A New Missonby itsjusttealChaptersChapter 1: Sad endings, New beginningsC 2. LandingChapter 3Chapter 4Chapter 5Chapter 6Chapter 1: Sad endings, New beginningsAuthor's Note This chapter and the next four are VERY OLD. I know the writing is bad, and everything after chapter five will show improvements. Chapter 1: Sad endings, New beginnings Year: 2018 Date: 12/25/47 Location: Afghanistan "Wind is 24MPH, range is 1300 meters. Target is walking. Adjust your sights for the lead, fire when ready. Aim high, and let's make history." Said a voice on my right.. I knew who he was, of course, I mean, didn't I read the mission briefing? My mission. Many missions I've had, most had been on my own. This is one of the rare occurrences when I actually do get a spotter, and someone who would watch my back. The Spotters name for this mission: Corporal Mark Durkinscoff. In the briefing, it had said that he was a recent graduate from a sniper school back in the states. He'd been on a few missions, and had even had to take the sniper position a few times. But hey, I wouldn't trade him for any other spotter in the world. Now, my part in the mission was the assassin. I don't like putting it that way, but its basically what a sniper does, other than help his fellow troops in the field. Besides that, the 'target' just happened to be an old friend of mine. He left the U.S and joined the Al-Qaeda, thus earning the title of 'traitor'. The names Christopher Kennedy, a high ranked member of the group. "Nah man, another head shot? If this is gonna be in the books, we gotta make it presentable. Where do you think I should shoot?" I grinned, looking at him. He looked back, and grinned with me. "All I'm gonna say, aim for the torso. The bullet will tear him up anyways. A shot from a .338 Lapua round in an M98? Fella's in for a bad time, no matter where you hit" He said, looking back into his scope. I loaded the magazine into the clip, bullet in the chamber, and took my aim. As Mark said, aim for the torso. That's exactly what I did. I closed my eyes. The next thing I knew, the bullet was making its way down range. I waited for the response. ... ... ... "Shit! I must have misread the wind speed! The shot went to the thigh!" He yelled. Immediately, my eyes snapped open, and I looked back into my scope. My eyes went straight to his leg, which seemed to be perfectly fine. But how? I looked up and locked eyes with his. I swear, he was looking straight at me. The next thing we knew, he was smiling and shouting orders and pointed into our direction. "Corporal, they new we were coming!" I shouted to him, he looked at me, and I could tell he was worried. " We need to get the fu-" I was cut off by an explosion behind me, then a searing pain in my right arm. I yelled out in pain. "Sergeant!" He yelled, taking out his M4A1. I looked back and saw an enemy bird, preparing for another shot. "Don't worry about me! Its just a bit of shrapnel! Look, as much as i'd like to stay and have some tea and crumpets, we need to get the fuck outta here! Follow me, Mark!" I yelled, slinging my Barrett M98 over my back and taking out my M4. I stood up and started running to the back of the building, where we had rappels waiting. Making sure he was following me, I hooked up to the repel and jumped the wall, Mark right next to me. "Reppel!" I yelled over the bombardment of bullets. Using one hand to hold onto the wire, and the other on my M4, we began to repel down the building. A few moments later, we touched down on the pavement below. I ran to a nearby car and took out my radio. "Command! This is Echo-2-1! We are compromised! Say again, we are compromised! Need immediate evac!" I yelled into the thing. A scratchy voice came back seconds later. "Roger that Echo-2-1, EVAC is on the way ETA 5 minutes. Out" "Shit! We gotta book it to the rendezvous or we'll be left behind" I crouched down and put the radio back on the hook. I got back up " Let's g-" A bullet grazed the top of the car, inches in front of my face. "Enemy positions to our front and right flank!" Mark yelled half a second later and immediately pulled up his M4A1, firing at the enemy, hoping to buy us some time. While he was spraying on them, I was focusing on the enemies to our front. I unloaded magazine after magazine unto the advancing troops, some bullets hitting its mark. Right as I loaded another mag, a searing pain shot through my right arm again, but the adrenaline pretty much blocked out most if the pain. I let the contents of the magazine soar through the air, receiving screams in return. "Sir, you've been hit!" I heard Mark yell. I took cover behind the car and assessed the damage. I looked to my right and saw that a bullet had hit almost exactly where the shrapnel had hit, which only led to it bleeding more. "It doesn't help that its the same spot as the shrapnel! Never mind that! We need to move now, follow me!" I yelled to him, moving from cover to cover, holding my gun up to my shoulder. We finished the last of the enemies, and made our way through the parking lot, and into an apartment building. I looked over my shoulder. "Suppressors on. We don't need anymore distractions" After loading the suppressors, we started moving quietly through the building. As soon as we cleared the first room, my radio went off. "Echo 2-1 this is Command, ETA two minutes" "We're oscar mike, out" I replied, tucking my radio away. A faint shuffling caught my attention, and I turned to my left, gun ready, to see an enemy soldier and noticed hes had better days. A knife was sticking out of his neck. I looked to my right and saw Durkinscoff smirking at me. I smiled back and nodded my head. "Keep moving" We strolled threw the rest of the building, and exited through the back. Our EVAC site was only one hundred yards away, and the sound of the Chinook was getting louder. "Sir? Its too quiet" I nodded in agreement. "We're almost there, lets book it" I said, taking off the suppressor, Mark doing the same. I stood up, and made a bee-line for the clearing. We arrived a minute later, and took cover behind a dead mule. Yes, a dead mule. We are in a clearing, aren't we? Meanwhile Mark took cover behind a rock, barley able to keep him cover. He glanced at me, and I glanced back. Something's not right. No more enemy contact, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, it just puts us on edge. We did just try to assassinate a high valued target. I took a glance at my watch and noticed that the chopper was supposed to arrive over 30 seconds ago. I fished for my radio as fast as I could, but to no avail. I couldn't find it anywhere. I looked at my spotters gear, and saw that his radio was busted completely. Our eyes met once again, and he motioned with his head out in the open. My eyes darted to the open, and there, lying right on the ground, was my radio. I looked back to Mark and said the words that might be my last. "Cover me" And with that, I bolted from cover and ran as fast as humanly possible towards my radio. When I reached the radio, I hastily bent down and fetched it, and as soon as I got back up, I was knocked to the ground in pain. I tried to open my eyes, but everything was just a blur mixed with a side order of pain, and there was a lot of it. The realization dawned on me, I was shot. I felt all over my body for the shot, and my hand brushed past an increasingly wet spot on my chest. I focused looking at my chest, and my eye sight slowly turned back to normal. What I saw, actually scared me. A small hole through my chest, which let out a profuse amount of blood. "Sergeant!" I heard Mark yell from behind. While he was running to me, I gingerly rose up to my knees, clutching my chest and my arm, which now bled more than it should have by now. Seconds later, I felt a pair of arms pulling me up, and realized it must have been Mark. When My arm was draped over his shoulder, I saw that it was not him, but another marine soldier. In the time I went to get the radio, the Chinook arrived. Man did I feel stupid. I collapsed to the ground once more and was now being dragged to the open helicopter door, firing my weapon on the arriving enemy troops. About halfway through, I dropped my gun, for I was too