Cinder’s face was a mask of detached interest as she looked over the latest reports from their front lines. It wasn’t lost on her that she wasn’t nearly as enthusiastic about the absolutely phenomenal rate the invasion was progressing as she arguably should have been. Her forces were cutting through the Harmony Sphere’s defenses like dragon fire through a cloud. Their losses were negligible―ninety percent of their own casualties were the result of common accidents rather than enemy action. Their victories were decisive. Their conquests swift.

This operation’s swift progression was a clear and concise validation of their warrior’s training and her own leadership in every conceivable way.

And she despised every moment of it.

This invasion was wrong. This loss of life could have been avoided. The deaths, the destruction―all of it―never had to happen. Twilight’s plan had been a workable one―a good one! They could have bypassed the innocent worlds of the Sphere and struck right at the heart of Chrysalis’ base of power: Equus. Everything could have been over in a single battle.

One fight, that was all that it would have taken. A confrontation where all of the casualties on the enemy’s side would have been changelings. No innocent ponies who were doing nothing more than defending their homes would have had to die.

Unfortunately, as high as her rank might have been, it wasn’t high enough to set policy for the Clans. She didn’t get to decide whether or not the invasion happened. Her duty was to see it carried out as ordered. All that she could do was guide her forces towards conducting the conquests as ethically as possible.

For all the good it was doing.

The cobalt dragoness’ clawed hands tensed, scratching up the ‘claw-resistant’ display screen of the data tablet clutched in her grasp. She managed to toss the offending tablet away before she actually snapped it in half―a fate its predecessor had suffered just the week prior―letting out a frustrated snarl.

Damn Smoke Jabberwock, the star admiral thought bitterly to herself, her gaze darting briefly back to the pad and the casualty reports that it was displaying.

Her directive for Clan Timberwolf was that an offer of surrender would always be extended to any force that they went up against prior to the start of actual combat. To her knowledge, each of her downtrace commanders were honoring that directive; however, the defending forces they encountered had yet to accept, always electing to fight instead. Hardly any even allowed themselves to be taken alive as prisoners, with ‘Steed pilots choosing to detonate their cores in an attempt to take one of their attackers out with them as they died. Combat vehicles and infantry often conducted some manner of suicide charge into Clan forces, leaving little option left but to defend themselves with lethal force.

In the depressingly few instances where a prisoner was able to be taken alive―usually as a result of being too gravely wounded to fight any longer, and also nearly impossible for Cinder’s medics to ultimately save―it was revealed that they’d heard stories of what became of ponies who surrendered to the dragon invaders. The allegations had sounded horrific to Cinder, and she’d made inquiries to track down the origin of such obviously fictitious rumors.

Only to discover that they had not been mere rumors. Nor had they been fictitious.

If there was a single mote of ‘good’ news, it was that the bulk of the atrocities seemed to be constrained to Smolder’s clan. Mostly.

Cinder had been utterly horrified at the findings. She had also been incensed that more of her commanders hadn’t been as appalled as she was. Those who had expressed anything even approaching condonation of what Smoke Jabberwock forces were doing on the worlds they took had found themselves transferred to non-combat related postings. She wanted her officers leading the troops into battle to not even give a moment’s thought towards such heinous acts.

Unfortunately, it seemed that that was about the extent of what she could do to mitigate the harm being inflicted on the Sphere. And while her current invasion commanders were, by all accounts, conducting themselves with integrity and treating any prisoners they took with decency, that didn’t change the overall reputation of the Clans in the eyes of the Sphere’s defenders. Nearly all of whom saw little distinction between the individual Clans. They didn’t consider that each one was largely autonomous, and so assumed that each followed similar conduct on the battlefield. As a result, they had been insistent on fighting to the death far more often than not no matter who they were actually up against.

Which led to repulsively high casualty rates for their forces even when combating the more benevolent Clans like Timberwolf, with most being wiped out to a pony. The reports of those rates inevitably made their way off world, further fueling the notion that all of the Dragon Clans weren’t in the habit of taking prisoners. Which further motivated the defenders on the next world to not even consider the possibility of surrendering; vowing to fight to the bitter end. Which, of course, only led them to become the next set of damning statistics.

It was a cycle of death that Cinder didn’t see a way to break. Especially not while there were units in Smoke Jabberwock which were actively validating the perceptions of the Harmony Sphere defenders.

Despite her best efforts, her forces had become just another meat grinder that ponies were dead set on throwing themselves into. And her ‘Steed pilots were only too happy to oblige, as they saw their kill counts soaring into the stratosphere. How could she blame them? Their job was to fight, and the ponies weren’t backing down.

She cradled her head in her claws, letting out a rattling breath as she fought to maintain her composure. She’d been sent here to free these ponies. That had been the mandate passed down to them by her parents when her father had smuggled what he could of the CLDF out of the Harmony Sphere. Their mission was to save the Sphere, not burn it to the ground themselves.

Where had it all gone so wrong? How had they managed to lose their way like this?

Was there even any way back?

Cinder didn’t know.

All she knew was that she had her orders: wrest control of the worlds of the Sphere from ComSpark’s grasp, planet by planet. She was doing all that she could to accomplish that mission while inflicting as little damage as possible, but it was clear to her that was going to be a near-futile endeavor. Still, she had to try, and she would continue to.

