Welcome to Equestria, Please do not Wrangle the local Wildlife

Chapters

Explanations
The plan, also violence happens
Cutie Mark Crusaders conspiracy theorists! YAAAY!
Prolouge
Arrival

Explanations

Getting the alien back to the castle without anypony seeing him was a bit tricky but Pinkie Pie had an idea. "What if we get that old dragon costume Rarity made when we were following Spike and hide him under that?" This suggestion had the result of everypony present looking towards her, each with their own question.

Rainbow Dash was skeptical, "Err, Pinkie? I thought we got rid of that old thing when we had to follow him and those jerks into the woods? How exactly are we gonna get ahold of it? That was like a two week's walk away from here and I cant carry it while flying."

Pinkie grinned and zipped over to a nearby tree and reached inside of a hole in it, somehow producing the massive costume from within, "I went back and got it, now I keep it here in case of needing-a-giant-dragon-costume-to-hide-an-alien-emergency!" She gasped for air and then resumed her smile and 'squeed'.

Applejack gave her an unconvinced look, "Y'all really had a dragon costume stored away in this exact spot, JUST in case an alien happened to need to sneak into Ponyville without causing a panic?" she snorted, "Pinkie, you have said some weird things but I just don't see how that's true."

Pinkie's smile shrunk down to more of a slightly embarrassed grin, "Yeah, heh, I just thought it would be cool to have a giant costume like that and decided to go and grab it after you girls came back."

Lonestar had no idea what any of them were talking about so he decided to just get under the dragon shaped tarp and follow the ponies. As they walked through the town he peered out through the eye holes that were cut into the neck and took note of his surroundings. It appeared to be a small town that was entirely inhabited by these brightly colored ponies. His eye began to twitch as he imagined lassoing them and then putting them all in a pen. He didn't really know what to do after that part but it was taking all of his self-control not to bring out his rope.

They got back to the castle without incident and quickly hurried inside. Lonestar pulled off the hot costume and wiped his brow with the back of his hand. "Whew I'm glad to be outta that thing, it's worse than being cooped up in a drop pod."

Twilight turned to him, "Is that what that giant fireball that we saw fly into the forest was? We saw an unusually large meteor fly overhead and decided to investigate what it might have been since it didn't look like normal space debris." She began to hover in excitement and as she continued talking a smile grew on her face to the point of almost looking demented, "And now We get to make first contact with an Alien species! Oh my gosh I have so many questions to ask you!"

Lonestar began to slowly back away, the smile on her face was reminding him of the Bovinian scientists who had made him as they watched his skills as a cowboy develop. "Um, well, as long as ya'll keep to just the questions and don't try to experiment on me sometin' nutty like that we should be just fine, what do you need to know?" He had suspected they were an underdeveloped species by the primitive construction of their buildings but this particular pony was acting like she was going to dissect him at any moment, he subconsciously powered up his Hyper-Bull just in case they decided to jump him.

Twilight used her magic to grab a quill and ink from a shelf and got ready to write down the stocky alien's every word. She opened her mouth to ask her first question but was beaten to the punch by Pinkie Pie, " So what's your name? You never said and I can't throw you a 'Welcome to Equestria' party if I don't know your name" This was followed by an even larger grin.

Lonestar had destroyed thousands of robots and wrangled the population of an entire cow civilization but the way that pink pony was somehow able to smile literally ear to ear was creeping him out. "Uh, Lonestar, my name's Lonestar" he decided to inflate his reputation a bit, "I'm called the wildest gun in the galaxy." In all honesty he was the only person who called himself that but he was sure in his mind that if there was some kind of ranking he would be on top.

"Oooo, what's a gun? Is it like my party cannon?" Out of nowhere the frizzy haired pony produced a massive cannon. This in itself was not startling as Lonestar himself could create sticks of dynamite with the nano-generator in his belt but the fact that it was aimed directly at his face was a minor cause of worry.

"HOLY HELL POINT THAT THING SOMEPLACE ELSE!!" He lunged to the side and triggered his burst rocket boots to gain the extra speed and distance he needed to hide in an alcove in the wall.

Rarity chastised Pinkie with a disapproving glare, "Really, Pinkie I would have thought you could restrain yourself just this once for such an important occasion such as this!" She glanced to where the cowboy was now poking his head around the corner cautiously. "Its alright, she wasn't going to fire it at you, its mostly harmless anyway... mostly"

Lonestar came back over to the ponies, his spurs jingling lightly as he did so, "Sorry 'bout that, I get a tad twitchy when I see a gun that big pointed at me, usually that means I'm 'bout to be in some serious trouble."