weak to hold it. Every few seconds a little cloud of dirt would spring up besides me. In a final attempt to get out of here, I drew my M9 and fired away at the enemies. There must have been about thirty or so, but it didn't matter. Everything counts. What seemed like hours later, I was being pulled into the Chinook, and being propped up on one of the seats. A few of the other marines were gathering outside the door, taking a few of the enemy soldiers before climbing aboard. I was looking out the door, just staring at the death, not even thinking anything about it. Suddenly, I felt a hand placed on my shoulder and looked over, seeing Mark screaming at the other men for a medic. I was no doctor, but I was guessing that I lost too much blood. I don't think they would be of help. While the medic was checking for my vitals, I clutched Mark's hand as the pain was too much. I got close to his ear and whispered, "I think that tea would be lovely right now" I said, giving a weak smile. "The crumpets too". He chuckled, finally. Another wave of bullets gets thrown at us from all directions and we returned fire seconds after. The medic seemed to have stopeed the bleeding in my chest and arm, and had gone to tend to another injured soldier. I looked over and found that it was Mark, his hand clutched over his stomach, face wretched in white hot pain. "Mark!" I yelled at him over the gunfire. He looked back at me, tears forming in his eyes. "Man does this hurt!" He yelled. With the strenght that I had left in me, I pulled myself over to Mark and clutched my hand with his. "Why isn't this bird in the air yet!" I yelled out. I looked back to Mark, him looking back up at me. "Mark, you're gonna be fine, do you understand?," He gave a slight nod. "Everythings gonna be alright, were gonna get outta this soon," I looked back up, "Get this chopper in the air now!" My command was soon heard as the chopper painstakingly stated to rise in the air. I looked to my left and saw that one of the soldiers had gotten my Barrett off the ground. Like that'l make a difference. Seconds went by as I crouch next to Mark, speaking soft and soothing words. I lift his hand up and saw two bullet holes that had gone straight through his stomach, inches apart. I looked out the open back of the Chinook and saw that we were almost out of the war zone. The gunner was still going ham on the enemies below us with his mini gun. " Can you stop the bleeding?" I yelled over the gunner. He looked to me with a smile. "I've already stopped the bleeding, we just need to cover the wou-" "RPG incoming!" The pilot yelled out to us. C 2. LandingSomething has gone wrong. We don't seem to have an archived copy of that chapter.Chapter 3About an hour later, Mark and I had gone a decent distance from the crash site. We made sure our tracks were covered behind us. “Mark,” I said in a hushed voice, “let’s set camp up here. Go set your weapons by the willow tree. I’ll set them by this Red Oak” Mark crouched over to the willow and quietly set down his gear. When we were both done setting our things down, Mark walked back over to me. “I don’t know about you, but I’m gonna get myself comfy” Dismissing himself, he walked back over to his gear and took out a combat knife. He climbed half the willow, and started to tear the long vines from it. Cutting a few more, he came down and made a makeshift hammock for himself. “We’re taking shifts, you know,” I smiled. He froze for a second and then sighed, and picked up his M4 and started to walk over to me. I stopped him, however. “Don’t worry, I’ll take the first shift. You’ve had a rough day” I said, retrieving my M4 off the ground. “Danke, Brandon” I heard Mark say as he slowly walked over to his newly made hammock. He gracefully lied down and covered himself with what he could. I could already tell he was asleep. I rested my M4 against the tree closest to me and sat down and put my hands on my knees. This makes zero sense whatsoever. How are we even here? I mean, the both of us got set up, we get severely wounded and then I get pulled into the Chinook. Seconds later, the chopper gets severely damaged by an RPG and we spiral out of the air. Right when we were about to crash, everything went black for me, and apparently Mark, too. “This doesn’t add up,” I mutter. I took off the bottom half of the ghillie suit and used it as a head rest, cause you know, the tree fucking hurts. I closed my eyes. A crack in the distance made me open my eyes in annoyance. “But that couldn’t be a..no.. That sounded way too much like an M9” I whispered. I quickly got up and grabbed my gun and an extra magazine. I searched my gear for anything else that might be useful, and found a pair of night vision goggles. Most have forgot that. Another cluster of shots clattered through the silent night. I stood up with my gun raised and kept a steady pace towards the supposed M9. Another crack ran out and I saw a flash of light in my goggles coming from the left. I instinctively twitched my aim to the left and stared into the night. I faintly saw a figure on the ground holding what looked like a pistol. Another figure came out from the bush behind it and pounced it. I heard a clear scream and ran towards the two. I stopped about thirty feet from them, steadied myself, and took the shot, sending a STANAG round right through the head of the wolf like creature., and then exploded into twigs and leaves. Strange. I stood there for a second with my gin still drawn as I looked at the bipedal figure I saw sprawled on the ground gasping for air. “You okay?” “Sergeant Duffy?” The man said as he quickly stood up and half gave me a salute. He wore a gritty pilot’s uniform, and his helmet was on the ground. I saw his legs buckle beneath hum as I quickly put my gun to my side and took his arm over my shoulder as he fell down. “Yeah man, don’t worry, I gotcha,” I steadied him over me as I bent down and picked up his helmet. We then started to slowly but surely walk back to base. “Can you tell me where you’re from?” “G-gainesville, Minnesota” He muttered. “Boston Massachusetts. Okay now how about your name?” “The names Nick, rank SrA in the air force” He said. “Alright, Nick. I want you to tell me everything that happened from about five hours ago all the way up to this point. Okay?” I asked. “Of course sir,” I could very faintly see the makeshift camp that Mark and I assembled. “Sorry, sir, but I can only remember certain parts. All I really remember is flying from the base to pick you two up. We get there a little late because of enemy resistance. From the cockpit I saw you get shot in the chest and fall to the ground like dead weight. Corporal Durkinscoff ran after you but quickly got hit. He clutched his stomach and went down. I landed the bird as fast as I could and had the marines disembark and get you guys. Once you two were finally loaded in, I started to “ascend from darkness”” He let out a small laugh at his joke. “Minutes later we get shot by an RPG and go spiraling through the air,” Nick let out a small cry of sadness. “I’m s-sorry, sir. I-I tried to steady it.” “Listen, don’t worry about it. From what I could tell, only us three made it out. We couldn’t find any other bodies” I told him, almost to the camp. “Three? We? Who else is here?” He asked, clearly happy that another had survived the initial “crash”. “It’s just my spotter, Corporal Mark, and I. We haven’t seen any trace of any other marine in these woods,” I could now make out the camp clearly. “Alright, enough chitter chatter. We’re al-“ A scratchy voice pushed itself through the Walkie on my shoulder. “Sir this is Mark! Where are you?! I heard a shot!” He whispered to me. I held down the red button and told him everything is fine and that I found the Pilot, Nick. Speaking of him, he stopped talking and slowed his effort in moving. I glanced at him and his face was pale as fuck, so that’s when I hoisted him over my shoulders and booked it over to the camp. “Mark! Need help over here man!” I yelled, jolting him awake. He instantly got up and stood at attention. I put Nick up against a tree and felt his face. When I say freezing, I mean freezing! “Help him in any way you can!” I yelled and went