> The semicolon is stronger than the sword. > by Starlight.Flux > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- > Prologue > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- OK Word Smith, you can do this. You're just as capable as anypony else, I think to myself with closed eyes while taking a couple of deep breaths and staring at my nemesis in the eyes. Well, where it would have eyes if an oak door had them, that is. A black oak door, that would hopefully lead to the most important meeting in my existence. Not much of a nemesis, but a nemesis never the less, especially for pony who gets as nervous as easily as me. I knock on the door a couple of times, and hope for the best. OK here goes... "Come in," says a male voice behind the door. I twist the doorknob with my magic and open the door, and slowly trot inside. Sitting at the desk is a human, who glances ups from the papers open in front of him and looks at me though silver tinned sunglasses. "Well as least you're not an Alicorn. It gets tiring hearing the same old stories from Mary Sues. I interviewed 50 this week alone!" I look at the digital clock and calendar on his desk. It's 8:50 on a Monday. "How many candidates have you seen today?" "51...Including you," He says taking off his tinned sunglasses, and rubbing his tired eyelids with his fingertips. "So if you're not a Mary Sue, it will make my day and my job a little easier." "Oh I know all about the little things," I boasted proudly. "In fact, that is how my story starts...with something small." [;] The semicolon is stronger than the sword ; ~ Prologue Or how a small typo and a tea-tray, almost caused an equestrian apocalypse [;] This story starts on board a dimension jumping spaceship called the Silver Sword, a ship that had a exterior that lived up to it's name. This ship was the pride of its owners, the Archive Inc. It was not the biggest, In fact it was one of the smallest and didn't need a big crew to run it (An advantage as far as Archive was concerned). However it the first of their spaceships to come with magically programmable hardware. This made it perfect for exploring parallel worlds, as it could adapt to its environment by adding new component when needed. All it would take to make a new piece of hardware was to create spell script describing the new hardware and its behaviors. As traveling between parallel worlds was how the Archive made it's money, it had a high importance in the fleet. The ability to make new hardware also came in handy, when catering to the crews needs. For example, if the current crew was a bunch of ponies, any crew with out the ability to use magic could have their rooms modified to make up for the lack of magic. However... The Silver Sword was a prototype, and like all prototypes there was a few bugs. Like for instance the one causing Midnight Hour, a headache. "There has to be a reason for the bulkheads being stuck open," said the bubblegum blue Pegasus, while looking at a tablet modified non-Unicorn use. "I need a fresh set of eyes to look over this source code," he said looking over to his cabin mate, who was currently listening to music on his headphones. Midnight Gets up and lifts off one of the speakers and shouts in his ears. "Debug! Some help please!" "Ahh! Don't do that!" "Sorry!" said Midnight, with a sheepish grin. "Can you take a second to look at this source code?" "Pass it here. Let me have a look," said debug while taking off his headphones. After a couple of seconds of looking though the spell script, a grin appeared on his face. "Midnight Hour," he said, half laughing, and passed the tablet back. "I think you need a break." Midnight let out a sigh, "Where is it? Go on, put me out of my misery." "Its on line number four hundred twenty-two, after the statement checking that the inter-dimensional engines are switched on." "I've already looked there about five times!" "Well, have a look again." Midnight looked at line four hundred twenty-two, and after a couple of seconds he facehoofed, before shaking his hoof at the screen. "Curse you semicolon, the nemesis of spell casters! How did that get there?" "It must have been added when we got the most up to date version of the spell for controlling the bulkheads." Midnight rubs his eyes with his hoofs. "That's coding 101! Don't add semicolons after if statements, otherwise the code after the statement will always run! I must have have been tried miss to that, " he said in frustration. "Do you want me to do the amendments while you have a break?" "Yeah all right. While you do that, I'm just going to get some fresh air." He said as he started to leave the