The Stars Beyond The Veil

by Charlemane

01 - The Bird in the Cage

If sound could carry in space, you would have heard the rhythmic thumping of my helmet against the drone control console as I tried in vain to solve my problems with the sheer power of my frustration. Sound, however, does not carry in space, so the only thing you would have seen would have been the image of me flailing like a madpony and making obscene gestures at an inanimate object. You may now take bets as to who was winning.

With a frustrated groan, I kicked the console with enough force to put tears in my eyes. Now, granted, most ponies would say that physical force would be the opposite of what you should apply in any situation regarding delicate, and finely tuned instrumentation, but these ponies had never encountered the Scrap Bandit. The Scrap Bandit was a ship in need of a kick in the teeth. It was perfectly horrendous, a mishmash of ship parts assembled from whatever was left of the junkyard it was built in. More on that later.

I stared at my WANDs readout, while I waited for my fix to kick in, sighing into the scrubbers in my helmet, and getting a minty fresh blast air in response. I was about to say ‘screw it’ when my WAND beeped with new information.

Reboot complete. Recalling drones to bay.

“Yes!” I shouted, throwing my legs up in victory. The ship shuddered as the drone bay opened. Three seconds later my WAND beeped again with another message for my readout.

Internal Exception Error: Drones 3 and 4 now rebooting.

Also, in space, no one can hear you scream.

*****

Six months. Compared to the lifetime before it, six months doesn’t seem like much time at all. That, however, is misinformation. Six months can be a long time, like, a really, really long time. You see, six months ago, my life sucked. My career as a salvager was on a seven-year streak and going nowhere, my account was about as empty as it had ever been, and I still needed to put in a solid twenty, before I could even make rent. But, it was all okay, or so I assured myself, because I was a pilot. Sure I was on the bottom rung of society, making barely enough to feed myself and wage-slave to one of the stingiest bastards this side of the PC, but I was a pilot! I could fly ships! How many ponies could claim that? Well, quite a few, but I was one of them, and damn was I proud.

When I was a little colt, I fantasized about going on some grand space adventure like the ones in my old comic books. Where I, the daring hero, would step up and save the galaxy with incredible feats of bravery and cunning. I wanted to be like Lickadee Split and the Scoot’n’Shoot 500, or Cap’n Cosmo and his crew of roughneck outlaws. I wanted to mean something. I wanted to do something important! And somehow, I just knew that my fate lay in the stars.

See, I had dreams once, and they were great dreams. I dreamed about becoming a pilot and going into space. I believed that if I could just get out there, I would discover my destiny. I would touch the stars and explore the great unknown. I was gonna be a pilot like my dad and fly spaceships, and it was going to be great. At least, before mom died.

I still remember the look on dad’s face when he told me what had happened. I remember how angry I had been; how alone, hurt, and confused I’d felt as I grappled with the loss. And then what did dad do? He joined the military. He left a note with his WAND on the couch, telling me I should keep it safe and make sure that I kept up the apartment while he was away. He left me with 200 bits, a run-down apartment, and no way to pay for it. And to top it all off, he didn’t even write. I never saw the bastard again.

In the blink of an eye, my dream was dead. But I didn’t give up on it, oh no. I got my dream. I sold my soul to someone else for it, but I got my dream. Despite everything, I earned my pilot’s license at the age of seventeen, and I was damn proud of it.

And now I’m a space janitor.

Did I want this? Hell no. How was I supposed to know that having a pervasive genetic defect barred you from military service? Or that showing up to a job interview without a cutie mark made you look like some druggie off the street? Why did it matter if I had Fade? I certainly wasn’t alone, billions of ponies had it and they did just fine… sometimes. I don’t know if you could imagine what it felt like to watch my dreams burn. I don’t know if I can even describe it. All I know is that it changed me.

I gave my damndest to chase my dreams, and I did whatever it took to get them. I dealt drugs to pay rent. I played buck-in-the-middle for desperate ponies trying to get their fix so they could deal with life, all the while answering help-wanted ads from the local classifieds. I wanted something better than a run-down apartment in the station slums. That’s how I met Junkyard.

He found me one slow day in my alley. He told me that he knew my father, and that he needed a talented young pegasus like myself to fly his ship for him. I couldn’t speak, I was so shocked. The next thing I knew, I was flying. Though, not the way I’d dreamed. Thanks to Junkyard, I became a salvager, a cog in the galactic machine. I was... average. I wouldn’t become like my heroes. Instead, I was just Horizon Seldat, a poor pony making just enough money to cover rent each month and little else. But I was flying, damn it! I was a pilot! And to me that meant something. Or at least it did.