over to my gear to try and find some sort of blanket for him. “Sarg he’s losing blood fast! Got a large gash in his right thigh!” I heard mark yell from behind. I found a blanket seconds later and some surgical ropes. I turned around and handed the blanket over to Mark, who put It on Nick with haste. I went to his leg and wrapped the rope above the hideous gash that spew a constant line of blood. Finishing the knot, Mark and I both realized what had to be done. “Mark, you and I both know what needs to be done,” I turned to Nick, who looked at me with noticeable fear. “You’re not gonna amputate are you?” “Fuck no! I was just thinking we need to burn the wound shut!” “What! I’m already in too much pain asshole!” “We could just clot the blood right Brandon?” Mark spoke up. Huh. When I was in college taking medical practices, I never did think of that. “You know what? You’re right Mark. Go fetch the gauss and some medical tape!” While he went to the gear, I applied as much pressure to the wound as I possibly could. Mark came back seconds later with the supplies and handed them to me, his hands trembling in fear for the wounded pilot. I quickly wrapped the gauss around the leg over the wound a few times, making sure it was secure, then taped tight. “Here, let me go get you some water,” I offered, and went and got some for him. While I surfed through the gear, I also found an MRE, and brought it to him. I quickly heated up the MRE and gave the rest of the water to Nick. “Eat up man, you’re going to need it” “Mark, you’ve had a little bit of sleep, I’m taking my turn. Wake me up in an hour or less” I grabbed a blanket for myself and lied down a few feet away from the two. “And one more thing, keep an eye on that wound” I yawned. Seconds later I fell asleep. A flash of light appeared in front of the beings face, and after a second’s freefall, it appeared to be held up by some type of force, and began reading aloud; “My Dearest Twilight Sparkle I trust you enough to complete this task, Twilight. You have permission to search and locate what caused that explosion yesterday. Celestia out. Till next time, Princess Twilight “Yes yes yes yes!” ‘Twilight’ yelled out of joy. A small bipedal figure could be heard walking down the stairs, walking up to Twilight. “I’m going to take a wild guess and say that Princess Celestia said yes?” Twilight began shaking her head up and down vigorously. “Ah. Nailed it. So…tell me again why you won’t let me come with?” The small being asked. “Because, Spike,” Twilight responded, getting the best poker face in response. “ugh, its because a baby dragon such as yourself shouldn’t be going on potentially dangerous adventures such as this one!” Twilight proclaimed. “Yeah that makes sense, seeing as I have done them before. Don’t you remember when I single handedly saved the Crystal Kingdom!” Spike fist pumped. Twilight brought a hoof to her chin thinking similar to a detective. “Well I gue-“Twilight was cut off as another flash of light exploded in front of her, and, seeing Celestia’s royal seal, quickly unraveled the scroll and read aloud with haste. “I will also be sending a small group of my Guards to aid on yor task, Twilight. Your teacher and mentor, Princess Celestia “Alright, Spike. Pack your bags, we leave at noon” Author's Note Keep in mind this story was written almost four years ago, my writing has vastly improved since then. I am in the process of writing a new story right with improved writing. I'm just seeing if anyone likes this. Comment are appreciated. Chapter 4"Princess Twilight." A guard pony, covered in golden armor, and an iron short sword in its sheath to its side, stood at attention. Twilight looked up from what she was doing and looked at Sergeant Red Hoof. "Yes, Sergeant ? Is everything ready to go?" She stood up and walked over to the window. "Yes, Princess. Our supplies have been gathered, were ready to go, just waiting for the go." He replied, still at attention and as stoic as he'll ever be. "Alright. I suppose Spike and I have all of our needed necessities, why don't we go outside then." Twilight suggested and proceeded to walk outside, with Red Hoof following behind. With the sound of the library door closing behind Twilight, she smiled at the sight in front of her. There was about twenty to thirty Royal Guard troops mulling around, talking to each other. One of them just happened to look Twilight's way, and snapped to attention. The other guards were quick to notice, and in seconds, all of them were at attention. Twilight tried to cover herself with a hoof, and chuckled sheepishly. She heard footsteps behind her, but did not look back. "So, are we ready to head out?" Twilight heard Spike say from her left. She looked towards him and smiled. "Not quite, Spike. We're still waiting for a few ponies." She replied. "Don't tell me, are the gi-" Spike was cut off. "Yes, Spike, they are coming." She said with an air of finality. Spike wisely decided to keep his mouth shut, let he be told to stay behind instead. One by one her friends started to show up until all of them were present. In total, there were six of her friends, including Spike. Twilight had gone over what the situation was and told them what they would be doing and what role they were to play if something bad were to happen. Twilight turned to Sergeant Red Hoof. "Alright Sergeant, we're ready to go." "Yes, Princess," Red Hoof turned to the rest of the men. "You heard the princess, boys! Double time it, move out!" ~ "Alright boys, what's our game plan?" I asked, while the three of us were sitting around the remains of the morning's fire. Mark raised his hand first. "I don't know why we never tried this before Sarge, but we could try the comms? Maybe we could get a hold of the guys at command." Hm. Gotta hand it to him, not once did I think of using the radios we gathered in the Chinook. "Alright that'll be first on the list," I looked over to Nick. "What about you? Got anything?" "Sorry, but I don't know what to do in these situations. I trained to be a pilot, not ground forces." "Understandable. Alright Mark, hand me over the Walkie. Lets try hitting up someone." Mark fished the walkie out of his bag and tossed it to me. I raised it up to my head, held down the button on the side, and spoke. "Delta 4 this is Echo 2-1 come in." I held down the button and was met with the sweet sound of nails scratching on a chalk board. I switched channels rapidly to try and get a signal, but nothing happened. I brought the Walkie back up to my face. "Command this Echo 2-1, I say again this is Echo 2-1, how copy?" I desperately tried to scan through the channels, and as I did, our faces grew with worry. "You think that it was busted during the crash?" Nick asked. "Yeah, I would like to hope that. Better than what I'm thinking." It better have been from the crash, because it's that or the Walkie wasn't picking up channels, obviously, but its highly unlikely that it would happen, because it is transmitted and received through satellite. "I had really hoped that it didn't have to resort to this. Men, we've been forced to go dark. We have no way of contacting Command. If we are lucky, we should be able to find an enemy patrol around here." I sighed. "I think we should move, sir." Mark softly announced, probably not wanting to bring anymore attention to us than we already did. ~ "Princess, we think we found something! Come quickly!" The sergeant called out. Twilight raised her head from Celestia's most recent message, and quickly started to trot towards Red Hoof. What Hoof had found startled the girls. Lying in a clearing was a scorched wreckage of some kind, and it looked like somepony had thrown metal all over the clearing. "What is it?" Twilight questioned Red Hoof. "I'm not too sure, Princess." He answered with a frown, wondering if it was safe enough to get close. "But whatever this is, somepony didn't want us to get anything from it." Anything the girls would've said was cut off by loud roar far off into the distance, causing all eyes (and weapons) to point towards the general location of the sound. "Who's there?!" Dash yelled out, flying upwards a few feet. Due to the thickness of the trees and foliage