room. "Besides, I can't cast it for a while anyway. Just make sure you do it soon, before a bird or something fly's in the engines..." "Don't you worry. As long as the engines aren't powered up nothing bad can happen. " I heard that one before, thought Midnight as he walked out the cabin. [;][;][;] It be nice to breath air that hasn't been recycled thousands of times, Midnight thought while checking the dials on the air lock. Good levels Oxygen. Check! Non dangerous levels of Carbon Dioxide. Check! levels of air pressure that are either so high it crush a pony's skull, or too low that it will cause them to explode. Check! The Silver Sword was currently in low orbit of a planet with a breathable atmosphere, so Midnight thought it was a good idea to go for a stroll outside on the upper deck of the ship. As he was about to find out, this was definitely not the case. The Pegasus walked up to a metal barrier at the edge of the deck to look out towards an alien sunset. He closed his eyes and felt the cold air against his face. "It's so nice to be out in the fresh air again!" he says before opening his eyes, just in time to catch a flash of pink and purple out towards the horizon. "That's odd, I wonder what that was?" he asked to nopony in particular, just before being thrown back by an explosion of cupcakes and party streamers. "What in the name of-" was about all Midnight could manage before a very happy pink earth pony, and a very stressed purple unicorn, flew over the barrier and onto the balcony. "SURPRISE!" Shouted the pink pony standing on her back hooves, with her fore-hoofs spread out wide. "What!? H..who are you and how the hay did you get up here? We are over 19,000 hoofs in the air!" The pink pony started bouncing around the Pegasus. "That was super easy! I just used my BPPC." "What the hay is a BPPC?" Midnight said, while getting back on to his hoofs. "Base Powered Party Cannon! Me and vinyl made him this morning!" "Rigggght...wait did you just say the BPPC was a 'him'?" "Yep! We call him Mr Wubwub! Anyway, when I saw your ship I realized that a new space ship would mean new ponies, and new ponies means making new friends! Midnight scratched his head in confusion, trying to work out where this conversation was going. "Um...OK..." "So I thought it was a good idea to use the BPPC to come up and meet you all. So I got a tea-tray, and was going to ride it all the way up here under the power of the BPPC' sound waves. But Twilight here thought it was a bad idea..." One of Twilight's eyes started twitching. "WORST. IDEA. EVER. " "...And got pulled along for the ride! but after couple of seconds the tray caught on fire, and we had to make a hasty exit. Then I had Twilight feed me bags of sweets so I could perform a Pinkie Party Megaboom!" After a couple of seconds pause the pink pony then asks "Any questions?" Midnight had loads of questions, as one would expect went first meeting Pinkie Pie. But before he could open his mouth to ask any, a very pissed off Pegasus with rainbow coloured mane had landed on the balcony. "Here's one! How about who is going to pay the damages for MY cloud house?!" "Hi Dashie!" "How much damage can be done to a house made of clouds?" asked Twilight, who just about gotten over her shock of traveling at speeds no unicorn should ever do. "Besides it looked fine too me!" "Fine!? Pinkie pie and that damned tea-tray broke my septic tank! The Rainbow Factory will not like this at all!" "Why's that Dashie? asked Pinkie, with a confused look. "Oh...horse apples!" said Rainbow Dash with the look of a pony who had just gave away trade secret. Fortunately for Rainbow, it was at this point Debug had caught up with the group, sounding very out of breath. "Midnight, you won't believe what-" he started to say, before pointing a hoof at pinkie. "YOU! You're the one I saw exploding outside a port-hole! You've only gone and damaged our engines! We now have a tea-tray stuck in there!" This captured the groups full attention. Pinkie pie, not wanting to miss a chance to make a new friend, bounced over to Debug, and handed him a yellow cupcake with orange sprinkles. "Hi there! Sorry about your ship! Here, have a cupcake!" "Err...OK, but I doubt this will make up for the damage to the ship," he said taking the cupcake from the pink pony, and taking a bite. A look of delightful surprise appeared on his face. "As this is a really good cupcake, I think I can forgive you...If you and your friends help fix the engine." "Okie doike" "Pinkie..." "Yes Dashie?" "Get away from the Changeling now!" She shouted, before charging towards were debug was standing. *~End of Prologue~*