This story is a sequel to Starshot: Star Speaker
Three years ago, an alien spacecraft was discovered buried deep beneath the Everfree Forest. Without delay, it was excavated and thoroughly studied to the best of Equestria's capabilities. All signs pointed it being completely defunct, never to fly again.
Though unfortunately for creatures visiting it during its first day as a museum, the truth was the exact opposite.
A three hour tour of the ship has now turned into a grand tour of the galaxy. Will homesickness overtake these new explorers, or will they learn to love going where no pony has gone before?
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In Part ll of the Starshot's tale, our intrepid space explorers meet the first bastion of resistance to the evil Oblivion Empire. One partially composed of a people who once swore loyalty to Luna. Unfortunately, a major difference in ideology may keep an alliance from forming.
Will they agree to disagree, or be picked off one by one by the Empire's strategic mastermind, Grand Admiral Warp Song?
Don't mean to start off on a sour note, but you misspelled "wilderness".'aight, on to the story proper.
...a Thrawn expy. Oh yes.
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Good lord XD. I need more coffee. Thanks for letting me know.
"You still remember? I cannot help but be touched. I, of course, remember you..."
Oh! It's continuing on as a separate fic! Good to know! Guess I had a misunderstanding somewhere.
Well, I'm here now, that's what's important.
Ah. Civil war, then. Actually had a hunch if that might be at play. It sort of explains some of the Steward's reminiscing about things...
Ooh, another puzzle piece falls into place now!
Wait, no...super-dreadnought? I'd figured Starshot was no bigger or powerful than a cruiser, heavy cruiser at most. That sure changes my views on that ship's original purpose--she's purely a warship, short and simple.
Now if only a certain Empire from Star Wars had figured that out themselves...
Also, it just clicked! NLR! Ha-ha, nicely done.
Star Wars references in the story.
Ooh! Just had another thought! The Nightmare itself! That would explain the "umbrumed" thestrals...
So...Song's long-lived.
Koopa Belt? I assume that's a play on Kuiper Belt, then.
I mean, even Starfleet still runs around in, frankly, pretty heavily armed ships all the time.
Every time they do that, I keep expecting this scene to play out:
And I'm half-expecting you'll make good on it at some future point, too.
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Great minds think alike--I'm not even mad you beat me to the punch on this.
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NLR... New Lunar Republic?
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Admiral Thrawn? At least that what on the art
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Super-dreadnought of one tech level might be be a mere destroyer in another.
It actually sounds that it was victim of attempt to seat it on several chairs of fleet orchestra... wanting own CSP wings, beam and intercepting capability. Do they have indirect fire weaponry?
Wonder if this means Nightmare Moon would be touched on more?
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The point is more that this means it's a ship meant purely for war regardless, which stands out to me as I had previously figured that, while always a military ship, it was still a bit more multi-purpose than that.
But then again, much of the Starshot hasn't been elaborated upon to us readers, and we still have scant few other Oblivion Empire ship-types with which to even compare it with, so maybe that misjudging on my part was inevitable to some degree.
Either way, that just makes the Starshot's new re-purposing as a ship more for peaceful operation than straight-up warfare all the more significant, so in a way it's not a bad thing, story-wise.
It would have had more impact if you saved the flashback scene for the next chapter. As far as drama goes
Once I saw that scene and I already knew that the grand admiral was a character it was just okay Luna knows this guy she's probably going to be shocked that's it but if you take it back and go back to her suddenly recognizing him but you don't know that she actually knew him from over a thousand years ago
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7th fleet was a nice touch
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A fair point. I might consider doing a switcheroo on that.
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It felt multipurpose because SD concept takes that in account. That's because concept of super-dreadnaught as battleship was a mobile heavily-armored fortress with jack-of-all-trades armament (and equipment). It was between-wars concept in Earth navy, early models even didn't took in account underwater warfare. Supposed to have an immunity zone (or at least, heavily armored zone), SD could be a naval HQ, or FOB coordination center as well.
The concept was a general flop. They turned to be just heavier versions of battleships, some were refitted to have more effective armament.
Later a lot of their roles were taken by carriers. If I'm not mistaken one famous Japanese carrier was a hull of unfinished super-dreadnaught.
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Actually, by "multi-purpose," I mean the ship could also actively engage in roles not even strictly related to military operation at all. Think USS Enterprise in other words, which is probably the other mistake on my part--trying to inject too much Star Trek into the Oblivion Empire's MO.
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Yes.
MOOOOAAAAARRRRR please
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Which was Royal Navy's MO for long while until late 19th century.
It's in nature of cruisers. They have to be self-sufficient and operate alone and hence they are able to perform paramilitary, diplomatic and even civil relief duties. Able carry extra cargo, have a dinghy (shuttle) on board, can house separate HQ or dignitaries or embedded personnel, etc.
