Chapter Nine

“Told ya so.” a voice said in the darkness of Canterlot’s deepest dungeon cell.

“Shut up.” another responded, matching the first bored voice.

“Told ya so.” the first voice said again, as it had for the last few hours.

“Shut up.” the second voice responded as it had since the first voice started.

In between the two voices, who were on opposite sides of the small cell, was a third figure. He too was sitting against the dark stone that made up the wall of their cell, opposite of the iron door entrance. Each of the three had nothing but pieces of tan cloth to protect them from the damp, cold cell. Outside the iron door where at the least five stories worth of stairs leading back up to the castle dungeons. The corridors split off to the left and right creating a ‘U’ shape with the stairway down to the creatures in the bottom most part.

A top these stairs where two royal guards, one Day Guard earth pony and one Night Guard pegasus, “Hey Bright, you know the story of those things?”

“Dusk, you know we’re not supposed to talk when on duty.” the Day Guard replied.

“Oh come on, think of it as sharing information about the enemy so I could better combat them.”

Bright chuckled at his friends excuse, “Fine, fine, these things are the ones that caused the throne room to collapse. Rumor has it that they even met with the Princesses in the Everfree and ended up breaking Celestia's horn.”

“Shut up, you gotta be pulling my leg.” Dusk finished with a dismissive wave of his hoof.

Bright had a smug grin on his face, “Nope, heard it from a friend of mine who works as Celestia's head maid. She walked in on Luna repairing the damages from the brief fight they had.”

“They didn’t look like much when they were brought in.”

“That’s the thing, after a magic analysis, the doctors concluded that they couldn’t of done most of the things that have been claimed without getting hurt somehow.”

“So, how did they do them?” Dusk said sitting down.

Bright did the same, “Celestia brought in a couple of tech professors from Canterlot University-”

“That’s why there were Deerlings walking around with high security clearance.”

“Yep, and get this, apparently their armor was the secret. I only heard muffles from the room I was guarding, but it’s some high tech stuff.”

"How did they catch them?" Dusk asked.

"Ambushed them and slammed them in between two pieces of marble. If the Princesses hadn't reacted so quick they would of escaped too."

"Escaped? From between two pieces of solid marble? How were they not dead?"

"Magic marble, it instantly formed a mold around them and solidified, but get this if they had been any slower in getting their armor off they would of broken out of the stuff. Seriously that armor made them almost invincible, but we got magic."

“You think we’re ever going to get some armor like that?” Dusk asked thinking of being inside a suit of invincible armor.

“Nope.” Bright said casually, derailing the line of thought that Dusk had been on.

“Huh, why?”

“Cause the brainiacs only got their helmets to work with. To examine the rest of the armor they need to have those things put it back on. I was escorting Twilight and one of the professors and they wouldn’t shut up about ways to get the armor to decompressed without having to put it on those things.”

“Couldn’t they just put them to sleep?” Dusk asked, ears on alert for any sound. Didn’t want a superior to walk around the corner and see two guards sitting down and having a chat.

“I thought the same thing, but those things need to be able to think. That’s the way the armor compression spell works, it needs to be on the original owner... I think.” Bright finished, scratching the back of his neck with his left forehoof.

“Aw don’t hurt yourself with all that thinking now. I say we just leave the magical stuff to the Unicorns and just stick to guarding doors and escorting uptight nobles.”

“Like Blueblood?”

A small shiver went through Dusk at the name, “Oh I don’t envy the Day Guards that have to escort him everywhere.”

“Could you believe he took control of the court yesterday?”

“What? How did he do that?”

“He stated that since both Princess Celestia and Princess Luna were the ones attacked that it wouldn’t be a fair trial for the creatures. He recited some old law and boom.” Bright brought his hoof down on the ground for emphasis, “He’s head of the court for the case.”

“Fair? Didn’t he immediately sentence them to death?”

“Yep, I’ve never heard a louder group gasp than when he said those words. I think Celestia had plans for those things, but she certainly wasn’t thinking of a death sentence.”

Dusk let out a small whistle, “So what happened next?”

“That was the end of it. Celestia’s advisors, that usually had a say in the big cases, were in an outrage, but nopony had noticed that there wasn’t a law that said they had to have a say.”

