This story is a sequel to Ms. Midshipmare Dash
Ensign Rainbow Dash, Royal Manticoran Navy, thought her past was behind her. She was wrong.
A sequel to Ms. Midshipmare Dash. It's by no means necessary to read the prequel first.
A crossover with The Honorverse, but zero knowledge of that source material is needed. I created an Honorverse Crossover group.
Thanks to Samey90, Justified Paranoia, Mockingbirb, and Raleigh for pre-reading.
Cover art by commission with Harwick. This looks amazing, and big thanks!
Chapters (1)
Been awhile since I read any of the books but IIRC The Ballroom is an anti slavery PAC with a "secret" terrorist faction. Like the IRA & the Provos? They like the Manties but favor the Havenites more (because some high level government officials are secretly involved, at least to the extent of taking bribes to look the other way.)
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Man, no matter how much you proofread...
Thanks!
Now I wonder what happened to Twilight and Pinkie? Good chapter and it was nice to see this story universe get returned to.
Still don't care for David Weber, but pony space opera gets exactly the love it deserves from this quarter - which is quite a lot.
Also, holy crap, I vaguely remember joking about Mary Sue Harrington and her victories-with-67%-casualty rates, but Applejack managed to lose her parents in two separate battles? Yikes. Also, that's a hell of a life - work as a hydroponics pone on one of the big ships, keeping people fed, until some day, by no act or failure of your own - kaboom! Vaporized because your CO was rash. Or heroic. Or just didn't have the good numbers that morning.
And Captain Heroic Last Stand goes down to hades with her escort of enemies, her valiant, fighting crew - and all the cooks, mechanics, hydroponics techs, and sanitation engineers along for the ride down into eternity.
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IIRC, Manticore has taken some pretty serious military casualties (they had a technology edge but Haven was a LOT bigger) plus the Sollies broke their own laws of war to bomb civilian targets with military targets in or nearby (think WW2) + some pretty heavy casualties when orbital facilities were destroyed.
Plus Mesa had a secret decapitation strike against some military production facilities.
In short, the Manties have to win fairly quick because
1) The Sollies got the numbers to take higher casualties
2) They've got a higher military tech base but overall Solly tech is at least as good as theirs & their tech edge won't last long
3) They ain't got the logistics for a prolonged fight.
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And it was delivered.
Yus!
Clearly my "glass Mesa with KEWs" plan is the correct course of action. Just need access to the local asteroid belt and some setting-specific sources of impulse.
It'd be fun! We could sell tickets!
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Biggest pay per view event in history.
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"For an extra nominal gratuity we'll engrave a message of your choice on a meteor, 50 words maximum, absolutely no restrictions on content so long as it's addressed to Mesa!"
Bravo Zulu!
Cutie Mark Crusaders Fusion Bottle Technicians! YAY!
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LMFAOOOOOOOooooo
I seriously want more of this universe.
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Oh, by Celestia, no!
Ok i didn’t think ponies/HH would work but apparently it does. :) You have my undivided attention. :)
In all the years I've been a Sci-Fi fan, I don't think I ever ran into this series.... And apparently I have 14 books to catch up on... God damn it.
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While I recover from a pucker factor that'd make a black hole blush... Cutie Mark Crusaders Chemical Accelerant Engineers yaaay!
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And see all the local slaves die? No, the only just course of action is to occupy the planet.
As slaves will be freed, all slaver holders' possessions will be split equally between their former slaves.
Those who surrender gain the right to have their actions judged in a fair trial, and resistance will be met with lethal force.
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And to this day countless humans and ponies alike wonder: where the hell did they find tree sap and pine-needles in the fusion room.
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Who needs tree-sap and pine needles, when you have lubricant, sealant, and an unfortunate tendency to confuse applicators in the same toolbox?
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Good point, slaves are human and should be treated as such.
So let's split the difference, evacuation of all slaves, and then as a cost-saving measure bundle the executions and the planetary razing.