around the clearing, she couldn't get a clean line of sight on whatever caused the noise. ~ "I think that's the edge of these bloody trees." Mark quietly called out, having taken point. After a moment, he let out a curse and quietly backed up. "What is it?" I whispered once he returned. "...I don't even know what that thing up there is, sir." He answered, looking behind him. "But I know for damn sure it's hostile. Almost walked into it eating a deer." "Right. Let's get around this clearing as quietly as possible." I muttered, causing Mark to return to his position and lead us away. A roar behind us told the three of us that we'd been found. "Run!" I yelled, not wanting to become some creature's lunch. Mark stopped long enough to grunt and lift Nick over his shoulder, before running. I ran after him, ready to help him should he fall. We saw a light ahead of us and we both ran faster, breaking free of the forest and hopefully losing whatever was chasing us. Chapter 5Rainbow Dash had floated higher into the sky, her wings beating faster than they ever had done before. She began to fly forward ever so slowly, keeping watch for whatever or whoever had made the insanely loud cracking noise. She shook her head clear and bolted forward towards the sound, but was quickly put to an end by Twilight's magic that tightly gripped her tail. "Dash, don't!" She ordered, but Dash didn't get the hint. "But Twilight! Don't you want to know what made that sound? No animal in the Everfree can make that sound!" She protested. "And how would you know that?" Twilight questioned, smirking. Rainbow instantly replied. "Seasons one through five of the Daring Doo books, of course! Nothing could have made that loud a noise, and you know it too Twilight." Rainbow shot back, putting on a smirk of her own. "Red Hoof, send out a three stallion search party please." Twilight sighed and continued investigating the scattered metal. Some of the wreckage was still aflame, and she made sure to stay out of that area. Her eyes darted across every nook and cranny of the metal, hoping to find some clue of what it might be. Seconds later she tilted her head in confusion, as she found a strange piece of material draped over a rather large piece of metal that stuck up from the ground. Twilight closed her eyes and illuminated her horn in a sparkly purple light and concentrated on lifting the material. When she thought the object was directly in front of her, she opened her eyes and saw nothing. Surprised, she looked to where she saw it first, to find that it was still resting there, not giving a single damn. She trotted forward and picked up the material to see that it was covered in what looked like leaves. Not even seconds later, she felt all of her energy release form her body and she reeled back, dropping the object and falling over herself. A guard pony was quick to aid his twilight princess up, making sure she was fine. The other elements were quick to follow as well. "What in tarnation happened?" Called out Applejack in her thick accent. Twilight started to speak, but all that came was a garbled gibberish sound. After taking a few deep breaths, she regained her composure, but only slightly. "I-I don't know, I've never seen anything like this before!" She pointed to the strange energy stealing material. "Whatever that is, It felt like it drained all my energy! I can't even use my magic on it!" Twilight turned to Red, stumbling a bit. "Red, could you try picking it up with your sword?" Five minutes ago... "I don't know what the hell this thing is man! Just keep running!" Nick and Mark were a few meters ahead of me, while I was lagging behind to keep the monster/beast on my ass instead of theirs. Hearing an extremely loud roar, I instinctively turned my head around and saw the beast in a full-on sprint towards us. As I turned back, my leg caught a tree stump and I went toppling over face first into the mud as my M2 fell off its sling on my back. "Holy shit!" I yelled as the beasts whipped its pointed tail at me, missing by a few inches and embedding itself in front of my shoulder. I quickly snapped my head back towards the beast and it stared straight into my eyes. My eyes flashed before my eyes, so to speak, as I saw everything that led up to the moment. Still looking into its eyes, I saw a faint glimmer in its left eye and it turned to look at the source. I heard a soft click of metal and less than a second later, an extremely loud bang came from behind me, and the beasts head shattered into pieces! I looked back, ears ringing, and tried to get a look at who saved my life. I blinked a few times and saw that it was Nick, holding up my fallen friend, the Barrett M82. He stood there, smiling. "Holy shit Nick! You saved my life!" I said, getting to my feet. "Heheh, yeah no problem." He smirked. "You realize you owe me now, right?" I shook my head. "Whatever floats your boat." Nick handed me my gun and I slung it on my back again. "Alright, enough with that thing. Let's keep moving. Keep it low, we are on the edge of the forest." "Roger dodger." Mark spoke up. In silence, the three of us followed the tree line until we came upon a straight dirt path. One end had gone into the forest, and we scratched that off immediately. Doing a quick scan of the area and finding nothing, I motioned to start moving inland, making sure to stay off the path so no enemy walking down it would see us. "Sir?" Mark silently piped up. "Go ahead." I whispered back. "Ever take a look at the scenery? Doesn't it look a bit strange to you?" He asked. I had us stop by a nearby bush and I looked around. Sure there were your average run of the mill trees hangin' around, but nothing seemed too off about them. But then a thought struck my mind like wildfire, which frightened me. We were in a colorful field full of the most vibrant colors, and besides that, we had a nice meet up with a manticore in the forest. Those things are supposed myths! Adding on to that, where we were stationed in Afghanistan, we were in a villa surrounded by a vast desert, no trees for miles. I heard a grunt from behind to find that Mark had set Nick down. "Yes Mark I do believe that this landscape is insanely different than what we were previously in." I said. "Yeah and what about that fucked up creature? I'm pretty sure that isn't supposed to exist. Just a theory though." Mark added. I was going to reply, but the snap of a twig caused all three of us to swirl in that direction. Mark rose his SAW, I rose my M4, and Nick unholstered his pistol. Emerging from the treeline in front of us was probably the last thing we expected; three white horses with golden armor in a Roman style fashion; the helmets had a blue plume sticking out of the top. One had wings sticking out of its back while the other had a horn sticking from its forehead. One had a spear levitating above it while the others were somehow holding them with their hooves. "Are... Those horses?" Nick said, looking up at me from his position on the ground. "We're certainly not in Kansas anymore." Mark grunted, slightly lowering his weapon. "What the hell?" I asked, looking at him. From what I saw they were wearing, the golden Roman style armor, they were obviously intelligent. The horses seemed to not pay attention as they were eying our weapons and stood ground. They saw us as a threat. All three of them started yelling at us... to get on the ground? The one with the spear seemed ready to throw. The three of us rose our weapons and started yelling as well. {-} Rainbow Dash ventured far off from the others and had gone closer to the edge of the forest, ignoring her princess's requests. While her mind was waging war on itself wondering what to do, it stopped when she faintly heard yelling, and lots of it. She flew a bit lower so that she was hovering just above the treeline and continued onwards with haste. In a few moments, she was bordering the edge of the forest and could hear the yelling much more clear. She recognized some of the yelling to be from the Guard that was sent out as a search party earlier. Staying above and out of the verbal fight atop the trees, Dash had gone parallel to whoever the guards were yelling at, and, for the first time in her life, she was actually scared at what she saw. Chapter 6Something has gone wrong. We don't seem to have an archived copy of that chapter.