“I never pictured blueblood as... smart enough to do that.”

Bright let out another small chuckle, “Same here, but nopony could stop him and their execution is scheduled three days from now.”

“What’s today again?”

“September thirteenth, almost the fourteenth.”

“Wow.” Dusk nodded his head, “Sucks to be them. I’m surprised they’re not taking this worse.”

“They have been pretty quiet, even the one that kept saying ‘I told you so’, but they are practically aliens so maybe they just don’t talk that much.”

“If I was them I’d be trying to make the guards as angry as possible so they would come in and I could knock them out. Or try and trick them into thinking I was sick and was about to die, anything to get them into the cell I was in.”

“Yeah, maybe they’re too stupid, or maybe they’ve accepted their fate and are praying to the creators.” Bright's left ear twitched violently, “Sompony’s coming this way.” the two snapped to attention as a few shadows were displayed on the wall down the hall.

Slowly the shadows shrunk as the three owners got farther away from the torchlight and turned the corner. The mares didn’t see it as the guards had years of training hiding it, but out of the corners of their eyes Dusk and Bright where studying and watching the three mares as they approached. They were easily recognized of course, not many ponies that work in the castle wouldn’t recognize three of the six elements of harmony.

The echo from their hooves got louder as the three approached from the long corridor to the left of the two guards. Bright, being the closest to them, saw the three were the Elements of Generosity, Magic, and Loyalty, in that order. Their actual names being Rarity, Twilight Sparkle, and Rainbow Dash, respectively. Twilight had a simple pair of saddlebags sporting her colors and her cutie mark and Rarity had silver scarf around her neck that had a small version of her cutie mark stitched into the end corner on her right shoulder. The only thing that Rainbow Dash wore was a smug grin.

The group stopped in front of the two guards and Twilight was the first to talk, “I’ve been given permission by Princes Celestia and Princes Luna to ask the creatures a few questions regarding their reasons for being here and-”

“Twilight, I don’t need one of your lectures, I just need to see your papers.” Bright said holding his hoof out expectantly. Dusk to his side let out a choked chuckle as Rainbow’s smug grin turned into a look of confusion.

“Wha- Oh of course.” Twilight lifted the flap on her one of her saddlebags and out floated two pieces of paper, one with Celestia’s sun seal and one with Luna’s moon seal.

“Wait a second, I thought you guys never moved? What gives?” Rainbow asked as the guards took the papers.

“That’s just the mares.” Dusk said before chuckling at his own joke while looking at the paper. Rainbow stifled a laugh at his joke while Rarity looked disgusted and Twilight just looked confused.

Bright let out a sigh beside him as examined the paper, “You realize you just made a sexist joke in front of three national heroes right?”

Dusk shrugged while looking closely at the moon seal, “... It’s good.” he finally said giving the paper back to Twilight.

“You’re all clear Miss. Sparkle, proceed with caution.” Bright gave back the paper and stood at attention once more.

The three of them moved passed the guards, Rarity looking oddly at Dusk before following the others down the stairs. After a few moments Rainbow broke the silence, “So, what’s the plan if they don’t talk?”

“What do mean?” Twilight asked.

“Well, are me and Rarity gonna do like a whole good cop bad cop thing while you take notes or are-”

“Rainbow, we’re just here to ask them some questions, if they don’t answer it’s entirely up to them.” Twilight interrupted.

“Okay, that makes this a whole lot more boring.”

“Think about it this way Rainbow Dash, you can tell all those little colts and fillies in your fan club that you got to talk to real aliens.” Rarity said as they neared the door.

“That’s an awesome idea!” Rainbow practically shouted just as they arrived at the door.

“Shut up!” A voiced yelled from the other side of the door, “Some of us are trying to sleep while you ponies plan our public murder.”

The three flinched at the sudden yell from behind the door. Rainbow was the first to recover and hovered in front of the metal bars that were at the top of the door, but before she could say anything Twilight pulled her back down.

“Sorry, about my friend, she was just excited about something.” Twilight started pulling out a pencil and a small stack of paper, “My name’s Twilight Sparkle and I’d like to ask you a few questions, if you don’t mind.”

There was no response for a little bit before a different voice came out, “Why?”

Before Twilight could respond Rarity spoke up, “I’m sorry, but would it be too much for us to ask for your names before we begin. My name is Rarity.”

