Commander Strike.

Doctor Bowman and his friend Chalcedony have just left when you sit down to have a drink. It’s not long before a few of your friends come over – Prisma, an alabaster Unicorn mare with a light blue and purple mane, who’s been in your Marine units since their inception. She’s trotting along with Jessie and another pony, a stallion called Milk Pail who has a habit of always wearing his modified Hardball armour, even when he really doesn’t need to.

“Commander,” Prisma says. She sits down, putting a cup of steaming coffee on the table gently and blowing on it. “I’m gonna guess our, uh, guests are gone.”

“Yup,” you reply. “Not gonna lie, I’m happier for it.”

“Me, too,” Jessie says coldly. “Never feels right to me when UNAC and PHL are about.”

“Eh, I’ve heard good things about Chalcedony at least,” Prisma says with a shrug.

“You have?” you say, raising an eyebrow. “Since when?”

“Since Marcus started playing Skype chess with her,” Prisma replies, smiling coyly. “Think they met pre-Barrierfall in Britain.”

“Dammit Schaefer,” you mutter, wondering if you have to have a talk with him. There’s technically no regulations against maintaining friendships with people outside the crew – even with PHL or UNAC – but it’s not up there with things.

You wonder what the Captain would say about it.

“Hey, Commander,” Milk Pail asks. “Why don’t you trust the PHL? They’ve got ponies, they should be our friends.”

The temperature at the table drops.

You snort. Oh boy, that’s going to be a fun topic.

“I don’t not-trust them,” you say. “But ever since I joined up with Ex-Astris, I’ve had one self-righteous PHL pony after another look at me like I’m some poor deluded filly who doesn’t know what she’s doing by being here. Even my family.” You take a sip of your drink, wishing it were something stronger. “I’ve no problem with the PHL, really. UNAC in general’s got more assholes than I’d like, but that’s inevitable. My problem’s with the ponies who act like they’re the only game in town, and anypony – anyone – else is just an idiot or deluded.”

“I hear that,” Jessie says. “Most ponies think I oughta have joined up with Lyra’s outfit from the getgo, but it was Biggs and Wedge who risked their lives to save me, and Cap who took us all in. None of their fancy agents saved me from the Empire, and none of their fancy agents got me out from Janvier’s base.”

“I mean, I get it,” Prisma says. “I’ve gotten the poor-lost-little-lamb look before. But they have money and resources we don’t. They’re not as bad as some of us think, but... “

“But?” you ask.

“But there’s something so overbearing about it all,” Prisma said. “Don’t have to like it, but who else would we work with? Division P?”

“Besides,” Milk Pail points out, “Cap works with the PHL.”

You roll your eyes. “Of course he does. Luna knows that man’s got an ego, but he’s been talking cooperation alongside Yarrow and Maine since the beginning.” You sigh. “Doesn’t mean I have to like it, or them.”

“I mean,” Prisma says, “Gardner’s UNAC, not PHL. So it’s not like -”

“You and I both know the PHL are beholden to UNAC,” you cut her off. “The PHL aren’t us, and we’re not them. And on both sides, there’s always going to be people who put territorialism, or some idea about ‘how things should be done’, over common sense. Look at the fuckin’ Carter side -”

“Point immediately fucking taken,” Prisma says.

“So you don’t trust the PHL because of the assholes?” Milk Pail asks.

“I don’t trust the PHL because the assholes are hidden,” you reply. “It’s easy with the Carter side of the ‘Front. Lovikov shot his Commander for ponification, when he was mostly armored. Taskforce Paris shoots anyone they feel like, or worse. It’s the same with O’Donnell and the Sons of Macha. Birch and Galt… don’t even get me Luna-damned started on those nutjobs. It’s like someone handed a nuclear warhead to a spoiled foal that’s never been so much as told no.” You take another sip of your drink. “But you can never tell with the PHL or UNAC. There’s a veneer of respectability. Because they’re ‘official’, but behind the smiles, they’re just waiting to trip you up or tear you down. Gardner is the worst of the bunch, but a man like that doesn’t get somewhere on his own.”

