Chapter 1: Same Ship, Different Day
It was said by those of the Proto-Solar era that the stars of the Etherium burned brightest when a soul of unquenchable courage and inner strength sailed among them.
If the legends were to be believed, then on this night, as a graceful, blue and golden galleon gently glided across the empty blue expanse of the Etherium, the stars could not be brighter. The galleon’s white, rounded sails blazed with solar energy, funnelling it through to its engines and propelling it forward, twinkling space dust and blue flames following in its wake. A white flag criss-crossed with red and gold was displayed proudly over the galleon’s main mast, a symbol of its Imperial allegiance.
And as it sailed silently into the night, a small streak of light followed it: a surfboard-shaped vehicle with a triangular sail, manned by a single human. Its driver grinned with anticipation even as he moved it behind the ship’s engines, feeling the heat on his bare skin. He closed his eyes and laughed, slamming his back foot on a switch behind him and bending down to grab the board with his right hand.
The sail folded instantly, and the solar surfer swooped downwards under the hull of the ship, its small plasma engine kicking into overdrive. The pilot swerved to avoid the ship’s thruster fins, then flipped his body horizontal and spinning the entire board like a corkscrew, emerging out from under the forecastle of the ship. As soon as he was clear, he slammed his heel on the back switch again, and without looking he lifted his hands up to catch the sail’s handlebar as it jumped into his grasp. The sail’s solar scoops immediately reacted to the light of the stars, and the sail flared up with light once more, pushing even more power into the engine and causing a massive burst of speed, sending the vehicle flying through the Etherium once more.
“Yeeeeah baby!” the pilot whooped, pumping a fist into the air as he circled the ship’s masts, the rush of wind blowing back his dark brown hair. “That’s what I’m talkin’ about!”
He was in his realm, and nothing could stop him!
“Mister Hawkins,” called a stern, feminine voice from the ship’s deck. “If you are done fooling about on that silly contraption, we have something to discuss in my state room.”
Well, except for her...
James “Jim” Hawkins, Ensign of the Imperial Navy, second officer of the RLS Legacy, and born adventurer, sighed as he brought his solar surfer in closer to the main deck, acknowledging the woman with a nod. “Aye, captain,” he answered, his face morphing from a look of euphoria to a more professional one.
He circled the ship once more, bringing the surfer into the small hangar bay underneath the ship, where two longboats lay docked. He closed the sail and hopped off the board, grabbing it and locking it onto a rack on one of the walls, before making his way to the stairs at the end of the room. He could almost run the entire route from the hangar to the captain’s cabin with his eyes closed.
He passed by several alien crew as he walked. A burly avian with red and blue plumage was carrying a pile of ropes to the cargo hold. A tall, cycloptic humanoid sat at a table playing poker with two others, a short squid-like creature with seven eyes and a large snail-like alien with tentacles all over his face and back. Most of the crew he recognized from previous ventures, while others were still new from the ship’s latest stop in Crescentia Spaceport.
But as he walked along the main deck, he spied a sinister-looking spidery alien swinging across the masts with ropes in her dark blue pincers. She wore the red jacket of an Imperial Navy commander, and her large, bulbous eyes glowed yellow in the dark.
Jim grimaced when he saw her. He knew he shouldn’t, since it had been years since the Treasure Planet Expedition (which he had been sworn to keep quiet about by Captain Amelia), and it was not her fault that her species, the Mantavors, were seen as cruel by the rest of the galaxies, but whenever he saw Commander Graven, he could only be reminded of that evil pirate he once worked with. To this day he could still feel Scroop’s claws around his neck, or his sinister eyes glaring down at him with disdain.
He shivered at the memory, trying to forget. It was a long time ago, and things had changed since then.
Commander Graven was different. Even though she never truly cared about Jim and simply did her job as the ship’s First Officer, she was never unfair, nor did she treat him without respect or common courtesy. They were both officers of the Navy, and they treated each other as such. It was a strained but professional relationship, which worked for the two of them.
Commander Graven silently crawled down the rigging of the main mast, siding up to Jim as he made his way across the deck. “Ensign,” she greeted, her voice hissing each syllable.