Even if it was hard to see what the actual benefit was of taking the worlds from the changelings, if so few of the pony inhabitants were being left alive and free,

However, no matter how much she might disagree with what was happening, she had sworn her loyalty to her Clan. She wouldn’t―she couldn’t―turn her back on them. They were her Clan, her family, and they had asked for her help. The dragoness could do no less than give it.

Devotion to your Clan.

Loyalty. An Element of Harmony. It was one of the guiding principles of their whole society. To buck any of those tenets was to rebuke the very core of her own being.

Which was why even the very thought that the galaxy might be better off if the Clans were ultimately defeated and driven out of the Sphere felt like bile in her mouth. Yet, at the same time...Cinder believed that she could bring herself to live with being defeated if an adversary capable of doing so eventually came along.

That day might even come before the casualty totals reached nine figures…

...She hoped.

Cinder drew in another ragged breath as she banished that traitorous thought. Smoke Jabberwock and their atrocities could be dealt with in the fullness of time. Chrysalis was the greater threat. Defeating her and ComSpark needed to be the focus, to the exclusion of all else.

She reached out and retrieved the data pad, quickly tabbing away from the casualty totals to the next set of reports: force deployments. The star admiral didn’t expect to see much here that would set her off like the previous collection of information had. Most of it had been rather mundane for the past couple of months. Her task force commanders already had well fleshed out lists of targets that they were to invade, and routes had been planned out well in advance.

In fact, so sure was the cobalt dragoness of her findings that she very nearly tabbed past the reports after giving them the briefest of glances. However, just before she did so, she caught sight of a notation attached to one of the otherwise unremarkable reports. It was a notice that a task force was diverting to a secondary target in lieu of a primary.

There were numerous reasons why something like this could have been the case. Supply considerations, outdated jump charts, or a plethora of other mundane occurrences that might require a commander on site to deviate from the established plan. That was why there even was a list of secondary invasion targets that could be substituted if the need arose.

A lot of those targets had been selected prior to the invasion commencing. Most with the understanding that they represented less well-defended worlds that a force could divert to if the commander wasn’t confident that they could succeed in capturing a better defended primary target. That way, the invasion could maintain momentum while reinforcements were dispatched to the understrength unit.

During initial planning, casualties for their forces during the invasion had been pessimistically projected, in an effort to avoid being unpleasantly surprised by any losses they might suffer. Of course, reality had demonstrated that even their most optimistic projections had apparently been grossly understated. No force commander had found a need to divert from the primary list.

Until now.

Cinder frowned as she pulled up the report in question and read through it. As she had assumed, this was not a decision that had been made because the commander had sustained too many losses to confidently take the next world on their assigned list of primary invasion targets. However, the star admiral was unable to find anything approaching a comprehensive explanation. The commander had simply cited: ‘Acting upon new intelligence’ as the motivation for making the change.

She pondered the note as she drummed her claws on the table pensively. Clan Timberwolf afforded even its junior commanders a great deal of autonomy in the field. Commanders were expected to utilize their best judgment when a situation changed, instead of allowing themselves to become bogged-down, always waiting on orders from higher echelons. It allowed Timberwolf forces to be flexible and adaptable. Cinder also trusted her commanders enough that she permitted them to make those changes without prior approval from her, and merely notify her of the changes.

Like had happened now.

It was a little curious to her that the commander in question hadn’t felt a need to elaborate on what the ‘intelligence’ was. Though there were any number of reasons why they might have declined to do so, including a desire to confirm their findings before submitting a comprehensive report.

Cinder made a note to follow up on the matter, and then tabbed to the logistics reports.

---

The sound of the door opening drew the attention of the entire flight control staff towards the new arrival. Of course, at the moment ‘the entire flight control staff’ consisted of just a single earth pony mare minding the room. Under normal operations, the number of flight controllers working here would have been closer to a dozen, both day and night. Not that anything in the region had been ‘normal’ for the past several months.

Since the start of the invasion by the forces of the Dragon Clans, the spaceport had seen quite the dramatic shift in traffic, in both directions. The mad flurry of activity as refugees from worlds that had fallen to the Clans. Lulls in traffic as the populace waited with baited breath to see who the next victims would be in the invasion. Another round of chaos as it became clear that Tilly would inevitably become the site of an invasion in the near future.

They were now soundly in the middle of another lull where spaceport traffic was concerned. Which meant that the staffing for the spaceport’s primary flight control tower had been reduced to only a single officer. It also meant that the room, which was normally a buzzing hive of chatter and activity, was deathly quiet. Thus the usually imperceptible sound of the door’s hydraulics pushing it aside were able to easily draw the gaze of the sole occupant towards the new arrival.

The lilac earth pony mare’s amber eyes widened in mild surprise as she saw a bored looking unicorn stallion magically wheeling in a mop and bucket. His steel gray coveralls immediately identified him as a member of the spaceport’s custodial staff. During normal operations, they too were in abundance around the facility both day and night. That was what made his arrival unusual to the mare: these were not ‘normal operations’. To the best of her knowledge, the entirety of the cleaning staff had been more or less dismissed. Those which hadn’t already long since fled the planet with their families anyway.

