A collection of story ideas and snippets that comes to me every once in a while.
This is basically a short collection of story snippets and ideas that comes to me every now and then. Sometimes, I'll write it out to either get it out of my head, or to gauge the reception to the idea. The snippets were previously posted on the SB.com forums. I thought I'll put it up here.
Don't expect any regular updates or anything like that.
"Eeooww!" Aaron jerked upright in his bed as he was rudely awakened by the twin points of pain on his forehead. As he furiously rubbed his head, his eyes fell on the cause of his sudden morning headache.
Perched on a nearby desk, with a pile of golf balls next to her, waas a 15 cm high orange pony with green eyes, freckles, a yellow mane and tail and wearing a small Stetsons.
The miniature pony was part of a set of revolutionary products from Hasbro Corp. The ponies, modeled after the characters from the unexpected hit My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic in terms of appearance and base personality, represents massive advancements in robotics, miniaturized consumer electronics and AI algorithms. The ponies could walk, talk and over time, develop their own unique personalities, based on their interactions of their environment and who they talk to. They could last a few days without recharging and when they do need it, the ponies would just lie down and 'sleep' on a specialized pad to wirelessly recharged them.
There are three 'baseline' models. The Earth ponies featured the highest strength and endurance. The unicorns can double as multipurpose IR transmitters and night light. The pegasus could climb near vertical surfaces (with special 'gecko' pads on their feet) and glide.
Soon after their release, the ponies had became best-sellers despite their rather high prices. So far, Hasbro Corp has only released the 'Mane Six', but promised to release more at a later date.
Apart from functioning as playthings and friends, the ponies could also act as a miniature personal assistants and secretary.
Which was why Applejack is glaring at Aaron from the top of his desk. Applejack had been a present from his mother, ostensibly because she was his favorite. He suspected that the true reason was with Applejack's personality, she could nag at him in proxy.
"Come on, you lazy colt. You got things to do today!" she shouted at Aaron. Aaron took a look at the room clock, and groaned. "Applejack, it's 8am on Saturday morning. Just let me go back to sleep."
Applejack narrowed her eyes. She nudged a golf ball away from the rest and glared at him.
"Ah'm a'counting down." She turns around.
"3..." Looks back and began to ready her legs.
"2..." She took aim...
"I'm up! I'm up! Don't shoot!" Aaron yelped as he leap from his bed and ran for the bathroom door.
After his quick shower and change of clothes, he made his way to the living room, where Applejack was sitting smugly on his coffee table.
Aaron growled, "Come on. Let's get some breakfast." as he reached down to get her. She leap onto his out-reach hand and climbed up his arm. After she had settled herself on his shoulder he asked, "What's the schedule for today?"
Applejack dutifully recited, "Well, after breakfast, you have..."
Aaron yawns as he trudged his way back to his modest apartment. After a rather busy day running all over town, he's more than happy to simply plop onto his bed when he reached it. But first...
"Alright, Applejack. Is there anything else I forgot today?" He asked the tiny orange cow-pony sitting on his shoulder.
"Hmm..." Applejack thought out loud, consulting the checklist stored on her onboard memory. "Well..."
Suddenly, she froze, her ears pricked up straight.
Puzzled by her pause, Aaron stopped and asked, "Is there something-"
"Did you hear that? she interrupted, her ears swiveling about here and there, straining to catch every sound.
"Hear wha- Hey!"
Aaron exclamation was ignored as Applejack quickly (and to his alarm) jumped to the ground. The durable pony landed on her hooves without any problems, and took off towards a nearby alley. Aaron immediately gave chase, wondering what was so urgent.
When he finally caught up to the surprising quick (for her size) cow-pony, she was rummaging through a small pile of rubbish next to a trash-bin.
"Applejack, what's going on?" he asked.
"Ah heard something. From in here. Help me clear this away."
He was puzzled by her odd behavior, but he began clearing the pile away.
It wasn't long before the reason for her urgency was revealed.
"Oh, no..." Aaron said.
Lying broken on the ground under the stray pile of trash was a Fluttershy. Her wings appeared to be mangled, maybe by some rats or a stray dog, her coat is dirty and matted and her back and hind legs seems to be broken.
As Aaron tries to decide what to do, the Fluttershy weakly murmur a soft cry for help. Applejack turned a pair of pleading eyes on him. That made his decision.
"Come on..." he softly said as he gingerly picked up Fluttershy, taking care not to do further damage.
Applejack watched in silence as Aaron carefully tucked the butter-yellow pegasus into a spare small box that he found. "What are you going to do?"
"I think there's some spare parts back home in storage that I can use to fix her. Also, there's someone I know that may help me out with this."
"...Alright." Applejack softly answered as she climbed up to his shoulder.
Both of them were quiet as Aaron quickly made his back to his apartment.
Twilight Sparkle violently swerved to the side, nearly tipping herself over. Moments later, the energy blasts from one of the three pursuing air-borne Decepticons impacted the the piece of terrain she had avoided, cratering the road and spraying her with dust and small debris.
As she sped along the empty expressway, swerving and dodging about in panic, she frantically thought to herself, "How did I get myself into this mess?!?"
She was an ordinary civilian scholar and archeologist, albeit one sponsored by Celestia Prime herself. During an expedition, she had uncovered some vague references to something called "The Elements of ~something~ (the name had been lost at this point)" and what looked like a map. The next thing she knew, the Decepticons were after her!
She couldn't call home for help, as the the off-world comms were jammed. Now, she desperately running for her spark!
"Eep!", she squeaked as she spotted a Decepticon unleashing a pair of missiles at her. In a flash, she transformed and jumped in desperation.
"BOOM!!!"
"Ow..." She had dodged the missiles, but they had hit the ground too close to her and the force of the explosions had caught and thrown her. She groaned as she forced herself to sit up, ignoring the pains and damages she had sustained. She blearily looked up, as the three Decepticons closed it for the kill.
Suddenly, a pink beam lanced out of nowhere and winged one of her pursuers. As the Decepticon crashed, it's comrades were suddenly assaulted by a barrage of rapid-fire energy blasts. Overwhelmed by the sudden ambush, the two Decepticons break off pursuit and flew/limped away to safety.
A deep rumble caught Twilight's attention, and she turned her head to see a dull-pink assault tank made it's way towards her from its' hiding place. The emblem of the Autobot Guard was embossed on the turret housing the main gun.
"Are you functional?" the tank asked in a flat voice. Twilight recognized her as the Autobot Guard mulit-changer, Pinkie Pie. One of the rare few bots that could assume more than one alt-mode. She still wasn't certain how many modes Pinkie Pie actually have.
As Twilight struggled to right herself, she asked, "What happened to the others?"
Pinkie Pie responded in a flat, monotonic voice, "Autobot Guard Captain AppleJack is currently negotiating with a civilian merchant named Rarity in order to secure a long-distance capable replacement spacecraft. Autobot Medic Fluttershy has departed in order to retrieve an old acquaintance, a civilian stunt-flyer named Rainbow Dash to serve as a suitable replacement pilot." She paused for a moment, before continuing, "Scholar Twilight Sparkle. We must now proceed to the spaceport. I will escort you."
Twilight couldn't help but gave a slight shudder as she transformed into her six-wheeled mobile telescope alt-mode, ignoring the complaints from her chassis. Multi-changers like Pinkie Pie were also unique because they were mentally... 'different'. Pinkie Pie had so far demonstrated that her alt-modes were connected to her multiple, nearly distinct personalities. Which alt-mode she assumed is dependent on the dominant personality at the time. Pinkie Pie was usually a cheerful, fun-loving, party-loving bot, which matches neatly to the alt-mode of a civilian Energon Catering truck. Whenever she's feeling particularly mischievous, the alt-mode was a civilian high-speed VTOL vehicle.
And whenever things get serious (like now), the grim, no-nonsense 'Pinkamena' takes over. It was so far in contrast to what Twilight had seen of her other 'moods' as far that this particular one gives her the creeps.
She shook herself out of her thoughts. Now is not the time to dwell on this sort of thing! She must get to the space-port! She had been lucky enough that this small squad of Autobot Guards were nearby and willing to help her.
She quickly sped towards the space-port, with Pinkamena rumbling alongside her, her main gun traversing back and forth scanning for attackers.
Edward cursed slightly as he pushes his variable fighter closer to escape velocity, keeping one eye on rear view monitor that's showing a small, cyan blue figure trying keep up with him.
It started out so simple. A recon probe has discovered a viable, habitable planet that was relatively close (using fold drives). Excited over a potential colonization site, the UN-Spacy attached to the Macross Fleet 37 sent a small scouting group to assess the planet.
To the disappointment of those eager to settle the fleet down on the planet, it was already inhabited, with large populations scattered all over the planet. They cannot, in good conscience, make landfall there.
However, the opportunity to learn about the new aliens was too much to resist, and the scientists decided to study them. Orbital observations showed significant agricultural and heavy industrial activities, though it appears that they haven't achieved space-flight yet.