“And my names-” Rainbow started before the first voice cut her off.

“Rainbow Dash.”

“Hey, how do you know that? Have you been spying on us?” Rainbow had her face right against the bars, “Is that why you came here, because you thought we would be an easily conquered planet?”

“Are you suggesting that just because we’re of a different race that we came here with nothing but bad intentions. Ha, fucking racist.” the first voice said, stopping her from continuing.

“What!? Well you’re-”

“Miss. Dash, we heard your friend say your name on the way down. Now could please be quiet, you’re giving me a headache.” A third voice interrupted her, “Now, my name is Alfred Diamond. Unless my CO says all I can tell you is my name and rank”

Twilight began writing while the second voice began talking, “You can tell them your name, rank, and anything you deem absolutely necessary. I’d rather not have the UNSC brand us as traitors on the off chance they find this place.”

“Okay, so what’s your name and does UNSC stand for something?” Twilight asked writing down everything she possibly could.

“Leonardo Blake, call me Leon, and the second one isn’t that important.”

“And my names Joshua Anderson, but I go by Josh. I’m going back to sleep now, got to get plenty of rest if you racists are going to have us murdered in a few days.” there was some shuffling on the other side of the door as Josh got more comfortable.

“Did turning over make that floor any more comfortable Josh?” Leon asked with a bit of sarcasm in his voice.

“Tons, I’m not facing either of you idiots.”

Unseen by the ponies, Leon shook his head in defeat before addressing them, “You, never did answer my question Miss Sparkle.”

“Oh, please call me Twi-”

“Miss. Sparkle, please answer my question or none of us will answer any of your questions.” Leon interrupted.

“O-okay, since you weren’t given a fair trial I was sent down here by both Princess Celestia and Princess Luna to get your side of the story. They’re currently looking for any loop hole in the laws by which to take control of the case from Prince Blueblood, or at least get you off of a death sentence.” Twilight answered, her voice becoming louder and more confident as she talked of the Princesses and afterwards.

There was silence for a long time before Leon spoke, “Alright Miss. Sparkle, we’ll tell you our side of the story, but in return we get to ask a question for every question you got an answer.”

“That sounds like a fair trade, but on one condition.” Rainbow and Rarity exchanged a confused glance before Twilight continued, “Please stop calling me Miss. Sparkle.”

There was a small pause before Leon answered, “Fair deal, why don’t you start Miss. Twilight.” Rarity held her hoof to her mouth to keep from giggling out loud, Rainbow didn’t even try to hide her chuckling as Twilight face-hoofed.

“Ha, I see what you did there.” Rainbow said as Twilight flashed her a glare.

“Ha, I see what you did there.” Josh said at the same time as Rainbow Dash.

“Hey, you some kind of mind reader now?”

“Girl, you’ve been reading way too many damn comic books.”

“And what’s that supposed to mean!?” Rainbow Dash yelled getting right next to the bars at the top of the door.

As Rainbow and Josh yelled at one another Rarity stepped next to Twilight and whispered, “Maybe we should of waited till morning, Rainbow would of been too tired to argue then.”

Giggling Twilight replied, “To bad the others had to go back to Ponyville and missed Rainbow arguing with an alien.”

“You are without a doubt thee most annoying hijo de perra I’ve ever encountered!” Josh yelled, “I’m done talking, good night!”

“I’m done too and not just cause you’re done!” Rainbow sat down with her back to the door.

A few seconds of silence passed before Leon spoke up, “Alright, now that that's out of the way, why don’t you start Twilight.”

Smiling that Leon used only her name, Twilight pulled out a few more papers, “First of all, can you tell me how you arrived in the throne room?”

****Location Unknown****

9/13/Morning

“Gah! Why won’t you open!” Gilda yelled as she slammed a stick into the glass-like pod on the front of the crashed vehicle.

“Gilda... they’re going to... be here soon.” The grey gryphon wheezed out as Gilda tried again to open the metal behemoth, this time from the back, “You need to... get to Queen Eve... and tell her what happened.”

“Dad I’m not leaving you, so just shut up already!” Gilda yelled smacking the stick against the pod once more. The stick snapped in two and she tossed it into the water with an angry growl before using her own talons to try and break the pod open. As Gilda continued her assault the noises from her shouting and scraping made the occupant inside the rear of the ship start to stir.