And Oblivion sound more like amalgam of Starwars Empire with lost emperor (lol, now she returns!) and terrans from Startrek.
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Something I recognize and agree with now, but hadn't before hand as much as I should've...mostly because much about the Empire and how it works was, and in many ways still is, unknown. Honestly, the idea stuck in my head for far longer than it probably should've been, though I suppose part of that was because I was still viewing the ship through the more friendly and naive eyes of Luna and crew, and not looking at it the way the empire itself would view it.
Long and short of it, never once did it occur to me that the Starshot was ever anything even approaching a dreadnaught, regardless of how we want to define what a dreadnaught is, and that's really all I was trying to say with that. The rest of this is superfluous to that point.
*shivers* That is a great beginning 2 chapters. Gave me chills. Hope you continue your awesome stories. Can't wait for the next update. *looks forlornly at the screen*
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Indeed
Warp Noonian? Song?
You never forget your Dog?
The admiral has decided to put two disparate groups together to have them in conflict at various levels, letting him play them against each other?
What a twist: it's the villain who pulls the prefix code trick.
Better start looking for that override, Luna.
Again, I feel like I oughta shoot you for that wordplay.
I can answer this--tactics. You don't actually need a large ginormous ship to bring the superior force to a battle. Indeed, there are several advantages to a smaller ship that a larger ship would not have.
To be honest, I can't blame him. If the situations were reversed, I'd imagine Luna and crew wouldn't be all that inclined to allow that either if they could.
Huh...just had an interesting though that could explain a great many things...
...have the Doc and the computer met before a great many years ago, under entirely different circumstances?
And to his credit, he was trying to avoid doing so...but then he got distracted by you, and then apparently whatever's happening out of system took priority over the both of you, so...
I suspect Song's more...following orders...for most of this than doing it purely because he wants to. Which, if true, would leave him in a rather interesting position that might be of some use to Luna and crew if they play their cards right...
But then again I also know very little of the other character he's taking such inspiration after, so...
Especially after all that talk of wanting to retake the Starshot for the empire, despite it being implied centuries out of date and likely no longer as relevant in the modern style of warfare in the here and now as it once was, despite whatever tactical advantages it may still possess. I mean, a dreadnought's still a dreadnought, but despite that, a WWI era dreadnought wouldn't stand much of a chance in naval warfare of today--I can only assume something similar would apply to the Starshot's class by now...
...Not that it matters currently, because we already know largely what's up with this other ship.
Hmm...I wonder if this means they're going to be expanding their crew here in a few...it would seem like an ideal time to do so and would be of benefit to both crews, surely...I mean, they seem to have a common enemy after all.
Yikes, that's saying something, considering Chrysalis wasn't exactly the shining example of non-callous behavior herself.
Oh, so that might still be at play and not just a throwaway reference after all...
Before her time, perhaps?
Hmm, that raises a relevant question--holed or whole?
It's really sort of a funny story--you'll laugh, actually...
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Again you beat me to the reference! I knew you were going to when I had to stop reading the chapter halfway through for something else, but them's the breaks.
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I.. hated that bit honestly..
Yeah.. kind of a mental reflex due to how Spike gets pushed around alot in the show.
The Nobles run the monarchy, the Capitalists run the Democracy, Chaos run the Anarchy?
Wonder which one Ol Smokey is going to use to mess things up?
Yeah, that seems to check out. Plus there's a whole bunch of other magical creatures that could probably put dents in the Oblivion's plans if given the chance--imagine if they crossed paths with Discord, for example.
I mean, it would explain a lot...but at the same time, I'm sure the empire had thousands of other ships with like AIs at the time too, so the odds of it do seem a tad...unlikely. Especially when you consider that the odds of more than one AI going rogue was clearly deemed likely enough for the empire to abandon the tech entirely.
But then again, probability does tend to loose some of its edge in the world of fictional drama such as this.
Eh, if that's their deal, then I sort of hope they choose to alter the deal later on and stick around for a bit longer afterwards. Like Luna, I think they'd stand the best chance working together for as long as they can.
Oh c'mon--adopting democracy doesn't mean you suddenly can no longer form an alliance with anyone even affiliated with a monarchy. After all, it's not so much the monarchy governing style that's totally at fault, its the individual rulers of said monarchies that go corrupt. If you could guarantee your monarchy's ruler remains fair and just, then it would really be the best way to go, politically speaking, because monarchies are the most efficient form of government out there. But this being reality, that's sadly something we cannot truly guarantee, so...
But my point with all of this, I suppose, is that just because it is a monarchy doesn't mean it's automatically and inherently evil, nor that they can't be a good ally...especially if they have a common enemy as you do.
Oh, there was plenty of long discussions about that very topic, trust us. In fact, in some ways, they never ended.