Once upon a time...

---

Charlemane Presents...

---

The C-Band crackled to life as I opened a line with the tower. It had a been another long shift, and all I really wanted to do was sleep.

“Scrap Bandit to Docking Authority,” I said, rolling through procedure, “Scrap Bandit requesting permission to snap in.”

I waited in the silence, staring at the gleaming line of ships leading home, like tiny stars in the great shadow of L6-C. A few years ago I would have told you the view was pretty, now, well, it was just another part of the job and a grim reminder of how boring the next few hours were going to be. Traffic always sucked around the queues.

After a few moments, the Tower responded, “Docking Authority to Scrap Bandit, please transmit credentials,” the buck in the tower said. He sounded bored, though at this time of night, who could blame him? If I was stuck in a chair staring at screens all day I’d be chewing horseshoes too. My WAND beeped a confirmation as I sent him the details.

“Scrap Bandit to Docking Authority, credentials sent,” I replied. I leaned back against my harness, easing into a more relaxed position while fighting the urge to stretch. My wings itched. I wanted to be out. Being cramped in a ship all day did hell to a pegasus’ nerves. I planned to get some fresh air in the station, and maybe even hit up the plaza for a quick flight before bed.

“Docking Authority to Scrap Bandit, permission granted! Please proceed in queue to dock one, three, delta,” the tower finally said. The console in front of me flashed with the details.

“Dock one, three, delta, aye Docking Authority,” I replied.

“Confirmation accepted. Welcome home, Scrap Bandit.” The line closed with a pop.

---

A Faderverse Story

---

I rolled into queue, levelling off as I passed the first dock marker and eased into position. I was in the line behind a small cargo ship, perhaps a few hulls larger than my own. Head lolling in weightlessness, I let my attention drift until I passed marker two: the services marker.

My WAND beeped as it was immediately flooded with advertisements for the various services available on-station. I grumbled as the jingle for Snowdrop’s Snowcones played for the thousandth time. I don’t care if it’s catchy, some things just get old. A small ping in my vision alerted me to an incoming call.

Incoming Transmission Request from Juryrig Enterprises.

I groaned. This day was about to get much, much longer. The C-Band opened with a soft crackle.

“What,” I said darkly.

“The hell do you mean what?” said the bane of my existence, “I’ve been waiting all sun-damned afternoon for your ass and all you have to say is ‘what?’” Junkyard sounded like he chewed concrete for a living, though considering he owned a scrapyard and made a living selling another ponies’ trash, that didn’t really surprise me. He had two volume settings: loud, and irate. “Where the hell have you been?”

I rolled my eyes as I actively tried to avoid looking at the drone console. “Fishing out that satellite from belt three, what else?”

“For eighteen hours? That should have taken eight, tops!”

“Yeah, eight, if I didn’t have to reboot your shitcan drones every ten minutes,” I shot back, adding a stomp for effect.

“Bullshit, those drones are good and you know it,” Junkyard replied.

Sure, two decades ago…

I was about to respond when my WAND fired off a proximity warning. I fired the bow thrusters, killing my forward momentum and barely avoiding another hole in the viewport. Several new messages popped up on my readout, presumably from the cargo ship I nearly rammed. At least now I had some reading material.

“Look, boss, as much as I’d love to chat, unless you want to add ‘replace fucking ship’ to the damages, I’m gonna have to chat later.”

“Office! Cargo! Now!” He bellowed. The C-Band popped as the line closed.

“Asshole,” I groused, sighing. Feeling a tingle creeping into my legs, I settled in for what was shaping up to be a very long night in the queues.

---

The Stars Beyond the Veil

Chapter One:

The Bird in the Cage

“Today we mourn the loss of the Bearers of Harmony, who time and time again have braved the darkness, selflessly risking their lives to protect the health and welfare of all. Today we gather to honor these heroes, these six mares, who left an unforgettable mark upon the lives of all Equestrians. It is with heartfelt sorrow, now, that we finally lay to rest Celestia’s own student and the bearer of Magic, Twilight Sparkle. May she rest peacefully in the arms of the goddesses, and may her selfless tenacity, enduring enthusiasm, and relentless entrepreneurial spirit serve as a shining example to all.”
- Memorial Service for Twilight Sparkle 1125 E.C.

---

The ship shuddered as the magnetic docking clamps finally locked into place, securing my ship to the docks, and finally allowing me to breathe a sigh of relief.