Yet, the stallion barely even paid the flight controller any attention as he stepped into the room, save for an initial nod in her direction that served little more purpose than to demonstrate that he acknowledged there was another pony in the room. Other than that, he seemed content to ignore her and focus exclusively on his bucket and mop. His head bobbed gently to the beat of whatever music was playing over a set of headphones that he was wearing.

For a brief moment, the mare considered asking what the stallion was even still doing in the spaceport. Again, she had been under the impression that they effectively no longer had a custodial staff. However, she ultimately thought better of asking the question. Presumably, nopony would know better about the spaceport’s custodial staffing levels than, well, the custodial staff. That stallion surely wouldn’t be here if he wasn’t supposed to. Chances were that, like herself, at least some members from every department had been retained to continue working.

If nothing else, he might even just be here because he had nowhere better to be.

Everypony with the means and opportunity to do so had pretty much already gotten themselves offworld. Few remained except for military personnel and essential staff. As well as those who were too poor or not well-connected enough to get off the planet. Most of those unfortunates were huddling at home with their loved ones. Those without any loved ones to speak of on the planet were doing what they could to occupy their minds. Such as going about their normal routines. Or as close to normal as the circumstances allowed, at any rate.

The mare could hardly blame this stallion for that, if that was the case here. She certainly wasn’t opposed to the company.

The flight controller felt herself unexpectedly stifling a yawn. She hadn’t even been feeling all that sleepy just a few minutes ago. It probably wasn’t tiredness so much as it was boredom.

The spaceport was seeing scant little traffic. Maybe―maybe―one DropShip would show up once a day or so. Usually a craft ferrying supplies around within the system as weapons and warfighting supplies were reorganized as various militia and planetary defense force commanders got around to submitting accurate inventory reports and not merely assuring their leadership structures that they had everything they were supposed to. Unsurprising to many familiar with how such things worked, the moment that news broke that there might be actual fighting in the near future, a lot of units suddenly―and quite unexpectedly, they promised―found themselves not being quite as topped up on material and ammunition as they had been regularly insisting they were for the past, well, forever.

Funnily enough, unit commanders were suddenly a lot less concerned about being punished for ‘losing’ equipment that they’d been made responsible for. Similarly, the powers that be in the higher echelons were also a lot less concerned about issuing reprimands or statements of charges for the misplaced supplies that were suddenly missing from inventories. Such things could be sorted out later. Provided any of them survived the imminent invasion by the Dragon Clans.

Judging from the few accounts that made it to other worlds, even ponies who surrendered to the Clans were more accurately classified as ‘victims’ than ‘POWs’, based on what became of them. Soldiers defending worlds attacked by clanners were―unofficially―encouraged to make sure they always kept a bullet reserved in their weapons for use on themselves if―when―defeat was imminent.

She yawned again, much to her own annoyance. Maybe some coffee would help to perk her up again…

The lilac earth pony flight controller felt herself jerk unexpectedly, as though she had just caught herself falling asleep in her chair. That was exceptionally odd. She’d only been on shift for a few hours, and had gotten what should have been more than enough sleep the night before. She shouldn’t be...the least bit...tired…

The unicorn stallion―who had never worked as a custodian a day in his life until an hour ago―watched as the lone flight controller slumped limply back in her chair, snoring softly. He ceased casting his lethargy spell and set about performing the job that he was actually here to do. One which didn’t involve mopping the floors with what―in retrospect―he was now pretty sure wasn’t actually floor cleaner. In his defense, the cleaning solutions in the closet hadn’t been very clearly labeled. The most defining characteristic of any of those bottles had been the color.

Perhaps he should have gone with the purple stuff instead?

He stepped over to a nearby console and began to access the spaceport’s flight logs. Once he’d made his way into the database that he wanted, he took out a portable drive and plugged it into the terminal. Almost immediately, a series of files uploaded into the system and began to dutifully insert themselves into the appropriate arrival and departure logs. The already crammed traffic control logs got a little bit more crowded as the better part of two dozen additional DropShip arrivals and departures were amended to the existing logs, along with their manifests.

None of those ships existed, of course. Nor did their cargos. However, over the past week, a team of agents which included himself had been hard at work across Tilly putting the pieces into place in order to create something of a ‘second exodus’ across the planet. Not an exodus of ponies, but of possessions. Records had been manipulated at just about every level to suggest that the planetary governor had put into place a plan to round up the world’s most valuable treasures and smuggle them offworld so that the encroaching Clan invaders wouldn’t be able to get their claws on them.

Such a deception would typically have been much more difficult to pull off, the unicorn knew. There were simply too many checks and balances―too many sets of eyes―to sustain a deception on this scale for very long. Under normal circumstances, all it would have taken was just checking one of the registries of the falsified DropShips against the ComSpark database, and anypony would instantly recognize it as a forgery.

Of course, with imminent doom on the horizon, hardly anypony on the planet was particularly worried about audits and record integrity reviews. Right about now, just about anypony could alter the official record to say whatever they wanted, and chances were extremely good that nopony would notice the discrepancies before the Clans invaded. And after the invasion, nopony would be around to care that a few official logs were wrong.

