"MAKING A FRIEND”

Hell, hell was a paradise when compared to the arid, rocky planet that Rex currently found himself on. He was in the middle of fighting for his life alongside his men against a seemingly limitless supply of battle droids. No matter how many droids they destroyed, they just kept coming.

Rex and his men were taking cover in the remains of an AT-TE. Their chances of survival looked bleak. They had limited ammunition, their artillery had been destroyed, and no reinforcements could be expected.

Rex was having a really bad time, the entire Republic convoy had been destroyed, half of his men where already dead, and there where almost no hope to get out of this alive.

Rex sighed, 'I wish the general was here', thought Rex right before an explosion nearly got him.

"Sir!” cried a trooper, "They are too many of them! We won’t be able to hold them for much longer. We need to ........." the clone was silenced by a gunshot to the head.

"Dammit!” yelled Rex. He then proceeded to stand up and return fire, before quickly taking cover again.

Another clone ran up to Rex, "Sir, there are too many droids, what should we do?”

Rex knew they were out of options. "We hold this position for as long as we can! Now keep firing!"

The clone nodded and continued firing at the droids.

"Can this get any worse?” muttered Rex.

They were still trying to resist the enemy when one of the clones shouted, "Captain, look in the sky!"

Rex does what the clone asks, and activates his binocular antenna. On the horizon he spots a squadron of bombardier droids flying toward them. He had a bad feeling about this.

After a few moments Rex had an idea, he made his way over to one of the clones to pass on his orders. "Bring all the remaining PLX-1 missile launchers to the front, and give them to the best shooters we have!”

"Yes sir", said the clone as he moved away.

Rex then turns to another of the remaining clones. "The rest of you form a line of fire and concentrate on the largest group of droids, You will provide cover for the launchers to get a clear shot!"

"Yes sir", said the clone.

However, another of the clones ran up to Rex, "Sir, are we going to try and take out the bombers with the launchers? The PLX-1’s are not meant to take out bombers."

Rex turned to look at him, "No”. Turning back to look at the bombers, "Concentrate your fire on the bombs when they fall. It’s our only chance." Rex stated, leaving behind the surprised trooper.

Rex made his way back to the front lines yelling at all the clones, "Move it, we don't have all day!"

Once Rex joined the others, and began firing at the droids, one of the clones approached him, "Sir, the shooters are ready!"

"Good, wait for my signal", replied Rex while taking cover behind the leg of the AT-TE.

"Sir, the bombers are almost on top of our position!” yelled the tech specialist.

While most of the clones were fighting the battle droids, the ones who were carrying the PLX-1’s were ready and waiting for the Captain orders.

The bombers were seconds away from their position.

"Shooters get your ground to air missiles ready!” Shouted Rex.

The bombers were preparing to drop their bombs.

"Ready!”

The bombers started to drop their bombs.

"Lock on to your targets!”

The bombs started to fall towards the clones.

“Fire!!!” bellowed Rex.

All the clones fired their missiles, thanks to their G.A.M., each missile was able to hit its target. The resulting explosion covered the sky. However, there where to many bombs, and some made it through.

While Rex scrambled to get to cover, one of the bombs fell directly in front of him. Rex could only cover himself with his arms, and expect the worst, but nothing happened.

After a couple seconds he lifted his arms to see what happened. Sitting in front of him was the bomb that should have taken his life. Rex couldn’t believe his luck. What where the chances that the bomb would be defective. Even if it was defective he didn’t want to be anywhere near it.

So Rex quickly distanced himself from the device.

While most of the bombs had been destroyed a few had made it through. However they weren’t all duds.

They landed all around the clones positions.

After the smoke from the bombs cleared a hole had been exposed by one of the bombs. While the rest of his troops continued to fight the droids Rex took a quick look at the hole, only to find something incredible.

"What the hell ....." muttered Rex, he was surprised at what he found at the bottom, it was a huge tunnel. ‘It must be some sort of underground tunnel network' thought Rex. He decided to take his chances.

He turned to the rest of his men, "Everyone in the hole now!"

The rest of his men did as they were ordered. They began to work their way to the hole maintaining suppressing fire the whole way. Rex was left up top to cover those who had yet to enter.

Many of the remaining clones were unable to make it. Some were shot while trying, and others were simply too wounded to make it.

As the droids continued to approach the hole they started to surround it.