“Commander,” Jim replied with a respectful nod.
“Tell me, young one,” said Graven. “What do you believe the captain has called us to her state room for?”
Jim shot her a look, careful to hide the bafflement in his eyes. “The captain hasn’t told you?”
The Mantavor shook her head. “No, and it’s irritating. As First Officer, I am supposed to be privy to any and all information the captain receives, but I have heard nothing.”
“Maybe she has only just heard about it herself?” Jim wondered aloud.
“Perhapsss...” Graven allowed. “Still annoying though. In any case, what are your thoughts?”
“You’ve never asked my opinion before.”
“I’m asking now.”
Jim brought his right hand to his chin. “A change to our standing orders, maybe?”
Graven shrugged, crossing her large, crab-like pincers over her chest. “Maybe, but I do not see what it could be. We have been tasked with patrolling the trade routes between Montressor and Merilon Prime and protecting it from pirates. There isn’t much else between here and there besides the Carrion Abyss.”
“I suppose we’ll see when we get there,” Jim sighed, walking up the steps to the Legacy’s quarterdeck, where the captain’s cabin was located. After knocking three times on the door, he and Graven stood silently, waiting to be addressed by their captain.
“Enter, if you please,” came a voice from beyond the door, and Jim and Graven obeyed.
The captain’s cabin was not large, but it was opulent. Four lanterns illuminated the room, reflecting off the curved glass windows at the back of the room. Red carpet with gold trimming lined the oak floorboards, and the ensign of the Imperial Navy was emblazoned in the center. Bookcases and shelves lined the walls, along with two closets and a small weapons rack. A globe and a locked log book lay on a small table near the entrance, and a vase of roses stood next to them.
In the center of the room sat a large, beautifully-carved mahogany desk, covered with star charts, maps, and navigation tools (and one wine glass). Four empty chairs stood in front of it, while behind it was a small, elegant chair on which sat a tall woman with cat-like features in a sharp blue uniform, a blue tricorn hat resting atop her head. Her face was stern, but her piercing green eyes betrayed a hidden sense of calm cheerfulness.
Jim had known Captain Amelia since the Treasure Planet Expedition, before she was made the Legacy’s permanent captain and before Jim joined the Naval Academy. Her discipline helped shape him into the man he was today, and although she carried an aura of professional stoicism, Jim knew better. Out of everyone he knew, she was probably one of the bravest and most dependable, and likewise she thought of him as sort of a little brother. Whenever he needed help, she was always there to teach him with a smile. She was kind, honest (sometimes brutally so), and benevolent to a degree, and cared greatly about the crew under her command.
Amelia looked up at her two visitors, and a small smirk appeared on her face. “Ah, Mister Hawkins and Miss Graven, so good of you to come. Please, take a seat.”
Jim and Graven sat down in two of the empty chairs, and Jim folded his hands over his lap. Amelia stood up from her desk and narrowed her eyes at the door. “Shan’t be a moment longer, I trust...” she murmured.
“Captain?” Graven asked, but her answer soon came when two other people joined them in the room: a man with soft canine features wearing glasses and scholarly clothes, and a tall, spindly copper robot with a white compass on his chest plate.
“Ah, apologies Amelia darling, I was burning the midnight oil, as it were,” Doctor Delbert Doppler spoke up quickly as he entered the room, depositing the scrolls he was carrying onto the desk. “You really should read the works of Dr. Arthur Lemonfield, his work on astrophysics is astonishing!”
Amelia smiled warmly at her husband. “Perhaps another time, love. We have more important things to think about right now.”
Before anyone else could say anything, the other newcomer threw his metal arms around Jim and laughed. “JIMMY!” he cried in a shrill voice. “Oh, it’s so good to see you again! How was your surf? Did ya beat your record again? Well, did ya, did ya, did ya?!”
Jim chuckled and slipped out of the robot’s embrace, giving him a fistbump instead. “Hey BEN, good to see you too. And yeah, you were right, those Breemian crystals worked perfectly for the engines, boosted my speed up at least fifteen percent.”