The Dragon Clans certainly weren’t going to notice anything odd about the falsified data. If anything, they were going to be incredibly intrigued by what it showed. Their instinctual greed and avarice was going to motivate them to not question it either. A dragon didn’t want to hear that a horde didn’t exist; only where it was located. If they interrogated any prisoners about it, the genuine claims of ignorance by the pony captives would probably only further convince them of how true the data was, otherwise the ponies wouldn’t be so determined to deny knowing anything about it!

A few prisoners would likely be tortured to death in order to get them to divulge further information about the nature of the treasures smuggled off world. The unicorn felt a little bad about that. Of course, it wasn’t like he bore any responsibility for these invasions in the first place. Heck, what he was doing right now was step one in the plan to stop the dragons from conquering any more of the Harmony Sphere than could be helped. He was part of one team of many, spread across dozens of worlds, planting the evidence needed to get the Dragon Clans to focus their advance towards a single goal:

Buckwheat.

‘The Vault of the Sphere’.

At least, that was what the Dragon Clans were going to believe the world was regarded as. To the best of the stallion’s knowledge, the world wasn’t particularly remarkable in any real way. It wasn’t a significant center of industry or commerce, or heavily trafficked, or even notably resource-rich. It was just...convenient. A world that lay mostly in the path of the advancing fleets of the four invading Clans. It wouldn’t be hardly any inconvenience whatsoever for each Clan to divert from their pre-planned invasion corridor to Buckwheat.

That was the purpose of the first phase: get all four Clans in one location with the bulk of their forces.

Step two was a little trickier, in that there was very little that he and the other Disciple agents operating in the Sphere could do directly. Mostly, they had to hope that ComSpark was still as capable at information gathering as they always had been and notice the shift in Clan activity on their own. They also had to notice it without really learning why the dragons were doing it. Obviously ComSpark would know that no vast stockpiles of wealth and treasure were being hoarded on Buckwheat. Learning that the dragons thought that too soon would likely prompt the changelings to start investigating what had led the Clans to believe such a preposterous thing. If they learned that the Disciples were behind it―a group that they knew to be the allies of the Dragon Clans―they’d almost certainly assume that Buckwheat was being set up as a trap for ComSpark, and not the Clans.

If the Clans took Buckwheat unopposed, and found no signs of any great hordes of treasure, it was highly unlikely they’d fall for any similar plot a second time. Which meant that it would be nearly impossible to get all four of the massive armies to converge again where they could be soundly defeated in a single battle.

So ComSpark had to notice that the Clans seemed to be unusually keen on taking Buckwheat, and that they were going to be launching a joint operation to do it. All without catching a whiff of Disciple involvement. Once they saw the opportunity that this provided, it should be a no-brainer that this represented a golden opportunity to stop the Clans dead in their tracks in a singular confrontation. ComSpark could take the lead in the defense, cripple the Dragon Clans, and cement themselves as the ‘Heroes of the Sphere’.

It was a golden opportunity.

Once the Clans were stopped, then they could finally begin preparations to launch the third phase of the plan.

The terminal beeped at the stallion, signaling that all files had been uploaded and sorted appropriately. The unicorn retrieved the drive and closed down the terminal. He then walked back over to his mop and bucket, and wandered out of the traffic control room. The mare continued to snooze at her station as the door closed behind him.

---

Victoria stirred, murmuring unintelligibly as her mind began to cross the foggy boundary between sleep and the waking world. She was hit almost immediately by a wave of annoyance as she sensed that something was amiss. Specifically, it was far cooler in the bed than it should have been. Her eyes still closed, the mare lethargically pawed at the far side of the bed, but found nothing more than the tangled remains of empty sheets that she was distinctly under the impression should have held a batpony.

The absence of the stallion in her bed spurred the ivory pegasus towards something approaching wakefulness. Her bold blue eyes fluttered open, and immediately confirmed the absence of her bedmate. The mare frowned and propped herself up in the bed, looking around the room for any sign of him. She let out a mildly annoyed sigh when she spotted Nacht Belle seated in front of her bedroom’s terminal. She immediately recognized that he was once more tinkering with the treaty that the two of them had been working at―sporadically―for the past two weeks.

Of course, whatever they wrote up here would naturally have to be passed through the diplomatic corps in both of their governments to ensure that all of the appropriately verbose legalese had been used. Lest they had accidentally agreed to cede all of the territories of both the Commonwealth and the Federation to the Our Worlds League somehow through a punctuation error.

“I assume there’s a good reason why that couldn’t have waited for a more reasonable hour than…” the mare glanced over at the time, “after sunrise, at least?”

The batpony glanced over his shoulder, smiling at the pegasus, “I was struck with inspiration during the night,” he remarked, “I think I found a way to reconcile integrating our existing legal systems into a unified court.”

Victoria stifled a yawn, drawing an amused smirk from her fiancé, “Sorry, that wasn’t because I was bored. I’m still tired,” the ivory mare assured him as she began to extract herself from the bed, “somepony kept me up most of the night.”

“To think that my sleep apnea might have continued to go undiagnosed without your help,” Nacht said, grinning at the mare as she walked up and nuzzled him, “I’ll be back to bed in a bit,” he assured her, “I just wanted to get this down while it was fresh in my mind.”

