Twilight, Spike and Shining Armor are on an epic quest and their goal is… the new season shirt of his favourite hoofball team. It is also a nice reminder how antisocial Twilight could be before she met her friends in Ponyville. She looks like a typical college mare while her brother doesn’t exactly look like a soldier with his red shirt and his saddlebag. Spike is also dragged along and seems more interested in his newspaper than in what is going on. Meanwhile the purple unicorn is annoyed that they have to walk to such a distant store, when there are other shops much closer.
Eventually they are on their way to the shop as Twilight complains and asks why she had to come. The reason is that he needs someone rational to stop him from buying what he wants to buy and several limited editions that he knows he couldn’t resist. He would have spend all his savings on that and then his mission would come and he wouldn’t be able to see a single game.
After that Shining awakes back on the ship. His dream was a reminder of all the things he would have to leave behind on his 2 year long journey: Friends, his favourite sports team, radio shows, plays, birthdays, Hearth's Warming Eves and his sister. He had to sacrifice all these things for his duty. It would even be difficult for letters to reach him. All letters would have to go over the Royal Mail and then to the Admiralty Section of Horse Guards. Everything must be registered, examined, it is expensive, letters from family are given a low priority, only few small objects can be sent with it, there is still the danger that a nervous soldier blasts the delivery when it reaches the ship and the group of Guards responsible for the letters is ridiculously understaffed for that task. It would have been easier if Twilight had returned to Canterlot after her task.
But the interviewers are still there with him to keep him company. The prolonged night doesn’t worry him much after what Princess Celestia said and soon he is ready to eat something before his talk with Commander Shepard. Outside he meets one of Celestia’s hoofmaidens: Minuette.
Soon he is in the mess hall and finds the rest of his group. Sergeant Thunderchild, Lance-Corporal Apple and Private Audience are talking about miniature gunpowder cannons with Petty Officer Turnip. They briefly mention the Master Chief (an actual rank in the navy) and how dangerous the recoil of that weapon is. Shining mentions his slightly eerie but still somewhat entertaining ability to hit impossible targets he didn’t want to hit. Most unicorns will just use telekinesis to shoot arrows at their targets. While Shining Armor’s strength is the use of defensive spells, Private Audience is very skilled at aiming and uses the long-range vision spell to further improve his vision.
He begins to get bored on their flight. Finally Shining takes the chance to ask Lance-Corporal Apple about the family reunion in Ponyville. Bitter Apple talks about that Applejack wanted to be Twilight’s friend and that Pinkie had already planed her party for her. Her brother knows also how the purple unicorn would probably react to a surprise party. The last thing Bitter saw of Twilight was her and Spike talking with Fluttershy.
Shining talks with Thunderchild about why he asked to be with Twilight's chariot team if he knew about this mission leading them away from Canterlot. Shining realised that the pegasus tried to get him to make an additional check on the team that had been assigned to Twilight. Thunderchild really cared for him and his sister.
Their first target is the “United Republics of Columbia” and it is a griffin democracy with an extended military and the huge city called Liberty City.
It is time to talk with Commander Shepard and Master Chief (he is even named Spartan). It leads to a brief confusion about ranks and titles and even the unicorn interviewer seems confused. Master Chief thinks about waiting until Cadence arrives but Shining wants to clarify his unit's position on the ship as soon as possible. They decide to create four groups, two directly under Shining Armor and two under the Master Chief. His units end up being called Misfit because they have been put together from various regiments and companies. Misfit Actual (Shining and his command squad), Misfit One (commanded by Sergeant Foaly) and Misfit Two (under Sergeant Reinold). Now they just need to decide the details for the placement of the troops and then they can start to train on the deck.
