Between Magic and Science

Nexus gripped the bright pink virtual storage disk in his hands. Like everything that crossed the portal, the bright pink crystal had changed form to fit in the new universe. He approached the door to his lab, accessing the doors systems with his implants. Inside was Rarity, who stood over an array of consoles and screens. She was going to be in charge of directing and guiding all four teams from here.

Nexus had secured a connection between the two worlds, using the strange powers of the draconequus Discord. Discord had opened a portal above the Canterlot castle, and above Tanktown. The plan now was to fly through one of Nightmare’s portals, and deliver the bomb into the Changeling hive that way. The plan was the same, except Rainbow Dash and Twilight had their armour outfitted with jet-packs, the same kind that Trax Dash had. Whirlwind and Burning Star would be in Whirlwind’s jet, carrying the payload, and Bravo team would trail behind in a support helicopter, in case something went wrong.

“Take this, Rarity,” he passed her the VSD, and she put it into a slot on the computer, “It should give you a live radar of the area surrounding Canterlot.”

“How exactly... nevermind. Thank you, Nexus.”

“Is something on your mind, Rarity?

“I’m just not used to working in somewhere so damp and cold...”

“Don’t worry, it’ll all be over soon,” Nexus said, exiting his lab. Powerjack and Fluttershy were playing what appeared to be patty-cake in the living room. It was odd, Powerjack’s armour had made his hands easily twice the size of Fluttershy’s. On the couch, Applejack could be seen asleep, her head lazily hanging over it’s arm. It was their last day before they executed the mission, and they had all trained hard. He hoped that they would be ready enough, three days was a short time frame.

There was a knock at the door. Nexus was expecting Peaceful Pride to come by with news on the armour, but it was someone else. Someone he had not wanted to see for a long time. His voice dripped of those who played roulette with revolvers.

“Hello, Nexus,” the young man said, a devious grin on his face. They were about the same age, but the other had stood a few inches taller than him. He had short cut brown hair, that appeared to be well combed. His sneering eyes were a strange orange, and he wore simple leather duster, and dress pants beneath it. Slung across his back was a sniper rifle.

“Deadshot?” Nexus nearly hissed the name. “What do you want?”

“I believe that you have the right to know that a large force of Raiders are approaching this town.”

Nexus laughed. Deadshot was sly, but he wouldn’t get him to believe something as crazy as Raiders attacking Tanktown.

“Yeah, right. Why should I believe anything you say after that stunt you pulled at the Coliseum? You nearly killed everyone!” Nexus recalled the shooting tournament, and Deadshot’s infuriating arrogance.

“Nexus, you must believe me, I have come to you for help,” Deadshot’s tone changed from silly to serious, and he continued, “I’ve thought about our last meeting, and am sincerely sorry for my... reckless actions.”

“What?” Nexus hadn’t expected Deadshot to apologize to him.

“I may not have shown it then, but I was in over my head. You, my friend, bested me.”

Nexus was silent, realizing that Deadshot was serious. Before this change of heart, he would have shot himself in the head before those words crossed his lips to anyone. This also meant that he needed to change his plans.

“How do you know this?”

“As I was practicing my sharpshooting, I couldn’t help but notice a tank off in the distance, Through my scope I could make out the vehicles, and a few figures. They seem to be resting now, preparing for an order to attack. I don’t know how far off they were, I couldn’t tell from my lookout tower.”

Nexus put a hand to his head.

“Do you still have any connections to the Tanktown mafia?”

“Only a few, who are you looking for?”

“Call up the Wrong Bros.”

“Okay, we got a change of plans, people!” Nexus had gathered his crew in the same room they had been briefed three days ago. He was in a hurry, and spoke loudly so no one missed what he had to say.

“I’m almost done with the armour, it won’t affect that, will it?”

“No, but I’ve gotten a report that said Raiders were gathering on the outskirts of town, and Raingear scans have confirmed the report. That means that Charlie team will be pushing through the Raiders and the changelings. Once the Raider’s line is broken, Raingear will send in their army via aircraft once we’ve secured a location behind enemy lines. Delta team, I got you some extra support.”

“Support?” Killjoy asked. He had made an almost complete recovery, and was ready for action.

“Yes, you remember Deadshot, right?”