Twilight gave a slight huff and brought up her quill again, "Well if you are quite done terrorizing our guest I would like to get on with my questions." Pinkie giggled apologetically.

"All right, whatcha got for me?"

She looked over him with a critical eye, "Why are you wearing cowpony clothes? Seems a little, well, primitive for a space-faring race." She turned to Applejack, suddenly aware of the fact she just accidentally insulted most of her family's life style, with a sheepish grin. "No offense."

"None taken."

Lonestar scratched the back of his head, "Well shoot, I've just always worn them. Long story short I was created in a lab by cow-people to be the perfect cowboy as an amusement park attraction to scare the calves. Only problem was security was really low and I broke out. There were just so many cows there I had to start wranglin' and I didn't stop until I couldn't find anymore cows, by that time the whole planet of them was out to pasture." He looked back to the ponies from his flashback and noticed their stunned expressions. "What?"

Applejack was the first to speak, "Mr. Lonestar, you wouldn't mind showing me and some of my kin how to do that would you?" Applejack, while confident in her skills as a cowpony couldn't even think about rounding up an entire planet's worth of cows.

"I'd love to but to be frank, if I got started I'd probably end up roundin' y'all up along with 'em. And given that it looks like I don't have any way off this planet it wouldn't be the best idea to give everything that lives on it reason to hate me."

Twilight finished writing everything he had said down and looked back up at him, "Why are you used to these... guns being pointed at you? Are you some kind of space soldier?"

He laughed, pulled out one of his cigars and lit it off of the heel of his rocket boot, "Ma'am, I am one of the universe's most skilled mercenaries, I blow up buildings and shoot down robots for a living, gettin' shot at in return is just an occupational hazard."

Twilight began to scribble furiously, her report to Celestia becoming longer by the second. Rainbow Dash seemed to be very disapproving of the fact that he was a hired gun, she flew into his face and glared, "A merc huh? In every story I've read mercs are always the goons of some villian, why are you here? YOU WERE SENT TO SPY ON US WEREN'T YOU?! YOU PLANING SOME KINDA INVASION?"

The stocky cowboy just laughed and gently pushed her away from him before her mane was lit on fire by his cigar. "Listen missy, I ain't our team's spy, I just yell a lot and chuck dynamite, if stealth is what you want you would need to be looking for Leon."

"Team? What team would that be?" Twilight interrupted.

Lonestar gave a swift reply, "I'm an Awesomenaut, we're the best team of mercenaries in the whole galaxy, right now our head honcho is Zork Industries. They make all kinds of stuff including weapons so our job is basically to fight on whichever side of the war that they are currently sellin' weapons to so they live long enough to buy more of 'em, something like that anyway, I just pay attention to the fighting."

Twilight looked at him in shock, "You keep a war on-going just for money?"

"Well, yeah, it ain't any real moral issue though, its just for the money, besides, the war is between two groups of robots so nobody really gets hurt as long as they leave the battlefield before they start fightin'. They get to fight it out over whatever it is they are fighting over, no one really knows what that is, the manufactures get more money than they know what to do with, we get a job, everyone wins."

Twilight thought the situation over in her head, it did seem logical, "Okay, I guess I get what you mean, but you still haven't explained why you are here, We found a circle of burnt trees with your footprints by it but there wasn't any kind of wreckage or ship nearby."

"Well, the thing about the Awesomenauts is that we have a policy of 'As long as you stay out of trouble while with us, we don't care what you did before you were with us, And one of our members is a complete phsychopath, ended up mugging a galactic senator about thirty-six hours ago, the entire posse of that senator came after us and we had to use the drop pods we normally use to deploy on the battlefield to escape, I have no idea where the rest of the team landed, this planet isn't even anywhere on the charts."

Twilight's ears perked up at the last sentence that the space-cowboy had spoken, "Wait you all evacuated? Then I think your teammates also landed here, the night that we saw your pod crash Other sightings of strange objects in the sky were reported all over Equestria."

Lonestar did a double take, "WHAT?!" He looked at Twilight with and urgent expression that almost bordered on fear, "Shucks I gotta get them grouped together before something happens."

Fluttershy spoke up (though whether it was really up was debatable), "Well, as long as they stay out of the Everfree they should be fine, Equestria is pretty civilized."