Your blog post was right, a tight focused POV is the way to do war, and especially a crossover. But I appreciated the telly sections too that really fleshed out the stakes. However
! I really like how you're gradually fleshing out this world with ponies and adding the other Mane 6 and show characters while staying true to the Honorverse and the feeling of the military setting. I definitely look forward to seeing more!
I never got far enough in the series to be familiar with the stuff about Mesa and their genetically modified slaves so I read up on it via Wiki . . . And poor Rainbow and Scootaloo.
Great story! Hope to see more in this universe.
Love these pair of stories! Even though I'm not familiar with the non-pony source material, I can get more than enough backstory from context alone.
And if you don't mind me pulling in another author, I can easily see this Scootaloo being the same one in TCC56's 'Some Kind of Hero'.
Awesome job!
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Thank you!
I loved Ms. Midshipmare Dash. I re-read it and was quite chuffed to see a comment that there was a sequel. I'm adding this to my favorites as well. I hope to see another sequel eventually.
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I’d prefer either a fully operational, completed Death Star II or the Sun Crusher to deal with Mesa, Eridani Edict (which the Solarian League has written into an amendment to their constitution) be damned (because both of those things are violations on the hoof, so to speak)…
RMN skinsuits are about as bulky as a wetsuit and are worn without anything underneath, as per On Basilisk Station pg 319 (Chapter 27) of the Baen paperback edition…
AJ’s mom was at the Battle of Hyacinth? Ouch… at least 3 CLs (one of them the Valiant-class HMS Defiant (CL-334)) against at least one heavy cruiser and one battlecruiser…
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I used that in Midshipmare, but knowingly ignored it for rule of drama in this one.
Landing PD: Pales in horror at the incoming chaos of the Cutie Mark Crusaders… “What did we do to deserve this?!”
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Battles that Honor Harrington had no part of at that. Second Basilisk was the Havenite raiding force from Hell, and Hyacinth… I have no words for that battle.
Oh this is good. I really hope we see more of the Manticorian Ponys.
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Thanks!
I have some more ideas —we still need Special Intelligence Officer Pinkie and Queen's Own Regiment Lieutenant Twilight — but they're undercooked, still medium-rare. If and when they reach well-done, I'll publish them.
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Actually, there was no need to have Dash strip off her skinsuit, because it has her rank on the collar according to House of Steel… unless it was for Rainbow Dash to show that she’s a pegasus?
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To show her wings, yes.
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Okay, I think I get it.
Kudos for creating the Honorverse Crossover group! This seems like the perfect breeding ground for passionate discussions, theories, and maybe even fan art of Rainbow Dash soaring through space in a Manticore-class cruiser.
a small world cup
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Oh, boy. Unless the girls have a powerful mind-glow, the Treecats won't be interested in them at all. Mesa definitely deserves a KEW strike. Glad that Scootaloo is free, learning to fly, and will soon have friends.
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Queen's Own Regiment for Twilight? That's the royalty's personal defense squad. Maybe she could be part of the Protector's Own Squadron instead. Do you know what would really be a kick in the teeth? If Pear Butter were one of the Defiant survivors, and those SS bastards decided to rape/murder her during
the final days leading to Aivars Terekhov's release (spoilers for those who didn't read The Shadow of Saganami.
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Oof! Ouch.
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Yeah. After the Hyacinth battle, the survivors were treated roughly by State Security. Around that time, the cease fire from Saint-Just was accepted by that fucking asshole High Ridge, and SS started getting into an orgy of death and torture for the hated Manticorans. The only reason Aivars survived was because the hospital he was at was a Navy run hospital that didn't accept anyone from SS getting in. SS felt that justice would not come for them. Then Theisman killed Saint-Just, and Aivars was sent home. Imagine the unfortunate brutality of that time and what could have happened to poor Pear Butter. Then you'll see why Aivars Terekhov went after the mercenary Haven ships with a vengeance. Especially that Mars-class in Nuncio: a Mars-class took down Defiant.