Celestia, never the mare for the dramatic, lazily turned and extended both wings until the bed covers slid off her, then moved her nightcap over to the nightstand.
“What ails the nation, my little pony?” she asked, calmly.
“One of the six ancient artifacts just activated,” he said between quick breaths. “It followed Keeper from the archives, and he urgently asks everyone of importance to meet him in the main hall. He said there might be an invasion coming from the Celestial Sea.”
An invasion from the sea? It wouldn’t have been the first, and she doubted it was connected with one of those dusty old trinkets in the archive. Star Swirl believed them to be harmless, but nonetheless insisted that they be kept safe and under watch.
She moved out of bed and draped one wing across his back.
“Tell me everything as we walk.”
Keeper moved restlessly back and forth in the royal meeting room. He had told the orb to wait here, but the artifact responded by floating over to the round table and drifting above its center. The new captain of the guard, Stonewielder, was the first to arrive. The pegasus only needed to take a quick glance at the orb and Keeper to get a sense of the situation.
Next to arrive was Prince Blueblood, who mostly grumbled about being dragged from bed. The unicorn was the only one to take a seat at the table and didn’t seem to even register the orb's presence. When Blueblood finally did so, he instinctively activated his horn.
“My Prince!” Keeper barked, nearly scaring the unicorn out of his seat. “I would advise that you refrain from using magic in its presence. The results can be problematic.”
Blueblood raised an eyebrow at Keeper, shrugged, then sat studying the orb with a bored expression.
“What is the situation?” Celestia asked, coming through the main door with Luna by her side. They both stopped a few yards from the table when they saw the orb. “Oh, I remember this one.”
“It came alive half an hour ago, Your Majesty,” Keeper said and bowed deeply. “I believe my foolish apprentice somehow switched it on.”
“And where is your apprentice now?” Luna asked, then frowned. “Would you remove your hood first so we can see you more clearly?”
Keeper mumbled to himself, but eventually pulled back the hood. He felt more at ease when his pale coat and white mane remained hidden. “Unfortunately, my apprentice is in the medical ward recovering from a mild concussion.”
“Concussion?”
“It was an accident,” Keeper continued when everyone in the room looked questionably at him. “I tried to levitate him to safety, but the orb warped my magic, and he hit a wall.”
“We will question him when has recovered,” Luna said and walked around the table while studying the orb from different angles. “It hovers but doesn’t seem active. You mention that it’s capable of speech?”
“Uh, yes. I told it to wait here until everyone was assembled.” Keeper had tried to start a conversation with the orb during their walk to the meeting room, but the artifact had remained silent despite his coaxing. “So, shall we begin?”
This time everyone turned to stare at the white orb.
“I hope you didn’t wake us all up because some ancient unicorn toy, most likely meant to entertain foals, told you that the world was ending,” Blueblood said, and was about to leave his chair.
“We’re still missing Fancy Pants,” Stonewielder said, joining the conversation.
“I don’t think we have time to wait for him,” Keeper replied, and took a gamble. He cleared his throat, then addressed the orb directly. “I brought the figures of authority you asked for; you may proceed.”
The orb instantly came to life and opened several small slots around its smooth, white surface. It emitted the same blue waves from before, and this time they enveloped the entire room. Keeper looked down at his hooves and saw his bones through the now transparent flesh. The thought of this artifact somehow being related to the Crystal Heart crossed his mind.
“Limited access granted,” the orb said, and closed the holes, canceling the strange magic. “Situation update: unknown vessel breached the outer perimeter thirty-five minutes ago. Eighty-nine percent of defense platforms destroyed. Complete failure estimated within fifteen minutes. Warning: significant debris ring in high orbit. Recommend planetary evacuation.”
The room fell silent, and everyone in the room waited for it to elaborate.
“Could you be more specific?” Celestia asked, carefully.
“Is this some Alien Alicorns versus Space Pirates reenactment?” Blueblood looked around like he expected everyone to start laughing.
The orb responded by opening a lid at its top, and a transparent hologram appeared high in the air. It was more detailed than what a unicorn could produce, but Keeper still didn’t understand what it was suppose to be. Yes, it was a long metal ship of sorts, but unlike any design he had ever seen before, and more importantly, lacking sails or a balloon. It was hard to get a sense of the scale without any comparisons, but he doubted it could be larger than an Equestrian galleon with so much metal padding.
A light flashed from the ship, and the hologram disappeared.
”Planetary evacuation recommended,” the orb repeated, and closed its top.
”How do you even evacuate a planet?” Luna asked, then frowned. ”What do you make of this, sister?”
”I have no idea,” Celestia replied. ”I understand its words, but not the meaning.”
”Majesty,” Stonewielder said sternly and pointed up at the ceiling. ”Look up, is it supposed to be this bright outside?”
Keeper followed the Captain's hoof to the skylight. It should be nighttime, and yet the sky was a strange blend of red and dark gray. The window was tiny compared to the ones in the great hall, but even so, Keeper saw a comet soar past.
”Wait, what just flew by?” Blueblood asked, and rose from the chair so fast it fell backward to the ground.