That said, it was a gamble...but I suspect it's one that will ultimately still pay off in some manner in the end.
Clearly, the idea that Nightmare Moon was their ticket to liberty and posterity still hasn't quite died out. Seeing similar concepts are still alive and well in the real world, even after even longer stretches of time, means it wouldn't be at all out of place here either.
The problem is that these thestrals see NMM as more their idealized and benevolent savior, rather than the ruthless and merciless conqueror she more truly was.
Yeah, you would think that.
No, can confirm--not the same thing. Starlight still had a distinct hierarchy going, with her at the top of course. Really, it was more of a dictatorship trying to disguise itself as something approximating...well, really, Marxist thought. Can't really in good conscience liken it to anything like a democracy (or Communism for that matter, since I know somebody's going to bring it up if I don't add that as a disclaimer).
It's actually a fair comparison, as the New Lunar Republic's system seems to be...shall we say...especially democratic? Going from what we've been told thus far, it definitely sounds less "structured" than any of the democratic systems currently in place in the real world that I know of, at least on the governmental/national level (space faring or otherwise).
Oh ho ho ho, I just figured something out.
He's Big Blue, isn't he?
So you can bet Spike's first foremost goal then is going to be try and find out an explanation for why Crescent apparently thinks needs to be so.
I think that should be, "Evil and cool aren't mutually exclusive."
This part really bothers me honestly..
What made the retirement crap worse is how the show writers made Luna completely fine about this. There should be issues from Luna retiring but the show writers just brushed it aside.
She really shouldn't be fine with it honestly, she didn't get to rule for much long nor got to enjoy her destiny of raising the moon/dreamguarding for much long compared to how Celestia got to raise the sun(hell, she literally raised the moon longer than Luna). She just got her own throne too, Luna didn't get to have much impact compared to Celestia nor got to shine as much as her due to the lost 1000 years. The writers just robbed Luna the chance to make up for those lost years for the sake of Twilight "chosen one" Sparkle there..
I am pretty sure Luna would be just as a great ruler as Twilight was in modern Equestria if she got to grow and learn, but nope.. the writers robbed Luna the chance to prove herself.
The whole retirement crap was Celestia's idea honestly. Just her given how she planned all of this from the beginning of the show.
The show writers honestly gave Luna a pretty terrible sendoff with this retirement stuff, doesn't help that how things went for her in the series finale made her rule end on a pretty bad note too.
I.. wanted to vent that out..
Unfortunately.. given how the show writers made Luna and Celestia look like absolute failures with how they can't deal with any threat at all anymore due to they can't fire freaking rainbows at baddies anymore(and other chances for Luna to prove herself gets robbed due to Celestia making her stay sidelined so Twilight "learns" from this), sadly the empire is most likely not going to run into trouble if they messed with Equestria during the show(not sure how they would fare against Twilight "chosen one" Sparkle though because how she's the "chosen one" that gets to be the real hero while Luna ends up looking like a failure).
The show writers sure messed up the natural alicorns' credibility there.
What did Luna meant by that there?
I hope my comment isn't really.. iffy there
Friendly reminder that Ponyville has mayoral elections every (unclear) years, and presumably, so do other towns in Equestria. Heck, even Luna was elected captain! Someone probably should've mentioned that at some point.
In any case, all caught up. And it's so refreshing to see a New Lunar Republic that's actually, you know, a republic and not just Luna's cult of personality. This should definitely make for some fascinating debates... though hopefully someone can knock some heads together and remind them all that they have bigger problems on the horizon. Looking forward to seeing where this goes from here.
Why isn't there a Star Wars tag?
Why did anybody ever shun anybody else, for that matter?
Well, the computer might.
And as we all know, the rule of cool is very important in sci-fi.
I mean, this is a fair point, and there's a few others we could level on Crescent too. Sure, she gave it her best shot and tried to do her best in trying circumstances, but...maybe command's just not for her.
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While I do sympathize and agree Luna got the short end of the stick on this case, I do feel I should point out that how do we know Luna even wanted to keep ruling herself? For all we know, she wanted to abdicate at that time too, for whatever reason, and going off what information the show gives us on the matter, it does seem like she did.
As to why that might be the case...I could only speculate. Maybe, after Nightmare Moon, she felt it would not be a good idea for her to rule solo (regardless of whether or not that's actually true). Maybe she saw it as a chance to interact more with her sister on a more one-on-one manner than she had been given while they ruled (it does seem like their princessly duties hampered that at times) and that was more important to her than ruling. Maybe she just agreed it was time for her and Celestia to abdicate and to let the new generation step in, regardless of how long she had actually ruled for, on the grounds that her and Celestia's manner of rule no longer seemed so relevant. I could probably go on.
