Never do a mission at night...
Ponyville was suffering. It was ravaged by alien terror group for mere hour , but they already had done a significant damage to the town. Most of the population was massacred, those few ponies who was still alive tried to hide or sneak out of this sloughterground with little to no succes. It appeared that unknown extraequestrial assailants took a lot of sadistic pleasure in hunting down remaining civilians. Or rather playing with them like overfed cats play with small animals they had cought just for the sake of tormenting and killing.
Sweetie Belle, cold with terror, hid in a trash bin, quiet as quiet can be. Through a little gap between the bin and its cover she could see an odd and terrifying creature standing in just a few meters away. It was a big, bipedal bug-like behemoth with large threatening-looking claws. Moon and stars reflected in its black shiny chitinous shell. This "thing" just stood there, as if in deep thought or just taking a quick rest from its bloody job, cutting off any way for Sweetie Belle to retreat. Something had cought its attention for a moment. Creature slightly turned its body, taking a look at what has disturbed its senses. Some earth pony twenty meters away was trying to sneak past while hiding in shadows. With a loud hiss, the "bug" had covered the distance between itself and its prey in five large leaps, stabbing the unexpecting pony in the side with a claw, nailing the screaming victim to the ground. Then, it extended an ovipositor from its body and stabbed the still alive pony with it, proceeding to lay some eggs. Fueled with such a horrid display, panic finally overtook Sweetie Belle's mind and she bolted away from her cover and run in no particular direction, heart pumping so hard it could be heard over her hoovesteps. Driven by profound horror, she tried to get as far from the chitinous monster as possible. She turned into a narrow alley and looked around, desperately trying to find a new hiding place.
"Hhhhhjjingh!!!" an abrupt sound came from not so afar.
After a delay so microscopicaly small that no living beign could spot it without the special equipment, a plasma bolt collided with Sweetie Belle's rear, completely tearing it off. The filly collapsed on the ground passing away from the pain, shock and terrible, terrible damage that had been done to her body. The last thing this sweet and kind little pony had seen in her life was some quickly moving lights in the night sky...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"We're almost there, prepare for deployment!", pilot had announced.
In the cabin of this transport craft six ponies and one dragon prepared themselves for a dangerous mission. They were Equestrian main defence from an alien threat. The only one at the moment, to be precise. Aliens invaded Equestria fourth months ago, with absolutely devastating effect. Almost half of the cities was burned down and pillaged, their population either killed, or abducted for purpose unknown. And nobody knew what horrible fate had beffalen upon other factions. In desperate attempt to fight aliens back, princess Celestia created Y-PON - a special organisation devoted to actively countering alien threat, while royal guard took a job of maintaning order in cities and organising refugee camps. The Element Bearers - and Spike - who had saved Equestria on several occasions before were formed into elite squad equipped with the best gear Equestria could provide. That includes cutting-edge magitech weapons - a semi-succesful attempt to imitate foe's superior armament.
"Okay girls, we'll do everithing by the book! *squee!*", Twilight said nervously,
"Rarity, Rainbow, Spike - you will proceed down the main street, kill everything that is not a pony - or Spike - and moves. If you find any civilians - escort them to skyranger for extraction. Rainbow will take the lead.
Me, Pinkie and AJ will go in the opposite direction, objective remains the same.
Fluttershy and the golem will stay and protect the scyranger."
Simultanious confirmations followed, almost making captain Twilight stunned.
"Okey-dokey-lokey!"
"As you wish, sugarcube!"
"Count on us, darling!"
"Hell yeah! We'll clean this place in one hour flat!"
"Sure thing, Twi,"
"Ehmm... okey... t-that's f-fine, i guess..."
The "Skyranger" extended its landing gear, landing vertically near the townhall at the main square of Ponyville. Jet engines stopped, a ramp lowered, opening ships rear and allowing the operatives to deploy.
First one to walk down the ramp was the copper golem, equipped with high-power crystal-shard migicannon. The mighty construct scanned surrounding with its powerful magical sight and with no enemies found said - or rather "emmited" - in a low droning voice:
"All clear,"
Apllejack hopped off the ramp and took cover behind a landing gear. She looked around and began tossing magical flares in all directions. Aliens and golem was able to see in partial darkness as if it was day, which cannot be said about ponies.