Chapter 1: Sad endings, New beginningsAuthor's Note This chapter and the next four are VERY OLD. I know the writing is bad, and everything after chapter five will show improvements. Chapter 1: Sad endings, New beginnings Year: 2018 Date: 12/25/47 Location: Afghanistan "Wind is 24MPH, range is 1300 meters. Target is walking. Adjust your sights for the lead, fire when ready. Aim high, and let's make history." Said a voice on my right.. I knew who he was, of course, I mean, didn't I read the mission briefing? My mission. Many missions I've had, most had been on my own. This is one of the rare occurrences when I actually do get a spotter, and someone who would watch my back. The Spotters name for this mission: Corporal Mark Durkinscoff. In the briefing, it had said that he was a recent graduate from a sniper school back in the states. He'd been on a few missions, and had even had to take the sniper position a few times. But hey, I wouldn't trade him for any other spotter in the world. Now, my part in the mission was the assassin. I don't like putting it that way, but its basically what a sniper does, other than help his fellow troops in the field. Besides that, the 'target' just happened to be an old friend of mine. He left the U.S and joined the Al-Qaeda, thus earning the title of 'traitor'. The names Christopher Kennedy, a high ranked member of the group. "Nah man, another head shot? If this is gonna be in the books, we gotta make it presentable. Where do you think I should shoot?" I grinned, looking at him. He looked back, and grinned with me. "All I'm gonna say, aim for the torso. The bullet will tear him up anyways. A shot from a .338 Lapua round in an M98? Fella's in for a bad time, no matter where you hit" He said, looking back into his scope. I loaded the magazine into the clip, bullet in the chamber, and took my aim. As Mark said, aim for the torso. That's exactly what I did. I closed my eyes. The next thing I knew, the bullet was making its way down range. I waited for the response. ... ... ... "Shit! I must have misread the wind speed! The shot went to the thigh!" He yelled. Immediately, my eyes snapped open, and I looked back into my scope. My eyes went straight to his leg, which seemed to be perfectly fine. But how? I looked up and locked eyes with his. I swear, he was looking straight at me. The next thing we knew, he was smiling and shouting orders and pointed into our direction. "Corporal, they new we were coming!" I shouted to him, he looked at me, and I could tell he was worried. " We need to get the fu-" I was cut off by an explosion behind me, then a searing pain in my right arm. I yelled out in pain. "Sergeant!" He yelled, taking out his M4A1. I looked back and saw an enemy bird, preparing for another shot. "Don't worry about me! Its just a bit of shrapnel! Look, as much as i'd like to stay and have some tea and crumpets, we need to get the fuck outta here! Follow me, Mark!" I yelled, slinging my Barrett M98 over my back and taking out my M4. I stood up and started running to the back of the building, where we had rappels waiting. Making sure he was following me, I hooked up to the repel and jumped the wall, Mark right next to me. "Reppel!" I yelled over the bombardment of bullets. Using one hand to hold onto the wire, and the other on my M4, we began to repel down the building. A few moments later, we touched down on the pavement below. I ran to a nearby car and took out my radio. "Command! This is Echo-2-1! We are compromised! Say again, we are compromised! Need immediate evac!" I yelled into the thing. A scratchy voice came back seconds later. "Roger that Echo-2-1, EVAC is on the way ETA 5 minutes. Out" "Shit! We gotta book it to the rendezvous or we'll be left behind" I crouched down and put the radio back on the hook. I got back up " Let's g-" A bullet grazed the top of the car, inches in front of my face. "Enemy positions to our front and right flank!" Mark yelled half a second later and immediately pulled up his M4A1, firing at the enemy, hoping to buy us some time. While he was spraying on them, I was focusing on the enemies to our front. I unloaded magazine after magazine unto the advancing troops, some bullets hitting its mark. Right as I loaded another mag, a searing pain shot through my right arm again, but the adrenaline pretty much blocked out most if the pain. I let the contents of the magazine soar through the air, receiving screams in return. "Sir, you've been hit!" I heard Mark yell. I took cover behind the car and assessed the damage. I looked to my right and saw that a bullet had hit almost exactly where the shrapnel had hit, which only led to it bleeding more. "It doesn't help that its the same spot as the shrapnel! Never mind that! We need to move now, follow me!" I yelled to him, moving from cover to cover, holding my gun up to my shoulder. We finished the last of the enemies, and made our way through the parking lot, and into an apartment building. I looked over my shoulder. "Suppressors on. We don't need anymore distractions" After loading the suppressors, we started moving quietly through the building. As soon as we cleared the first room, my radio went off. "Echo 2-1 this is Command, ETA two minutes" "We're oscar mike, out" I replied, tucking my radio away. A faint shuffling caught my attention, and I turned to my left, gun ready, to see an enemy soldier and noticed hes had better days. A knife was sticking out of his neck. I looked to my right and saw Durkinscoff smirking at me. I smiled back and nodded my head. "Keep moving" We strolled threw the rest of the building, and exited through the back. Our EVAC site was only one hundred yards away, and the sound of the Chinook was getting louder. "Sir? Its too quiet" I nodded in agreement. "We're almost there, lets book it" I said, taking off the suppressor, Mark doing the same. I stood up, and made a bee-line for the clearing. We arrived a minute later, and took cover behind a dead mule. Yes, a dead mule. We are in a clearing, aren't we? Meanwhile Mark took cover behind a rock, barley able to keep him cover. He glanced at me, and I glanced back. Something's not right. No more enemy contact, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, it just puts us on edge. We did just try to assassinate a high valued target. I took a glance at my watch and noticed that the chopper was supposed to arrive over 30 seconds ago. I fished for my radio as fast as I could, but to no avail. I couldn't find it anywhere. I looked at my spotters gear, and saw that his radio was busted completely. Our eyes met once again, and he motioned with his head out in the open. My eyes darted to the open, and there, lying right on the ground, was my radio. I looked back to Mark and said the words that might be my last. "Cover me" And with that, I bolted from cover and ran as fast as humanly possible towards my radio. When I reached the radio, I hastily bent down and fetched it, and as soon as I got back up, I was knocked to the ground in pain. I tried to open my eyes, but everything was just a blur mixed with a side order of pain, and there was a lot of it. The realization dawned on me, I was shot. I felt all over my body for the shot, and my hand brushed past an increasingly wet spot on my chest. I focused looking at my chest, and my eye sight slowly turned back to normal. What I saw, actually scared me. A small hole through my chest, which let out a profuse amount of blood. "Sergeant!" I heard Mark yell from behind. While he was running to me, I gingerly rose up to my knees, clutching my chest and my arm, which now bled more than it should have by now. Seconds later, I felt a pair of arms pulling me up, and realized it must have been Mark. When My arm was draped over his shoulder, I saw that it was not him, but another marine soldier. In the time I went to get the radio, the Chinook arrived. Man did I feel stupid. I collapsed to the ground once more and was now being dragged to the open helicopter door, firing my weapon on the arriving enemy troops. About halfway through, I