Meanwhile, King Ashford Talon of the Silver Claw Clan tried his best to keep not to bleed out, a task easier said than done. As he laid there against some moss by large tree he kept expecting to sense the finality of his existence, to, despite his best efforts, experience death's cold embrace as he could no longer hold it off. After another minute of Gilda trying her best to open the pod the King did start to sense something, but it was not the finality he was expecting. With a low whoosh sound, barely audible to his ears, a sense of dread began to flow through him, along with a rush of adrenalin, for their pursuers had found them.

King Ashford looked through the open canopy, scanning the skies, and saw three figures in armor dive bombing towards their position. Knowing they’d been spotted he shouted, “Gilda!” whatever else he was going to say was cut off as he began violently coughing.

Time slowed down as Gilda turned from her spot just in time to see their attackers diving in from the east. Their fur and feathers were all black as the armor enchantments made it so. The armor they wore was a deep purple, with an amber trim, and the leader had a white star in the center of his chest plate. With the sun behind them, Gilda was blinded for a second before the first of the attackers slammed into her and pinned her to the cold, muddy ground. Thankfully they hadn’t landed in the water that surrounded the ship.

The King, despite his wounds, retrieved his sword from his right, uninjured side and was about to charge his daughter’s attacker when he felt cold steel pressed against his throat, a fourth attacker had snuck up behind him, “Ah, ah, ah, I wouldn’t do that if I were you. Now toss it away.”

With his daughter pinned to the ground and a dagger at his throat, the King let out a sigh and threw his sword into the water near the ship, “Good, now then...” the dagger was removed from it’s spot on his neck and the hilt impacted the back of his skull before he could do anything.

Gilda watched with her head shoved in the dirt and a dagger laying on the back of her neck as her father fell to the ground unconscious. She hadn’t seen the blow herself, but feared the worst. She screamed out at her attackers and tried to shake the gryphon off her back, but there was sharp pain at the back of her skull and her efforts of escape stopped almost instantly.

Her eyes became unfocused and her body began to relax as if under some kind of spell. Gilda could no longer scream out at her attackers or resist in any kind of way, but she could still make sense of what they were saying.

The gryphon on her back eased his way off of her before speaking to another she couldn’t see, “About time you put the bitch under, I thought I was going to have to knock her out.”

“Ah, she had a very well guarded mind for a non-magic user, but the paralysis spell did the trick and it seems Swift has taken care of the King.” a second voice replied as she was drug over to her father. They said nothing as she was dragged through the mud and put beside her unconscious father. Gilda’s eyes began to get blurry as she looked at her father. She knew what they were going to do, it was the end for both of them.

“Now, how the hell are we going to get them back to the castle?” a third voice asked, once again outside of her vision.

“Well, we only have to lug back this fine bitch.” Gilda felt the first voices talons gently pat her flank, “So we could kill and leave the False King, but I think King Black wanted to mount his head on a pike back at the castle.”

“We could cut off his head now and bring it back to King Black as a gift.” the third voice said before asking, “Do you think he would let us have some fun with the Princess?”

“From the rumors going around the castle, that’s not an exclusive group so I don’t see why not.” the first voice said, making the tears come from Gilda’s eyes multiply, “Why don’t we move away from the Deerling thing and indulge ourselves for this great achievement.”

“I-I don’t think we should guys.” a fourth small voice said. After a few seconds it added, “I-I-I mean w-what if the King wants her a-all to himself.”

Suddenly there was a strange mechanical sound that filled the air as if something was winding down. Gilda couldn’t see it but all the armored gryphons looked to the crashed ship as it’s rear end began to open up and reveal the contents. The doorway that had once blocked entry slid into itself and lowered making a small ramp. It barely missed hitting the other vehicle attached to it.

“You know, after that girl woke me up, I couldn’t help but overhear your conversation.” A figure was standing in the dark innards of the ship, looking down on the three attackers and their prisoners. With the initial shock gone, the four gryphons quickly got into position around the two prisoners with two in front and two behind them, “Oh, there’s no need for you to get all defensive about it, I’ve seen plenty of sick fucks just like you in my day.”