Rainbow Dash did the same, as rest of the group exited the craft and spread around the place, taking cover here and there, never going too far away from each other and scanning environment for threat. After this standart maneuver they split up and proceeded according to plan.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Rainbow Dash lead her group with caution. They slowly made their way down the street, dashing from cover to cover. Rarity constantly consulted with motion detector. This time it was indicating a small, cautios movement behind the next corner. Judging by the size of detected distortion there was a couple of small enemies or a single big one.
"Hey, darling," she whispered to Rainbow Dash, "it appears that there is one or two foes behind that corner," Rarity pointed at the motion detector's display.
"I'll check it," with that, Rainbow gently and silently took flight and landed on the roof of the buildnig behind which sensor indicated foes.
Slowly, she crept to the edge of the roof and took a peek down.
There indeed were present two grey creatures with large heads - so called "sectoids". One of them was peeking of the corner slightly, other was watching in the opposite direction. If Rainbow had decided to walk around the house, the second one would spot her and begin a firefight. But in her current position she had a tactical advantage. She took out a magical grenade and primed it to explode on impact. Then she extended her hoof over the ledge and let the grenade go...
*Clank-BOOM!*
The violent explosion of magical energy generated by the grenade's enchantment tore the fragile sectoid bodies into pieces, scattering them around the place.
"Double kill!" Rainbow said in low voice an giggled.
A bolt of green plasma flew past, missing Rainbow Dash for just a half meter and scarying the living gut out of her. She darted quickly to the side of the building opposite to the direction fire was coming from, and hid behind the roof.
"Rarity!" she whispered heavily into magi-tolkie, eyes wide from surprise, "where did that came from?!"
"I dont know, its out of detector's range and house is blocking the view!"
Two plasma bolts pierced the roof again nearly demolishing it. Whoever it was, he decided to take his chances in hitting the enemy who had overestimated durability of her cover.
Rainbow jumped of the roof and landed behid the building, plasma bolts continued to demolish the house from top to bottom. She quickly ran to Rarity who took cover behind the other house.
Meanwhile, spike crawled around the building and spotted the Rainbow's attacker at the street adjacent to the main one.
It was something they had never encountered before - a large biconvex hovering metal plasma-shooting pancake of death, two meters in diameter. Disk ceased fire and moved to the main street.
"A disc-shaped thingy is moving in your direction, Rainbow! Lets catch it into the crossfire!"
"Sounds good!"
Spike laid down and waited until the cyberdisk be closer. At the point when it reached the corner of a house Spike was hiding behind, he opened fire. First Spike's shot hit the target, damaging the anti-grav system and causing the disc to wiggle. Disc shot back in the vague direction of Spike and managed to hit nothing. Rainbow Dash leaned from her corner and shovered the damaged machine with the flurry of high-speed magic crystals from her magirifle. She managed to do some damage before disc switched its attention to her and, despite the wobble, landed a surprisingly precise shot right in the head. Next shot from Spike disabled the disk and it plopped down dead.
"Ha! Not so tough!" Spike boasted. "Hey, Rainbow? Rainbow?!" he said into magi-tokie, but no responce folloved.
"Spike... come here...", Rarity's voice came instead. It was quiet and shaking, as if she was about to cry.
"What happened?!" the dragon yelled as he run around the building. And then his worried sight stumbled upon the dead body of Rainbow Dash. Rarity was sitting alongside of it, crying silently, oblivious to danger of exposing herself so much. His eyes grew wide with shock. No amount of psychological training could prepare him or Rarity for such a loss. The Element Of Loyalty, savior of Equestria, one of the best flyers that ever lived and just a faithfull and loyal friend had died... just like that... There was no epic battle with evil overlord or anything epic enough to be worthy of her. She was just shot in the head by an agonising alien machine and died without even realising it.
A loud hiss emitted from the wreck of the metal disk. The two remaining operatives simultaniously turned their heads in the direction of sound and raised their weapons quickly, ready to put the blasted thing down once more time, if it was so foolish to come back to life.
But it had no ability to do so. Quite on the contrary. However, the machine had one last loud word to say before it passed into unexistance.
"BOOM!!!"
A powerfull blast erupted from the metal corpse, demolishing nearby surroundings and shattering windows in those houses that was too far away to be destroyed. The shokwave put Spike and Rarity in the air, tearing off their armor, clothes, and skin and propelled them away, generously spraying blood and gibs in a narrow conical pattern. Another two heroes of Equestria had died in horrible and unepic manner...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"...BOOM!"