dropped my gun, for I was too weak to hold it. Every few seconds a little cloud of dirt would spring up besides me. In a final attempt to get out of here, I drew my M9 and fired away at the enemies. There must have been about thirty or so, but it didn't matter. Everything counts. What seemed like hours later, I was being pulled into the Chinook, and being propped up on one of the seats. A few of the other marines were gathering outside the door, taking a few of the enemy soldiers before climbing aboard. I was looking out the door, just staring at the death, not even thinking anything about it. Suddenly, I felt a hand placed on my shoulder and looked over, seeing Mark screaming at the other men for a medic. I was no doctor, but I was guessing that I lost too much blood. I don't think they would be of help. While the medic was checking for my vitals, I clutched Mark's hand as the pain was too much. I got close to his ear and whispered, "I think that tea would be lovely right now" I said, giving a weak smile. "The crumpets too". He chuckled, finally. Another wave of bullets gets thrown at us from all directions and we returned fire seconds after. The medic seemed to have stopeed the bleeding in my chest and arm, and had gone to tend to another injured soldier. I looked over and found that it was Mark, his hand clutched over his stomach, face wretched in white hot pain. "Mark!" I yelled at him over the gunfire. He looked back at me, tears forming in his eyes. "Man does this hurt!" He yelled. With the strenght that I had left in me, I pulled myself over to Mark and clutched my hand with his. "Why isn't this bird in the air yet!" I yelled out. I looked back to Mark, him looking back up at me. "Mark, you're gonna be fine, do you understand?," He gave a slight nod. "Everythings gonna be alright, were gonna get outta this soon," I looked back up, "Get this chopper in the air now!" My command was soon heard as the chopper painstakingly stated to rise in the air. I looked to my left and saw that one of the soldiers had gotten my Barrett off the ground. Like that'l make a difference. Seconds went by as I crouch next to Mark, speaking soft and soothing words. I lift his hand up and saw two bullet holes that had gone straight through his stomach, inches apart. I looked out the open back of the Chinook and saw that we were almost out of the war zone. The gunner was still going ham on the enemies below us with his mini gun. " Can you stop the bleeding?" I yelled over the gunner. He looked to me with a smile. "I've already stopped the bleeding, we just need to cover the wou-" "RPG incoming!" The pilot yelled out to us.
Chapter 3About an hour later, Mark and I had gone a decent distance from the crash site. We made sure our tracks were covered behind us. “Mark,” I said in a hushed voice, “let’s set camp up here. Go set your weapons by the willow tree. I’ll set them by this Red Oak” Mark crouched over to the willow and quietly set down his gear. When we were both done setting our things down, Mark walked back over to me. “I don’t know about you, but I’m gonna get myself comfy” Dismissing himself, he walked back over to his gear and took out a combat knife. He climbed half the willow, and started to tear the long vines from it. Cutting a few more, he came down and made a makeshift hammock for himself. “We’re taking shifts, you know,” I smiled. He froze for a second and then sighed, and picked up his M4 and started to walk over to me. I stopped him, however. “Don’t worry, I’ll take the first shift. You’ve had a rough day” I said, retrieving my M4 off the ground. “Danke, Brandon” I heard Mark say as he slowly walked over to his newly made hammock. He gracefully lied down and covered himself with what he could. I could already tell he was asleep. I rested my M4 against the tree closest to me and sat down and put my hands on my knees. This makes zero sense whatsoever. How are we even here? I mean, the both of us got set up, we get severely wounded and then I get pulled into the Chinook. Seconds later, the chopper gets severely damaged by an RPG and we spiral out of the air. Right when we were about to crash, everything went black for me, and apparently Mark, too. “This doesn’t add up,” I mutter. I took off the bottom half of the ghillie suit and used it as a head rest, cause you know, the tree fucking hurts. I closed my eyes. A crack in the distance made me open my eyes in annoyance. “But that couldn’t be a..no.. That sounded way too much like an M9” I whispered. I quickly got up and grabbed my gun and an extra magazine. I searched my gear for anything else that might be useful, and found a pair of night vision goggles. Most have forgot that. Another cluster of shots clattered through the silent night. I stood up with my gun raised and kept a steady pace towards the supposed M9. Another crack ran out and I saw a flash of light in my goggles coming from the left. I instinctively twitched my aim to the left and stared into the night. I faintly saw a figure on the ground holding what looked like a pistol. Another figure came out from the bush behind it and pounced it. I heard a clear scream and ran towards the two. I stopped about thirty feet from them, steadied myself, and took the shot, sending a STANAG round right through the head of the wolf like creature., and then exploded into twigs and leaves. Strange. I stood there for a second with my gin still drawn as I looked at the bipedal figure I saw sprawled on the ground gasping for air. “You okay?” “Sergeant Duffy?” The man said as he quickly stood up and half gave me a salute. He wore a gritty pilot’s uniform, and his helmet was on the ground. I saw his legs buckle beneath hum as I quickly put my gun to my side and took his arm over my shoulder as he fell down. “Yeah man, don’t worry, I gotcha,” I steadied him over me as I bent down and picked up his helmet. We then started to slowly but surely walk back to base. “Can you tell me where you’re from?” “G-gainesville, Minnesota” He muttered. “Boston Massachusetts. Okay now how about your name?” “The names Nick, rank SrA in the air force” He said. “Alright, Nick. I want you to tell me everything that happened from about five hours ago all the way up to this point. Okay?” I asked. “Of course sir,” I could very faintly see the makeshift camp that Mark and I assembled. “Sorry, sir, but I can only remember certain parts. All I really remember is flying from the base to pick you two up. We get there a little late because of enemy resistance. From the cockpit I saw you get shot in the chest and fall to the ground like dead weight. Corporal Durkinscoff ran after you but quickly got hit. He clutched his stomach and went down. I landed the bird as fast as I could and had the marines disembark and get you guys. Once you two were finally loaded in, I started to “ascend from darkness”” He let out a small laugh at his joke. “Minutes later we get shot by an RPG and go spiraling through the air,” Nick let out a small cry of sadness. “I’m s-sorry, sir. I-I tried to steady it.” “Listen, don’t worry about it. From what I could tell, only us three made it out. We couldn’t find any other bodies” I told him, almost to the camp. “Three? We? Who else is here?” He asked, clearly happy that another had survived the initial “crash”. “It’s just my spotter, Corporal Mark, and I. We haven’t seen any trace of any other marine in these woods,” I could now make out the camp clearly. “Alright, enough chitter chatter. We’re al-“ A scratchy voice pushed itself through the Walkie on my shoulder. “Sir this is Mark! Where are you?! I heard a shot!” He whispered to me. I held down the red button and told him everything is fine and that I found the Pilot, Nick. Speaking of him, he stopped talking and slowed his effort in moving. I glanced at him and his face was pale as fuck, so that’s when I hoisted him over my shoulders and booked it over to the camp. “Mark! Need help over here man!” I yelled, jolting him awake. He instantly got up and stood at attention. I put Nick up against a tree and felt his face. When I say freezing, I mean freezing! “Help him in any way you can!” I yelled and went over to my gear to try and find some sort of blanket for him. “Sarg