ValtonAce

I looked around the group of worried faces.

“We have to evacuate the village. There are bombers incoming.” I said.

“What in tarnation are those?” The Texan pony asked.

I sighed. “They are bigger versions of the plane I came down in. They carry bombs, which will destroy this town unless we can stop them.”

“How?” Twilight asked.

“If I can get my plane back up in the air, I had some ammo I hadn’t used yet. Where is my plane?” I asked.

Twilight glanced at the others. “It’s still in the swamp. There's no way we can get there in time.”

I stepped into the daylight. The sun looked beautiful on the clouds.

‘Too bad it won’t last long enough.’ I thought. Anger started to well inside of me.

‘Too bad I can’t get into the air. Too bad I can’t fucking kill the bastards.’  I closed my eyes, tears fighting to be free.

‘Too bad I can’t avenge Buzz and Mikey.’

“Uhh, Twilight? What’s happening to his cutie mark?” Rainbow Dash asked. Valton’s cutie mark was beginning to glow.

“I...I don’t know.” She replied, taking a step back. The wind began to pick up around them, cycloning around Valton. Trees began to bend and snap.

“He’s whipping up a tornado!” Applejack cried.

The images flashed into my head. Wings, struts, pylons, all congregating on one thing. A plane the likes of which I had never seen before. I felt nothing, not the ground underneath my hooves nor the sun’s rays on my flanks.

‘Too bad that the fucking Russians tried to mess with me.’

“What is happening?” Rarity yelled over the wind. “My hair is getting messed up.”

Twilight didn’t answer. She was too busy staring at the thing Valton was assembling. It was made of wood, yet looked like metal, shining in the sunlight. Suddenly the wind began to die down. Valton staggered and fell in front of the contraption.

“What is that thing Valton?” I heard Rainbow ask.

I shook my head and stood shakily.“I don’t know.” I looked back at the others. “How did I do that? How did I build that out of thin air?”

“I’m not sure. You’re not a unicorn. Only unicorns can do magic.” Twilight said, looking off into the distance. “I’d like to run some tests on you.”

“I don’t have time right now. I’ll see you on the ground later.” I climbed into the cockpit, noticing that the helmet was sitting on the seat, and that the controls seemed similar to the Raptor’s. I placed the helmet on my head and the diaplay showed up, showing me my altitude and other things.

“Welcome back sir.” The green text appeared near the bottom left.

“Do you have an audio option?” I asked, barely able to read the text.

“Yes sir.” A crisp English accent answered me.

“Holy shit, you sound like Jarvis!” I exclaimed.

“I must inquire, who?”

‘You know, Jarvis? From Iron Man? Never mind. Mind if I call you Jarvis anyway?” I said.

“Armaments at 20% sir. Only enough for 5 planes sir.” Jarvis said.

“Uhhh, okay. Hows the fuel?”

“50%.”

“Shit”

“Ready for takeoff sir?”

I glanced around the plane. “We don’t have enough room to take off, Jarvis.”

“Sir, the ED-101 Phoenix is a VTOL fighter.” That explained why I didn’t recognize it.  I’d never heard of the Phoenix before. I looked out the window and gestured wildly at the group to get them out of the way.

“I’m ready.” I said, mentally switching myself off as I always did before a fight and grabbed the stick between my hooves “Let’s do this.”

The giant metal...thing lifted off with a roar.

“Uh, Twi? What just happened?” Applejack said, picking her hat up off of a fence post.

“Oh, my hair! It’s ruined!” Rarity cried

“Switching to regular flight mode sir.” There was a slight bump and the plane shot forwards.

“How long to engagement Jarvis?”

“60 seconds sir. Advise you climb to 2500 feet. The bombers are descending.”

“Roger.” I said as I pulled the stick back and felt the G-Forces press me backwards. I scanned in front of me, eyes searching for anything. I spotted a few black dots headed towards town.

“Got’em. Activate radar.” The plane’s radar began to sweep, and pinged one of the planes.

“Too far off for a shot, sir. 100 feet to maximum range.”

“Fuck it.” I said firing a missile. The radar locked on a second later and the missile began to track towards the fighter. It broke left, and exploded. The debris fell to the ground, smashing into a barn and lighting it. The bombers began a slow turn to run as three of the fighters raced closer to me.

I rolled and dove, as a beeping told me that the MiGs were trying to get a lock. I brought the stick back, flashing over their heads as I went airborne. I rolled over again, flying straight down at them as I fired short bursts of the machine gun in the nose. One of the planes’ wing fell off and it rolled into a deadman’s spiral.

I came out of the dive, right behind a MiG, and got an immediate lock. I fired, and the missile turned the plane, and pilot, into an airbound torch. The lone surviving MiG turned tail and ran.

“Whoo! Hell yeah!” I whooped, sweat pouring down my body. “Nailed the bastards!”

“Sir, you are now what’s considered an ace. Congratulations!”

The reverberating sounds of the dogfight were still over Applejack’s head as she ran to Sweet Apple Acres. She galloped through the gates and stopped dead in her tracks as she saw what waited in front of her. Applebloom was crying beside Big Macintosh, as Granny Smith lay in front of both.

“No, nononononononono!” Applejack yelled and ran towards her family. She skidded to a halt next to granny’s body and stared at Big Mac as tears welled in her eyes.

“Is- is she-?” Applejack couldn’t finish her sentence.

“Yup.” Mac said, looking down sadly. Applejack slumped to the ground, sobbing.

“Sir, I suggest you don’t do that again. We only have 5% fuel left.” Jarvis scolded after I did a barrel roll.

“Then I’d better find a place to land.” I replied, pulling the throttle back to idle.

“Sir, I have found three places to land. One is in the middle of town, the other is in the middle of the forest, and the third is where we took off from.”

“What’s the closest? I’m running out of sky here.”  I wasn't kidding. The plane was just gliding, and the ground was getting closer by the second.

“The town.” Jarvis said. “It is 2.5 meters closer tha-”

“Stuff the lecture.” I said. “Just tell me how to get there.” A small directional arrow appeared under my display, and I relit the engines. The plane turned and rumbled towards the center of the small town I had saved.

“Switching to hover mode now, sir.”

“Here he comes.” Rainbow Dash said, swooping down to where the others stood. Fluttershy looked worriedly at Dash.

“I wonder how he did that.” Twilight said, chewing on her lip in concentration. “I didn’t help him, and Rarity said she didn’t, so who did?”

“I don’t know, but that was AWESOME!” Dash said, doing a quick flip before landing. “I want to know how to do that. Do you think he will teach me?” She grinned wildly.

“You’ll get a chance” Twilight said. “But I’m first.” She was still looking at the plane as it came wobbling into view, its roar becoming louder with every second.

“Looks like I have a welcoming committee.” I said. “Jarvis, let’s make this look good, eh?”

“Sir, I doubt we have the fuel. We are down to 1% fuel capacity.”

“So no fireworks, then?” I said, starting to concentrate on landing.

“Undoubtedly, sir.”