Edward's flight group was tasked with studying the aliens a little closer, with emphasis on not disturbing them. His fighter had especially been outfitted for low visual observability, and the weapons (aside from the head-mounted lasers and the pair of machine guns mounted near the intakes) had been removed. They had covertly entered the atmosphere and separated, though remained in radio contact, to cover more ground. He landed in an untamed forest. From there, he got out and made observations of a nearby village using a set of high-powered binoculars.
The re-entry and flight to the ground was weird enough. Some of the massive clouds formations resembled buildings, he swore he saw something that flew around those clouds. He and his group gave those clouds a wide berth.
Not to mention he had the feeling of being watched, by something big, even before entering the atmosphere.
The observations was quiet enough, though he was surprised to see exactly what the 'aliens' looked like.
Ponies. Four legged, cute-looking, brightly colored ponies.
At first, he thought he was looking at livestock, but seeing them go about their daily routines dispelled that notion. He determined that there are three main 'types'. A normal-looking one, one resembling pegasus from the Greek legends, and one looking like honest-to-God unicorns.
He was perched in a tree at the edge of the forest, making some notations when he saw something out of the corner of his eye. A cyan-blue pegasus, with a rainbow-coloured(?) mane and tail was looking straight at him in surprise, despite it being some distance away, and him covered in a camo-net.
He stilled himself, hoping it was a coincidence, when the pegasus snapped out of its' shock and flew towards him. He cursed, abandoned his post and made for his variable fighter parked in GERWALK mode deep in the forest.
Whatever this thing is, it's fast. Despite the trees, the head-start, and that he's using a jet propelled flight-pack attached to his Ex-Gear, the pegasus is actually gaining on him. Upon reaching his fighter, he quickly got in and lifted off. To his surprise, the pegasus followed him up.
Now, he's trying to shake off the pursuing pegasus. It has to break off pursuit at some point. The air is getting too thin up here!
Finally, he looked at the rear view monitor, and saw the cyan-blue form falling back. Despite it being a cause for relief, he narrowed his eyes. Something's wrong.
He quickly shifted to Battroid mode, and used the head sensors to zoomed in on the figure. What he saw made his heart sank.
The pegasus was falling uncontrollably, it's body limp. It may have passed out trying to stubbornly catch up to him despite the thinning air.
Making a split-second decision, he shifted his fighter to GERWALK mode, and dove after the free-falling form.
'Come on. Come on...", he thought as he struggled to match velocities, keep himself steady and use his fighter's right arm to gently grasp the falling, tumbling, unconscious pegasus. 'The ground is coming up pretty fast...'
Finally, the large metal fist closed loosely around the body, and he quickly pulled up and slowed his descent, careful not to jostle his previous cargo too much. The feet of his variable fighter had barely skimmed the top of the forest.
He had landed in an empty field near the forest, and set the limp form down on the ground (its' still alive) when he spotted five 'ponies' running towards him. 'Uh oh...'
Edwards gritted his teeth as he watched the green dragon reeled away, slightly dazed from his sudden ambush. 'Time to go!'
He then quickly brought his variable fighter's right hand to the ground to gently scoop up the three cowering figures there; Fluttershy, Rarity and Pinkie Pie.
"Hang on!" he exclaimed, both to the ponies in the hand (through external speakers) and to Twilight Sparkle and Spike who were strapped into the rear seat, watching anxiously.
He swung his variable fighter, still in GERWALK mode around and 'skated' away along the ground on the thrusters. Not too soon, as the dragon recovered, roared in anger and gave chase.
Edwards used his fighter's left hand to protectively cover the ponies as he skimmed along the ground through the forest. As he maneuvered his fighter through any gap amongst the large trees big enough to fit through, he could hear the dragon simply crashing through them behind him.
Eventually he came to a wide, churning river. He took advantage of the open space and gunned the thrusters, speeding away downriver. The dragon emerged from the trees moments later, and chased after the fleeing machine.
'Okay, Let's look at the situation', Edwards thought to himself as he navigated the river at high speed. 'I'm carrying 3 civilians, I can't risk taking to the air because my wings were damaged, and I have a huge dragon chasing me. The wide river now has high cliffs on either side, I have no offensive loadouts, no guns except for the machine guns and head ca...'
"Look out!" he was jolted out of his thoughts at the sudden cry of alarm from Twilight. A check of the rear view monitor showed the dragon flying behind him, and had opened it's mouth...
He quickly strafed his fighter to the left; just in time avoid the stream of fire passing through the space he had occupied not moments ago. The dragon then swept the breath of fire towards him. He strafed further left to avoid it. As he neared the cliffside, nearly scrapping off the rest of mangled left wing and with the stream of fire boxing him in, he boosted and 'jumped' over the stream, making a roll as he did so. The breath of fire tried to moved upwards to catch him, but it petered out.
His thrusters kicked up a spray of water as he 'landed'. There was a 'eep' from the back as he landed, but he paid it no thought as he made a quick check on his previous cargo. All three ponies were still there, still alive and clinging to the 'fingers', their heads poking through between them and watching wide eyed. He then jetted away from the dragon as it recovers from it's attack.
As he zoomed down the river, he abruptly came to a large lake. As he looked about, the dragon burst out onto the lake as well.
'Alright, let's see how you'll take this!' He quickly spun his fighter around while maintaining forward momentum. He brought up the side-mounted machine guns, centered the targeting reticle on the dragon and pulled the trigger.
A spray of energy bullets erupted from the guns, sped down the distance between him and the dragon and...
"Oh, Come on!" Edwards swore as the bullets splattered on the reptilian scales of the dragon, doing nothing but leave small scorch marks. The dragon let out a bellowing roar.
Correction: It did do something. It made the dragon even madder.
As he played 'keep away' from the dragon over the surface of the lake, he furiously combed his brain for another tactic. Any tactic.
Note: This is more of an experiment, to see if I could write a decent action scene.
Edwards could only looked in disbelief at the sight before him. Beside him, his friend and fellow ambassador/translator Twilight Sparkle had stopped and gawked. On one side in front of hangar 3, stood a variable fighter, a two person variant, in GERWALK mode. It is covered from nose to tailfin and thrusters in sticky tree sap. Stuck to the sap was various sticks, leaves and other forest detritus.
Standing on the other side, stood four figures. No wait, make that five. Standing on the upraised palm of the tallest figure was normally tall and stoic Lieutenant Jade, now 15 cm tall and blushingly dressed in a handkerchief. The figure holding her up was the heavyset, usually jovial Sergent Sato, now grumpily sporting thick wooly hair all over his body. Edwards had previously wondered why a hairy gorilla was standing on the runway, before he realized that the said 'gorilla' was wearing a flight suit.
Standing next to the humans, were three fillies. One, an earth pony with a yellow coat and a red mane and tail. The next, an orange pegasus with purple mane and tail. The last, a pale lavender unicorn with two tone purple mane and tail. All three looked like they've been mud wrestling.
Edwards stared at the unusual group for a moment more before sighing and raising his hand to massage his temples to futilely ward off the impending headache.
"Alright. Jade. Sato. How did you two end up like ..." he trailed off, at a loss for words and instead resorted to gesturing at them to indicate their current 'condition'.
Lieutenant Jade hesitantly cleared her throat and spoke up. "Captain. Sergent Sato and I were accidentally knocked into a patch of blue flowers. The locals called it 'Poison Joke'. When we got out of it, we became as you see now." She sounded like a chipmunk.
Edwards glanced at Twilight, and she answered his unspoken query. "Poison Joke is a magical plant that likes to play magic pranks on whoever got into them. Normally, the effects takes overnight to occur, but apparently it has a accelerated effect on humans..."
'A magical plant that likes to pla..." Edwards shook his head. He can sort out that particular headache later. He glared at Jade and Sato. "And how exactly did you get 'knock into' the Poison Joke in the first place? Why were you there?"
This time, Sato answered, "Well, sir. Me and Jade were finishing up the geographical survey near the coast and were heading back to the research center with our data, when we spotted three young ponies running into Everfree forest. I've positively identified them as Applebloom, Sweetie Bell and Scoota..."
"Stop", Edward commanded, his headache bursting to full strength. Of course. That explains a lot. Applebloom, Sweetie Bell and Scootaloo. Collectively known as the Cutie Mark Crusaders, or the CMC for short. Also known on the base as the 3-pony walking disaster zone and the Three Stooges.
When the UN Spacy and the Equestrian Princesses agreed on setting up a research center, outreach base and trade center here near Ponyville, the news had garnered a lot of interest. Interest in humans from outer space and their technology. The reception were generally positive, with some isolated grumblings here and there.
Anyway, the CMC had asked (read: begged) to help out around the center in order to 'find their special talent and get their cutie marks'. Most people found them endearing and their determination admirable. Like the local ponies had, the humans quickly learned that the CMCs had a collective talent of getting themselves into trouble. And despite the security, somehow managed to get themselves into the normally restricted (to them) places.