“I can appreciate that. Why don’t you tell me this brilliant idea of yours?” She purred as she snuggled up next to her beloved.

The batpony placed one of his leathery wings around her, giving the mare a peck on the cheek before turning back to the console to begin giving his explanation of the notion that had come to him during the night, “So, you know how we weren’t sure how to go about reconciling judge selections between our two realms? Well, I realized that we could solve the problem by just―”

The terminal beeped at the pair, interrupting the batpony. Both ponies glanced at the screen, and saw that the reason for the alert had been that a priority message had just been received by the palace. One that was addressed specifically to Nacht Belle. The stallion frowned as he regarded the notification, paying special attention to the listed sender of the message.

REGENCY COUNCIL of THE FEDERATED MOONS

It took only seconds for the batpony’s confusion to resolve itself. At which point Nacht Belle felt himself overcome with numbness. The main advisory body to the First Prince was the Privy Council, made up of the realm’s highest-ranking military advisors and the Federation’s cabinet ministers. It was only ever rebranded as the ‘Regency’ Council when transitioning between Princes.

The bat pony opened the message.

Nacht knew what it was going to say of course. Maybe not exactly the wording that would be used, or the specific circumstances that it was going to outline. But he was certainly aware of the ultimate purpose of the message: his brother was dead, and he was being summoned back to the Federation so that he could be officially crowned as the next First Prince.

His gaze passed stiffly over the words, taking them in as he made his way through the seemingly endless litany of prescribed formalities that protocol required of such high-ranking government correspondence. Finally he managed to make his way to the portion that he had been both seeking out, and dreading to read: the details of his brother’s death.

It was of surprisingly little comfort to the batpony to learn that it had been in battle, or that it had been the result of an act of heroic self-sacrifice in order to ensure the successful defense of the Federation world which was being attacked. Menulis had held off an enemy assault almost on his own, buying time for the defender’s lines to reform behind him after they’d been forced to fall back. By the time his brother’s Big Mac had fallen, the defending Federation troops were ready to counter-attack, and they apparently did so with ruthless efficiency, devastating the invading Highlander forces and driving them off the planet entirely.

He initially derided his brother’s actions. Instinctively, he lamented that Menulis hadn’t simply ordered others to hold back the hippogriff attackers so that he could fall back with the rest of his forces to help organize them. He’d have likely lived under those circumstances. Of course, Nacht knew that there wasn’t a single pilot among his brother’s units that could match him in skill, and so it would have taken several ‘Steed pilots to do what he had accomplished on his own.

Nacht wondered if he would have been able to order several of his subordinates to die for him. Obviously his brother had not. He’d shouldered the risk himself. Noble for an individual, perhaps. Reckless for a First Prince, to whom an entire nation looked for guidance and leadership.

Then the guilt hit him. His brother was dead, and all he could do was criticize Menulis’ valor? It wasn’t his brother who deserved Nacht’s scorn, but those pitiless hippogriff mercenaries and their Combine masters! His inaugural act as First Prince would be to launch a campaign of retribution against them. They’d pay in blood for what they’d done!

“Nacht?”

The word startled the stallion, who only now realized that Victoria had left the bed and made her way to his side. The inflection in the word made it clear that this was not her first attempt to get his attention. One of her wings draped themselves cautiously over his shoulders as the mare looked from him to the message on the terminal. Her touch seemed to bleed away some of his newfound anxiety. Not all of it, of course; but it helped some nonetheless. His own leathery wing lifted to touch hers in reciprocation.

“My visit’s going to be cut short, it seems,” he began, noting how stilted his words were coming out as he tried to rein in both his grief and his rage, “I’m needed back at the palace.

“For my coronation.”

He felt Victoria tense the moment that last word was out of his mouth. She recognized immediately what had happened. In the next moment, her other wing moved in as the pegasus mare enveloped him in a consoling embrace, “I’m so sorry…”

Nacht leaned in to her, relishing the touch of his lover. Not much else was said between them in the next minute. Not much was needed. Both had lost family in the past, and both knew well how abruptly the mantle of leadership could pass from one member of a House to the next. It was doubtful that there was a member of any noble house anywhere in the Sphere who wasn’t familiar with such things. They were a way of life.

“Should I come with you…?” the ivory mare asked finally, letting the offer hang in the air as an option if he needed it.

He wanted her to, but, “Best you not,” he finally said, reluctantly. “Too many might see the Archon of the Pony Commonwealth ‘chaperoning’ the Crown Prince of the Federation as meaning that I’m being ‘controlled’ by you. It certainly won’t help if they see that, and then immediately hear my proposal for a union between us,” his bitter tone made his displeasure at having to keep such petty politicking in mind clear, “It might undermine my legitimacy with some of the political factions back home.

“Nopony outside the Privy Council and the diplomatic corps even knows I’m here now,” he pointed out.

“Fair enough,” Victoria agreed, sounding equally as exasperated by the unavoidable machinations of The Great Game as her beloved was, “I’ll arrange for an envoy to depart around the time the Commonwealth can be expected to have ‘officially’ heard about your ascension. They’ll be able to work on getting the specifics of the alliance in place until enough time has passed to make announcing our betrothal seem ‘uncoerced’, or whatever.”

“Shouldn’t be more than a year, I hope.”