“Ah-HA, I knew it!” the Legacy’s navigator cheered, waving his long arms in the air. “I knew we could make it faster! Oh, I can’t wait to try it out!”
“Ahem,” Graven hissed, drawing everyone’s attention to her. “I believe we’ve been called here for a reason, we mustn’t keep the captain waiting.”
BEN shrunk back and gave a small, apologetic smile. “Eh, heheh...sorry. Shutting up now.” He lifted two of his fingers and made a zipping motion over his mouth.
Amelia cleared her throat. “Right then, lady and gents, I shall make this brief. Only a few moments ago, I received an urgent transmission from the Imperial High Command informing us of a disturbance near Arcturius Prime. Several Arcturian merchant ships have been destroyed or hijacked, and we’ve also received reports of rising pirate activity near the Carrion Abyss. All Imperial ships have now been put on high alert, and until told otherwise, we are to remain at a battle-ready stance.”
Pirates. The word brought a look of disdain to all in the room, and Graven gave a low hissing growl as her pincers clenched. “Just say the word, captain,” she snarled. “Say the word and I will carve a path through every pirate ship from here to Arcturius Prime in the Emperor’s name.”
Amelia held up a hand and shook her head. “While I appreciate your boundless enthusiasm for the hunt, commander, we have other plans. The transmission also informed me of a change to our orders. The trade routes will now be monitored by the RLS Oxford and the RLS Aurora. We are being sent to the Outer Reaches to investigate something far more...peculiar.”
“Peculiar in what way, my dear?” Delbert asked.
Amelia hesitated. “High Command is not positive on what they have detected, only that it’s a strange, very faint energy signature coming from one of the planets. They did a cross-reference, and it appears to be quite similar to the remains recovered from the destruction of Treasure Planet.”
Jim blinked, startled at this revelation. He exchanged a worried glance with BEN, who only shrugged. Despite having the most knowledge of Flint’s trove, BEN was just as clueless as he was. “Treasure Planet?” Jim echoed. “But...how could that be?”
“We’re not certain, all that we know is that the energy signature wasn’t there before, but now it is,” the captain explained. “High Command is adamant about not repeating another Treasure Planet disaster, and seeing as we have the most experience in dealing with this sort of thing, they are sending us to locate the signature and, if necessary, contain the situation.”
“And if it’s nothing?” Graven hissed. “We will have abandoned the trade route for nothing and wasted too much time chasing ghosts of the past instead of protecting the Empire’s capital planet.”
“Treasure Planet was a masterpiece of pirate engineering and organization,” Amelia reminded her calmly. “The things I saw on that cursed place...commander, should a second portal be found, heaven forbid, the entire known reaches of the universe will be in danger from pirate attacks, and we’d be helpless to stop them. We cannot allow that to happen.”
“I agree with the captain,” BEN supplied. “That Captain Flint guy was a huge piece of work, and if there’s another one like him running around, we oughta kick his butt! Pow, bam, bang, hi-yah-foom!”
Graven rolled her eyes. “Fine, fine, but if this turns out to be a waste of time, I’m throwing this rusty idiot off the ship and you can’t stop me.”
“Permission granted,” Amelia replied without hesitation, a smirk forming on her face.
BEN’s jaw dropped. “Wha--? You...hey!” Graven gave a sinister cackle of unrestrained eagerness.
Delbert sighed and his ears drooped. “I guess I’ll go tell Sarah that she’ll have to watch the children for a little while longer. She’s going to kill me...”
“Oh shut up, darling, you know she adores the little beasts,” Amelia chuckled as her husband left the room, turning her attention to the maps on her desk. “I’ve calculated the distance from here to our destination. At full sails, we should reach the planet in question within three days. Our supplies should hold out until then, barring any disastrous circumstances.”
BEN shot up straight from his chair and gave a sharp salute. “Just give me a heading, cap’n, and I’ll get us there in a jiffy!”
Without looking up, Amelia reached into her desk and pulled out a small black disk the size of her palm, handing it to her navigator. BEN snagged it and opened his chest plate, slipping the disk in. His blue eyes suddenly blinked out as lines of computer code shifted across his optic lenses, before flickering back to blue. He then hopped out of the room with a delighted cry of “Adventure, ho!”, running up the stairs outside to the ship’s wheel.