Finally all the clones that could make it were in the hole. The only one left on the surface was Rex. With one last look to make sure he was the last one he jumped in as well, that’s when everything went dark.........
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Sometime later Rex finally woke up. He opened his eyes and took note of his situation. He was still wearing his helmet witch was a good thing.

However he appeared to be locked in some kind of wooden room, which was strange in and of itself. It didn't end there though, he quickly realized that he was lying in a very comfortable bed.

After another few seconds of trying to figure out what this place was he gave up, at least for the time being.

"Why do I always have to wake up in strange places?" he asked himself.

When he finally tried to off the bed he almost collapsed again as pain raced through his body. “Aaaaaagghh!” without hesitation he fell back onto the bed.

”That hurt a lot. It almost feels like I got body slammed by a super battle droid, again.” After a couple more minutes he braced himself and tried to sit up again. Since he knew what to expect he was able to do it this time.

Now that he was finally up he took the chance to examine the rest of his body.

At what he saw he couldn’t help but chuckle, despite the pain. There were, what appeared to be bandages, wrapped all around his armor. "Looks like someone didn’t know how to get my armor off,” joked Rex until he thought of something. “Or maybe they don’t know that this is armor”.

At that moment Rex suddenly remembered the strange dream he had while he was sleeping. ‘What was that about?, I think it was a dream, but did it really happen, that was before I came to this planet, it was before……..,’ suddenly, Rex heard something right behind him, "what was that?" Rex spun to face the origin of the noise.

Only to see a tiny creature hiding in the doorway with a look of terror on her face.

Rex recognized her, ‘It’s the yellow one from earlier, this must be her house. She is probably the one who brought me here, she saved my life,’ thought Rex.

Regardless Rex was surprised to see the creature, he was expecting some kind of military to show up at least.

After going through everything he knew Rex could see no reason to fight at the moment. He looked back at the creature again, only to see she was in same place, frozen in terror.

Not wanting to scare her anymore Rex decided to try a more diplomatic approach then he was used to.

So with no better ideas in mind he simply held out his hand, "Hello there miss."

Sadly, the creature just continued to stare at Rex. Instead of answering she began scream, loudly. So loudly in fact it left Rex stunned for a few seconds.

As soon as he recovered he had other issues on his mind. 'This is not good, I need to stop her before she alerts any others in the vicinity.'

So ignoring the pain Rex jumped out of bed and ran over to her as fast as he could. Once he was in reach he clapped his hand over her mouth to silence her.

This in turn caused her to panic even more.

"Calm down please! I’m not going to hurt you!" Shouted Rex trying in an attempt calm her, but it didn't work.

As he continued to try and calm the panicked creature he slowly became aware of something happening on his shoulder. Curious as to what it might be he tilted his head to get a better view of the cause.

To his surprise there was a different creature standing on his shoulder.

Unlike the other one this one was white, and had two long ears and some kind of fluffy tail. While Rex was making this observation the little white creature continued kicking his helmet, which had been the source of the odd feeling.

It seemed like it was trying to protect the other creature.

Rex would have laughed at the absolute ridiculousness of this situation, if he wasn’t in such a serious situation.

Rex ignored the white creature, and continued trying to calm the yellow one down, but she just kept fighting and she was stronger than she looked.

Rex could have just knocked her out, but he preferred to stick with his plan to not use lethal force, or anything else that may get him in even more trouble later on.

He was starting to run out of patience however, and knew he was going to have to do something soon to resolve this situation one way or another.

At that moment his hand slipped a little, and the creature accidentally bit him while she was trying to get away.
"Arrrg!" Shouted Rex as he wrenched his hand away from the creature. "Dammit! That really hurt". Rex had to admit it was painful, painful enough to make him mad.

"That’s it! No more Mr. nice guy!" Rex said as he grabbed the creature and placed it in front of him.

"Now listen!" Rex said silencing the creature and getting her full attention, “You may not understand me, and I may not understand you! I just want you to know that I will not harm you, and you have nothing to fear from me!”

After staring at each other for a few seconds he added. “Oh, and please tell your little friend here to stop kicking my helmet it’s getting annoying.” Rex was pointing at the little white creature.

To Rex’s surprise the yellow creature had started to calm down. Noting this Rex decided to let her go. She was no longer staring at him with a look of terror just one of nervousness, and maybe a tiny shred of curiosity.