he’s losing blood fast! Got a large gash in his right thigh!” I heard mark yell from behind. I found a blanket seconds later and some surgical ropes. I turned around and handed the blanket over to Mark, who put It on Nick with haste. I went to his leg and wrapped the rope above the hideous gash that spew a constant line of blood. Finishing the knot, Mark and I both realized what had to be done. “Mark, you and I both know what needs to be done,” I turned to Nick, who looked at me with noticeable fear. “You’re not gonna amputate are you?” “Fuck no! I was just thinking we need to burn the wound shut!” “What! I’m already in too much pain asshole!” “We could just clot the blood right Brandon?” Mark spoke up. Huh. When I was in college taking medical practices, I never did think of that. “You know what? You’re right Mark. Go fetch the gauss and some medical tape!” While he went to the gear, I applied as much pressure to the wound as I possibly could. Mark came back seconds later with the supplies and handed them to me, his hands trembling in fear for the wounded pilot. I quickly wrapped the gauss around the leg over the wound a few times, making sure it was secure, then taped tight. “Here, let me go get you some water,” I offered, and went and got some for him. While I surfed through the gear, I also found an MRE, and brought it to him. I quickly heated up the MRE and gave the rest of the water to Nick. “Eat up man, you’re going to need it” “Mark, you’ve had a little bit of sleep, I’m taking my turn. Wake me up in an hour or less” I grabbed a blanket for myself and lied down a few feet away from the two. “And one more thing, keep an eye on that wound” I yawned. Seconds later I fell asleep. A flash of light appeared in front of the beings face, and after a second’s freefall, it appeared to be held up by some type of force, and began reading aloud; “My Dearest Twilight Sparkle I trust you enough to complete this task, Twilight. You have permission to search and locate what caused that explosion yesterday. Celestia out. Till next time, Princess Twilight “Yes yes yes yes!” ‘Twilight’ yelled out of joy. A small bipedal figure could be heard walking down the stairs, walking up to Twilight. “I’m going to take a wild guess and say that Princess Celestia said yes?” Twilight began shaking her head up and down vigorously. “Ah. Nailed it. So…tell me again why you won’t let me come with?” The small being asked. “Because, Spike,” Twilight responded, getting the best poker face in response. “ugh, its because a baby dragon such as yourself shouldn’t be going on potentially dangerous adventures such as this one!” Twilight proclaimed. “Yeah that makes sense, seeing as I have done them before. Don’t you remember when I single handedly saved the Crystal Kingdom!” Spike fist pumped. Twilight brought a hoof to her chin thinking similar to a detective. “Well I gue-“Twilight was cut off as another flash of light exploded in front of her, and, seeing Celestia’s royal seal, quickly unraveled the scroll and read aloud with haste. “I will also be sending a small group of my Guards to aid on yor task, Twilight. Your teacher and mentor, Princess Celestia “Alright, Spike. Pack your bags, we leave at noon” Author's Note Keep in mind this story was written almost four years ago, my writing has vastly improved since then. I am in the process of writing a new story right with improved writing. I'm just seeing if anyone likes this. Comment are appreciated.
Chapter 4"Princess Twilight." A guard pony, covered in golden armor, and an iron short sword in its sheath to its side, stood at attention. Twilight looked up from what she was doing and looked at Sergeant Red Hoof. "Yes, Sergeant ? Is everything ready to go?" She stood up and walked over to the window. "Yes, Princess. Our supplies have been gathered, were ready to go, just waiting for the go." He replied, still at attention and as stoic as he'll ever be. "Alright. I suppose Spike and I have all of our needed necessities, why don't we go outside then." Twilight suggested and proceeded to walk outside, with Red Hoof following behind. With the sound of the library door closing behind Twilight, she smiled at the sight in front of her. There was about twenty to thirty Royal Guard troops mulling around, talking to each other. One of them just happened to look Twilight's way, and snapped to attention. The other guards were quick to notice, and in seconds, all of them were at attention. Twilight tried to cover herself with a hoof, and chuckled sheepishly. She heard footsteps behind her, but did not look back. "So, are we ready to head out?" Twilight heard Spike say from her left. She looked towards him and smiled. "Not quite, Spike. We're still waiting for a few ponies." She replied. "Don't tell me, are the gi-" Spike was cut off. "Yes, Spike, they are coming." She said with an air of finality. Spike wisely decided to keep his mouth shut, let he be told to stay behind instead. One by one her friends started to show up until all of them were present. In total, there were six of her friends, including Spike. Twilight had gone over what the situation was and told them what they would be doing and what role they were to play if something bad were to happen. Twilight turned to Sergeant Red Hoof. "Alright Sergeant, we're ready to go." "Yes, Princess," Red Hoof turned to the rest of the men. "You heard the princess, boys! Double time it, move out!" ~ "Alright boys, what's our game plan?" I asked, while the three of us were sitting around the remains of the morning's fire. Mark raised his hand first. "I don't know why we never tried this before Sarge, but we could try the comms? Maybe we could get a hold of the guys at command." Hm. Gotta hand it to him, not once did I think of using the radios we gathered in the Chinook. "Alright that'll be first on the list," I looked over to Nick. "What about you? Got anything?" "Sorry, but I don't know what to do in these situations. I trained to be a pilot, not ground forces." "Understandable. Alright Mark, hand me over the Walkie. Lets try hitting up someone." Mark fished the walkie out of his bag and tossed it to me. I raised it up to my head, held down the button on the side, and spoke. "Delta 4 this is Echo 2-1 come in." I held down the button and was met with the sweet sound of nails scratching on a chalk board. I switched channels rapidly to try and get a signal, but nothing happened. I brought the Walkie back up to my face. "Command this Echo 2-1, I say again this is Echo 2-1, how copy?" I desperately tried to scan through the channels, and as I did, our faces grew with worry. "You think that it was busted during the crash?" Nick asked. "Yeah, I would like to hope that. Better than what I'm thinking." It better have been from the crash, because it's that or the Walkie wasn't picking up channels, obviously, but its highly unlikely that it would happen, because it is transmitted and received through satellite. "I had really hoped that it didn't have to resort to this. Men, we've been forced to go dark. We have no way of contacting Command. If we are lucky, we should be able to find an enemy patrol around here." I sighed. "I think we should move, sir." Mark softly announced, probably not wanting to bring anymore attention to us than we already did. ~ "Princess, we think we found something! Come quickly!" The sergeant called out. Twilight raised her head from Celestia's most recent message, and quickly started to trot towards Red Hoof. What Hoof had found startled the girls. Lying in a clearing was a scorched wreckage of some kind, and it looked like somepony had thrown metal all over the clearing. "What is it?" Twilight questioned Red Hoof. "I'm not too sure, Princess." He answered with a frown, wondering if it was safe enough to get close. "But whatever this is, somepony didn't want us to get anything from it." Anything the girls would've said was cut off by loud roar far off into the distance, causing all eyes (and weapons) to point towards the general location of the sound. "Who's there?!" Dash yelled out, flying upwards a few feet. Due to the thickness of the trees and foliage around the clearing, she couldn't get a clean line of sight on whatever caused the noise. ~ "I think that's the edge of these bloody trees." Mark quietly called out, having taken point. After a moment, he let out a curse and quietly backed up. "What is it?" I whispered once he returned. "...I don't even know what that thing up there is, sir." He answered, looking behind him. "But I know for damn sure it's hostile. Almost walked into it eating a deer." "Right. Let's get around this clearing as quietly as possible." I muttered, causing Mark to return to his position and lead us away. A roar behind us told the three of us that we'd been found. "Run!" I yelled, not wanting to become some creature's lunch. Mark stopped long enough to grunt and lift Nick over his shoulder, before running. I ran after him, ready to help him should he fall. We saw a light ahead of us and we both ran faster, breaking free of the forest and hopefully losing whatever was chasing us.