Their tenacity and resourcefulness might have impress some people, except that the CMCs were impatient, determined to try everything they can get their hoofs on, and tended to not listen to adults when they're saying something. Already, they've made the head mechanic chased them out of the hangars (CMC mechanics), fried the main navigation board of a variable fighter (CMC repairponies) and gave the pilot of a Cheyenne Mk II a heart attack when he found them messing around in the cockpit of his Destroid (CMC robot pilots!).
The suffering captain looked despairingly at the lavender pony beside him. "Twilight, is there a way to fix this? Or reverse it?"
"Yes, there's a special herbal remedy bath that can fix this. The local spa can mix it up quickly."
Edwards nodded and turned to the pilot standing there. "Sato. Jade. March yourselves to the spa to get rid of your 'condition'. Once you're back to normal, come back here ASAP. Twilight, can you go with them and arrange for the bath?"
"Now, you three," Edwards growled as he focused on the 3 miserable fillies. "I got half-a-mind to banned you from the base and the center. But I won't. However, if you're so eager to help out around here, you can start by washing the gunk off this fighter. I'll be keeping a close eye on you while you work. I'll also be informing your parents and siblings of your recent escapade. The rags, brushes and buckets are near the main building. Now get in line and follow me."
The fillies scrambled and quickly lined up behind him. He tiredly shook his head at their antics and herded them towards the main building. Twilight gave him a sympathetic look before heading towards the spa, with the two humans trailing behind her.
Captain Edwards, along with the rest of his squadron, stood in the hanger where the L.A.I. Corporation R&D department had set up shop on the Equestrian NUNS airbase. In front of them, standing in GERWALK mode, was the captain's stock VF-25S fighter. At least, it used to be.
Now, it sported gold-trimmed, streamlined armor plates, it's arms practically covered with them and the wings tips now has an additional pair of engines, fixed on rotating swivel mounts. The perplexed captain asked again, "What on Earth is this?"
"Ah, captain!" The head scientist Lloyd cheerfully called out. "Nice of you to come by! How did you like the new gear? Me and my team dubs it the 'Wizard' pack."
Edwards took in the state of his fighter again, and cautiously inquired,"Okay. What is it, and why?"
The (resident mad) scientist enthusiastically answered, "Well, since the Princesses had asked to help them make their own variable fighters, me and my team had been researching Equestrian magic and ways to incorporate it ..."
"Yes. I know that. Along with the 'helping them to develop their own space-industry' bit." The captain interrupted. "I meant, what is this, specifically?"
"Ah, ah. Impatient aren't we? This here, " the blond man gestured to the fighter, "is our latest prototype. The 'wizard' pack is designed to channel the magic spells of the unicorn pony co-pilot through the armor plates on the arms, bypassing the obstruction issue, and-"
Jamil raised an eyebrow. "Obstruction issue?", the heavyset man rumbled.
"Well, yes. We found out that unicorn magic spells, with a few exceptions, required a direct and unobstructed line-of-sight between the caster and the target. A bit of annoyance, really, when one tries to protect the pony pilot with an armored canopy. So, we bypass the issue by channeling the spells from the pony through the special gold alloy embedded in the armor plates instead. The engines were taken from a future VF-25 'Tornado' pack to compensate for the weight."
"Okay..." Edwards began, "Is this... going to work? I mean, we've seen what happened in that test when you guys tried to channel the innate magic of a pegasus co-pilot to work on a fighter."
Kaede smirked,"Honestly, I've never thought that a multi-ton variable fighter could actually get stuck in a cloud."
Arthur chimed in, "At least the Princesses found it funny."
"I think we've set a record. No-one had actually made them laughed so hard they couldn't stand up straight. At least, not in recent memory."
"It was pretty funny, with the cursing and arguing coming over the comm-link from the pilots and the fighter's limbs flailing about."
"Especially when they tried to jet themselves out and only ended up flipping the fighter and the cloud upside down."
"Like a tortoise that's been put on it's back."
Jamil joined in, "Remember the time they tried the Earth pony co-pilot?"
Lloyd spoke up, looking a little annoyed, "For your information, that was because of a acorn that got wedged into the armor, not the armor itself. Variable fighter armor pieces do not just spontaneously sprout roots and leaves just because it's imbued with Earth pony magic!."
Edwards quickly cut in before the conversation can get even further derailed. "Anyway. Are you sure this will work?"
At the question, Lloyd's demeanor immediately brightened. "Yes, yes. Of course, it will work! The small scale testing proved that. Right now, we want to test it on an actual, full-sized fighter in combat situations. Besides, the risk of things going wrong is quite small."
There was a beat, before the captain cautiously asked, "Okay. What happens if something does go wrong?"
"Well, the unicorn would either get a head-splitting migraine the size of the planet, or the magic could build up inside the armor plates and cause the arms to explode. But don't worry! The risk of that happening is pretty small. Besides, I thought you pilots love a bit of risk, right?" Lloyd cheerfully answered.
There was a slight pause as the group digested this, then the captain, with one eyebrow now slightly twitching, asked, "Okay. Now on to my second question. Why my fighter? And how did you get permission for this?"
"Why not? Besides, I thought you'd appreciated the new toys you got now. What, with your combat record and all. So, me and my team just went ahead and install it onto your fighter." He grinned.
Edwards stared at the man in front of him, before sighing and began to massage his temples. "You never asked for permission, did you?"
The scientist laughed, waving the issue away. "Nope! It would taken too long to get through the red-tape anyway. Better get it done now and apologize for it later, as I always say!"
The captain groaned, trying to ease his growing headache.
I would probably expand the Macross: Equestria snippets to a full blown story some time in the near future.
"Very good, Chrysalis! Your disguises are getting better!"
Before Queen Chrysalis, she was Princess Chrysalis.
"When I'm gone, all this will be your responsibility. To care and to rule."
Before her, there was another Queen.
"Remember your lessons. Now..."
Her mother.
"How's your day, my dear daughter?"
Her wise, peaceful, gentle mother.
"Your subjects look upon you for guidance. In return, you must safeguard their well-being."
Over 900 years ago, the Queen decided, on her own, to explore the lands beyond. Her daughter eagerly awaits her return, to hear from her tales of the lands beyond.
"There's a much larger world out there, and one must constantly learn new things."
She never return.
-----------------------------
Now, after so long, she found her.
"Remember, Chrysalis. Never disguise yourself for too long..."
But her mother couldn't remember her.
"Or else, you begin to forget who you are."
She tried so hard to make her remember.
"You'll start to take on their memories, their mannerisms..."
But she wouldn't remember.
"And eventually, you are them."
--------------------------
In all her dreams and prayers, she never thought she'll actually fought against her mother.
"No. You won't."
Not like this.
"You may have made it impossible for Shinning Armor to perform his spell."
The assault on Canterlot...
"But now that you have so foolishly revealed your true self..."
The goal, to secure a plentiful food source for her brood, was a secondary one.
A fortress, built to withstand the oncoming assault of the beings classified as 'Angels'.
An on-slought foretold by the Dead Sea Scrolls.
Merely a step in the ultimate plan of the council of the Seele. Of the plans of one Gendo Ikari.
A plan of achieving Instrumentality. A plan of reuniting with his beloved.
They eagerly await for the arrival of the Angels, to begin the next phase of their plans.
And waited.
And waited.
And waited some more.
Where the hell are they?!?
Fluttershy paused as she took in the strange sight before her.
She was busy picking some flowers in the meadow, when she came across one of the oddest... things she'd ever seen.
The 'thing' had a pitch back 'skin', stood on two legs, like a minotaur and had bone-like coverings on it's shoulders. At first, she thought that it has no head, until it turned around a bit. It's head was set low past it's shoulders and it was covered with a bone-like mask that has a beak, like a bird. Below the head was something that looked like a red marble, that was partially enclosed by 'ribs'.
It's also about as tall as a filly.
It's currently looking about in confusion, and hasn't seen her yet. It's... sort of cute, in a way.
Feeling curious, she move in closer.
The being that was known to humans as 'Sachiel' looked around in confusion.
This... isn't Earth.
It doesn't hear the call of Father. It doesn't hear the song of His counterpart.
In fact, this... place is peaceful. Calming. Relaxing.
It also seems to be smaller than what it was supposed to be.
As it glanced around, it caught sight of something coming slowly towards it. It was a four-legged creature, with a butter-milk coat and has a pink... mane and tail (it thinks). It's soul-song is... gentle. Kind. Curious.
As the creature cautiously approaches, it wonders...
"Twi. Why is there a big blue diamond floating behind you?"
"Oh, this? It appeared in the library yesterday. So far, it seems harmless. I think it's related somehow to those new 'friends' of Fluttershy's."
*grunts*
"You're still not sure about them."
"I think there's something off about them alright. Plus, one of them is a stealing critter."
"You're still mad at the snake-like one that kept stealing your apples? It seems to like them a lot."