Rex couldn’t believe it, somehow the creature had understood him. At a loss for what to do next he just stood there.
Surprisingly she was the first one to make a move.

She picked up her hoof and pointed at herself, and quietly said. “Fluttershy.”

Realizing that must be her name Rex decided to play along. He would think about the odds of her understanding him later.

Rex knelt down so he was eye level with Fluttershy, and with his hand pointed at himself. "Rex.”

After a few moments Fluttershy smiled, and with one of her hooves she pointed at his shoulder. Specifically at the little white creature that was still kicking his helmet in a vain attempt to hurt him.

"Angel," she said while grabbing the white creature.

'Angel? That must be his name', thought Rex, 'maybe we cannot understand each other, but I guess our names will continue sounding the same regardless of language.

This may be the opportunity I was looking for.’

After Fluttershy introduced him to Angel she said something else and walked over to the bed, and with her hoof motioned towards the bed.

“Ok, I know what you want me to do.”

Rex understood what she wanted, she wanted Rex to get back in bed. So Rex did as she asked, ignoring the pain, and headed over to the bed where he sat down.

Fluttershy then indicated she wanted him to remain in bed. Once she was sure he understood she made her way to the door, but just before leaving she turned and said a few words to Angel.

He frowned at whatever she said but turned to leave with her regardless. Just as they were both about to leave the room angel turned around, and with one of his arms made a gesture showing he was watching him.

With that he finally turned at hopped after Fluttershy.

Rex remained sitting up in bed unable to believe what had just happened. 'This is going better than I expected. I’ve made contact with a local and she’s not trying to run away from me anymore.

Perhaps if a play my cards right they may be able to help me return to the Republic.’
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________

(POV Fluttershy)

Fluttershy couldn't believe how crazy the last day had been. The day had started out so normally so how had it ended up like this. She was now in the process of trying to cook for an alien that was currently sitting in her bed upstairs. She started to think back on just what had happened.

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Some Hours Before

"What’s the matter Angel? Is there something going on outside?" Angel didn’t’ answer. Instead he just started to hop even faster gesturing madly as he went.

"I don’t understand Angel, did something happen?" once again no answer came. Fluttershy didn’t get the chance to ask any more questions.

She didn’t need to, she could see the answer with her own eyes.

"Aaaaaaagghhhhh" Fluttershy cried. Grabbing Angel along the way she dashed back to her home and slammed door behind her. She had done this all so quickly even Rainbow Dash would have been impressed.

"Oh no Angel! The alien is out there, we have to hide!" screamed Fluttershy while Angel continued trying to calm her.

After a few minutes, Fluttershy decided to take another look to see if the alien was gone.

To her surprise, the alien had not moved. 'Is there something wrong with it? 'With a little more confidence she stepped a little closer.

She could now see a slight rise and fall to its chest, so it was still breathing. Relieved that it wasn’t dead she tentatively reached at a hoof and nudged it a couple times, no response.

"Oh no, it must be unconscious! I should do something!" Fluttershy stopped herself there. ”What if it's dangerous, it might hurt me, or eat me or….NO! Dangerous or not, it needs help!”

After a slight pause she continued in a whisper. ”I just hope I’m doing the right thing.”

After arriving at her decision she began dragging the alien back to her house.

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Back to the present

While cooking, Fluttershy continued to wonder about the Alien. 'Wow, I cannot believe that the alien is in my house ........ The same alien who hurt the Changelings ....... and that poor Manticore.......and the..... 'Fluttershy began to panic,' No, no no no, I must be calm, certainly he did it because he was afraid. Lots of animals hurt others when they are afraid. He does seem friendly though, and he even told me his name. What was it again? Oh yeah, Rex, what a strange name, and he also ..... '.

Knock! .... Knock! .... Knock!

"Oh, coming," said Fluttershy as she left the kitchen and headed to the front door.

Fluttershy opened the door, only to find Twilight and Rainbow Dash waiting outside. "Oh, hello Twilight, hello Rainbow, what are you are doing .....?, Fluttershy was interrupted by Twilight.

"No time for formalities Fluttershy by any chance have you seen the Alien around here?

"Yeah! He owes me a rematch!" Rainbow Dash added, fuming with anger.

Fluttershy began to feel nervous, but tried to hide it behind a false smile. "No. Sorry but I didn’t see anything, but….. if I see anything I’ll be sure to tell you girls. You know that r..right?", she said letting out a nervous laugh as she did so.

