Game Set Match

          Chapter 3 "black Friday"

-Pvt Pawns Marshall

04:56 o clock

New Mombasa Shopping Centre

"Urff, talk about a crappy landing.." Pawns groaned, and unclipped his safety harness. He pushed on the release of his pod, but it stuck fast.

"What the hay... This stuff always happens to me!" He sighed and pushed a button on his helmet.

"Pawns to King, requesting immediate pod release." He signalled over watch that his pod wouldn't open, and then waited. Pawns was a young earth pony, with a black messy crop of a mane on his head, and a red coat of fur. His green eyes twinkled with excitement. His pod was clean, but much like Rooks, had a picture in the top left corner. This one was of Queen, holding her helmet and dragging Pawns out of a burning warthog jeep. He sighed happily, and picked the picture up, and held it to his heart.

"If only I could tell you how I feel. Maybe you feel the same my love." Unbeknownst to him, his com was still on, and his love proclamation was being spread through the main area of the Alicorns Horn. "Your deep blue-". He was interrupted by the sound of Queen clearing her throat.

"Hey Romeo! Get your head out of the stars, and get your flank out there! Your pod unlocked five minutes ago." Pawn's red face turned an even darker shade, and he quickly put on his helmet and hopped out of his pod, opening the side on it and grabbing his assault rifle and target locator. He turned on his VISR and looked around the area.

"So Rook's over there... Guess I better meet him half way." He didn't notice the massive group of red dots moving in on his location to investigate the explosion. He steeped around the mall in awe.

"I heard this place was big, but this is just unreal!" He said, amazed at the size of the complex. For fun, he downloaded the mall map from a Kiosk and looked at it.

"Hmmmmmmm.... I think I'll check out the Desert Gem Jewelry store. Maybe I can pick Queen up something." He put away his rifle and dashed off to the store. As he passed an open window, a pony with compound eyes, a hard shell on its back which housed powerful thin wings, and four mandibles clicked its jaws curiously at the thing it observed. It the crawled out of the window frame and flew elsewhere.

Pawns Turned one last corner, and hopped over a collapsed cell phone stand, and smiled as the store met his eyes. "Now lets see... What would Queen want?" He trotted slowly into the store, trying to find anything in the destroyed remains of the store. Most of the pricey items had already went missing, this store having being raided more then once by the looks of it. As he looked under the counter, he heard a soft clicking noise. He stiffened and jumped behind the counter, arming his rifle and pressing his body against the counter's wall. He cautiously peeped his head out, and made a small terrified squeak. A drone had managed to find its way to him, having found his location only by pure luck. It's emerald body glittered in the light of the store, and it stared curiously at some of the gems, infatuated by their shimmering properties. Pawns slowly pulled his rifle up, and aimed at the drones head. "Just keep looking, give me just one more second... There!" He smiled as the rifle's reflex sight Lined up with the drone's head, and he squeezed the trigger. Shell casings fell to the floor as the .25 caliber shots flung the drone backward, and over a display stand, it's head pocked with bloody holes. As green blood flowed onto the floor, Pawns grinned and put his rifle away, and added another tick mark to his kill count. "Sorry buddy. Better luck next time." As he went to leave the store, he bumped Into something. He looked up, and saw it was a crowd of drones, having come to investigate the noise of his rifle.

"Buck! Forgot you guys came in swarms!" He pulled out his rifle and started to spray the crowd. Blood flew and screeches pierced the air as some of them fell, the others extending their wings and taking flight, shooting their plasma pistols and needlers at him. Pawns barely dodged the wave of green and purple projectiles flung at him, and he retreated down an escalator. Sliding down the railing, he took the small break to reload, and get into a defending position. As he pulled up his map, he cursed. In his pursuit of gems, he had went in the complete opposite direction of Rook, his teammate now not visible. "Damn!" He yelled as he shot more rounds off at the drones. They advanced relentlessly, the bullets whizzing harmlessly by them. As Pawns tried to take down his air borne foes, he suddenly felt a sharp pain in his side, he looked down, and saw his armour was cracked from the fall from space, and a needle had embedded itself In his side, blood pooling under the wound. He grunted and pulled it out. Bad idea. The jagged spikes made the exit wound bigger, blood pouring freely from the wound. He yelled in pain as more shots from the enemy flew by him. He picked up his rifle and shot blindly. Suddenly, a loud ringing filled the air. He looked up, and a green glowing orb smashed Into his body. He fell back, and his visor blacked out, his armour sparking. The drones looked at their enemy, and one of them flew down to him. The armoured ponies helmet had a needle sticking through the visor, and it wasn't moving. Convinced they had killed him, they grabbed his legs and flew off. Unable to see anything, save for a massive purple spike inches from his snout, Pawns decided it was best to stay dead and they hopefully might leave him alone.