It started normal enough. Raise the sun, breakfast with Luna, sort through the paperwork, start the Day Court...
She was in the middle of listening to one of her citizens petitions when an orb of light suddenly appeared in the middle of the room. The orb quickly expanded to a large sphere, before dissipating, revealing...
"Discord!" Celestia exclaimed, wings flaring out in alarm. It couldn't be! She can still see the (resealed) statue of him in the gardens out the window. A blink later, he was suddenly in front of her. She mentally braced herself as he...
Clasped both arms on her shoulders, looked into her eyes and demanded, "Celestia! Are you a power-mad megalomaniac tyrant that wants to conquer all?!"
Celestia spluttered in indignation, "What? No! What's the me-"
"Are you a nymphomaniac goddess out to sexually molest and corrupt anyone and anything within your reach?!"
Stunned by the random accusation, Celestia barked out, "No! What's your game this ti-"
"Are you a mad empress that loved to maliciously prank and tease your subject?!"
This time, she scowled, "No! What's -"
She cut herself off, squeaking in surprise and chagrin as Discord suddenly zipped to behind her, lifted up her tail and hindquarters and quickly checked underneath.
"Discord!" She whipped around in indignation at the draconequus who had released her. "What's -"
"Oh, Thank the Chaos!" Discord exclaimed joyfully, surprising Celestia. "You're the normal, goody-two-shoes original Princess Celestia!"
Before she can blink, she suddenly found Discord hugging her and winding his serpentine body around hers, mumbling something about "Safe now. Bad ones can't get me. Safe now..."
And now, here she is. Being used as a comfort cuddle... being by an apparently very traumatized draconequus. She could see her sister and the guards just outside the doors, just as flabbergasted at the situation as she was.
Twilight Sparkle slowly woke up, blinking blearily in the morning light.
'Uugh... I really should stop doing these marathon studying sessions...', she thought to herself as she struggled out in nice, comfy bed.
"Spike...?" She called out, wondering where's her little brother/assistant. Usually, he would be up and making breakfast about now...
Oh, right. He's at a sleepover with the Crusaders at Rarity's place.
Groggily, she made her way down the stairs, her mind still heavy and sluggish with sleep. Nevertheless, she mentally goes through her 'morning routine' list.
'Let's see... get some light breakfast first... maybe some orange juice or tea to wake me up a bit... then a quick wash and shower... then make something in the kitchen? No, we've out of groceries... need to pick some up later... I'll go to the Sunny-Side Cafe instead for breakfast...'
"Good morning, Twilight Sparkle." Nightmare Moon greeted her from the library table as Twilight walked pass her.
Twilight mumbled a 'good morning' in return and waved back at Discord, who was lounging on one of the chairs. A huge yawn interrupted a return nod of acknowledgement back to Queen Chrysalis, who was sitting stiffly beside Nightmare.
As she entered the small kitchen, she began to mentally review her checklist for the day.
'After breakfast, drop by Rarity's to pick up Spike. Then I'll drop by Sweet Apple Acres to take a look at the odd fungus Applejack found growing on some of her trees. Later, I'll...'
'Wait a minute.'
Suddenly, what and who she just greeted hit her. She turned around, did a short gallop back to the kitchen doorway and skidded to a stop to stare into the main library chamber.
All three of her 'guests' stared back at her.
Twilight watched them for a moment more, before she quickly went back into the kitchen, turned on the kitchen tap and stuck her head under the streaming water.
Now wide awake and her head soaking wet, she went back to the doorway and peered around it.
Rainbow Dash gritted her teeth as she 'flips' her Raider around to line up her twin KE cannons on her more agile, crescent-shaped opponent, 'walking' her shots across the central body until the rounds chews through the thin armor and caused it to explode satisfactorily.
Eliminating that one brought some brief reprieve, until a proximity alert sounded and a staccato of impacts on her hull quickly brought her back. Fortunately, the rounds merely dented her Raider's comparatively thicker armor and didn't punch through. Sighting the perpetrator behind her through her monitors, it suddenly went up in a burst of flame and shrapnel as her wingpony swoops in and destroys it before it can take another burst of potshots at her.
Sighing in relieve, she signaled her thanks before wheeling her Raider around, intending to seek out new targets. Unfortunately, there's a lot of them. As she maneuvers to aid the rest of her numerically inferior forces, she caught sight of her mothership and internally winced. The StarBlazer, the independent, semi-civilian self sufficient Explorer-type ship was frantically defending itself against the missile barrages from the two six-armed, starfish-like Basestars, but she can tell some are getting through. Even as she watched, three missiles had snuck through the ECM, the Helldart interceptors and the Phalanx point defense batteries. Two impacted against the glowing discs of the pin-point defense barrier system, but one was missed and...
BOOM!
Twilight Sparkle stumbled as the missile impacted the hull and detonated, causing the ship to shudder. Even as she recovers and gets back onto her hooves, ponies all around her in the ship's bridge were already reporting the damages, and sending what damage control teams could be spared to the impact site. The teams are stretched thin, battling fires and carrying the wounded to the ship's med facilities. She felt a pang of pity at the thought of the workload on Fluttershy and her fellow medical personnel.
As she processed the most recent damage report, Lyra the communication officer calls out. "Ma'am. Applejack from Engineering. " At Twilight's nod, the pale-green pony patched Applejack through.
Immediately, her friend's voice came in, "Twi. We can't take much more of this! The ship is going to be scrap metal at this rate! The reactors are strained, and the superstructure is getting warped. Rare's just told me that the missile stocks and ammunition stores are running low, we're losing more and more defense projectors and the ECM is getting less effective by the minute!"
Twilight urgently combed her mind for a solution, but nothing suitable comes to mind. Their previous attempts to escape didn't work and these Cylons are not interested in getting them to surrender. She was at her wit's end, until her friend, Pinkie Pie's words suddenly drifted through her thoughts, "Sometimes, you just have to be unpredictable and do the unexpected! It's more fun that way!" The unexpected...
Her mind quickly put together a plan and she snapped out, "Applejack, how's the FTL drive?"
Applejack paused at the query, before answering, "The drive's still spooling up, but we've nearly ready for another jump."
Twilight nodded, "Good. I want you to release the safety limiters and wire around the failsafes. We've going to do a super-long distance jump, and we need as much as power to the drives as possible."
"Release the... But Twi-" Applejack exclaimed, taken back by the drastic order.
"Just do it! I'll handle the rest." Twilight snapped at her.
"...Yes, Ma'am." With that, Applejack signed off.
Burying the slight pang of guilt, she barked out at the communication officer. "Recall our fighters. We're jumping."
"All friendly Raiders and recovery pods are in the hangar."
"Twi, The drive is ready, but if we don't jump soon, they'll tear themselves apart."
"More missiles incoming!"
"Alright. Coordinates are set. Get ready for FTL jump on my mark."
"Ma'am! These coordinates! They'll put us in-"
"3. 2. 1. Jump!"
"We're where!?"
The cry of shock from the ponies before her were loud, but the feelings behind them were understandable, considering their own past and where they are now.
"We're currently deep on the Colonial side of the Red Line." Twilight Sparkle semi-calmly repeated, internally bracing herself for the potential incoming storm.
"Why did we jump here?! Wouldn't it be better if we just head back to Equestrian space?" Rainbow Dash demanded.
"I'll get to that in a moment. AJ, how's the ship?" Twilight asked.
Applejack stared at her for a moment, before sighing, "Well, Twi. The ship has taken a lot of pounding, but with the ongoing repairs, we're good as long as we don't get ourselves into another fight anytime soon. We've taken hits in the cargo and lab sections, so we lost some supplies and equipment there. But we've good in terms of food and spare parts. The mini-factory is churning out replacement parts and resupplying the ammunition and interceptor missile stocks, so we might be a tad low on the fabber stocks later. We've lost the stellar observation sensor array, whatever's in the secondary hangar and the large starboard cannon though. As for the drive, well..."
She winced, before continuing, "The drive's toast. Half of it had melted into a solid lump, and the other half had nearly torqued itself apart before we shut it down. There's no way to repair it, and we don't have the replacement parts nor the raw materials. We ain't going anywhere fast unless we replace it completely."
There was a brief silence as the present gathering of ponies processed the information, before Rarity cleared her throat and asked, "Twilight dear. Not to rush you, as Rainbow Dash had earlier asked, why exactly did we jump to Colonial space?"
Twilight sighed, before answering, "I've jumped us here because it's the safest place we can go."
At the puzzled silence, she continued, "I think they have a way of tracking us somehow. Maybe they planted a beacon on us somehow or they got lucky with their Raider patrols. But those basestars somehow followed us through two consecutive FTL jumps. I'm wanted to jump us back to Equestrian space, but I can't take the risk of accidentally leading those ships back to Equestria. Especially when you consider our mutual history. Jumping here is the best option I can think of."
There was another bout of silence, before Applejack spoke up, "Are sure about this, Twi? I mean, with the Cimtar Accords and all..."