There’s a pause at that.

“At least,” Prisma says quietly, “they might have been able to help Sharon?”

You snort. “We’ll see. I don’t think they will.”

“You don’t?” Jessie asks.

You sigh, looking around, suddenly aware that more than a few eyes are turned your way. So you think carefully before saying the next sentence in your head.

“I don’t know,” is what you settle on. “Sharon’s case is… unique.”

More so than you two know, you think at them, but you can’t say that. Maybe if you could it would be easier, but it isn’t, and you can’t.

“Maybe they’ll figure something out, or use her to figure something bigger out,” you continue. “But… I dunno, it doesn’t feel like they will.”

“Just because you don’t trust them -” Prisma says.

“It’s not that,” you cut her off. “It’s… it’s not something they can fix.”

“We don’t have that much of a choice but to try,” Prisma says. “Look at the Carter side – That’s what absolute failure to compromise looks like.”

“No one’s asking us not to compromise, not to work with them,” you snap. “But with this… it’s more like, it doesn’t feel like any of us can make it work. Not Us. Certainly not them.”

The words feel treasonous out of your mouth, but they also feel right.

“Then why are we letting her live like this?” Milk Pail asks. “Isn’t it… wrong?”

“Until we prove we can’t help her, or learn something from her…” you sigh. “The Captain thinks that it’s best to let her… continue… and you know how he is.”

They nod, none of them happy about it. How could they be? Like the rest, they understood what the Captain was going for when he said they would be keeping Sharon alive, but that didn’t mean they agreed.

The bond you feel with the Captain transcended words. You’ve tried to describe it before, with words like ‘loved’ or ‘liked’ or ‘respected’ and failed every time. He’d understood you in a way few did even back when you were in Equestria, but you wish you could say the same for him.

How can a man exude such an aura of control, even as he makes decisions you struggle to comprehend? Giving virtually everything to the PHL, even as he talks behind their backs and has to know that they want his organization and consider him optional. And the funding. Oh, the funding. There are holes in Romero’s books you could (and technically have) fit the Thunderchild ships inside.

Captain, you think then, you need to learn something soon. Otherwise…

You don’t want to think it, because if you don’t think about it, it cannot happen. But the word is already stuck, somewhere deep in your mind.

Mutiny.

You’d die to protect him from it, but you can almost smell that feeling in the air.

Captain Romero,

It is 6am. You are tired and feeling less than charitable. The PHL R&D people’s recent visit demonstrated that Sharon’s case – Sunbeam’s case – is more complex than you would have wanted it to be. It was the second relapse.

The second. Not an isolated incident, not a freak accident of a faulty conversion.

This is… unprecedented. Unheard of. You know this should be cause for celebration. This is literally the first situation of its sort in the history of this conflict. There were Slow Newfoals, but they didn’t relapse into their humanity, they lapsed into what is now considered the ‘default’ Newfoal state. This is the exact opposite.

“Alright,” you say to Well Met as you approach the door to Sharon’s Sunbeam’s quarters.

He’s there, eyes wide and a hoof coming up to his mouth. He motions to the open door, and you pop your head into the door, frowning as you do so.

A small speaker is blaring music. It’s Sharon’s playlist, you know: you’ve heard it a dozen times.

“#Needless to say I keep a check, she was a bad-bad nevertheless…”

“She’s still listening to music?” you whisper, looking down at Well Met. He shakes his head and points at Sharon Sunbeam herself.

She has a spanner held in her horn’s TK field, a sickly pale blue that seems to flicker with a deeper blue now and again, as though it’s a sputtering LED. And yet it’s working well enough that she’s screwing a piece of hardware together well enough. You recognise it after a moment – a piece of REV armour servo that Sharon had tucked away somewhere where she thought you couldn’t see it, one she’d been working on to ‘make better’. It’s amazing what you learn about a woman when you read her logs, and it’s more amazing that you don’t feel guilty for the breach of privacy.

The dead have no privacy, you want to think, but between the relapse and… this… you start wondering if Sharon’s really dead at all.

Well Met is looking up at you, eyes wide, and you understand why he brought you here now. The song is still playing.