Neither was happy at the prospect, but the Archon didn’t voice an argument to the new timetable. Both already felt like they’d waited more than long enough at this point, and were champing at the bit to finally make things official regarding their relationship. Light had finally been visible at the end of the tunnel when Victoria had returned and claimed her throne from her uncle. No longer ‘playing dead’ in exile, it had looked like the pair could finally tie the knot under the guise of Nacht being served up to the Commonwealth as a political token for an alliance.

As was the common purpose of family members among Noble Houses.

Now, however, he had ceased to be a mere ‘member’ of House Belle. His brother’s death had propelled him to its head. An alliance through marriage with the Commonwealth was still on the table, yes, but announcing it in his position as First Prince too soon after his coronation would have political consequences, and raise many questions among the more cynical of the noble court. That sort of political instability on the precipice of a confrontation with the Clans―and perhaps ComSpark―was the last thing either of their realms needed.

And so that tin can had to be bucked down the road a little further. Again.

At times, Nacht felt like the universe itself was conspiring to keep them apart in perpetuity. It had become something of an inside joke for them, even, “So I’ll schedule the next postponement of our wedding for twelve months from now?” The pegasus asked, flashing the stallion a sardonic smile.

“Fourteen,” he countered, “it’ll take two months for me to get back home; so twelve months from my coronation.”

“Ah, of course. Fourteen months then,” she leaned in and kissed him deeply, purring softly when they parted, “Until the next galactic crisis pushes things back.”

“Obviously until then,” he agreed, grinning.

“Do you want some time alone?” She asked, gesturing towards the message.

Nacht clasped his wings firmly around the mare and shook his head, “No. This is exactly the kind of thing I need you to be a part of: my heartaches, as well as my joys,” he told her, placing his head against hers, “I’ll get through this better with you than without you.”

“In that case,” Victoria said, snuggling up to the batpony, “why don’t you tell me about him? I want to hear all about the brother-in-law I almost got to have…”

---

The string of epithets that echoed through the nearly empty ‘Steed Bay was significantly louder than the banging of metal that had preceded it, Blood Chit noted. The crimson pegasus glanced up at the Crystal Cavalier nestled in its stall. Most of the ablative plating had been removed from the heavy BattleSteed, leaving behind an emaciated-looking monstrosity of struts and myomer muscles. Like some sort of skinless metal goliath.

Standing bedside it was Twilight’s Rainbow Dash, which was in a similar state of disassembly. Both were surrounded by cranes and machinery that the technician crews used to aid them in the repair and refit of the company’s ‘Steeds. All of those pieces of equipment lay dormant at the moment though, because the crews that usually operated them were fast asleep in their temporary quarters aboard Havoc Station. The interim security chief would have been in his quarters asleep too; except that sleep wasn’t a thing that came easily these days.

To help with his newfound insomnia, the pegasus stallion had taken to walking around. However, walking aimlessly didn’t actually seem to work well on Havoc Station itself―too mundane, he supposed―and the station kept routing him into a lounge. So he’d instead sought out the Zathura and its more familiar corridors.

This had been something of a mixed blessing, as it turned out. While the DropShip didn’t morph its layout as he traversed it, he’d found himself experiencing sudden pangs every time he passed by the assigned quarters of a member of the crew who’d died during the raid he’d led on the hidden changeling HyperSpark Generator. No matter how many times others told him―or how many times he told himself―their deaths hadn’t been his fault, it was still difficult for Blood Chit to truly internalize that idea.

He’d led the mission. He’d made the plan and given the orders. How could he not be responsible for all those lost lives? The changelings may have pulled the triggers, but he’d walked his friends right into their gunsights in the first place.

The crimson stallion had been about to leave the ship, and its haunting reminders, when he’d heard noise coming from the ‘Steed Bay. It was somewhat comforting to know that he wasn’t the only one having issues sleeping.

“If I ever meet a descendent of the pony who designed this piece of shit,” a mare was snarling as she extracted herself from the Cavalier’s innards, idly rubbing at her gnarled horn, “I’ll slap them so hard the sheet’ll fly off their ancestor’s ghost!

“Fucking engineers never for one moment consider techs when they’re deciding where those bolts go,” the kirin continued to mutter as she noisily stomped across the gantry to fetch another tool from an open cabinet before stomping back towards the ‘Steed, “Now I have to take apart half the fucking frame just to get at one fucking melted wiring harness because they buried the retaining bolts so far up their own asses…” The rest of her annoyed tirade became too muffled to make out as the chief technician crawled back inside the BattleSteed.

Blood Chit couldn’t keep his lips from spreading into an amused little smile as he witnessed the first little smidge of normalcy that he’d seen in a long while: Mig working on a ‘Steed. He fluttered up to the gantry and landed just in time to have to dodge an impact ratchet that went hurtling his way.

“Fuck crystal ponies and their fucking Imperial measurement system!” Came a shout from within the dark interior of the Cavalier, “Why couldn’t they have used metric like everypony else in the galaxy?! If I strip another bolt because eleven is too small and twelve has too much fucking play, I’m just going to tear this whole thing down and rebuild it with proper bolts,” the mare snarled as she once more poked her head out into the light of the ‘Steed Bay.