"I know, AJ." Twilight interrupted, "I know the consequences of breaking those. I was hoping that since we looked so different since the Armistice, the Colonials might not realized about our own origins and give us some help. Maybe even a replacement FTL drive..."
"Them?" Rainbow Dash snorted. "What can they do? Think they'll help us out of the goodness of their hearts?" she said, voicing the general opinion most Equestrians have towards the Colonials: Low.
"Well... why not? Maybe they've changed a lot since then. We haven't had any contact with them ever since the Schism. Who knows what changes they had went through. Besides, it couldn't hurt to try." Twilight optimistically answered, a part of her eager to find out.
There were some skepticism, but eventually the rest agreed to Twilight's plan.
"I hope this works out..." Applejack muttered as she disconnects from the virtual conference.
Notes: The time is roughly about 38 years after the conclusion of the Cylon War
Just to clarify: This is merely to serve as an online backup of snippets and ideas I find interesting regarding a Mass Effect cross. Credits to their respective writers.
Every year, the three heads of the Equestrian Government officially met to decide broad matters of policy for their nation, settle disputes between their areas of responsibility, and on the rare occasions when everything was going well, just socialize in general. As was traditional, responsibility for choosing the location of the meeting was rotated among the three heads in turn. Traditionally, the chooser would decide the meeting be held in the seat of their power, although over the past millenium, Princess Celestia had chosen some unconventional meeting sites. This year however, the meeting place was chosen by the Commander.
They were on a space station.
True, the meeting room was far from cramped and the view of Equestria below was spectacular. Still, despite being designed with Pony comfort in mind, Celestia found the station's artificialness unsettling. And despite the utility of electronic displays and records, she missed the days when the meeting table would have been piled high with paper books and records. Not that she let any of her discomfort show of course. Celestia wasn't about to retard technological progress out of mere personal pettiness.
Sitting to Celestia's left a third of the way around the round meeting table and opposite the Commander was Chancellor Ballot Box. He was elected head of the Equestrian Parliament and Celestia's theoretical equal. In practice of course, Celestia dominated if for no other reason that she had centuries of seniority and political experience on him.
Currently, Ballot Box was briefing the Princess and Commander on the internal state of Equestria's lands, which were his responsibility. That basically translated into the state of Equestria's civilian infrastructure and economy and nowadays included the same for colony worlds. And after an hour long "briefing" that sounded half like an election campaign speech, Celestia could sum up everything he had said into one line, "Everything's fine!"
Celestia didn't let any irritation show though. She just gracefully thanked Ballot Box for his thorough detail. For not the first time, she quashed the impulse to lash out. No matter how tempting that would be, down that road led to the Chancellor handing powers over to the Princess, inevitably resulting in the Princess drowning in more work and responsibilities than she could handle. Celestia had already seen that happen once and she adamantly refused to let it happen again.
With the Chancellor done, it was now the Pegasus Commander's turn. The Commander's two major responsibilities were handling Equestria weather service and military defense. Historically, the two had been one and the same. But as time went on, the two had grown into separate services with some rivalry between the two but always retained the same Commander. In times of peace, the Commander would be chosen by his or her predecessor from the ranks of the weather service. On the rare occasions when war came to Equestria, it was the military that provided the Commander.
Equestria was not at war. But Celestia found it a sign of the times that the newly promoted Commander was not only from the military arm, but that she wasn't even a Pony.
Commander Hannah Shepherd was a human, and had distinguished herself in action against Battarian "pirates" and had a exemplary record elsewhere. True, she was young for the post and had been chosen over an entire corps of flag officers who had previously outranked her. But most of those officers had been weather service, and Pegasus tradition was that the Commander and nopony else picked her successor and old Commander Spring Showers had chosen Hannah Shepherd.
Celestia hadn't known what Spring Showers had been thinking, but she could guess. Worse, Celestia agreed with her decision which boded ill for the future.
Commander Shepherd skimped on the state of the weather service, which was only to be expected. Like Chancellor Ballot Box, her report basically amounted to little more than, "Everything's fine!" Instead, her report focused on ship deployments, possible alien threats to Equestrian civilians, and new technological and magical developments that she'd like the budget - and here she looked at Ballot Box directly - to upgrade the armed forces with.
"As Commander of the Equestrian Armed Forces, one of my responsibilities is to think of worse case scenarios and come up with counters for them, or at least mitigate their risk," Shepherd was saying. "One of the nightmare possibilities - no offense your majesty - is that our conventional space forces will simply be overwhelmed by an attacker, either through numerical or technological superiority. Now obviously, I can't say who such an attacker would be given that the scenario is purely hypothetical; it could be the Citadel, or it could be some as yet unknown race coming through from some unexplored part of the galaxy. One of the solutions that my think tanks came up with however isn't really my area of responsibility at all."
"It's not, Commander?" Celestia asked. "That seems to be an odd admission to make given that your responsibility is the defense of our nation."
"No, your Majesty," Shepherd confirmed. There was a trace of nervousness in her voice and mannerisms, something Celestia had seen countless times when Ponies were about to tell her something they thought she wouldn't want to hear. "It's not solely my responsibility because if we decide to use it, it would have to be your office who implements it since your office is the one with all the required skills to do so."
Celestia found her eyes widening involuntarily in surprise. There wasn't exactly a shortage of unicorns in military service. The responsibility of her office focused solely on the management of magic, which these days meant primarily education and academic programs to teach magic and the ethical usage thereof. Most applied magic had over the centuries been shifted over to private enterprise, taken by the offices like the Commander's military, or just been outright supplanted by advancing technology. What could Commander Shepherd be talking about that would require the explicit active cooperation of Celestia's office?
"Could you elaborate, Commander?" Celestia asked.
"My people have prepared a brief video that basically summarizes everything," Shepherd said. A touch of a button brought a holographic video to life above the center of the table. "We're calling this 'Sunbeam'."
The video was short and to the point. It couldn't have been more than five minutes long. And it felt to Celestia like she had just been stabbed in the gut... or the back.
"Commander, this..." Celestia struggled for words. "This is an abomination."
"Abomination? You're too kind, Your Majesty!" Ballot Box added in a furor. "It goes against every Equestrian tradition and value we hold dear. It's a direct violation of an agreement made by our Founding Ponies! Why, if the voters even caught a whiff that we were even seriously considering such a thing..."
"Look, I'm sorry, but I had to bring it up," Shepherd said apologetically to them. "I know it's everything you said it is and more. If after this meeting you both want my resignation," Shepherd glanced at Celestia, showing who's opinion truly mattered to her "you can have it. But, please, can you let me explain myself first?"
"What explanation could there possibly be..." Ballot Box began.
"Ballot Box, hush," Celestia interrupted. Ballot Box's mouth shut with an audible click, and he turned to the Princess in surprise. But Celestia's gaze was narrowed and locked on the Commander. "Explain."
"As I mentioned, using Sunbeam is a last resort," Shepherd said. "If we have to use Sunbeam, it means the fleet has failed in the defense of Equestria. It means my office has failed. It means I failed." She sighed. "Sunbeam is a weapon of last resort, something we keep in our toolbox and hope like hell we never have to use. But if we ever need it, we'd better have it. As the old proverb says, better to have something and not need it, than to need it and not have it.
"But I won't deny the danger of having it in our toolbox," Shepherd continued. "If we have it, then the temptation will always be there to use it with the additional danger of misusing it. There's too many echoes in Sunbeam of the RKVs of the Last War. If we implement Sunbeam, then we risk going down the path of the Last War again. Because before the Last War, we told ourselves the same thing, 'we'll just build RKVs just in case, but we'll never use them.' But in the end, we did use them.
"But I would be remiss in my duties as Commander if I didn't even consider the idea, or bring it up here," Shepherd finished. She looked from the Chancellor to the Princess. "So what do you two say? Do we implement Sunbeam and risk obliterating ourselves? Or do we not implement Sunbeam and hope like hell that nothing too powerful for our conventional space forces to handle hits us?"
"I... I..." Ballot Box stuttered, for once at a loss for words. He turned to Celestia, obviously looking for guidance from age old wisdom. "Your Majesty?"
Celestia looked from human to Pony and back again, indecision churning inside her, knowing that whatever she chose could well damn her for an eternity. What should she decide?
On the Death of Terra, I'm not sure how important the exact details of the war are to a ME/MLP story like this. Basically the humans had a Final War, and survivors had to flee a dying homeworld.
How about this for a bit of background, enough ME tech got made that FTL was about ready officially. Unofficially? Various governments had a small number of FTL combat ships, not even frigate sized, more insystem gunboats, all with the intention of being able to strike harder and faster than the other side(s), possibly inside their communication loop (Bases B, C, D, and E are all dead before anyone knows Base A was hit) Nice idea, a real war winner for the first side to use it. The kicker? All the major powers had it, and no one knew anyone else did. Perhaps a favorite tactics was to kick loose a RKKV just before dropping out of warp?