"It ain't them Ah'm worried about! Its whatever they run into! Some of them have really nasty personalities."

Twilight made an extra note on her report and handed it off to Spike, (who had been silent out of fear) "Quick, send this to Princess Celestia." She turned back to Lonestar, "Now that we know there isn't any hostile force coming, we can help you find your friends!" She smiled like it would be a cakewalk, not knowing how wrong she was.

Deep in the Everfree forest, a pack of Timberwolves was on the hunt, they had caught the scent of something and had been following it for over a day now. They all stopped as they heard a rustling in the bushes near them, followed by sadistic high pitched laughter. A blast of red energy flew out from the leaves and incinerated one of the wolves, the rest began to growl as a short and giggling figure with three glowing red eyes and an aura of crackling red lightning surrounding her jumped out of the bush she had been hiding in. About twenty seconds later she placed her hands back together and her inhibitor cuffs began to suppress her powers once more. Ayla looked around at the scorched remains of the Timberwolf pack and grinned, "This place is dangerous! I like It!

The plan, also violence happens

A hoof gently knocked on the door of Twilight's castle, the door was opened by Spike who had a very nervous look on his face, "Y-yeah? What do you need?" He looked out to see a white pegasus with a pink mane and a white coat standing on the doorstep. Her cutie mark was of a sun that was giving a cheery smile.

"Hello Spike, may I come in?"

His eyes widened, he would recognize Princess Celestia's motherly voice anywhere. "OH! yeah, sure your highness." He opened the door further to let her in and she trotted inside. She was met with the sight of The Bearers all standing looking at an odd creature who was obviously the alien that had been in the letter that Twilight had sent her. Upon reading it she had immediately donned her magical disguise which she used for going out in public incognito, then set off for Ponyville at high speeds.

Once Spike shut the door she dropped her disguise and watched as all off the ponies present did a double take while the alien looked on in minor amusement.

"Oh my gosh Celestia if I had known you would come right away I would have had a better welcome planned!"

"We didn't know you would come as soon as we sent the letter."

"We have to throw a party!"

"How is Philomena doing?"

"How did you manage that disguise?"

"It is such an honor to see you again."

She chuckled inwardly and politely waved them off, "It's very good to see you girls but right now I am here to speak with our visitor." She turned her attention to Lonestar who had been patiently smoking his cigar. "So, a mercenary from another world has come to Equestria. May I ask what your intent in coming here was?" Her tone was calm but Lonestar could tell that she was extremely serious, he guessed that he was not the best person to be making first contact with an underdeveloped world. particularly one inhabited by ponies. Polite words and diplomacy were not his strong suit.

"It was just an accident ma'am, we don't even have this planet on our charts, I just want to find the rest of my team before somethin' bad happens. Two of 'em are geniuses and can probably build us a new ship to get outta your hair... er, mane."

Celestia looked puzzled, "Since you are already here, why are you in such a hurry to leave? I understand you are worried about your friends but why not relax and stay for a while? I am sure our two species could learn much from each other."

Lonestar was not convinced, "If you ponies have never been in contact with off-world life, we ain't the best people ya'll are gonna want as your introduction to space." As he spoke he voice raised until it was bordering on yelling, "Some of the team can behave themselves but most of 'em can barely fit into our society let alone yours. You don't even have guns for Chrissakes!"

Celestia just smiled gently, "Well then this would be the perfect time for them to learn how to act outside of war, we haven't had any large scale conflicts in over a thousand years, only small scuffles with neighboring species. Maybe you can find out you can live without having to fight all the time."

Lonestar was skeptical but it did make sense to him, several of the crew members, including him, could do with a little learning up on behavior that did not involve blowing up everything in sight for fun and profit. "Okay we can discuss this later but the main issue we got here is that we have no idea where the rest of the team is."

Rainbow Dash spoke up, "Well we can't exactly just put up missing posters now can we? It would cause a panic! we should try to get together a few ponies who we can trust that can help us find the rest of them. Then, once we have them all we can make some kind of announcement officially and then we can find them places to fit in until they leave!"