Eventually the ponies become nervous that the sun still didn’t rise and that the Mare in the Moon seems to be missing. If Shining knew that his sister was in danger, he would probably turn the entire fleet around and come to her aid. Eventually he decides to talk with one of Cadence’s hoofmaidens: Twinkle Shine. Considering what she looks like with her white fur and pink mane she might be a construct made by Princess Celestia to keep an eye on her sister. The Alicorn of Harmony sleeps in summer months until the sun rises and since the sunrise is delayed by the minor threat of eternal darkness she is oversleeping.
He shows his cynical side by commenting that the Princess will at least to not sleep for all eternity in the case of eternal darkness. When Shining tells them that he wants to meet the Princess for lunch/breakfast/whatever the two hoofmaidens look like they just hear something very romantic. As he is about to leave the sun rises and it seems more beautiful than ever. Minuette leaves them to talk with the Princess and Cadence is smart enough to immediately realize that someone must be outside when she is called “Your Highness.” The door is definitely not soundproof enough and as the unicorn enters and the Princess calls him Shining the two hoofmaidens outside squeal with joy and begin to sing about their romance.
She just wanted to talk with Corporal Griffen to prepare herself for their visit in the griffin lands. They briefly talk about the meeting with Commander Shepard and what might happened in Equestria. Soon after that both he and Cadence are called into the communications room. He already knows that he will probably not like what he will hear.
In the Communications Room Commander Shepard is talking to Lieutenant Commander Bond. Cadence comes in as well. They have two urgent messages from Canterlot and Liberty City. In the letter from Canterlot Celestia explains that her sister Luna returned and thanks to the help of the six heroes there was nothing to worry about. Eternal darkness was avoided but Cadence is more shocked that Celestia had a sister. Next the Sun Goddess tells them that the story of the Mare in the Moon was true and Cadence and Shining realise that they were wrong and the purple unicorn was right and Mr. Bond thinks that in hindsight it was really obvious what the legend was about. Cadence remembers that she once asked Celestia about her family and she said she had only nieces and nephews “left in this world”.
Then they continue with descriptions of the ponies that saved Luna from herself. Lance-Corporal Apple reacted accordingly to Applejack being one of them and faints but after that he is as proud on her like it can be expected from an Apple. The next four names don’t ring any bells but Bond and Shepard prepare themselves with ear plugs before revealing that Twilight is the Element of Magic. Both react with a very LOUD “What?” and Cadence might have accidently used her Royal Canterlot voice. Celestia saw that coming and apologizes that they had to learn it this way and reminds them that everyone involved is fine. For now the Sun Goddess will have to make up for the lost time with her sister but they will get more detailed information as soon as possible.
At this point Shining Armor isn’t sure if he wants to jump around in joy, is proud on his sister for saving the world, would want to take a look at the faces of all of Twilight’s critics or should simply faint. The next message is actually more worrying because it is about something that can cause them a lot of trouble in the future and not something that is already over. A Hooviet ship on a diplomatic mission landed in Liberty City and they wish to talk to Cadence. The Alicorn wonders why they always talk with such dread about the Hooviets, after all they can hardly be worse than the Mare in the Moon that wanted to drown the entire world in darkness and could have starved everyone to death. Now that Nightmare Moon can’t longer take the role of the bogeyman Bond suggests the “Great Destroyer” a griffon myth that is very likely talking about Discord.
She knows that the Hooviets try to turn any diplomatic discussion to their advantage and constantly attempt to expand their influence over other nations. They even fought a brutal war against the dragons. Various nations will be present and that will be the perfect opportunity for the Hooviets to test them. She suspects a few minor attempts to embarrass her and Shining adds the possibility that they might sneak into her bedroom, take pictures and mail them to the tabloids.
Cadence wonder if they would really be careless enough to risk an diplomatic disaster with a nation that has two gods as their leaders, their pets alone could probably burn the entire capital to the ground or freeze it for all eternity. Going against Equestria seems like total insanity. But the problem is that while the Empire does seem to learn from defeats and disasters, it isn’t able to learn when the best move of a game is not to play. In the end they can only try to not let the situation escalate. Finally they can discuss the security arrangements.