“This is business of the Royal Crown, due to the nature of this incident you are to come down from there and come with us back to the castle. Failure to do so will result in the forfeit of your life.” the lead gryphon with the white star chest piece spoke with a confident, malicious tone as if addressing a common civilian. The two gryphons in front pulled out their swords, one in the back pointed a crossbow with one of its talons, and the last gryphon just held up their right talons.

“Oh, so you’re from the Royal Crown. I’m so sorry, I thought you were a bunch of badly dressed rapists, cause that’s what I got from your little talk a moment ago.” the figure said without moving an inch.

“You-you dare mock the King’s personal Royal Guard. Come down now and your death will be swift, something I cannot promise if we are forced to retrieve you.”

“Ha! Okay okay, you win, I'll come down.” the figure walked into the light and jumped off the side of the ramp, “Alright now you said something about a swift death?”

The gryphons all stared wide eyed at the creature that was almost twice their height. It stood on two legs in black armor with strips of dark green in some places. It also seemed to have a number of smooth surfaces that for some reason didn’t reflect light. The helmet seemed different and there was a large dark green strip where the eyes would be on a normal creature.

It had two things stuck to it’s back, but the gryphons couldn’t see them to know it they were weapons or part of it’s armor. Then there was its left arm, or lack there of. Instead it looked like a skeletal version of the other arm only completely made of metal.

“What in tartarus are you?” the lead guard asked with a look of pure confusion.

“My name is Chase Blake and I, am a Spartan.”

There was a long silence that followed as the gryphons took in the answer the strange creature had given them. Soon the gryphon behind the hostages holding a crossbow stated, “You look like a mutant minotaur to me.”

There was a murmur of agreement between them as Chase let out a sigh, ‘So much for them just running in fear, oh well I can add gryphons on to my kill list.’ “Alright, how bout we get to business and you release those gryphons. Ahem, failure to do so will result in the forfeit of your life.” he said the last sentence in his best impression of the gruff sounding leader.

“Are you mocking me?!” the leader shouted.

“No, no, not at all... okay maybe a little.” the spartan said as he grabbed something that was on his back and pointed it at them.

“Swift! Kill this bastard!” the leader shouted and the one called Davis shot his crossbow at Chase. The bolt flew true and hit its mark right in the middle of the spartan’s chest. As it made contact a layer of light flashed around the spartan for a moment and the bolt fell into the water, broken.

“He has a shield around him.” the other gryphon in the back stated.

“Then work your magic and take it down!” the leader yelled back at the gryphon. Said gryphon closed it’s eyes and it’s talon began glowing while the other reloaded his crossbow.

“Okay, I don’t know what you’re doing, but if you stand down now I won’t kill you. This is your last chance.” Chase warned as he aimed his rifle at the leaders head.

“Is that shield down!” the leader asked loudly behind him.

“I-I... I can’t find any traces of magic around him. No active, passive, or natural. That shield wasn’t made by magic.” the gryphon said quietly.

A dead silence fell over them before there was a loud splash at the front of the group. The gryphon next to the leader had dropped his sword into the water, “I’m not with them! I just didn’t want to die I swear!”

The gryphon leader reacted swiftly and slashed at the traitor with his sword. Before the blade connected there was a loud bang that echoed throughout the swap for miles and the leader dropped dead in the water with a hole going straight through his head. The rebellious gryphon fell backwards as the dead gryphons blade bounced harmlessly off his chest plate.

The crossbow gryphon shot up in the air and started flying off, but fell back to the ground dead as three more booms erupted from the spartans weapon. The mage gryphon sat there watching it all play out, noting that the weapon that the spartan used was like that of a highly advanced crossbow. Thinking quickly, he erected a bubble barrier around himself stared the spartan down. A ripple went through the barrier as a Chase shot at him.

Keeping his barrier up, the gryphon raised his wings and was about to go up into the air when the barrier was assaulted with ripples from whatever weapon the spartan had. The mental strain from so much force hitting the barrier repeatedly became too much and it soon fell. The gryphon collapsed onto his side from exhaustion and closed his eyes, fully expecting his end to come from the hands of this alien.

The rebellious gryphon stared at the dead bodies of his commander and Swift the crossbow gryphon. Then he looked at the mage gryphon, heavily panting and probably waiting for his end to come.