“Commander,” said Amelia, looking up to Graven. “Inform the crew about our change in heading, and then prepare a series of battle drills. I want this crew whipped into shape before we reach our destination, am I clear?”
“Crystal, ma’am,” Graven replied, standing up and saluting before exiting the room.
“What do you want me to do, captain?” asked Jim as he stood up.
“Mister Hawkins, I am putting you in charge of the investigation. You are to document everything we find, and report to me every day,” said Amelia, holding up a scroll. “This was all the information provided to me in the transmission regarding the energy signature. Read over it, and then pick out a team for planetary exploration once we’ve arrived.”
Jim took the scroll and opened it, scanning its contents briefly and warily eyeing the Emperor’s signature at the bottom. The Emperor never personally signed any orders given to any single ship, that duty was usually carried out by the Lord Admiral. To have him sign this one personally meant that this mission was of far greater importance than Captain Amelia had let on. “Aye captain,” Jim replied, rolling the scroll up. “I’ll pick a few people out in an hour.”
“That’ll do,” the captain nodded. “Dismissed.”
Jim saluted and was about to leave the room when Amelia called out once more, “James.”
Jim froze and looked back at her. The captain gave him a warm smile, and she said quietly, “You’ve become an excellent spacer. I just want you to know that I’m proud of how far you’ve come since...since our first voyage. I trust that you will accomplish this task with utmost care and the same professional excellence you’ve shown me thus far.” She cleared her throat. “Now then, good luck, Mister Hawkins. Goodnight.”
Jim smiled back. “Goodnight, captain.”
Jim opened the doors to his quarters, peering into the room with a suspicious glare. He knew what lay inside. He could feel its presence, and he knew that it knew that he knew it was there.
He calmly closed the door and stepped into the darkened room, flicking a light switch on the wall. He tip-toed over to the room’s only chair and draped his uniform coat over it, making sure not to disturb anything else in the room. He then scanned the room itself, noting the prepared cot, the picture of his mother on the night stand, the racked plasma pistol on the wall, the extra pair of boots on the floor next to his tool box, and the bookcase on the far side of the room. He cast his eyes over to the boots and stared at them for a moment before pouncing, grabbing both of them.
“Aha! Gotcha!” he cried, only to receive a gurgling giggle in his ears. He looked down at the boots in his hands, puzzled, then turned around, only to see one of the books on the shelf float into the the air and swirl around into a pink blob with eyes and a mouth. The blob was laughing uproariously at his expense, slapping its tiny belly with one of its small appendages.
Jim shook his head and laughed. “Alright, alright, you win this time, Morph. Good to see ya, buddy.” He held up a finger, and the little shapeshifter floated over to him, nuzzling his finger with a soft coo. The mischievous shapeshifting blob had grown slightly in the years since the destruction of Treasure Planet, but it seemed that he never truly outgrew his playful pranks.
As Jim stood back up, Morph floated about, wagging his tongue at his master in anticipation. Jim smirked and dug into one of his trouser pockets, pulling out a cookie. “As long as you don’t tell anyone. I had to swipe that from ol’ Haggard down in the galley.”
Morph’s eyes grew as big as saucers (literally), and he enveloped the cookie with his mouth and ate it in one gulp, licking his nonexistent lips and belching.
Jim scratched the top of Morph’s head with a finger and said, “Hey, guess what? We’re going to someplace new in a few days, and the captain gave me a mission to lead personally. I’ll be picking a team.”
“Oooo!” Morph bubbled, and he slid onto Jim’s shoulder and shifted into a miniature version of him, whispering into Jim’s ear, “What are we doing, what are we doing?”
“Not quite sure yet,” Jim replied, sitting down on the cot and opening the scroll he got from the captain. “All I know is that this planet was charted centuries ago, but was never really explored beyond the basics, so that’s gonna be interesting. Oh, and it’s apparently a paradise planet, so you know what that means.”