“#… calling it quits now, baby I’m a wreck. Crash at my place, baby you’re a wreck.”

Without another word, you turn and leave, and Well Met follows.

“You see what I mean,” he says.

You don’t answer, your mind reeling with possibility. Beautiful. Terrifying. Hope and fear mix within your mind, until your mind is a battleground of warring thoughts.

“Sir?” Well Met asks.

You stop, before looking down at him. His eyes are still wide, filled with that strange, cosmic wonder. He’s seen something that shouldn’t be possible, just like you. His mind, a scientist’s mind, is brimming with the possibilities, just like yours, but unlike you, he’s not afraid. For a moment, you envy him. But then you remember: you are the Captain. You chart the course.

“Doctor,” you say after a brief moment of silence. “That… that’s not normal, is it?”

“That was Sharon’s hobby, sir,” Well Met said. “Not Sunbeam’s.” He takes a deep breath. “Not only is it a human piece of technology that she should instinctively hate, but if it’s anything to do with her past life, she should hate it even more. What we’ve just seen…” He closed his eyes, composing himself. “It’s not just unprecedented, it’s insane. It violates Newfoal science as I’ve understood it since Newfoals were first conceived.”

You nod, your feelings confirmed.

“Alright,” you say. “Then I’ll speak to her tomorrow.”

“About what, sir?” Well Met asks.

“What we just saw,” you reply with a small, bitter smile. “And what it means.”

You turn and walk away after saying that, the matter closed, and music drifting from the half-open door.

“#Then you’re left in the dust, unless I stuck by you. You’re a sunflower, you’re a sunflower.”

Sharon.

“You can’t begin to imagine the future you are denying yourself,” the creature that looks like Twilight Sparkle says at one point, the two of you still sitting in your mind, trapped with each other. “You cannot begin to imagine the future we will build.”

“‘We’?” you ask her.

“We, the Newfoals, the ponies of Equestria… all of it,” the Not-Sparkle says, idly looking at her hoof. “Your world is built on fear, on worry, on hatred, on anger. Competition, corruption, replaced with cooperation and cohesion.”

“All while lacking free will,” you scowl. “I’ve seen Newfoals. They’re just… shells.”

“They’re free,” Not-Twilight retorts. “Free, not just of the cares and worries of human life, but the terror of choice.”

“Free from choice, huh?” you say, shaking your head. “How’s that work out?”

“Perfectly,” she replies. “Without choice, they are free from the burden of finding their own path in life. Without choice, they are free to simply enjoy the task before them. Without knowing the false freedom of choice, they cannot be overwhelmed by all that life could be. Without what could be, they are content with what is.”

You smirk this time, reminded of a half-forgotten memory. “Ponies that know not what they have lost but only what they’ve been given, right?”

“Ah, I see, you understand,” Not-Sparkle says to you, smiling.

“No,” you counter, “I’m misquoting a maniac from fiction. He was stopped. Celestia will be too.”

“Ah,” Not-Sparkle says, her smile fading. “A pity.”

“And what about natural born ponies?” you ask. “I’ve met some. They’re pretty wilful.”

Not-Twilight snorts. “Ponies have soul marks that tell them what they are meant to be, and yet choice was still a terror that condemned them to uncertainty and doubt.”

A chill runs up your spine (and you ignore the thought that, what if it isn’t really your spine?) and you swallow.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” you ask.

“There are others who see the truth already among the natural-born,” the Not-Sparkle says. “Others who understand what is happening. The Newfoal is the template – all life on Equus will follow.” She grins, a vile rictus that somehow seems to stretch her face beyond what should be physically possible. “From now… until the end of time.”

And right there, you feel it. Sick to your stomach, cold, and terrified.

This, you think, is bigger than we ever thought.

Special thanks to Doctor Fluffy, who created Prisma for Light Despondent, and helped me flesh out the conversation between HLF ponies.

(Let’s get real, four years ago nobody would have ever written ‘HLF ponies’ like that 😂. I may be a mediocre writer at best, but I get to do fun **** occasionally)