“Queues suck,” I grumbled as I sent off a request for a cargo lift and hit the harness release. The latches came free, and I drifted out of my improvised pilot’s chair, floating slightly toward the ceiling as my momentum carried me upward. Twisting, I grabbed a handlebar on the roof of pilot’s cabin, before kicking off toward the rusted door to the access corridor. Keying the door control, I waited. And waited. And waited.

“Dammit,” I groaned. Honestly, I should have known better than to trust the Bandit to have working controls, but given how long I had been working I’m just going to blame the fatigue. Slowly, I pried open the small maintenance panel next to the door and used my WAND to turn the little lever inside. The door to the access corridor grinded open at a snail’s pace. Once it was open wide enough, I wiggled through into the vacuum corridor beyond.

Now, in normal starships the interior of the ship is pressurized, and possesses such niceties as artificial gravity and airlocks that open and close on their own. The Bandit is not a normal starship. Artificial gravity was bucked, and the builder’s idea of a safe depressurization chamber was two pipes on either side of the door to brace yourself against, as the vacuum rapidly sucked everything into space. Lucky for me, that last little feature resolved itself after one of the previous pilots was ejected into the orbit of Luna six after a meteorite breached the pilot cabin. Did I mention that I was the one who installed the harness? That was why. And no, Junkyard did not fix the breach. At least the view was nice.

I took a short stroll down the access corridor to the rear facing airlock, releasing the door clamps and swinging it open with some difficulty. Making a controlled float outside, I shut the hatch behind me.

Ugly. That was the Scrap Bandit in a word. I used to joke it was more scrap than bandit until other ponies started adopting the moniker and wouldn’t let it go. Junkyard built the monstrosity from leftover scrap so he could stop spending his bits on rental fees. Consequently, the exact same day he finished it he also stopped flying, choosing instead to hire pilots too desperate or stupid enough to try and fly it themselves.

Since then, the ship has scored three kills all of whom were previous pilots. The first died when the life support gave out and started flooding the ship with carbon dioxide, the second from a magical discharge during a routine engine check, and the last when, well, I already covered that one.

I gently kicked off the hull of the Scrap Bandit toward the docking platform and activated my suits magnetic soles using my WAND. I landed with a thud I felt more than heard. As I recovered, a pegasus in a muddy brown dock worker suit approached me.

“You the one who ordered the cargo lift?” she asked, the radio in her helmet giving her voice a mechanical edge.

“Yeah, I’ve got a load of salvage I need delivered to Junkyard’s shop.” I replied. The dock worker took a brief glance at the Scrap Bandit.

“We don’t tow spaceships.”

I mentally updated my list of things I hated about my job. Times I’d heard that joke, plus one. Grumbling, I said, “Just get the cargo to the shop and bill the owner.” Junkyard’s ship, Junkyard’s problem. I smiled at the lecture I would be getting when the bill arrived.

“Whatever.” the dock worker replied. She turned and kicked off towards the waiting cargo lift where a second tech stood waiting. Not bothering to watch their work, I trotted across the platform to the airlock and the station beyond. The airlock closed behind me as I entered, and immediately began to pressurize with breathable air with a hiss that built in volume as sound slowly returned.

I sat on my haunches and my forehooves found the latches on either side of my helmet. Two clicks later my helmet was off, floating briefly for a moment before clattering to the ground as the artificial gravity kicked in. A sickening lurch filled me as my normal weight returned. WAND glowing, I scooped up my helmet and stored it in my suit’s pack and then took a deep breath of the freshly cycled air. It smelled like heaven compared to the scrubbed substitute I had been inhaling for the last eighteen hours.

A chime sounded and the door to the station interior slid neatly open. I trotted through the small corridor into the main boulevard, and from there into the city street. A wave of relief followed. Airspace. Glorious airspace. Spending too long in a cramped area would drive any pegasus nuts. That’s why our colonies were built like the cities on planets. We needed the headroom, if only for our sanity. Sighing, I followed the roads leading to Junkyard’s office.

*****

Since in the moment after I walked into his office, I was not pelted with pens, notepads, mugs and whatever other hard objects may have been within reach of Junkyard’s hooves, I assumed that the bill had not yet arrived. I considered it a lucky break and began hoping that I would be getting paid in full for this job.

Junkyard sat at his desk and immediately turned to see me, his tail knocking over a stack of papers as his obese dark brown frame rotated ponderously in his seat. He ignored the falling papers and focused his grumpy demeanor in my direction.

“There you are ya lazy git.” Junkyard said, his gruff voice carrying its familiar hostile edge.

“Always a pleasure to see you too, Junkyard,” I said evenly, “Sat’s recovered. Where’s my pay?” I sent a log of the cargo details to the small tablet sitting crosswise on his desk. It beeped as the transmission went through.