The other ponies including the princesses seemed to like the idea but Lonestar just muttered to himself, "Like our lives weren't already like a Holo-show from the 2180s"

=======================================================================

The next day the new recruits were brought to the castle to be told what they would be doing. Pinkie Pie had brought her cousin Vinyl Scratch, her performances giving her an excuse to move throughout the land on a whim. Rainbow had surprisingly brought Derpy Doo, her reasoning being that if she accidentally let something slip no one would pay it any mind. Applejack had brought Big Mac, his apple cart would be able to provide a much more practical method of covert transport than a dragon costume. Finally Twilight had brought Zecora, her knowledge of the Everfree would be invaluable in case any of the crew had ended up in there. Rarity and Fluttershy had not brought anypony new, as Fluttershy would be enlisting the help of any animals they came across and Rarity was planning on using her own business to search for information.

They all met in the library and Twilight gave them the plan. "Okay everypony, as you have ben told by the ponies who brought you here, Equestria is the landing site of several escape pods of an alien craft. They are not here to harm us but are unaccustomed to our peaceful way of life. So it is going to be our job to try and find any news of strange goings-on in any part of Equestria or neighboring countries to see if we can find them all before they are discovered by the general populace and panic ensues."

Vinyl raised a hoof, "It would be helpful if we knew where we should start looking, if Celestia wants this all kept under the rug until we've found 'em all, how are we going to find info on them?"

Rarity answered her question, "I am sure we all will have our own sources of information but I for one will be able to listen to the gossip of my customers about any kind of strange events."

Vinyl nodded, "Alright makes sense, I guess the ponies at the clubs I play at might hear things.

"I can ask anypony if anything weird is happening on my deliveries!" Derpy proudly proclaimed.

Zecora then stepped forward with a grave expression, "I fear the forest has given me a warning, a rush of creatures this very morning. A creature lurks in the trees, snapping branches and burning leaves. Everywhere it brings death, roaring madly with every breath."

Everypony looked at her with a worried expression, except for Lonestar, "The hell are you rhyming for? This ain't a preschool this is serious."

She glared at him, "It is a proud tradition of my race, to make sure we rhyme in every place." She composed herself, "What could these warnings mean? You who searches for your team?"

He scratched his beard, "Damn, I never was too great at riddles. In any case I would say we should just head towards whatever it is and see what happens. If its some monster rampaging around then I can sure as hell put it down for ya'll." He turned to Twilight, "I guess you're the leader of this posse, what do we do?"

She gulped and though to herself, "Okay Twilight, you can do this, just leading a group of alien hunting ponies. You could potentially cause an international panic, but that won't happen!" Okay everypony, I have a plan! Lonestar, you, Zecora, Rainbow, and Fluttershy head into the forest. Find whatever this is and if it is one of your teammates bring them back here, Big Mac will be ready to smuggle you back into town in his cart." She looked to Lonestar, "Exactly how many of your friends are their? We need to find somewhere to keep them all hidden, this is a public library and I can't juts permanently shut it down."

"Hmm, Well there are 22 of us now, we have been picking up some new recruits lately, some of them will need a good amount of space though."

"Alright then, Applejack, Pinkie, and Rarity, you three see if you can find somewhere that will be big enough to hold them all that is out of sight."

Pinkie saluted eagerly, "Yes sir princess ma'am!" She flew out the door in a pink blur, Applejack and Rarity running after her.

She then looked to the two remaining ponies, Vinyl and Derpy. "Okay you two, start searching for any kind of news about meteors, asteroids, or weird monsters that you can find. If you hear anything, tell me immediately."

As they all went out and began their searches, Twilight wrote a letter to Celestia, who was handling the press and other matters of state. She finished her report and had Spike send it off.

"I don't know Twilight." he said with a worried look, "This seems like a bad idea to me, somepony is gonna find out and we aren't gonna be able to stop them from telling everypony."

"It will be fine Spike, I trust them not to let a secret like this get out."

=======================================================

Deep in the Everfree, the group of searchers continued their journey to where all the creatures of the forest had been running from. The further in they went, the more signs of destruction they found; dead animals, trees that had branches ripped off of them, and several piles of ash in a clearing that appeared to be the remains of Timberwolves. Fluttershy was practically having a nervous breakdown.

"Ohmygoshohmygoshohmygosh! What could have possibly done something like this? All these dead animals, and it didn't even eat them! It just killed them and left them to sit in the open!" She began to hyperventilate as more carcasses appeared.

Lonestar bent down and touched one, the blood from a wound was still freshly bleeding. "Well whatever it is its close now, this bear only died a few minutes ago." A rumbling growl ripped through the quiet forest and the group quickly backed into a circle. Lonestar pulled out his blaster and generated a few sticks of dynamite, his arm poised to throw.