Twilight and Rainbow Dash looked at each other in confusion. They could see just how nervous Fluttershy was, but they decided that it was probably just because the alien was still on the loose and she was scared.

Fluttershy did not like lying to her friends, but she was not sure how they would react, especially Twilight. Surely she would tell Princess Celestia, and then the Princess would lock Rex in prison again for sure.

Even if Fluttershy had just met Rex, she liked him, and somehow like the animals she was able to communicate with him. She could see that he wasn’t as bad as the others made him out to be. He just needed a chance to show it. A chance she could give him.

“Ok, well, thanks for the help Fluttershy.” With that Twilight turned around and began to leave. Fluttershy felt relieved, but before she could close the door Rainbow spoke up.

“Fluttershy, is there somepony home with you?” asked Rainbow Dash.

Fluttershy’s nervousness came back full force. "I.....I....no....no there’s no pony here.....why do you ask Rainbow?"

"Well, because I can smell something cooking, and you usually only cook if you have guests, or something.”

Fluttershy didn’t know what to do so she did the first thing that came to mind, "I .... I ..... I'msorrybutIhavetogobye!" she shouted quickly, flinging the door closed as she finished, leaving her two friends baffled.

Fluttershy collapsed against the door as relief washed over her. After taking a few moments to regain her composure she headed back to the kitchen.

"Well, I better go finish cooking, Rex must be hungry after everything he’s been through." With that Fluttershy smiled and continued where she had left off.

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Twilight and Rainbow Dash were both confused as they made their way back to Ponyville. Rainbow finally broke the silence, "What happened to Fluttershy?"

"I don’t know, but we better continue looking for that alien. Do you think you could continue on your own for a bit? I have to go write a letter to the Princess. We are going to need her help.” answered Twilight.

Rainbow Dash nodded and they both went their separate ways.

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(POV Rex)

Rex was currently sitting on the small bed, his head filled with thoughts of how to get himself on better terms with these creatures. His thoughts were interrupted when the sound of the door opening caught his attention.

Rex turned to see who it was, it was Fluttershy. She flew through the doorway carrying a tray with food on it, or at least that’s what Rex assumed it was.

Fluttershy approached him and handed him the tray.

Rex, knowing that she was offering him the food, took it gladly.

Fluttershy was ecstatic that he had accepted the food she had made. Her excitement quickly changed to curiosity. How was it going to eat if it didn't have a mouth?

Fluttershy was very curious, so she just stared until something happened. When it did she couldn’t believe it. Rex put his hands on either side of his head, and gave a small twist. He then proceeded to take his head off. Fluttershy was in a near panic, that is until she saw the face underneath.

That’s when it hit her, what he had pulled off wasn’t his head, but a helmet. Fluttershy continued to examine his face. It was flesh colored, and just like a pony’s, he had two eyes, a nose, two ears, and a mouth.

Unlike ponies however he had no hair to speak of, except for a very thin layer on top of his head.

Rex began to eat, and was pleasantly surprised. It was strange for sure, there was no meat to speak of, but the taste wasn’t so bad. He even began to enjoy it, and it had been a long time since he had enjoyed a meal.

The only way it could have been better is if Fluttershy would stop staring. Ever since he had taken his first bite she had been staring at him with an odd look in her eyes. He did his best to ignore her.

A few minutes later, and Rex had finished eating. "Well that wasn’t so bad," he stated. Before he could relax again he had one important matter to attend to. His injuries from the construction accident had yet to be treated. So he decided to get it over with.
Fluttershy was surprised by what happened next.

Rex began to remove the white parts of his body, and everything else he was wearing, leaving only a thin black cloth.

Before Fluttershy could do anything, Rex began to reply the bandages that Fluttershy had put on before. She was impressed by his knowledge of first aid.

After Rex finished putting all the bandages back on a smirk spread across his face. “Much better.”

While watching Rex Fluttershy had a sudden urge to know everything about his species. It wasn't just that however she wanted to know him as a person. Maybe they could be friends.

With that in mind Fluttershy spent the rest of the day with Rex.

TO BE CONTINUED

Author's Note

This is the longer chapter sow far, sorry for all the time it took me, but here is.

Many thanks Cobalt Blur, I can tell you become to me a good friend.