The survivors started cannibalizing everything that wasn't smashed flat, with obsessiveness and thoroughness that would impress a Quarian. Grabbing official half completed 'colony' ships, all the Eezo they could scrape up, possibly looking at a habitat and going, "You know, with the right bracing and a jury rigged Eezo core we could take this sucker FTL." Or building an FTL and Eezo core, then half dismantling a habitat to weld the living modules to it.
Whinny-Pedia: The Exodus Fleet: Name collectively given to the vessels that evacuated the surviving human population from Sol to Equestria (do we have a star name?). Something of a misnomer, since some 'ships' were nothing more than space habitats rebuilt around generation zero FTL and Eezo cores. Save a sealed portion that exist in the Canterlot Royal Museum no original parts still exist. They were dismantled due to Eezo dust contamination. The Sanctuary Field Museum (Site of first landfall of Humans on Equestria) does have reproductions of some of the more famous ones, included the 'Ad Astra' habitat/spaceship that was the flagship of the Exodus.
"The Princesses do not understand the horrors of what might lurk out there. Humanity ever since we arrived have forged ourselves into Equestria's Sword and Shield. But with the conflict between us and the Turians and the aftereffects, we found that Equestria needs protection. A guardian.
Even if the Princesses do not approve.
We are Cerberus. And we guard the Gates of Hell to prevent the evils inside from escaping into the heaven that is Equestria.
We are the damned. We were born into the darkness. We live in the darkness and so we will also die in the darkness. And while we may be reviled and dispised by those we protect, we find comfort in knowing that with our sacrifice they are free and alive to do so, and thus we take comfort in that."
And I thought Celestia would try to step hard on Cerebus, finding their hearts in the right place, but their actions, "Discordant".
"To my embarrassment we have become the living embodiment of our Ponies' kindness and generosity to Humanity when they felt their most unworthy of either. Cerebus is one of the more fanatical versions of such devotion, that has encompassed other Equestrians, even if it is still primarily human. I fear for them Luna, what they might unknowingly become in their self assigned role as Equestria's protectors in such dark places. So I find myself trying to drag them to the light, and fearing I will lose them as I once lost you. And part of me wonders, what if they see this more clearly than I do?"
"Especially if they do means we must stop them 'Tia. I know very well the dangers of isolation in a thankless task. Tis a vexingly human attitude though, "I might die, so others will live." The dusky winged unicorn shook her head. "My guard is better suited for this task, we will search the dark places for our lost ones, spy out what they have found, and take appropriate action while bringing them home."
As for what happened when they first arrived... well... ______________________________________________________
Staring out at the stars, Celestia is lost in her thoughts until the sound of hooves slowly making their way towards her breaks her out of them. Softly smiling, she turns to see her recently returned sister. "Hello there Luna. Couldn't sleep?"
Luna shakes her head with a sigh. "No... so much has changed." Reaching the balcony where her sister is standing, she looks down to see a human couple on a bench far below. "Including our new... subjects."
Closing her eyes in grief, Celestia nods. "Do you know of their story yet? You have been back for only two days..."
Snorting, Luna gives Celestia a look. "Of course I do." Her eyes then become haunted. "Such horror in their pasts I..." She then looks up as a star-like dot crosses the heaven. "Why?"
Knowing the true question behind it, Celestia also looks up, her eyes fogging over as she slips into memory. "Our first inkling was of a star crossing our skys you know. Then it fell from the heavens and landed on the coast." A slight twitch of her lips happen. "I was among the first there and saw them. At first I was frightened I'm afraid to say but then... I looked into their eyes."
Luna looks over at her sister in confusion. "Their eyes 'Tia?"
Celestia nods her head. "Yes, their eyes." She then turns to her sister who gasps at the emotions there. "They showed a being who's spirit was completely broken, almost a shell of what they once were." She bows her head as her sight becomes blury. "They were all so thin Lulu. It... it was..." She trails off as she takes a shaky breath. "They didn't bother to hide what had happened. What they had done." With a stomp her hoof, Celestia scowls. "They didn't even consider that we would let them settle. In fact all they wanted was perhaps some food for supplies."
After a few minutes of silence, Luna speaks up with a question that's been bouncing in her head. "So... why?"
Celestia is silent for a moment before speaking. "I... almost didn't." Feeling Luna's shocked expression, she sighs. "I was horrified by what had happened. It was so far out of my comprehension that I almost told them to leave and never come back. But those eyes... and her."
Luna blinks in confusion. "Her 'Tia?"
Nodding, Celestia nods in grief. "Yes, 'Her' Lulu. Her name was Emily and she was a survivor from Earth. I could feel her dying as me and you can feel sometimes when we're near one who is. I'm ashamed to admit that I demanded to see her. I thought..." She shakes her head as a tear drips from her eye. "I was able to. And that was when I saw the other half of humanity. Emily was a small girl. She was dying from having been poisoned by what had happened. I saw her hooked up to mechines to try and keep her alive." Now sobbing, Celestia falls to her knees. "While the others were thin, she was almost skeletal Luna. Her hair was falling out and she had been blinded. She somehow knew I was there though. Her voice will always haunt me. She asked who I was and where. So... I told her. I talked to her Luna. She... she finally asked if she could feel that sun. She was cold. I knew that there was nothing that could be done. So, after they unhooked her, I used my magic and gently brought her outside the ship. And she smiled and told me it felt warm." Being comforted by Luna, she turns to the direction of the sea. "She... was the first human to be buried on Equestria. But she was far from the last... There may have been bumps and issues, but we have never regreted taking them in." Choking back a sob, Celestia buries her head in her younger sister's neck. "I still visit her. Every Salvation Day morning, I go there. And I stand next to her gravestone as I raise the sun before telling her that I'll make sure that it's another warm day..."
Luna leaned up against her sister, feeling the pulse of her slowly healing magic. "Do you remember Clover, Pansy, and Cookie 'Tia? How their eyes looked when they told of of the founding, and the Windegos? Human eyes remind me of them when they talk of their Lost Earth."
Celestia nodded, "Yes, though it took me years to make the same connection. My own reminder of the Element of Honesty. My student, Twilight Sparkle, had a rather controversial term paper comparing how close Early Equestrian came to going down the same path of Earth before those three pulled our ponies back."
My name is.... no, never mind, who I am and where I come from doesn't matter. All you need to know is that I am human, and I was among the first of us to tread on equestrian soil as well as one of the first to see Celestia.
Do you think me rude or disrespectful for not using her honorific here? Perhaps, but this little article isn't _about_ Princess Celestia. It's about Celestia, which is who she is, and not Princess, which is _what_ she is.
The years pass, and generations of us spring up that have never had to endure the exodus, never watched their world burn, and their race rush gleefully towards suicide. These younger generations revere their monarch of course, they grow up knowing the debt of gratitude that we have towards Celestia, Luna, and all Equestria's children. But I know too that they don't quite understand that intensity of feeling that we have towards Celestia. Soon, I suspect, as we reach for the stars again, others will wonder the same.
Some will hypothesize that it is simply a debt of gratitude, that we first who were personally saved and owe her our lives are just closer to the heart of the matter. This is true, but only in the sense that we _were_ personally touched. That our physical beings were saved is... minor in comparison.
Others more cynical will rationalize that we needed to place our faith is something, something other than another Human, for the depth of betrayal that we inflicted upon ourselves is vaster and deeper than any ocean. There is an element of this, I admit, but this is not why we love her.
No. To truly understand, you must understand the state we were in.
We were _broken_ than vaunted human spirit that we now take pride in again was a crushed and dead thing. We did not believe that we would survive and we weren't looking for salvation. No, we were simply looking, like a wounded animal, or some dark hole to die in.
And then we found Equestria.
Did you think we celebrated our salvation then? If you did, then you're dead wrong.
Equestria, was a slap in the face. A bitter reminder of what we once had and would never have, never _deserve_ to have again. Equestria is a land of light, lush forests, cerulean oceans. Paradise. This we saw, but we were minded only of the hell we had turned our own Paradise into, of a smoke darkened sky, dead skeletons of splintered trees, and lakes, rivers, and oceans of blood.
It pained us, those first of us who landed and asked for some small relief.... we felt that our very presence tainted the planet. We were in agreement, we would ask for supplies, and leave, and save this wondrous planet from the hell we would surely wreak if we stayed.
And then Celestia came, and our shame deepened. She was as beautiful then, as she is now, and we felt like tawdry wretched things incomparison. I am old now, and perhaps it is simply a hyperbole inflicted by an elder mind, but it almost felt as if her light burned us.
We all knew what a human leader would have done with such as us. Hurried perhaps to usher us from their doorstep. Granted some aid in some pubic way and gleaned the support from their followers. At best, some more aid and hurtful pity if they were still human enough to care.
She, instead, asked to see the sickest of us.
Pity and compassion are... similar things, separated only by hairsbreadth of emotional distance. We expected pity at best, instead, well.... I'm not entirely sure Celestia is even capable of pity.