Chapter 5Rainbow Dash had floated higher into the sky, her wings beating faster than they ever had done before. She began to fly forward ever so slowly, keeping watch for whatever or whoever had made the insanely loud cracking noise. She shook her head clear and bolted forward towards the sound, but was quickly put to an end by Twilight's magic that tightly gripped her tail. "Dash, don't!" She ordered, but Dash didn't get the hint. "But Twilight! Don't you want to know what made that sound? No animal in the Everfree can make that sound!" She protested. "And how would you know that?" Twilight questioned, smirking. Rainbow instantly replied. "Seasons one through five of the Daring Doo books, of course! Nothing could have made that loud a noise, and you know it too Twilight." Rainbow shot back, putting on a smirk of her own. "Red Hoof, send out a three stallion search party please." Twilight sighed and continued investigating the scattered metal. Some of the wreckage was still aflame, and she made sure to stay out of that area. Her eyes darted across every nook and cranny of the metal, hoping to find some clue of what it might be. Seconds later she tilted her head in confusion, as she found a strange piece of material draped over a rather large piece of metal that stuck up from the ground. Twilight closed her eyes and illuminated her horn in a sparkly purple light and concentrated on lifting the material. When she thought the object was directly in front of her, she opened her eyes and saw nothing. Surprised, she looked to where she saw it first, to find that it was still resting there, not giving a single damn. She trotted forward and picked up the material to see that it was covered in what looked like leaves. Not even seconds later, she felt all of her energy release form her body and she reeled back, dropping the object and falling over herself. A guard pony was quick to aid his twilight princess up, making sure she was fine. The other elements were quick to follow as well. "What in tarnation happened?" Called out Applejack in her thick accent. Twilight started to speak, but all that came was a garbled gibberish sound. After taking a few deep breaths, she regained her composure, but only slightly. "I-I don't know, I've never seen anything like this before!" She pointed to the strange energy stealing material. "Whatever that is, It felt like it drained all my energy! I can't even use my magic on it!" Twilight turned to Red, stumbling a bit. "Red, could you try picking it up with your sword?" Five minutes ago... "I don't know what the hell this thing is man! Just keep running!" Nick and Mark were a few meters ahead of me, while I was lagging behind to keep the monster/beast on my ass instead of theirs. Hearing an extremely loud roar, I instinctively turned my head around and saw the beast in a full-on sprint towards us. As I turned back, my leg caught a tree stump and I went toppling over face first into the mud as my M2 fell off its sling on my back. "Holy shit!" I yelled as the beasts whipped its pointed tail at me, missing by a few inches and embedding itself in front of my shoulder. I quickly snapped my head back towards the beast and it stared straight into my eyes. My eyes flashed before my eyes, so to speak, as I saw everything that led up to the moment. Still looking into its eyes, I saw a faint glimmer in its left eye and it turned to look at the source. I heard a soft click of metal and less than a second later, an extremely loud bang came from behind me, and the beasts head shattered into pieces! I looked back, ears ringing, and tried to get a look at who saved my life. I blinked a few times and saw that it was Nick, holding up my fallen friend, the Barrett M82. He stood there, smiling. "Holy shit Nick! You saved my life!" I said, getting to my feet. "Heheh, yeah no problem." He smirked. "You realize you owe me now, right?" I shook my head. "Whatever floats your boat." Nick handed me my gun and I slung it on my back again. "Alright, enough with that thing. Let's keep moving. Keep it low, we are on the edge of the forest." "Roger dodger." Mark spoke up. In silence, the three of us followed the tree line until we came upon a straight dirt path. One end had gone into the forest, and we scratched that off immediately. Doing a quick scan of the area and finding nothing, I motioned to start moving inland, making sure to stay off the path so no enemy walking down it would see us. "Sir?" Mark silently piped up. "Go ahead." I whispered back. "Ever take a look at the scenery? Doesn't it look a bit strange to you?" He asked. I had us stop by a nearby bush and I looked around. Sure there were your average run of the mill trees hangin' around, but nothing seemed too off about them. But then a thought struck my mind like wildfire, which frightened me. We were in a colorful field full of the most vibrant colors, and besides that, we had a nice meet up with a manticore in the forest. Those things are supposed myths! Adding on to that, where we were stationed in Afghanistan, we were in a villa surrounded by a vast desert, no trees for miles. I heard a grunt from behind to find that Mark had set Nick down. "Yes Mark I do believe that this landscape is insanely different than what we were previously in." I said. "Yeah and what about that fucked up creature? I'm pretty sure that isn't supposed to exist. Just a theory though." Mark added. I was going to reply, but the snap of a twig caused all three of us to swirl in that direction. Mark rose his SAW, I rose my M4, and Nick unholstered his pistol. Emerging from the treeline in front of us was probably the last thing we expected; three white horses with golden armor in a Roman style fashion; the helmets had a blue plume sticking out of the top. One had wings sticking out of its back while the other had a horn sticking from its forehead. One had a spear levitating above it while the others were somehow holding them with their hooves. "Are... Those horses?" Nick said, looking up at me from his position on the ground. "We're certainly not in Kansas anymore." Mark grunted, slightly lowering his weapon. "What the hell?" I asked, looking at him. From what I saw they were wearing, the golden Roman style armor, they were obviously intelligent. The horses seemed to not pay attention as they were eying our weapons and stood ground. They saw us as a threat. All three of them started yelling at us... to get on the ground? The one with the spear seemed ready to throw. The three of us rose our weapons and started yelling as well. {-} Rainbow Dash ventured far off from the others and had gone closer to the edge of the forest, ignoring her princess's requests. While her mind was waging war on itself wondering what to do, it stopped when she faintly heard yelling, and lots of it. She flew a bit lower so that she was hovering just above the treeline and continued onwards with haste. In a few moments, she was bordering the edge of the forest and could hear the yelling much more clear. She recognized some of the yelling to be from the Guard that was sent out as a search party earlier. Staying above and out of the verbal fight atop the trees, Dash had gone parallel to whoever the guards were yelling at, and, for the first time in her life, she was actually scared at what she saw.
