Chapter 5
Lyra stared at the shut door, shivering slightly as she pictured the ponies inside.
It hadn’t been long since she saw the final message of the Equestria’s previous captain, just long enough to get a set of human clothing to go with the human body. Underclothes, a set of white pants, and a button-up vest with her name and cutie mark on it, along with a jacket she had left behind in the medical bay.
She felt like it was going to suffocate her. But her skin was clearly not as sturdy as a pony coat, so the extra protection wouldn’t go amiss. She would have to wear it long enough to decide whether she preferred to go the pony way or not.
“If you wish, I could sedate the passengers again,” Computer said, as though it were offering her tea. “They would be considerably less aware of the passage of time if they spent it unconscious.”
Lyra winced at the offer, shaking her head. “Thanks Computer, no. I owe it to Sweets to show her what I did. You’re… sure you can’t change me back?”
“Even if I could, I wouldn’t,” Computer said, voice even. “You woke me, Captain. As my old crew are dead, your involvement makes you their natural replacement. If you wish to relinquish the position to someone more qualified… we might make the trade. Eventually. But not until this mission is complete.”
“Right.” Lyra pressed her soft paw up against the metal door, and nearly jumped when it slid open on its own accord.
Inside was a dining area of sorts, with tables too high for ponies to use comfortably. Everything now seemed right for Lyra, just like the doors.
“You’re pretty,” said a voice from just inside. Muffins stared openly at her as she walked in, and apparently couldn’t notice the distinct wobble to her steps, the complete lack of confidence. “Is the air nicer further from the ground?”
Lyra had no idea how to answer that question, so she just bent down and patted Muffins on the head. “It’s fine, Muffins. I’m fine. How have you been?”
“Great!” she said. “The food here isn’t my favorite, but they have muffins, so they can’t be all bad.”
The others, Time Turner and Sweetie, were both on their hooves too, staring at her from the other side of the room.
Time Turner had his usual tact. “What a frighteningly useless creature. I imagine a swift breeze could blow you over like that. And those digits… have you broken any of them yet?”
Lyra ignored him too, crossing the distance between them until she was facing Sweetie. Their eyes met, and connection that was both pain and relief passed between them. Lyra reached out with one paw, and Bon Bon held out one of her legs. Lyra dropped down onto one knee, so that she was close to her friend’s face. Had pony fur always felt so soft? Maybe her skin was just better at feeling it.
For almost a minute, there was only silence between them, before Bon Bon finally spoke. “You really bucked up this time, Harper.”
She nodded weakly. “Sure did. It’s not over yet, either. There’s… more. I can’t change back right away, or take us right back home. We’ve... kinda stuck our noses in it.”
“Not the strangest adventure I’ve had,” Bon Bon said, smiling ruefully, shoving her in the shoulder with one hoof. “What even are you?”
She tried to answer, for whatever it was worth. But she couldn’t help but feel like an idiot as she repeated what Computer had explained.
“That seems a little close-minded, don’t you think? Only a captain of one species is allowed. Hardly fair.”
“Necessary,” said Computer’s voice from nearby. It spoke in ordinary Ponish now, as fluently as it had spoken the ancient variety. It didn’t fill the whole room this time, but seemed to choose just a single patch of wall. “Assuming this sector of space resembles the one we left behind. It is absolutely critical that no ship is ever allowed to fall into enemy hands.”
“Why?” Bon Bon turned, glaring at the wall. Lyra recognized this look—this was the way she got whenever someone attacked her ‘best friend’. It was her “defending my girlfriend” look. “She already said she wanted to be your captain. You could’ve just put a hat on her like a normal pony.”
“I could not,” Computer said. “Because there is no such thing as an unarmed starship. A collision from relativistic speed could devastate an entire planet. As no nonhuman ship is capable of instant trans-relativistic jumps, we must zealously guard this ability.”
“By… changing anypony who isn’t human to start with,” Bon Bon finished. “That doesn’t seem very secure.”
Computer didn’t argue further—it wasn’t half as proud as the pony.
“Does it hurt, Professor Heartstrings?” Time Turner asked, from just beside her. “The magic seems like it would have many unpleasant side-effects. Those things you have instead of hooves… may I see them?”
“Not right now.” Lyra stuck her paws self-consciously into her pockets, then rose into a standing position. At least when she was all the way up, she was so much taller than the others that they couldn’t get right in her face. “You should all know what we’ve gotten into,” she said turning away. “Computer said there’s a better place to show you. This ship has a bridge, just like ours. Let’s go there.”