“Fun, fun, fun!” Morph cheered in his squeaky voice.
“Heheh, you bet. Who knows what we’ll find?” Jim held up the scroll and read its contents. “Oh look, it’s got a name...Equus, huh?”
“Equus?” Morph asked, shifting back into his normal form and looking at Jim quizzically.
Jim shrugged. “Yeah, I don’t know either. Sounds a little like ‘equine’, to me.” Then he closed his eyes and smirked. “Heh, most planets I know are named after the inhabitants, like Acturius Prime. What’s this one gonna be like, I wonder?”
Morph giggled, then pointed at Jim. “Team?”
Jim snapped his fingers. “Right, that. Wanna come with?”
Morph did several excited twirls in the air and then settled down on Jim’s head with a grin. Jim tossed the scroll onto his cot and grabbed his coat once more, putting it on as he left the room.
As he walked up the stairs to the main deck, he couldn’t help but chuckle. “A planet full of intelligent horses. Boy, that’ll be the day.”
And so the adventure begins! As we can see, Jim's got a pretty sweet life, and it's about to get a little crazier.
I hope you guys are enjoying the story so far. Let me know if there's anything I can improve as I go along. I'm always open for suggestions or criticism.
Next up, the Mane 6 receive an unexpected visitor in the Castle of Friendship, just as a mysterious ship makes its way into orbit.
God bless! 
(EDIT: Found out Graven's/Scroop's official species name: the Mantavors, according to Disney. Edited it in.)
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Looking good so far I think, there may have been a few grammatical errors here and there I think a re-read by you should be able to catch, but otherwise I think it's solid enough writing, and I look forward to the next!
An interesting premise, and a god start. I always thought Treasure Planet was underrated, so it's nice to see it get attention where the characters are more fleshed out like this. Plus, with this being the MLP universe, we don't have to worry about pesky questions like: "How can they breathe in space?" or "how can they travel between stars with breaking the light barrier?" and so on. Magic and wonky physics solves everything.
So far, you've done good work with characterization, especially on the Treasure Planet side of the cast. I like how you've kept the epilogue of the movie, with the captain marrying Doppler, and Hawkins joining the navy as well. Your pony (and dragon) characterizations are pretty good too, though we haven't seen the full breadth of their emotions yet. Your OCs are likeable and have nice characterizations as well.
Plus, your grammar is excellent!
Look forward to seeing where this goes; it has potential.
10797878
Thanks a lot for the kind words! I'm glad you're liking the story so far. As for the ponies' characterization, you'll be seeing more of them in the next chapter, so I can start fleshing them out a bit as well. Can't wait to start writing Pinkie's and Starlight's dialogue.
this looks really good i love the treasure planet and I look forward to reading more.
there is only one thing that bothers me Jim call the planet Equus but they have not had first contact so why would the mapmakers name that planet Equus it makes sense when they have had contact with the ponies but it's not just them on that planet so I do not think the other creatures and their nations would have agreed on that name
10800142
I knew someone was going to ask about that. Don't worry, I thought about that.
Ask yourself this: why is the map also on the planet? Maybe Equus has been explored before, a long time ago?
And if so, I wonder why nobody came back? Hmmmm...I smell a mystery!
And so the adventure begins! Im hooked! Keep it up!!!!
Oh boy, here we go!
Also, is anyone just waiting for Dash to be caught off guard by the speed of the ship? I can imagine it now:
Captain- "Brace yourself, Miss Dash."
Rainbow- "For what? With how slow this thing is going we won't even-AAAAAAHHHHH!!!"
crashes into the wall behind her
Can anyone else see that happening?
i LOVE BEN, i'm so hooked, WAS I EVER DANCING WITH AN ANDROID NAMED LOOPEY??
You captured the characters in this chapter quite well. Very pleased & eager for more. Also... this Graven is interesting. Hm.
*Snickers*
Good old BEN, never a dull moment when he's around!
Did you mean Emblem, rather than Ensign?
10951543
Nope. If it's on a flag, it's an ensign:
11050459
It wasn't. There's an Empire in the universe of Treasure Planet, it's just not really mentioned in the movie.