"What was that?!" Twilight gasped as the sound of a distant explosion reached her ears.
"I guess that's sound of our friends kicking some alien flanks!" Pinkie exclaimed happily, "We should too!"
"I just hope it is not the other way around..."
"Hay, girl, there is no need to worry about 'em! They are good fighters and they have Spike with them - that stands up for somethin'! Especially with that alien thingamabob that Spike had yoinked from the aliens..." Applejack put a comforting hoof on Twilight's shoulder.
Twilight just wanted but was interrupted by the Pinkie's gasp
"Aliens! In that house! I see them on my motion scanner!" she pointed in the direction of a big two-storied house.
"Okay, let us..." Twilight just began explaining her plan but Pinkie bolted away to the building.
"Pinkie, what are you doing?!" she shouted.
"WAIT, YOU SILLY MOTHERBUCKER!!!" Applejack yelled as she rushed towards Pinkie.
"Girls! What are you... AAAHH!!!" Twilight felt as if something hard and heavy had collided with her very mind. Something from the outside was whacking her mind trying to destroy it. It did so with determination and persistance, very hard to resist. Twilight fell on the ground grabbing her temples as she mobilized all her inner reserves to fight the intrusion off...
"I KNOW YOU ARE IN THERE!!!" Pinkie Pie shouted and kicked the door in. It flew right into an unexpecting sectoid and smashed his thin skull in, scarying the living gut out of others two that were present in the room. Grey ones did not see that coming... This was a tactical advantage which any other fighter would make a great use of, but Pinkie Pie was above all those fancy things about cover and flanking maneuvers. She raised her rapid-firing crystalline magicannon, or "party-cannon" as she nick-named it, and unleashed the hailstorm of magical crystall shards on the room, completely obliterating the furniture and doors, chipping away big chunks from the walls and ocasionally hitting the enemies.
"T-t-t-this m-m-m-m-makes m-m-m-y v-v-v-oice s-s-sound sil-l-l-l-ly..." she stuttered as her body was shaken by the gun's recoil. She continued to fire for another five second before finally stopping. Pinkie took a look around the room, admiring her work.
"Ha! You are dealt with! PINKIE PIE STYLE!" she gloated.
Room looked terrible. Floor was covered in thick layer of splinted wood, torn clothes, shattered glass and broken houseware as well as remaings of the sectoids. A thick fog of dust and alien blood was filling the space between the ceiling and thick layer of rubble on the floor. Moonlight flown through the broken windows and occassional holes made by Pinkie's rapid-fire redecoration. Accompanied by the vague sparkling of the magical tracers from party-cannon's projectiles it was giving a strange surrealistic look to the interior.
"WHAT IN THE ROTTING HAY WAS YOU THINKING ABOUT!!!" Apllejack shouted after emerging from her cover,
"We all could be dead now because of you!"
"Nope, i perfectly knew what i was doing! The dakka-party-stomping never fails!"
"Party-what?!" Pinkie Pie got Applejack confused with the same ease though less devastating effect than she did with aliens
"Dakka-party-stomp! It's when you all like "THUMP!!!" and dakka-dakka-dakka with a party-cannon! But make sure you have brought a lot of dakka with you - you can never have enough of those!" She said and pointed on the long hexagonal crystals strapped to her vaist. Those thing served as ammo clips for the party-cannon and basically all Y-PON weapons.
"I just... Let's go back to Twi', okay?" Applejack gave up.
"HI, GIRLS!!!"
Suddenly, a said unicorn appeared and took them both into tight embrace. She wore a mask of complete insanity on her face, her mane was disheveled and dirty and her voice sounded unusually high-pitched.
"Twilight, what in the hay..." She stummered as she noticed two magi-grenades Twilight was holding in her hooves. Primed.
A sudden flash of violet and a roaring maelstrom of unleashed magick had atomized another three Elements Of Harmony.
On the second floor a thin and tall alien figure covered in brown robe giggled in glee...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Fluttershy guarded the skyranger. Her friends had left and she was all alone with that creepy construct and the pilot.
"Um... Hello?" she said to the pilot through the magi-tolkie. Her profound fear of staing alone in this place had overcame her shyness and forced her to seek comfort in conversation with somepony, even if it means starting it herself.
"What is it, agent?" pilot replied.
"Um, n-nothing... I-i just wanted to chat... if that is okay, uhm..." she stuttered.