Whatever the reason, it seems presumptuous to assume Luna actually wanted to keep ruling, when there's actually no direct evidence that she did by that time in the show.
And anyway, from a writing perspective, I should also remind that while Celestia and Luna are still important characters that deserve their share of the spotlight, they're still not the central characters--the show was never about them, it was about Twilight and friends. And seeing the show was about to end, it did seem logical to end it in a way that progressed those characters towards the logical outcome, Twilight especially, which meant Celestia and Luna needed to pave the way in some manner.
Could the writers have done a better job justifying it? Of course.
But at the same time, I can see why they did it in the way they did. It did seem like a logical way to end the show, at least by that point in time.
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Agreed. I think you have an interesting idea in that Luna decided full-on rulership wasn't for her after the Nightmare Moon incident.
I think my personal headcanon is a bit similar to your third theory; Celestia and Luna had always intended to abdicate to a successor after leading Equestria to a place of stability after it's founding. Long story short, they kind of strayed from that idea, Nightmare Moon happened, and in the lead-up to her return Celestia started looking for potential successors amongst her students, eventually deciding on Twilight.
But that's just me.
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Personally, I like the idea she abdicated because the chance to spend more time with her sister was more important to her.
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I can definitely see that for sure. Much as people like to go on about the "New Lunar Republic" bit (not the one in this story), I think it's obvious by now that Luna would rather be with her sister.
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Because it... isn't a Star Wars crossover? Just a pony sci-fi fic with a lot of references to popular sci-fi media set in space or based on space travel?
Kudos to anyone else who picked up this chapter's big reference. I won't spoil it for y'all, though. xD
I'm envisioning a Jefferies Tube. And c'mon...so are most of the rest of you, admit it.
Well, I suspect we'll be finding out for sure soon, no doubt...but I have been wondering about that. Song did seem to leave both ships in oddly favorable circumstances, and where they would inevitably find each other while he was away...so it does make it seem like he hoped they would cross paths with each other...maybe even hoping they would team up with each other.
If so, then that leaves the big question of why. Maybe he hoped they would do so, so to prove themselves the more capable opponents he seems to respect them as? Or is it bigger than that, and this was his own way of "rebelling" so to speak, by giving them the fighting chance to further the cause for him?
Or am I just reading way too much into it?
It'd probably help if I knew more about the character I know heavy inspiration was taken from for Song...but alas.
Yeah, propaganda's funny like that.
Also, she retired from that. I think Luna mentioned that already, but it's worth repeating anyway if so. Not only is she not actually a monarch anymore, she probably doesn't think of herself as one and probably would prefer others didn't either, despite her accepting the role as leader aboard the Starshot.
Yeah, but not because she was a princess, but rather because they all already knew she not only had experience leading, they also already knew how she would lead from her past example...and they heartily approved.
She also accepted the position as captain reluctantly, and we've already seen she's second-guessed whether she's really suitable for the role a few times since. If that all doesn't prove Spike's point, I don't know what will.
Well then...you can trust that Spike's reasons for trusting Luna are trustworthy, and that you can trust him when he says you can put her trust in her. But trust me, as trustworthy as Luna is, I trust you will still want to determine that trust for yourself. Either way, I trust that trust will need to be earned, but you'll have to trust both her and Spike enough to actually associate with Luna first before that trust can be earned, but trust me, that trust can be obtained, and I entrust that you will try to get that trust.
...did I also mention trust?
Or the one.
That said, I have to reluctantly admit that Pharynx has a point. I'm confident that Gleaming has no plans to try and pull such a stunt and may actually object to such an attempt, and there's still the fact that the Starshot is, while still a powerful warship, is also going to be quite out of date, and potentially have other weaknesses the likes of Song would know how to exploit, or just leave it technologically too out of date to be practically bring back up to date and the NLR ought to know those are real risks already...but inevitably some NLR creature is probably going to come to these same conclusions and at least try to make the attempt to take the Starshot further down the road, I'm sure.
Darn good advice right there.
My money's on Song having done more hacking than they're aware of, something that'll kick in once they've gotten where he wants them to go. It worked (for a certain value of "worked") for Governor Tarkin, after all.
"This shall be a red-letter day in history, Captain Pillion. It will see the end both of Nightmare Moon and of the rebellion."
That's the vibe I'm getting out of this chapter- that exact same strategem.
i wager Song can track them. He let them go, to track them to the hidden base...
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10538319 Could be sorbet, or frozen yogurt.
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May the Schwartz be with you!
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Oh, with the trip to the sentient planet?
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No, I mean how he let the Millennium Falcon go in the first Star Wars movie so that they could track it to Yavin.
Then Discord appears! "Discord is no god... Discord is... THE DEVIL!!"
Pony Vegeta, "OMG, HE'S SO COOL... BUT SO STUPID!!"