"ROAAAAARRRRR!!" A massive black monster burst out of the trees and charged towards the circle of terrified ponies. It was huge, bigger than a manticore. It had the hunched over look of a gorilla but was much more primal, its feet resembled those of a lion with long claws adorning each finger. Its gaping maw was lined with dozens of razor sharp fangs and saliva flew from its maw as it pounded its way towards its next victims. Or so it thought, as the ponies scattered the odd creature in the center of the group threw something at its face. KA-BOOM! An explosion ripped through the air, so bright that the monster was temporarily blinded by the light. as it reeled from the blast it felt a series of white hot bolts slam into its exposed underbelly, searing with pain. It shook its head to clear the burning light from its eyes, just in time to see the biped point at it and whistle sharply. A giant bull made of blue energy materialized in front of it and charged towards the monster, ramming it up against a tree, further confusing it.

Lonestar felt his dynamite generator buzz, signaling it was ready for another round. He grabbed it from his belt and lit the fuses off of his cigar, he prepared to throw it into the monster's gaping maw but it swung out with its hind leg, catching him in his gut. he flew backwards, the blow hitting him so hard that when he collided with a tree its trunk was cracked. He felt the air rush from his lungs and looked up to see the beast barreling towards him, he reached for his blaster but he had dropped it after the kick. His bull and dynamite were on cool-down and his boots wouldn't lift him of fast enough to save him. Suddenly a rainbow colored blur streaked across his vision, taking the monster with it and into a boulder.

Rainbow Dash had initially fled like the other two equestrians but upon looking back and seeing Lonestar about to get ripped to shreds she steeled herself to intervene. She accelerated towards the monster hoof-first and rammed it as hard as she could. They collided with a boulder and she rebounded off of the creature but as she lifted off it grabbed her tail. "AHHHHH! LET GO OF ME!" She screamed and thrashed as it began to bring her towards its mouth.

Lonestar got up and saw what was happening. He looked wildly for his blast but saw nothing. He desperately began to run towards the beast in hopes of distracting it but before he could a little girl's voice called out.

"Hey! I wanna play too!" An ball of red light with a small trail behind it slammed into the monster's side and it roared in pain and threw Rainbow away. It looked towards the source of the ball and promptly got a five pound padlock on a chain swung into its face with great force, shattering most of its teeth. The barrage of blows kept on coming, battering the beast more and more. Lonestar watched the spectacle, already knowing who was assaulting the monster. He once again grabbed his dynamite and threw it into the monster, which swallowed, gagged, and then exploded into a stream of black smoke.

"HA You don't look so good pardner!" he picked up his blaster and holstered it. He looked over at Rainbow Dash, who was standing with her mouth agape, stuttering

"Th-th-th-th"

"Th- what?" Lonestar asked, worried the mare might have gone into shock.

"THAT WAS AWESOME! YOU KICKED ITS BUTT! Where did you pull those explosives from?" She excitedly began to hover.

"Hey! what about me? I was cool too ?" the girl's voice said angrily.

Dash then looked over to the third member of the fight who had saved her life. It was another alien obviously, she was bipedal with green skin and a third eye in the middle of her forehead. "Who exactly are you?"

The girl grinned and began to skip towards Lonestar, "I'm Ayla! Where are we Mister Lonestar? I like it here!"

Lonestar looked around, not seeing the other two members of the search party, "Come on missy, I'll explain when we get back to the town but we gotta find a zebra, and a pony for now."

"Yay! hide and seek!" She skipped off ahead of them, her chain jingling as she did so.

Rainbow looked over to Lonestar, "Umm, why is she wearing that?"

"Oh, she wont let us take it off, its from when she was in a maximum security prison's psyche ward. She likes to use it as a jump rope."

=====================================================

They found Fluttershy and Zecora in Zecora's hut, barricading the doors and windows. Rainbow knocked on the door, "Hey guys, we got rid of the monster, lets head back to town." They peeked through a hole in the boards, and then came outside.

Once they were near the town the saw Big Mac standing on the outskirts, trying to act casual. Fluttershy went over and told him they were ready, and he brought his cart to the edge of the forest. The 'nauts climbed in and the ride to whatever housing Pinkie, Rarity, and Applejack had found began.

Cutie Mark Crusaders conspiracy theorists! YAAAY!

During the planning of the Alien Recovery Project (ARP), Twilight had overlooked something very important; Riding in the back af an apple cart covered in apples, unable to move is incredibly uncomfortable. Particularly when you are in the cart with a restless eight-year old.