“Hey, you there pal?” something poked his head three times forcing the gryphon to look up and immediately his pupils shrank in fear, “Wow, how did you get your pupils to do that?”

“P-please don’t hurt me.”

“Okay since you said please I won’t. You got a name?” Chase said putting his MA5D onto his back.

“... Kaylon...”

“Well then Kaylon in case you didn’t hear me earlier I’m Chase. Now inside that ship is a white box with a red plus symbol on it. You know what a plus sign is right?” Chase asked pointing back to the crashed vehicle. Kaylon nodded and Chase continued, “Okay then, that’s a first aid kit. I need you to go up there and get it or that gryphons gonna die.”

Kaylon nodded and took off for the ship while Chase walked slowly over to the panting gryphon. Gipping and activating his red energy sword for intimidation purposes only, Chase knelt down beside the mage, “Okay you are going to start telling me everything about what you used to stop my bullets or you will meet with an unfortunate fate. Understand?” to make his point Chase tapped the chest plate of the armor with his sword.

There was a small flash as Chase pulled the sword away to see a white bridge connect from the armor to the center of his sword, “The hell?” he looked to the gryphon to see that he still had his eyes closed and seemed to have no clue that the trade was even happening. Chase began to feel a pressure building at the back of his head, annoying and slightly painful. Backing away from the gryphon did no good as the energy line went straight and stretched back with him. Chase made a sharp pull with his sword hoping to disconnect the line, but instead it made the gryphon mage come flying at him.

Not even bothering to move, the mages side collided with Chase and fell to the ground, now unconscious. The white line was still there though and the pressure and pain were getting worse the longer he stayed connected. Shaking the sword up and down didn’t work, but when Chase twisted the sword and put the plasma blade between the sword center and source of the energy line broke and the build up stopped.

Once he deactivated his sword the pressure and pain disappeared and left the ‘What the hell just happened?’ mystery open for debate. With the gryphon mage now unconscious, and sporting different feather and fur colors for some reason, Chase put all thoughts and questions at the back of his mind with all the other questions that have amassed since he woke up.

The flapping of wings alerted him to the arrival Kaylon, who had a bulky first aid box held in his talons. Chase took the box as he landed and pushed the still conscious Gilda to the side to have better access to the King’s wound, “Alright, I’m not my teams medic, but hopefully the tried and true ‘Sanitize, Close, Wrap’ method works.”

“What’s the ‘Sanitize, Close, Wrap’ method?” Kaylon asked relaxing a little bit as Chase began treating the wound.

“It’s the basic method that most try first when they have little to no medical experience. First you disinfect the wound first, then you normally stitch and or cauterize the wound, but we got this little bit of awesomeness in a can.” Chase held up a small canister with the words ‘Bio-foam’ on the side, “Lastly you wrap it with sterile cloth and just make sure the cloth stays sterile. Once my buddy Ethan wakes up he should be able to review my work and make sure I didn’t mess up.”

“Sooo... you could be doing this wrong?” Kaylon asked as he used some moss nearby to prop up Gilda’s head like a pillow.

“Since the invention of Bio-foam even the most inexperienced medic can at least ensure that the wound will stay closed and clean. So there isn’t that much room for error.” Chase explained as Kaylon began moving the dead bodies of the gryphons away from them.

“Wow, we usually need a magic user to be that sure about a wound being okay.” Kaylon said making Chase look up from the Bio-foam filled wound.

“Did you just say magic?” Chase asked looking at the gryphon from his spot.

“Yeah... why?”

“Oh, no reason...” Chase said as he began to apply the bandages around the King’s midsection, binding the wings as well, “So, does that armor make you look all black with some ‘enchantment’ or something?”

“Yeah, but it’s more a uniform thing than a practical one.” Kaylon answered as he took of his helmet. The feathers on his head and neck changed, revealing his natural dark silver colorage, “Can I ask you a personal question?”

“Shoot.” Chase said while thinking about the armor magic and what his sword had done a few minutes prior.

“You could of waited and stayed out of the fight here, but instead you intervened and saved those two, and me.” he paused for a moment, “Why did you do it though?”