The kirin stopped up short when she finally noticed that she wasn’t alone in the Bay, “...Oh. Hey.”

“Hey.”

Blood Chit felt his throat grow a little dry all of a sudden. It had been a subtle thing, but the stallion had heard the faint note of strain in the technician’s voice, and he could see her eyes dart away from him briefly. The two of them hadn’t had a proper conversation since he’d returned from the raid. In fact, the last time the two of them had spoken at any length, had been when he’d gone to collect Tig for the mission.

He’d promised the rosy mare that he’d look after her sister and bring her back safe and sound.

The silence that hovered between them now felt like it lasted an eternity. What exactly was either of them supposed to say to the other? Anything that Blood Chit could think to say in the moment felt incredibly forced and contrived; and yet the growing length of the silence extending between them only served to make him even more anxious. He had to say something, even if it wasn’t particularly enlightening.

“Working on a ‘Steed, huh?”

The stallion mentally facehoofed. Frantically, he strove to recover some semblance of tact by expounding further on what could only charitably be looked upon as a ‘thought’, so that he didn’t come off like a complete idiot, “―Alone, I mean. I thought you had a whole team to help you with that?”

“They’re on the station,” Mig explained, still appearing to have trouble looking the pegasus in the eye, “It’s been a while since they got some leave.”

“Same with my team,” Blood Chit managed to say in a far more natural tone, as he found their conversation shift to a topic that he could actually contribute to, “We’ve been pulling double shifts since―” the crimson flier’s words caught in his throat, and he could only bring himself to say, “...we found our team short-hooved.”

He still winced slightly. Mig’s hoof rubbed uncomfortably at her leg. Somehow, trying to phrase things more ‘delicately’ had actually made Blood Chit feel worse. It was almost like he’d cheapened what happened to those ponies on his mission. Like their deaths didn’t matter beyond what they’d done to the security department’s staffing roster. The reality couldn’t have been farther from the truth; yet it was still difficult for the pegasus to just outright say: ‘―since seventeen ponies died.’

“That…” Blood Chit struggled for the words, but kept finding himself coming up short, “Mig, that wasn’t how I meant…

“I really suck at this. I’m sorry.”

More uncomfortable silence.

When Blood Chit felt like he couldn’t stand it anymore, the pegasus decided that retreat was the better part of valor, and gave up on fumbling this conversation even further. He turned and spread his wings to fly away and resume his walk someplace else. However, Mig’s words stopped him, “Did you know this was Tig’s favorite ‘Steed?”

He turned his head back to look at the rose-hued kirin, and found her gaze locked on the partially dismantled BattleSteed. The faintest ghost of a smile was trying to form on her face as she talked about her twin, “Not just on the ship. Like, if Tig could work on one ‘Steed, out of every model they ever built, it would be a Crystal Cavalier.

“It’s not because they’re particularly amazing, from a technical standpoint―not in my opinion anyway―it’s because Tig was fascinated by more than just the mechanics of a BattleSteed,” the kirin tech continued, talking to Blood Chit while only barely seeming to acknowledge he was even there. She mostly just wanted to talk about her sister; and needed somepony else there to hear how amazing Tig really was, “She saw these things as physical manifestations of history itself. They’re like interactive museums, almost. To her, at least.

“She loved reading about their histories. About the company that built it, the lead engineer who designed it, the little stories about why certain choices were made one way or the other; things like that. For her, they were an insight into a completely different time and way of thinking.

“Take the Cavalier, for example; and I don’t mean the six-bee variant, or even the six model. I’m talking about the OG ‘CY-CVL’―before they thought they’d even need to slip model numbers in there. That model was completely unarmed.” She finally broke her stare with the ‘Steed to look at Blood Chit now, gaging his reaction to the revelation; and the pegasus did have to admit that he was genuinely surprised by it. The idea of a BattleSteed carrying no weapons was an absurd concept to the stallion, “They were armored all to Tartarus―to the point that they carried more plating than even a Big Mac―but not so much as a single machine gun.

“The idea was supposed to be that they’d fight like pre-League crystal knights from thousands of years ago or whatever: charge at the enemy and hit them with their big, pointy, lance,” she waved her hoof at the dismantled weapon laying on the deck at the ‘Steed’s hooves, sniggering at the absurdity of the notion that battles might have been fought like that.

“It’s obviously stupid sounding to us now, but it actually made sense to those engineers that that was how ‘Steeds would fight, because that was how their flesh and blood soldiers still fought! Weapons tech lagged so far behind everything else back then, because it hadn’t been needed for hundreds of years. All of Equus had been united as a singular coalition of species for centuries, so armies didn’t exist anymore.

“We were flying through the stars in massive spaceships colonizing worlds...and the most powerful weapon a guard pony carried was still a spear,” Mig was shaking her head, chortling mirthfully. Blood Chit likewise was chuckling at the anachronistic image such a thought produced in his own head.

“...And that’s what this ‘Steed represents: an insight into that simpler―maybe more naïve―time in our history, where we’d never thought about fighting. Not with each other, or anycreature else.” The mare’s features darkened now, and her smile melted away, “At least, that’s how Tig explained it to me once. Me? I don’t feel quite that way about it. When I look at this Cavalier, I just see the engineering, the technical hurdles that had to be overcome, and even the design flaws that were either overlooked at the time or just accepted for the sake of meeting a design deadline. No matter how long or hard I look at one of these things, it’s just technology to me.