Keeper’s ears flickered, something was going on outside the room. It was inaudible at first, but the more he strained his hearing the clearer it became.
Ponies were screaming.
Celestia and Luna were the first to act, both slamming through the main door so fast that Keeper barely had time to react. The guards at the entrance were surprised to see their rulers run past them with such haste.
Keeper ran after them and silently cursed whenever his dark robe threatened to trip him over. He couldn’t keep up with them for long, and was soon alone in one of the hallways, back against the wall and panting heavily. Outside it sounded like the entire city was in an uproar.
Curious about the sudden brightness in the hallway, he stood up on his hindlegs and jumped to look out one of the windows, then instantly wished he hadn’t. The night sky was an inferno, and there were meteor trails everywhere he looked: thousands of them.
”Is this what the orb warned about?” he asked, to no one in particular.
The ship wasn’t coming from the sea, but from outer space!
”Keeper,” Stonewielder said, appearing at the end of the hallway. ”The Princesses need us. Follow me!”
It was fortunate that the Captain’s strict tone was so effective, else Keeper would’ve continued staring blankly out the window. Instead, he quickly broke into a full gallop despite his fatigue and followed wherever the Captain leads him.
They scurried through the palace side-by-side, ignoring the terrified staff. Some guards had even abandoned their posts, leaving their spears behind on the ground.
The Captain wasn’t happy when he saw that.
They found both Princesses on the plateau behind the throne room, and Celestia acknowledged their presence with a nod.
”Captain Stonewielder,” she said. ”We have a situation on our hooves. I want word sent to every enlisted unicorn in the country. I want protective domes around every town and city within the hour. Understand?”
“Yes, your Majesty,” he said, and saluted before taking to the air.
“Keeper,” she continued and noticed how hard he was panting. “When you’ve caught your breath, I want you to return to the meeting room and get as much information you can from the artifact. We need to know more.”
Keeper simply nodded and sat down on the cold stone.
Celestia turned away from him and returned to her sister's side. It was hard for Keeper to see from where he was, but the Princess of the Night had her horn active, and she appeared to be crying.
“They are all gone,” Luna said, her voice broken. She was looking up into the sky with lifeless eyes. “I can’t sense a single one.”
Keeper didn’t understand and turned in wonder at the burning sky. Everywhere he looked he could see the fiery tails of slow-moving meteors, their blazing bodies strong enough to illuminate the entire night sky.
He stood up and was about ready to return to his assignment when the ground suddenly began pounding. It was barely noticeable at first, and it grew more violent until Keeper had to strain himself to be able to remain standing. Luckily, the earthquake lasted only for a short while.
But Keeper no longer dared to move, and could only listen to the cacophony of the panicked city, until it was eventually drowned out by the ringing of alarm bells.
Helena scratched the side of her chin. The small stealth pod she was in wasn’t the most stable vessel she owned, and the way it violently hurtled towards the surface lacked much of the grace she often desired in her spacecraft, but the velocity and design made it untraceable by even the most advanced tracking system.
The situation outside her pod was worse than she had initially estimated. It no doubt looked like armageddon to the inhabitants below, but she had made sure that her ship’s weapons blew the defense platforms into small enough pieces that they would, mostly, burn up in the atmosphere.
The only real danger was her main ship, which she ordered to make a crash landing on an isolated mountain ridge. The people on the ground would no doubt feel the tremors across the entire continent when it impacts the surface, but she was confident it wouldn’t cause any devastating earthquakes.
Still, looking out the window of her small pod, it might be best if she stayed low for a few days and let things calm down on the surface. Having stayed awake for weeks at a time presented no real difficulties for her, but she might as well take this opportunity to recover.
Then the fun would begin.
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Oh man! OH MAN!
Crashing your car into a house with no way of getting home instead of parking normally possibly isn't the best idea, but it's one hell of an entrance to the party!
Why would she deliberately crash it? Why would she allow her ship to become damaged in the first place if shes as BAMF as claimed?
I would normally say story moving like this was too fast.
This however works which is pretty neat. Feels quite a bit like alot of science fiction I read in the past when I was younger.
Too early to tell but it seems internally consistent, and well written. Just in a style I haven't seen in a bit. Kind of like the early ring world short stories.
Looking forward to more.
Too bad lady, your the wrong species to "blend in" with the society on the surface
The defense platforms were the stars and Luna could "feel" them... interesting
8559001
Hahaha...
I imagine crashing into à 5 stars hôtel with a Bentley then walking calmly in, throwing the keys to a random guy. "Park it in the shadow please."
I call bullshit.
She can't be that old if she was born in such ancient times. She can't have precious new technology of she got her spaceship 1000 years ago. Biologically speeding up time so much is impossible. She is a side pirate, no matter what excuse you use.
11026061
As the timeline goes, the thousand years was mentioned as the time it took her to travel to the nearest colonizable star system in the era when space travel first became feasible. It then took her another three hundred thousand years to cross the galaxy in search of intelligent life. And this all happened three million years ago from when the story begins.
While she wouldn't see herself as a pirate, that statement isn't entirely incorrect.
Big House of Suns energy.
I love it!