“Aw, well I signed up for the military, back in my universe, to protect the innocent and follow my friends and brother. Now I thought that these two where the enemies at first.” Chase pointed at King Ashford and Princess Gilda, “Then I overheard their conversation about how this king wanted to prevent a war, but for all I knew the war could of been completely justified so I stayed back. Then someone mentioned raping the Princess. Now back where I come from, rape is something that we have laws against and my moral side told me, it was time to intervene.”

Kaylon stayed quiet while the information soaked in. Chase waited a few seconds for his response, before getting up and walking to the ship when silence was all he got. Chase walked around the front to the two pods and peered inside, “Yo, sleepin uglies, it’s time for you to get up now!”

“What are you doing?” Kaylon yelled at him looking in the skies for more scouting parties.

“Do you ever stop asking questions?” Chase asked but continued before Kaylon could respond, “Nevermind, I wanted to give them a chance to wake up before I used the fun way.” Kaylon resisted asking what the ‘fun way’ was and went back to trying to get the mud off of Princess Gilda’s face.

Chase flipped open a little panel that was beside the bottom cockpit and pulled on a chord that was inside. The pod-like windshield gave a little click and made a short hiss before it popped up a little, free of the safety locks. Chase flipped it up the rest of the way revealing the unconscious spartan known as Ethan. The man’s head was locked in position as his armor was still locked from before the crash. Looking him over, Chase couldn’t see any visible scratches or nicks on the Black VENATOR-class armor, or the CONTOURED-class forearms and legs armor.

Chase shook his head in approval at a small thought in his head before using his own armor systems to connect to Ethan’s and release the armor lock down. As the man’s arms fell to his side Chase gripped the top and bottom of the torso armor and hefted Ethan out of the pilot seat. Setting Ethan down next to the ship Chase turned his attention to the second pod-like windshield and repeated the opening process.

Chase was greeted with the site of Hank’s OPERATOR-class armored helmet being shield by his XV-27 SHIFTING-class armor forearms. There were no visible scratches on the other pieces of the OPERATOR-class armor he wore or the LG-50 BULK-class leg armor. Chase already knew that both Hank and Ethan were fine and just unconscious because of the squad health monitor he could pull up on the spot when ever he wanted.

Dragging Hank out of the Pelican cockpit was a lot harder than Ethan because of the sheer size of the man and the increased height of the second pilot’s position. After a few moments of trial and error Chase finally managed to get Hank out and set him up next to Ethan. After shutting both hatches, Chase dragged the two unconscious spartans towards where the gryphons were.

“Okay, I gotta ask just, what is the ‘fun way’ of waking them up.” Kaylon asked as Chase laid down the spartans away from the water.

“Oh, first I need to see if I can find any black markers, but trust me it will be funny when they wake up.” Chase said laughing and walking back to the ship.

Kaylon sighed in disappointment and muttered, “Why do I have a bad feeling about this?”

A loud *SHR* sound penetrated the air around the small campsite that Kaylon had built when Chase was gone. Turning Kaylon saw one of the once unconscious creatures applying more Bio-foam to some areas in the Kings wound. Turning his head from the spot the spartan had once been to the spot now by the king, Kaylon was baffled that he had snuck by him without alerting him in any way.

“Bandages.” Ethan said simply. It was more of a command than a question. A command Kaylon immediately completed as a renewed fear of the spartans came up in his heart. After giving the Bandages to Ethan, Kaylon quickly backed away to what he believed to be a safe distance and watched as Ethan applied a professional’s touch to the bandagings.

With two of the spartans now awake Kaylon thought about what changes this could mean for the kingdom. Even what the appearance of these creatures could mean for the whole world. One thing was for sure though...

“Found a red marker!”

It was going to be one heck of a weird adventure.

Author's Note

Okay holy sh*t that forever. Now I have a very good reason I didn't write in the whole capture scene. I had horrible writers block for that single scene because I had so much thought up for it. Though the main reason this is out late is because I just kept putting it off till I only had a few days to write this. Also, no editing was done what so ever because I am five minutes from my dead line, so please don't critique to hard on it for that.

Alright I have kept with my once a month update and now for the Community Question: What are you planning on doing when/if you get Halo the Master Chief Collection?

My answer: I plan on taking a vacation day and doing a full legendary play through of all the games. I don't even care if there's an achievement for it.