"Keep your eyes open and mouth shut, agent! Your idle chatter and absent-mindedness can cost us our lives!" Pilot sounded very annoyed.
"Eeek! okay..." She squeaked and hid deeper inside of the skyranger's cabin, peeking outside from time to time. Golem stood outside, his head rotated skanning for any movement.
"Agent?" she heard after a minute or two.
"Y-e-es?"
"I am sorry for what i have said. We are all on the edge here. A little chat will help us to keep our wits and will do no harm, i guess. Especially with that copper ultravision-thingy outside, kepping an eye on everything..." pilot said with a little guilt in his voice.
"O-o-oh, thank you! I'm so scared right now i could dig myself a deep hole in the ground and hide there like a rabbit..."
"Well, there is no need to bury yourself yet!" The pilot chuckled,
"What is your name, agent?"
"Fluttershy..." she whispered.
"Didnt quite catch that..."
"It is Fluttershy" she said even more quietly.
"By Celestia's flaming ass, that was hard to hear even with the volume turned up to eleven!" pilot laughed.
"Well, it is nice to meet you, Fluttershy. My name is Jet. Blazing Jet." He said softly. Then he was silent for couple of seconds, gathering his courage. He had already seen this girl before, and this timid, but quite pretty pegasus occupied his thoughts since then.
"Look, what do you think if we hang out later? It will be really nice to know you and..."
"ENEMY SPOTTED!" the golem rung, disrupting Jet's attempt to invite his crush to a date. He - the golem, not Jet - turned his torso in the direction of the foe, aiming his deadly weapon.
"SHHHHHTTRIUMMM", he fired into the darkness. Large crystallyne projectile collided with the ground near two sectoids that was trying to hide behind a bush. A bright flash of light made them visible for everyone for a moment as crystall shell broke apart into million of tiny but razor-sharp and very hard pieces. The magic contained in the crystall evoked a powerfull telekinetic storm that cought the shards and swirl them around at crazy speed, cutting and piercing everything within radius of effect. After raging for a couple of second it began to calm down, sectoids reduced to pulp.
Meanwhile, golem took a major hit in his side that turned him around. The costruct managed to keep balance and landed two shots right into attackers, while most of the enemy fire did glancing hits on him, if any.
Fluttershy shook with fear.
"They came for us, we all gonna die!!!" she cryed, "nononononononononono!!!" she panicked and run away from the battle into the darkness of town.
"Fluttershy, NO!!!" she heard Jet's voice in her ear.
"Rotting hay!!!" Jet slammed the side of the cocpit with his hoof. Fluttershy was as good as dead right now. He turned on the engines, ready to take off, not wanting to wait untill aliens will overrun the golem and procced to kill him.
Suddenly, the craft shook and the moaning of twisted and torn metal was heard. Pilot looked at the control panel - one of the engines was offline, sensors reporting fire. One of the buggers shot the thing rigth into the air intake! He still could take off on three engines though, he will not get as far away from the place, as he ould otherwise, but anything would be better than staying here. When engines developed enough thrust, Jet pulled the hadle and skyranger took flight, leaving the semidestroyed golem behind.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Fluttershy run. Driven by profound horror, she tried to get as far from the battle as possible. She turned into a narrow alley and looked around, desperately trying to find a hiding place.
"Ah!!!" She tripped over something. Something big and soft. She turned her head around and froze in terror. On the dirty, covered with blood and fecal matter road lied a half of a filly. Her rear was completely torn off. There was something familiar about this poor thing. A coat of pure white, although dirty. A horn and mane of pink and purple... That's looks an awful like...
"S-s-s-weetie B-b-belle???" Fluttershy stuttered, her eyes grew so wide it hurt. Her heart virtually stopped.
"Hhhhhjjingh!!!" an abrupt sound came from not so afar...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Dear princess Celestia!
Civilians lost.....................129 -2580.
Y-PON operatives lost.....7 -140.
Aliens killed......................6 +120.
Overall rating...................-2600:Terrible!
Celestia held a scroll before her eyes, silent. Her right eye twitched slightly and she was breathing heavily. An increasing noise of jet engines coming from the outside drew her attention. She turned her head to the window. A damaged skyranger with one engine utterly destroyed was trying to land on one of the Canterlot's landing pads.
She looked on the battle report again...
"FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU!!!!!!"