Not of course, that we even realized it then. We were to far gone to care. A nearly dead man floating in a frozen pond is hardly likely to take notice of a bonfire, however close he is to it.
And then she met and spoke to Emily. A child we all knew was going to die. And with the utmost of gentleness, she took the child, where, under an alien but oh so gentle sun, she, miraculously obtained a last moment of happiness before passing.
You must understand, we didn't feel anything at her passing. So very very many of us had passed, both in the war, and on the way to Equestria. It was an inevitable thing. All of us would die. Some likely even envied her. Dead ourselves, we were past grief, or sorrow.
But Celestia wasn't. Every line of her, non-human as she was, was carved in sorrow. And she _wept_. She _wept_ for Emily and she wept for humanity. She was a glorious and alien being, as far above us as the sun is above the earth. By all rights she shouldn't have even been touched by us, nor spared us a second glance. And yet she grieved for we who were beyond grief. Sorrowed for our lost world and our lost child. Wept for what we never thought we could be again.
And did you know? That touched us. We thought we were as nothing, and yet here was a living goddess grieving for what we were. When we thought we weren't worth anything, her grief told us we were _wrong_. Her sorrow... her sorrow was like a dagger in the hearts we'd lost. It hurt, it hurt terribly... but soon too we grieved. We too wept for lost earth, for Emily, that lost child. For our cultures, and our families, for all of humanity lost to the dark. I am not ashamed at all to admit I cried harder that day than anytime then or since.
And that is why we love her. For that which grieves is _alive_
And when that storm of grief passed, while our hearts were still aching... she asked if we would like to stay.
Celestia didn't just save our lives, she saved all that we are, and all that we ever will be.
Equestrian Human attitudes are colored by that first meeting?
"Celestia saw us at our worst, and wept because she saw what we could be, what we threw away in our collective madness. So we strive, not for the dead, but the living, for Celestia who offered us hope, for Luna, who knows the path of redemption. To fail to be the best person is more than a personal failure, it is to turn our backs to the promise Celestia wept for, to betray it and Her." (personal journal of one of the Exodus Fleet?)
"Humanity came to the Principles of Harmony much later than Ponies, and suffered far greater than the old nations did during the Founding Period. But Celestia's compassion showed them Generosity, Kindness, Friendship and Honesty. And while grief did flow heavy in those early days, grief is not Laughter's opposite, but a cleansing rain to wash sorrow, for one must feel to Laugh, and as Humanity can attest the opposite of Laughter is to hide from all feelings, for fear of being crushed by the weight of them. Finally came Loyality, even among Ponies Humans are renown for their Loyality to the Twin Thrones, and Celestia. Many Ponies look at this and think that Humans before Equestria were inherently ignorant of the Elements, while Ponies are naturally attuned to them.
This is the worst form of Dishonesty, self-delusion. A clear eyed look at the Founding Period and the events proceeding show that Ponies weren't naturally more Harmonious, we were luckier. We had three that grabbed our herds as they stampeeded off our own cliff, and hauled us back. The Humans had no one to snatch them back from the abyss." -Term Paper, Equestrian History and Human Studies, Twilight Sparkle yr 999 ANM
That's great, but with a slight adjustment (Or rather just my opinion). At the time when Celestia wept, as much as she is wise and far seeing, aside from the brief moment of shared empathy, she doesn't _truly_ know humanity, or it's true potential. Which means the grief is an act of pure compassion for what humanity lost, and that even what was lost was worthwhile. And which means that her offer to let them stay is the truest act of kindness, as well as a leap of faith that Humanity does have the potential to be good. Celestia offer friendship to Humanity as it was then, wretched and weakened, and not out of any conception of what humanity _might_ be in the future.
And that would be a motivation for Humanity to excel like no other.
I really like the bit with Twilight at the end there. It's at once a pretty damn good analysis, on top of which, it's got the vaguely anvilly feeling of a term paper written by Twilight.
Okay, run this through, mark II. "Celestia saw us at our worst, and wept because she saw what we terrible things we had done, what we threw away in our collective madness. She felt all our self inflicted pains and wept for us when we were too wounded to do so for ouselves.
Then in an act of faith that still boggles the mind she offered us a new home. A place on Equestria. Not seperate as some reservation or preserve to keep a random species from dying, but a place in the Herds of Equestria, where we might rest and recover. Some wonder today at how far sighted Celestia was, what we might become if helped.
I think she had no idea at all, or at least didn't care. She offered us a place in her heart, not because we were worthy, or 'had potential', but because it was kind, it was right. And a living Godess took her own leap of faith on Humanity. It would be the worst form of ingratitude to dissapoint her.
So we strive, not for the dead, but the living, for Celestia who offered us hope, for Luna, who knows the path of redemption. To fail to be the best person is more than a personal failure, betrayal of a Godess Faith in part of her Herd." (personal journal of one of the Exodus Fleet?)
"Of the ten billion humans that called the Earth system home. It is estimated that up to 250,000 survived to take part in the Exodus. 135,000 lived to reach Equestria and finally 50,000 survived their first year on Equestria. "
" The hardest hit amongst the survivors were the engine crews of the Exodus ships. They had the greatest exposure to Ezeo poisoning amongst the fleet. Almpst all of them died within a year of reaching Equestria. Some just gave up having given all they could during the journey here.They had nothing left."
"Close evaluations of the Equestrian Societies found very little room to foment factionalism between the various species. The three 'Pony' races have a quasi-religious connection with their Diarchy. The newest subjects of 'Old Equestria', the Humans in comparison are fanatics. This represents a strategic problem for any successful intervention, Humanity makes up 80% of the Alliance's military, and are also prominent in rescue response services. Between the Humans and Unicorns they also have a solid lock on external biotic talents, and the rest of the Ponies at least counter the other members of the Alliance should a serious fissuring be engineered. The closer interrelationships have grown to the point of families containing members of different, incompatible species."
Celestia's World is the inner most planet of the Epona system. It is a small, geologically dead, rocky world with a high metal content. Celestia' World orbits close enough to be tidelocked. As small rocky planets go, Celestia's World is utterly unremarkable, except for the singular geographical feature that gives the world its name.
Carved into the planet's day side surface are the words CELESTIA WAS HERE. The individual letters are roughly 500 kilometers tall and five kilometers deep. Geological analysis indicates that the lettering was carved via some form of rapid thermal pulse. As the lettering is on Celestia's World dayside, it was all but invisible from Equestria and not discovered until a human probe surveying the system sent back pictures of them.
Princess Celestia herself has no comment when asked about the geographical feature that names her. Questioning her Majesty inevitably leads to her changing the subject to topics about youthful follies and discussions of anti-intoxication laws.
It could be used as a way to futher disguished humanity from the Quarians.
Humanity kept ahold of everything that it could in a vice like grip. Cultures, languages, religions, so on and so forth. Yet it was willing to move on, and new innovations are built upon the foundations of the homelands. There would be differences, yes, but now everyone will make an effort to live in harmony, to make compromises instead of war, to build a city on a hill that they could be proud of. They viewed themselves as clear eyed pioneers, wanting a fresh start on a new world and a clean slate. Hard work would be expected, but worth it, because there's no going home now. The fact that the new world was hospitable, and the inhabitants were friendly, was an unexpected boon.
The Quarians, on the other hand, went the opposite route. Religious belief has almost died altogether in all but the most casual of blasphemes. Their culture was stripped away of all but what was needed to survive, and instead built around the survival of the fleet. Everything, from the government to the rite of passage, is because of the needs of the fleet. They toy with the idea of settling down, but they're not pioneers. They're crusaders. One day, no matter how grave the cost, they will reclaim their homeworld from the Geth and rebuild their former glory from the ruins of their ancestors.
The Human Exodus Fleet was falling apart by the time they got to Equestria, and if they had to go much farther would have faced extinction. The Quarian Migrant Fleet, while hardly self sufficent, is able to survive and thrive as a nomadic culture in space. When the Exodus Fleet left, humanity didn't know if there were any living sapients outside of the remnants of their species. When the Migrant Fleet left, they were spurned by the Citadel and their former allied sapients.
Really and truely, they're two sides of the same coin.
On the Death of Terra, I'm not sure how important the exact details of the war are to a ME/MLP story like this. Basically the humans had a Final War, and survivors had to flee a dying homeworld.
How about this for a bit of background, enough ME tech got made that FTL was about ready officially. Unofficially? Various governments had a small number of FTL combat ships, not even frigate sized, more insystem gunboats, all with the intention of being able to strike harder and faster than the other side(s), possibly inside their communication loop (Bases B, C, D, and E are all dead before anyone knows Base A was hit) Nice idea, a real war winner for the first side to use it. The kicker? All the major powers had it, and no one knew anyone else did. Perhaps a favorite tactics was to kick loose a RKKV just before dropping out of warp?