“That no good arrogant jerk who almost got us all killed?” Killjoy was infuriated by the name.

“He’s changed his ways, Killoy, he told us about the Raider attack.”

“How do you know that he’s not working with them?” Killjoy shouted back.

“He flat out told me that I had bested him back at the Shooting Tournament, for one.”

“Oh, he did?”

“Yeah.”

“Well then... sorry. Carry on.”

Nexus cleared his throat, “Anyway, he’s managed to get in touch with the Wrong brothers, the pizza makers who worked with the mafia for a short time. They’ve agreed to support Delta team in the defense of Tanktown, sending in what agents they can. As for Alpha and Bravo, plan is the same, you’re going in via air. You’ll have a connection to Rarity, who’ll keep be keeping you updated throughout the mission. Any questions or concerns?”

Nobody spoke up.

“Good. Now, everyone meet at Powerjack’s training facility and we’ll brief you on your equipment. Pride?”

“Yes, everything is ready to go, I suppose...”

Everyone had gathered in the armoury of Powerjack’s facility. Peaceful Pride stood in front of a row of manikins, all wearing the suits of power armour.

“Each of these suits are custom tailored to compliment each and every one of your combat capabilities, save Fluttershy and Powerjack,” Pride looked up at Powerjack, who was standing at the back of the crowd, with Fluttershy hoisted up onto his back. She smiled and waved to him, like she was having a good time.

Waving back, Pride continued his speech. “Each one has a heads-up-display built into the helmet, that will give you information on your vitals, the mission objectives, the location of friendly units, and ammunition reserves. Each one also has a personal energy field, which will nullify incoming damage until it is broken. It takes some time to recharge, so make sure you can get to cover. On top of all this, these suits will increase your endurance and strength, making it easier for you to take action in combat.”

They were silent, waiting for him to continue. “You may now retrieve each of your suits.”

They had all donned their armour, and were now waiting for Pride’s overview. Each one looked almost identical, it’s smooth silver surface fitted to each of their bodies. Upon the chestplate of each was a mark, signifying who it belongs to. Rainbow Dash had recognized them as their cutie marks, and suddenly felt energized as she put hers on. She held her helmet at her side, like all of the others.

“Rainbow Dash,” she heard Pride speak to her, “Your armour, along with Twilight’s is outfitted with a jetpack unit. It will allow you to fly with Whirlwind’s jet. It’s designed to be light, so it’s not as protected as the others. Use that to your advantage, though. Trax Dash is in the same boat. Getting there is your top priority.”

“Got it,” she said.

Pride approached Whirlwind and Burning Star, who would be piloting the jet.

“Your armour is built to withstand heavy impact, in case you need to abandon your jet. Nothing too fancy on it. Vinyl Scratch, upon your request, I put...” he trailed off as he turned to face the DJ, who was grinning expectantly, “... a sound system into your armour. There’s a selection of songs I thought you might like that you can choose from via your HUD, which will play through your helmet.”

“Alright!” She jumped into the air, and noticed she could propel herself higher than usual.

“There’s also,” Pride sighed, he couldn’t believe he had actually met her requests, “A sub woofer and stereo, if you wish to play it externally.”

“Thanks!”

“Killjoy, your armour has a built in force field projector. You put up a large force field, similar to the ones Nexus can put up with kinetics, but it’ll drain your shields while you’re using it.”

Killjoy nodded.

“Applejack, your armour has 50 yards of steel cable and a tow hook that you can fire out of it, as requested.”

“Buttercrust, your armour has extra supply reserves in it. Nova, your armour has a sentry uplink that lets you take control of it as needed. Pinkie, you’re armour is built like Whirlwind’s, impact resistant, since we’ll be in the helicopter.”

Cee Flat had approached him. “What about me and Record Wrex?”

“I built both of yours to have digital display interfaces, they’ll let you bypass electronic lock systems.”

“Alright, cool. So, how do I use it?”

“It should be as simple as activating it in your HUD and touching the panel.”

“Activating it?” Cee was puzzled.

“You’ll know what I mean when the systems are brought online.”

Cee Flat rolled his eyes as Pride approached Nexus.

“Your armour was the most difficult for me to do. It has an energy transmission field that should use the excess energy from the Elements of Heroism to power up your suit, but hopefully it won’t come to that.”