“Ship?” Bon Bon asked, more than a little fear slipping into her voice. “Not a building?”
Lyra looked, but no, this room had no sign of windows like the medical room had. “It’s easier to show you,” she said. “I don’t understand it any better. But at least we can try to understand it together.
They went to the bridge. Lyra knew what to expect from her time on the Solaris, big windows and all the controls necessary to direct their flight.
The Equestria’s bridge was different. They had to travel deep into the tower, down to levels that hadn’t opened for them before. But Lyra now stood at the right height, and the button list gave her more than twice the options they’d had before.
“Captain on the bridge,” said another voice as the door opened—not Computer’s voice, though it came from the wall the same way.
There weren’t any windows on the bridge—instead, every wall was a window, though it didn’t seem to have any glass holding back the weather outside. Half a dozen chairs were spread around the room, with different controls in front of each one.
The snowy wastes north of the Crystal Empire were gone from in front of them. Instead, the Equestria was surrounded with stars.
There were thousands of them, brighter and more vivid than she’d seen even on the darkest nights. She couldn’t see the moon, but Equus was below them, a round green sphere as welcoming as it was familiar.
“I am beginning to understand what you meant when you said this was a ‘Starship,’ Computer chap. You mean we fly so high that the stars are visible even during the day. The society will be thrilled to hear we were right about the atmospheric diffusion of light. I’ll put your name as a contributor on the paper.”
“I am flattered,” Computer said, practically cheerful as it spoke now. “But you aren’t quite right. The Equestria is a Gardener-class Imperial supercarrier. My… carrier section is currently not attached. But even the nose portion rates as a Communion-class lancer, capable of instantaneous non-relativistic jumps.”
When Time Turner’s eyes just glazed over in response, Computer went on. “It’s called a starship because we travel between stars. You’ll get to see a little of that shortly. Captain, if you would take your seat.”
The ground illuminated, outlining a path to a chair at the back and center of the room. It had little rests for her arms, which retracted as Lyra got close, moving out of her way. It seemed to call to her.
“Hold on, Heartstrings,” Bon Bon said. “We aren’t just agreeing to what it wants, are we? It already…” She gestured weakly with a hoof. “Did this to you. Frankly, I’m not sure we should help it.”
“It can hear you,” Computer said, almost casually. “Not that I want you to be less honest around me. Organics are most productive when they don’t fear retaliation for their words. I just thought you ought to know.”
Lyra settled into the seat, and the mechanical arms rested into place on either side of her. They didn’t hold her down, didn’t restrict her movement really. With her arms in place, the space in front of her lit up.
It was a little like the first place they’d seen Computer, only this one showed a tiny image of a tower. Or… maybe not a tower. She recognized the tip of the image as the Horn of Celestia she knew, with a set of massive sloping wings down the sides and numerous glowing disks along one face. There were dozens of protrusions emerging from the frame, along with openings that she couldn’t even guess at.
“I haven’t agreed to anything,” Lyra said. “But I think you should hear Computer out. He says we can get back to… he says that he will let us go home after we do this mission for it. Don’t you, Computer?”
The glowing space in front of her panned, showing a faint image of Equus impossibly far below. And somewhere, apparently on the far side of the room, she could make out their sun. A warm, reassuring ball of yellow light.
“Your description is correct in its essence. This vessel has a single command from its previous captain. You must travel to your homeworld, and interface with the Conflux. We must make an account of our colonial attempt. Out of interest, how would you rate the success of your planet out of ten?”
Muffins bounced right up beside the chair, spreading her wings and hanging in the air a little longer with every jump. “Ten! Equestria is perfect!”
“Your response has been logged,” Computer said.
“It seems like…” Bon Bon stomped one hoof, scraping against the carpet. “We’re being used, Heartstrings. You see that, don’t you? We don’t have a say in this. From the first, we’ve been dragged along. How do we know this isn’t the first of many demands? Maybe we’ll never see home again.”
“I don’t know how much choice we have,” Time Turner said. But Lyra could hear it in his tone—it was a familiar academic agreement, the way he always sounded when he was about to agree with one of Lyra’s stupid plans. “What is ‘our homeworld,’ Computer? I only know one world, and it’s undoubtedly our home. Wouldn’t you agree, Agent Drops?”
“Yes,” she said, sitting on her haunches beside the command chair. “Equestria is our home. We don’t need any other world.”