The survivors started cannibalizing everything that wasn't smashed flat, with obsessiveness and thoroughness that would impress a Quarian. Grabbing official half completed 'colony' ships, all the Eezo they could scrape up, possibly looking at a habitat and going, "You know, with the right bracing and a jury rigged Eezo core we could take this sucker FTL." Or building an FTL and Eezo core, then half dismantling a habitat to weld the living modules to it.
Whinny-Pedia:
The Exodus Fleet: Name collectively given to the vessels that evacuated the surviving human population from Sol to Equestria (do we have a star name?). Something of a misnomer, since some 'ships' were nothing more than space habitats rebuilt around generation zero FTL and Eezo cores. Save a sealed portion that exist in the Canterlot Royal Museum no original parts still exist. They were dismantled due to Eezo dust contamination. The Sanctuary Field Museum (Site of first landfall of Humans on Equestria) does have reproductions of some of the more famous ones, included the 'Ad Astra' habitat/spaceship that was the flagship of the Exodus.
Another fairly unique practice to Equestrian culture, ship painting (commonly referred to as aslik’vis, or ‘loud ship’ in Asari) refers to the aesthetic decorations commonly found on most Equestrian space craft. Common to pony owned civilian spacecraft, the goal of this practice is to turn the ship's hull into a narrative piece of art.
Most commonly these paintings depict figures or events of importance to the ship owner. The personal crafts of Envoy Twilight Sparkle commonly depict Starswirl the Bearded, a noted scholar and early pioneer of the scientific study of biotics in Equestrian society. The ships of Sweet Apple Acres typically depict pastoral scenes, as well as the history of the widespread Apple clan. The ships of the Night Guard depict scenes of the Diarch of the Night, typically in reference to a redemption arc involving the mythical figure of the Diarch or various accomplishments of the office, although historical military and scholarly figures of many species are also common.
The most remarkable of example of this practice is the Day Fleet of Princess Celestia. From the first commissioned craft to the smallest shuttle, in sequence of building, there has been over 500,000 sequential panels depicting the mythical origins and epic history of Equestria. This narrative has yet to breach early written records, and are being exhaustively studied by scholars and anthropologists from both the EA and the Citadel. In several instances Princess Celestia has been seen passing on sketches, giving instructions, and even personally painting ships herself, suggesting that her ship paintings are a personal project to record the oral history of the Equestrian royal family in a visual form.
Human practices, especially in regards to military ships, are similar but different. Human ship painting involves the use of heraldry on larger ships, typically using colors to denote branch. Only three images are used on commissioned military and law enforcement craft: the Crest of the Royal Family (used as a figurehead), the emblem of the branch of service (typically before the name and registry of the ship) and the ship badge (after the name and registry of the ship). Ship badges and 'unit patches' may be simple or elaborate, but are typically depicting symbols and phrases of deep importance to the unit. These ship badges and unit paches are also common in Equestrian uniforms, denoting the wearer as member of a larger community.
On small military shuttles, ground vehicles, and human owned civilian space craft ship painting takes the form of ‘nose art’. These pieces of human folk art are expressions of individuality, often times evoking memories of peacetime life or home. Unlike the almost permanent ship paintings of their pony counterparts human nose art is of an ephemeral nature, and have been noted to change when ownership of a craft changes, or even at the whims of the primary vehicle operator. Like pony ship paintings these pieces of art are recorded whenever possible by Citadel anthropologists, in the hopes of gaining a better insight to human psychology and group identity.
Hornmade Goods is a classification of consumer products exported by the Equestrian Alliance. These products are so named because they are reportedly constructed by individual or small groups of Equestrian Unicorns using their biotic abilities as focused through their horns (hence the term "Hornmade") in manner not unlike pre-industrial handicrafts.
Hornmade products command high prices within the Equestrian Alliance and even higher prices outside the Equestrian Alliance. The high prices are partially caused by the handicraft nature of their construction, but mostly by the high demand for Hornmade products.
The demand is the result of Hornmade products having unusual properties despite their apparently standard, sometimes even primitive construction. These properties are often wildly at odds of what properties the constituent materials should have, and often have no discernible cause.
Examples of Hornmade products include but are not limited to:
* A scroll made of primitive wood pulp paper. If burned, the paper will quickly turn into a cloud of ash that will somehow move itself to its intended recipient and reconstruct itself and any message written on it. No discernable signs of nanotechnology are found in the paper.
* A set of custom made shoes, beautifully designed, but constructed of simple leather and cloth. When set on an opaque cloud of mist or smoke, behaves as though the cloud were a solid object capable of supporting the weight of not only the shoes, but the sophont wearing the shoes. No eezo or even a power supply could be found in them.
* A glass jar of edible, multicolored paste called "Zap Apple Jam". Universally considered delicious by all sentient species that have sampled it regardless of what kind of diet or even biochemistry their species normally prefers. The only other notable property is that Zap Apple Jam holds a small electric charge.
Given the utility of some of the more unusual Hornmade products's properties, there is some question as to why Equestrian technology appears to be so conventional. The answer it seems lies in the fact that only a few rare unicorns actually possess the talents required to Hornmake any finished goods, which makes industrializing the process difficult. Secondly, the arrival of the humans to Equestria vastly upgraded the Equestrian tech base with conventional technological solutions such that the Unicorns never needed to figure out how to properly industrialize Horn crafting processes, thus relegating Hornmade goods more or less permanently to the luxury market.
***
The Asari Matriarch dismissed the article in favor of examining her new desk that the projector sat on. It was beautifully made with gold trimmed edges embedded with gems and images of dancing Ponies. The desk top was perfectly flat with a mirror finish. A test shove revealed the desk to be rock solid and steady, the perfect work desk.
And a glance under the desk revealed that there were no legs. The desk top was floating above a floor it had no physical contact with whatsoever.
The Asari Matriarch's mind flashed back to a report from her people after they had attempted to reverse engineer a similar desk. No eezo. No power supply. No sensors. No circuitry. Not even an actual Mass Effect field that they could detect. And...
The Asari Matriarch pushed gently at the desk to move it out of the way. Unlike her previous shove, this time the desk glided over smoothly with almost no resistance, but stopped the instant she released her hand. Then she sat on it to test its firmness again. The desk refused to budge.
Yes, she thought. It most definitely was reading her mind.
Every race known has a medal or award usually issued for Gallantry or Courage in battle considered the highest award that race can bestow on an individual. The Equestrian peoples' buck this trend in that they have six awards that are considered equal known as the Medals of Harmony Each of them represents an Equestrian Cardinal Virtue. There are only known to be three beings at one time that can award this honour the first two are the Solar and Lunar Diarch's and the bearer of the title 'Bearer of the Element of'
The criteria for earning this award is not fully known as they have been few times they have been awarded to both military and civilian personel the citation has varied significantly;
The Medal of Kindness This medal takes the form of six pink sapphire, two on either side of a bar of gold and two above taking the form of a local insect known as a 'butterfly'. The one of the few known awards of this medal was given to a group of civilian docters who stayed behind to tend patients that could not be evacuated when the Batarian's assaulted Appleloosa in what the Equestrians often miss call 'The First Contact War'.
The Medal of Laughter This medal takes the form of a briliant blue Zircon in the shape of an irregular flat backed nonagon, similar to a rounded tear drop with a protrusion at the base enclosed with a gold rim. The common belief is it represents the tears the awardee has soothed though what differentiates this award from the Medal of Kindness is unclear. It is als been noted by some to be similar in shape to a party prop known as a 'balloon'
The Medal of Loyalty This medal also takes the form of an irregular flat backed nonagon, but in this case it is formed of Ruby and cut as a jagged bolt again usually with a gold rim. The best understood of the six awards it is often issued to those military personel who have stood by their fellows at massive risk despite having the oppertunity to depart the field. Often issued to those who survive a 'Code Zero Action' by the current Title Bearer.
The Medal of Generosity This medal takes the form of a purple sapphire gem cut as a octahedron with two sides truncated set in a gold frame. It is thought by citidel cultural experts that the missing pieces represent the sacrifices the award holder has made
The Medal of Honesty This medal takes the form of a padparadscha sapphire cut into nine facets topped with two thin twin faceted emerald 'leaves' set in a gold frame giving the form of a local fruit called an 'apple'. While Citadel experts debate the symbology it is rumoured that some humans have a myth surrounding the fruit.
The Medal of Friendship This medal takes the form of a flat backed tetrahaidecahedron cut as a star of unknown type. In colour it is flashes pink, lilac or white depending on how light strikes it's facets though the colour of the light seems to make no difference to the colours refracted to the constination of gemologists. It is also unique that it has never been awarded to a single individual. From the citations issued it is believed that the current Title Bearer, Royal Envoy Twilight Sparkle, favours awarding it to those of diverse origin that have cooperated to improve the lives of those in Equestrian space as a number of Quarian have been recipients of the award.
The Trim on the as has been noted is usually gold but on occasion the award has been issued with a rose gold posthumously or silver on the rare occations when issued by the Lunar Diarch.