“To her, they were art. And I miss being able to see them through her eyes that way.”

There was another silence, but this time Blood Chit did have some idea of what to say, “I miss her too. I miss all of them.”

Mig was once more idly rubbing her leg, “...I didn’t know a lot of the other ponies on the mission that well,” the kirin admitted softly, “The security details were always just sort of...there, you know? They sort of blended into the structure of the ship, if that makes any sense? After a while, I even stopped really ‘seeing’ them.

“I hate the way that makes me sound,” Mig said, cringing deeply.

“Nah, you’re good,” the pegasus assured her, even finding some way to manage a warm smile for the mare, “That’s just sort of how things got for ponies in jobs like that: security, janitorial, food service. We’re used to being just sort of a uniform that ‘exists’ in the moment, and then gets forgotten about the moment we’re out of sight. It doesn’t make you a bad pony.”

“You knew them though, didn’t you?”

Blood Chit swallowed back a lump in his throat, but his words still came out a little more hoarse than he would have liked, “I did. I knew them.”

“Well?” She asked. The stallion nodded silently.

“I don’t think I recognized a single other name on the list of the dead, other than my sister and the tech I sent with her,” Mig admitted somberly, “and I barely interacted with that tech off-duty. I don’t…” she hesitated, letting out a resigned sigh, “I don’t think I like that about myself.

“It just...never really felt like it mattered if I got to know the ponies on this ship or not, you know? Tig and I weren’t here because we loved the mercenary life, or needed the money, or anything like that. We didn’t feel like we needed to get to know anypony here, because this wasn’t going to be a long-term thing,” Mig admitted, “All of this was just to piss off our mother. Once we’d made our point, we were going to go back home,” that last bit was said with a note of bitter ruefulness as she flashed the stallion with a mirthless smirk.

“Nopony was supposed to get hurt.

“But now we’re involved in something that is way above our heads…” another pause, this one mixed with a worried look on the kirin’s face, “and I haven’t heard from my family in months.”

Blood Chit’s expression had grown more sober as well as the mare spoke, “I haven’t heard anything from Chanterelle since PEA-02-UX,” he informed her, unable to keep the worried tone from coloring his words, “I know we were promised that the Disciples―or Clans, or whatever―were going to get them out of the Sphere so they’d be safe from the changelings...but now that we’re also kind of going against them too?” He shrugged helplessly, almost feeling overwhelmed by his inability to do anything about the situation.

“He’s probably not safe no matter who has him,” the crimson stallion acknowledged, “and I have no idea when I’ll see him again,” Blood Chit couldn’t bring himself to say ‘if’ he’d see his coltfriend again, even though he couldn’t help but think it in the back of his mind.

“All I can do,” the pegasus affirmed, taking a breath and doing his best to favor the kirin mechanic with a reassuring smile, “is keep moving forward and trust that I’ll see him again someday, safe and sound; and that we’ll be able to build or life together like we planned.

“That’s all any of us can do: keep moving forward, and trust that things will eventually get better.”

“Presumably because they can’t get much worse,” Mig retorted softly. The pair were quiet for several long seconds, then, “Do you really think any of us are going to make it through this? Honestly?”

“The way I see it: if I give up, then I’m definitely not going to get my happily ever after,” Blood Chit said, somehow managing to affect a positive outlook in spite of his own fears. Only an idiot wouldn’t have been acutely aware of how heavily the deck was stacked against them right now. They were signing on with an under-equipped faction in order to go up against two of the most powerful forces that the galaxy had ever seen. There were going to be more bodies before this was all over; of that much the stallion had no doubt.

He also couldn’t bring himself to guess at which of his friends and shipmates wouldn’t be there at the end. So he actively chose to believe that they all would be. As would their friends and families back in the Sphere. It was the only way he knew to keep the fear and dread from crushing his spirit entirely.

“I guess you’re right,” the rosy mare acknowledged. Her gaze drifted back to the Crystal Cavalier, “I don’t know what a ‘happily ever after’ looks like for me right now though. I sort of always assumed that Tig and I would have time to figure out what it would be. Never gave it much thought. Never had to.

“One day we would just go back to the Confederation and become ‘proper heiresses’ for our House. Never occurred to us that might not be something that happens,” she sighed, “Didn’t bother coming up with a ‘Plan B’.”

“You may not have to,” Blood Chit said, “If everything works out, you’ll probably still be able to go back home and pick up your life where you left off,” he assured her.

“I hope you’re right,” the rosy kirin sighed, rubbing the back of her head fretfully. Finally she managed to muster up something resembling a smile, looking thankfully in Blood Chit’s direction, “Thanks for that, Chit. I appreciate you coming by. I should get back to work though,” Mig said, looking around for the impact driver that she’d thrown in her earlier fit.

“Could you use a hoof?” The stallion offered.

“You know how to rebuild ‘Steeds?”

“Not even a little bit,” he said with a broad smile, “but I can hold a flashlight with the best of them!”

Next Chapter: Chapter 35: Mercenary's Star Estimated time remaining: 14 Hours, 46 Minutes