“The planet below is a colony of the Imperial Star Navy,” Computer said, with the same voice he used to explain any unremarkable fact. “It is the world of your birth. But the homeworld of your species is called Earth. Look.”
The windows shifted. The view of their own distant sun and many further stars zoomed out, until they seemed to be looking at thousands of stars straight on, with a single blue dot at one point in the map.
“This is your current location, Equus. The place of my construction, your homeworld, is here.” The view began to zoom, until another yellow star seemed to be directly in front of them, surrounded with a swarm of thousands of glittering shapes, making it totally black in places. It was like a swarm of flies trying to eat it.
“Looks like someone forgot their garbage,” Bon Bon said flatly.
“I’ve charted our course in thirty-eight randomly obfuscated jumps,” Computer said. The space in front of Lyra lit up green, with arrows pointing down at one of the buttons. Tiny text in Old Ponish read “Warp Authorization.”
“Just press that button,” Computer said. “And we’ll be home.” Then its voice came more quietly, from the seat right behind her head. She somehow knew that none of the others would be able to hear it. “I’ve performed a psychological evaluation. I know you, Captain. You want to see the place your parents came from. It’s waiting for you.”
Computer was right—she did.
Lyra pressed the button, and the universe went white.
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Or as Atomic Rockets puts it "Any propulsion system powerful enough to be interesting is a weapons system as well."
Looking forward to seeing what goes wrong on Earth. I believe there was mention of some kind of war or conflict?
Presumably hostiles aren't given the opportunity to change species.
Given the ship's long period of dormancy, there's no telling what Earth is like at this point. We'll see soon enough.
Fast language translation though probably easy since Ponish is likely a derivative of English or whatever language humanity was speaking at the exodus.
Until another species unlocks it. Heck, I can't imagine the testing phases when this tech was developed.
I think they'll be less thrilled about the atmosphere and more thrilled about how'll you've gotten into orbit. And that'll be just the tip of the iceberg.
True, even now, most people don't have any fealty or connection to the "Cradle of Humanity" beyond a history lesson. A down-the-line descendent across stars would have as much connection for Earth especially if its a ruin. Our ponies are probably only interested in what secrets they can recover to benefit their nation. I'd doubt they'd care about building an interstellar civilization unless it had Equestria and the planet Equus as its base.
Gotta love hard (or at least harder) sci-fi!
How many of x does it take to destroy y?
One, at sufficient velocity.
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Considering that Equestria doesn't seem to have been contacted by the mother planet, Earth is probably long dead or fallen to barbarism.
Lyra referring to her hands as paws amuses me and I hope it continues.
First, that really makes me wonder where the carrier section is. Also, 'Communion-class' is an interesting military designation.
Another question that comes to mind is why does the 'Imperial Star Navy' have colonies?
Starscribe, I presume the pandemic killed this due to lack of time as all hell generally broke loose this year... But it's really good and off to an tantalizing start. If you don't mind my asking, what was the price in time/cash for this commission and what would it be to finish when/if time and the universe allow? Or is there a long line of other projects that preclude that as an option?
I'm not trying to pry, I just really like your work... : )
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As the description says, this was part of Starscribe's Patreon. The Story Sponsor tier (currently sold out) is $25/mo and has him writing ~2k word chapters released once a month. There's also the Chapter Sponsor tier (currently sold out) also at $25/mo which adds another chapter per month to an existing incomplete story. The Director tier (currently sold out) is $80/mo is like Story Sponsor, except gives four chapters per month instead of one. (The Fellow tier is $10/mo and gets your name into a pool of people who can get mini-fics, but is not applicable for a story like this.)
Starscribe's commissioned fics are separate, negotiated directly with him, generally more expensive (though also release faster), and are charged per word rather than per time period. (Although when I contacted him last September, his schedule was too full for a new commission.)
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Thank you for the explanation : )
I bought Message in a Bottle, but didn't know about the details you listed. I'm glad he's got all the work he wants!
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(Return to Sender is a sequel to Message in a Bottle.)
Well if you liked Message in a Bottle enough to buy a physical copy, be sure to check out Return to Sender that's currently in progress!
The first chapter is available for anyone to read on Starscribe's Patreon. Patrons can read everything he's done so far (18 chapters). Or, you can wait patiently for the story to finish and he'll start posting it here on Fimfiction.
Not sure how well the ponies would react to them being an experimental colony.