“Hopefully not,” he agreed. That was everyone, they all put their helmets on as Pride gave the word.

Rainbow Dash saw nothing for a moment at the helmet slid over her head, then she could see the world around her, the running of the of the others to retrieve weapons from the racks on the walls. The moment she touched one, an icon of the gun appeared in the top right corner of her HUD, displaying the number of bullets in the current magazine, and the number of magazines she had in her suit storage.

“Rarity, open up com relays,” Pride said, and she suddenly heard Rarity’s voice.

“It’s good to see you’re all ready to get this done,” she heard her friend say, “I’ll be keeping an eye on all of your progress via the the devices in your helmets that allow me to see through your eyes. I’ll activate the rest of your HUD systems now.”

Suddenly, a bar appeared in her HUD, stretching across the top. An icon next to it indicated it was her shields, and she saw the blue energy field begin to charge around her. There was an icon of a human body, with all body parts showing up in green.

“Okay people, lock and load. Grab your gear, and meet your respective teams,” she heard Nexus say over the radio. Rainbow made her way out to the small runway behind the facility, where Burning Star was securing the bomb to the bottom of the jet. Above her head was an arrow, one that displayed her vitals, as well as the name STAR. She looked up at her.

“Ready to go, Rainbow?” She asked, and Rainbow looked up into the night sky. The portal had been blocked by some clouds, but they’d be going in a different way anyway. She secured her weapon, an assault rifle, to her back, where the magnetic locks held it in place. Below that, two wings had shot out of the jetpack unit, indicating she was ready to fly. Trax Dash and Twilight had stepped into her field of view, with the names TRAX and TWI over their heads.

“Ready as I’ll ever be.”

The helicopter took a while to start up, so he took the time to tell Pinkie Pie how to operate the main weapons. There were two seats in the cockpit, although there was room for an eight-man squad in the back.

“The stick in front of you controls the aim of the weapons. The main gun is pretty powerful, so you don’t have to shoot very much to take your target down.”

Pinkie sat on a seat behind Pride, that was also above raised above him. Through her helmet she looked over the controls she had. Looked simple enough. This fired this, that fired that, this raised altitude, this lowered it, it all became clear to her.

“Okay!” Her cheerful tone was replaced with one of extreme seriousness. “Let’s do this!”

On the other side of the complex, Killjoy was preparing his vehicle to defend the town. Nova Burst, Applejack, and Buttercrust would commandeer the tank with him, and when the battle started Nova Burst would secure an area with his sentry. Applejack sat nervously on the ground as Killjoy looked over his preparation list one last time.

“We’re ready,” he said.

“Let’s get this over with,” she said. As great as all of this was, she had to remember to not get too excited. It was time for fighting.

She could see Nexus in a truck, driving off with his team. He heard his voice in her helmet.

“Killjoy, we’re heading out. I’ll see you on the other side, man,” he said.

“Yeah, I’ll off in a minute,” Killjoy replied, turning to Applejack.

“Hop in.”

“You ready Fluttershy?” Nexus’s voice had awoken her from her sleep on Powerjack’s back. She had her arms wrapped around his helmet.

“Yeah, I guess so.”

“Let’s get it kickin’!: Vinyl cheered, and Record Wrex pumped his fist in the air.

“Just like you, Vinyl,” Cee said, watching from the passenger seat, “What’s the time, Nexus?”

“I got 11:50. We’re just leaving Tanktown now,” Nexus put hand to his helmet, speaking into the radio. “Whirlwind, what’s your status?”

“We’re ready to take off, waiting for Rarity’s signal.” Whirlwind looked back at Burning Star to say, “Please excuse me if I’m flying a bit crooked, I may have had the smallest sip of ale tonight and-”

“I don’t want to hear it,” she said.

On the runway, Twilight Sparkle looked over at Rainbow Dash.

“I’ve noticed that you’ve been kinda tense with Trax Dash lately,” the princess said.

“Yeah, he’s kind of a jerk,” Rainbow replied.

“This may be the last chance you have to talk with him, you know.”

There was something Rainbow had wanted to tell him. “I kinda wanted to-”

“You know,” Trax Dash’s voice came over the squad’s radio, “You really shouldn’t say too much on an open channel.”

She heard him laughing, as well as Whirlwind and Burning Star.

“Forget it.”