Junkyard picked up the tablet and scanned through it with his beady black eyes, muttering idly to himself while a frown deepened on his face—probably its most natural position.

I cleared my throat and received an annoyed glare in response. “My pay?” I said.

Junkyard made a noncommittal grunt, “Later, payday isn’t till the end of the week. And I haven’t verified this shipment yet.” It’s worth noting that Junkyard’s cutie mark was an IOU. Did I mention he was also fat? Oh, and ugly. Like his ship.

“Rent is in three days, boss,” I argued, “I need my pay now! I’ll lose my apartment if the landlord doesn’t get his due.”

“Not my fault you don’t know how to manage your money,” Junkyard snorted.

“That’s because I don’t have any money to manage! You stingy git!”

Junkyard slammed a hoof on his desk. “Do you really wanna do this right now you ungrateful little shit?” he barked. “I’ve got things to do and all you’re doing is interrupting.”

“And I’ve got food to buy so I don’t die and cost you the only pilot to survive your shitcan of a ship!”

“I can’t pay you now.” Junkyard folded his fore hooves in front of him.

“Find a way.”

“You’re in no position to argue,” he countered.

“Neither are you,” I reminded him. This was a regular discussion. On bad days it would go on for hours with much shouting and heated arguing, sometimes drawing the attention of people outside the shop. Strangely enough, today was not a bad day. That, or Junkyard really did have something more pressing to attend to aside from sitting on his ass and collecting revenue.
He glared at me for a moment and then, grumbling noisily, ducked underneath his desk to the safe he kept there. There was a low beeping noise and a few moments later he placed a pair of bitsticks on the desk.

“Here’s half. I’ll pay you the rest once I finish inspecting the salvage,” he rumbled, setting himself back down into his seat.

“Thanks, boss,” I said sweetly. I levitated the bitsticks into the suit’s pack, noting Junkyard’s jealous eyes as they drifted to the device on my forehead. I shifted my head slightly so he could get a better look while a vain grin spread across my face.

“Get out.” he barked. I turned and stormed out. As I left I passed a unicorn in a dock worker’s suit, entering the office with a small pad floating in front of her. I smiled as I brushed past her imagining what the look on Junkyard’s face would be in a few short minutes. Tomorrow would suck, but it was so worth the trouble.

On the way back to my apartment I stopped by the plaza near Haymart and Hooves. My wings itched. I needed to fly, and while my body wanted nothing more than to bury itself into my couch, my mind needed some form of release. The plaza had emptied out, which was understandable for that time of day. The daytime cycle had ended and it was time for most ponies to put their fillies to bed.

I was quickly aloft and did a few easy warm-up laps around the flight zone, before setting into a faster but comfortable pace. It felt great, and after a full day of nothing but being locked in the cockpit harness, stretching my wings was just what I needed. I tried my best to ignore the small robotic sentry tracking me for the slightest legal infraction. Eventually I succeeded.

Flights like this were what kept me going throughout the years. The body needs sleep, but the soul needs rest as well. Letting myself fall into the easy, rhythmic wingbeats in the still evening air gave me some form of escape from an otherwise thankless and pointless existence. In the sky I could fly, not high of course, but high enough that I could enjoy the ancient splendor of what my ancestors did thousands of years ago.

This was what I lived for. I was certain. I had always been certain, and yet I still did not have my cutie mark. Jokingly I had always wondered whether my special talent was being invisible, that I actually found my cutie mark a long time ago, and it was simply hiding in plain sight. My true purpose in life: to fade into the background as another turning cog in the great galactic machine. I didn’t believe it, and yet. No, there was no escaping truth.

Truth was I knew why I was a blank flank. According to the doc I had inherited it from my mother, who, while not a blank flank herself, was a carrier. I had Fade Syndrome, an incurable genetic defect that prevented a cutie mark from ever appearing. Millions of ponies had it and that number grew with each generation. Mom beat the curb by not being affected by it, but passed the defect to me. I wish I had her luck. At least I would never have to learn that my special talent was finding crappy bosses. Thanks Mom.

A chirping noise filled my head and my WAND activated its AR screen, notifying me that I was quickly running out of flight time and that I would start racking up fines if I did not land within the next few minutes. Reluctantly, I set down and folded up my wings, taking one last longing look at the air above before trotting off to my apartment a couple sectors away.

*****

It took thirty minutes to get home, and by that time I could feel the bags forming under my eyes. I scanned my keycard using my mouth, my brain too fried to effectively use my WAND’s levitation magic. The hatch opened with a hiss and I plodded inside my dingy little apartment.

The apartment should have been condemned. I always felt that if a comparison could be made, my apartment was to a normal apartment what the Scrap Bandit was to an aristocrat’s pleasure yacht. Sadly this was not a fair comparison. While I was certain the key difference between the Bandit and the salvage it pulled in was that the salvage could be made useful again, the Bandit still functioned after a sort. Sure it was an old beat-up ship with a nasty owner and in desperate need of a little TLC, but it still did its job. Nothing worked in my apartment. No water, no power, no heat. Heck, with the windows in the shape they were, the place barely qualified as shelter.

I rubbed the crystal on my head with a hoof, trying to get its rough surfaces to scratch the coat underneath. Before undoing the strap and setting it on an end table. My eyes lingered on the device. I was lucky to have it, sort of.

WAND was short for ‘Wireless Arcane Networking Device’. It was a tool that most professionals used to help them with everyday tasks in the bigger colonies. It could be loaded with a large variety of programs, but was mostly used for its telekinetic magic. A WAND allowed any non-unicorn pony to use levitation magic like a normal unicorn to a fair degree. It was not a perfect substitute, but it was better than trying to use your mouth on everything, not to mention much more sanitary. Unicorns could also use them but they wore them around the neck instead of centered on the forehead. For them, they worked more as an augmentation for the spells they cast with their horns or for accessing the M-Net. WANDs could wirelessly access any number of terminals or computers in a short radius, allowing a user to interact with them without direct contact. They also had a built in augmented reality matrix that could project a readout in front of you that only you could see, unless instructed otherwise. I won’t go into all of its functions, but like any good piece of hardware, a WAND could do just about anything a small computer or tablet could do, but was much more portable. Some could even cast spells.

For an extremely useful and notably expensive piece of hardware, mine was a piece of junk. It was slow, rusty and had one strap loose so it sometimes shifted on the cranium. Not to mention, it was old. Very old. In fact, it was so old that I couldn’t find parts for it anymore. The special alloy inset for the focusing gem was tarnished, and the rest of its casing was scratched and dented so much that the original paint had peeled. Before my dad took off, he told me that the damn thing was passed down from his father and his father before him. I don’t recall just how far back it went, I just knew growing up that if I ever lost it I would get one hell of a beating later.

My WAND was one of the few things my dad left me before he, well, left me. He also left me the apartment, all of his bills and the couch. I loved the couch. Beneath the reek of old cigarettes, booze and mildew was a nice lumpy, if a bit grimy, piece of furniture that only slightly creaked when you laid down on it and was much more comfortable than the hard floor on an average night. Granted it was not much, but it was reasonably comfy and most importantly, it was mine.

It was on this wonderful piece of furniture that I was going to pass out for the rest of the night, once I got some food in me. I headed to the fridge and pulled out a delightfully warm bottle of cider and an old can of wheat mash. Reclining in my couch, I used my teeth to pull the tab on the can of mash and dug in. What can I say? I have a penchant for fine dining. Sleep came easily.

*****

I arrived back at Junkyard’s office early the following morning for my next job. It was the same thing on a different day, or so I had thought. The office was empty, which was uncharacteristic for my employer. He practically lived there. An empty donut box was still sitting on top of the small bookshelf behind his desk where it had been the day before. The papers that had fallen off the desk were still on the floor. This struck me as odd. While the rest of his office was debatable, Junkyard had always tried to maintain some form of orderliness around his desk.

It wasn’t until I trotted inside that I noticed something was truly wrong. The chair was overturned as if the oaf had fallen out of his seat. As I approached his desk I found him. Curled up on the floor like a scared foal, lying in a pool of drying blood with several holes riddling his side was Junkyard, his beady black eyes glazed over and his face frozen in a rictus of sheer terror.

My boss was dead.

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Notice: 96% Remaining...

Comments

[BlueColton]

It's funny...I vaguely recall scrolling through the first chapter some months back without really reading it. I have to be honest with you. I was bored out of my mind a work and decided to read this while on lunch. I found myself genuinely surprised by how quickly I was pulled into this story. I honestly believe that MLP and SCiFi do not mix...but my interest is suddenly piqued.

Horizon's narrative strangely easy to fall into. From his self-deprecating monologues to his witty comments, I found him very easy to empathize with. You've managed to set up an interesting world that I hope is full of more entertaining characters. You've go my interest. Now lets see if you can keep it, space pony.

[Gobeman]

6758193 ive had this in my read later for a long time....*i mostly read when a total words are more than 6k*
and you got me whit this chapter too

[Blewfire]

Well that can't be good. Boss dies from excessive oxygen exposure do to extra orifices.