"Are we there yet?"

"No"

"Are we there yet?"

"I said no!"

"Are we there yet?"

"*sigh* You just gonna keep this up?"

"Yep... are we there yet?"

=====================================================

The cart finally stopped, Big Mac looked back to where the two aliens were hidden, hearing hushed voices, "Hey partner, we there yet?"

"Eyup."

They both poked their heads out from beneath the apples and looked at where they would be staying until further notice. It was a small storage building on the edge of town.

"How in the world are all of us gonna fit in that tiny thing? I thought those ponies were supposed to find us somethin' big."

"Eyup" Big Mac was also puzzled by the small accommodations, but he knew that since Pinkie Pie was involved things were not as they seemed. Speak of the draconis, he thought, Pinkie came bouncing towards the cart with her usual grin.

"Hi everypony! Come on inside! I can't wait to show you your new house!" She bounced to the door and entered the building. Ayla looked to Lonestar and shrugged before hopping out of the cart and skipping happily after the pony, her chain clinking along after her. Lonestar took a moment to extract himself from the pile of apples and opened the door. Inside was a simple room with a few cardboard boxes in it, hardly what he would call a house.

"Sooo, how long are we gonna be staying here exactly? This ain't really my idea of livable conditions."

Pinkie just smiled, "Oh there's more to it, follow me!" and with that, she opened up one of the boxes and disappeared inside. Lonestar opened it up to find that it was actually a disguised chute that led down into a much larger area. He lowered himself down and Ayla hoped after him. They both looked around themselves to find that it was practically an entire house's worth of rooms and space.

Pinkie Pie held her front legs out in a "Ta-Da" gesture, "Well? What do you think?"

Ayla grinned, "Neat! I want that room!" she skipped over to a big bedroom with several very large beds. It had been furnished by Applejack, and function was clearly put above form. She then locked the door and soon her light snoring could be heard through the door.

"Oh umm, That's the boys' room, the girls' room is over there." She pointed a hoof down the hall to a different room which had obviously been decorated by Rarity. There was a lot of lace, gemstones, and other things that she loved to use in her designs. Ayla slowly walked out of the boys' room, a dangerously calm look on her face, "Oh, okay, of course, I'm a girl, I have to like pink things and lace don't I? Okay then, I'll sleep in there." She walked into the room and shut the door.

"Aww she's a real cutie isn't sh-urk!" Her voice was cut off by Lonestar, who knew what was coming, grabbing her by the neck and running for cover behind what appeared to be a kitchen counter. A loud rumbling came from the hallway and red light flashed from underneath the doorway of the now occupied room. Pinkie uncovered her ears long enough to hear maniacal laughter what sounded like a tornado. The storm died down and silence filled the room. The door opened again and Ayla skipped out, her face now back to its normal toothy grin.

"You were right! I did like it in there!" Pinkie curiously looked around the corner and into the room. It was almost completely destroyed; the walls had scorch marks, the lace had been burnt to a crisp, the gems had reverted into the volcanic substance they came from, and a smell of sulfur permeated the air. Pinkie's jaw literally dropped to the floor, not even Spike caused that much damage so quickly when he gotten a cold and sneezed all over the library.

As Ayla happily raided the fridge Lonestar came over to Pinkie and said, "Word of advice, it ain't a good plan to tell her what to do, it only pisses her off and then she throws a tantrum, which pretty much means your ass is screwed unless you take cover."

"I think she just needs a hug!" She began to bounce towards the green skinned psychopath.

"NO WAIT!"

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Back at the castle Twilight was transcribing Fluttershy's report of the events in the forest to Celestia.

"And then this horrible black creature came out of nowhere! We just ran but the alien and Rainbow stayed and fought. Zecora and I ran back to her hut and boarded it up. About half an hour later Rainbow Dash and the alien came back, and they had another alien with them, she said her name was Ayla and that she was only eight years old."

Twilight finished the letter and had Spike send it off, "You're the local animal expert, did you recognize what the creature was?"

"N-no, it wasn't like anything else I've ever seen."

"Hmm, it could be some kind of lost species, I'll check through my books to see if I can find any hint of them, do you think you could draw it for me?"

"Um, sure, I'll try." She proceeded to mouth-draw with the pencil Twilight gave her to make a crude sketch of the beast that attacked them.

"There you go, I need to get back to Angel, He'll be worrying about me." With that she ran out of the door and off to her cottage.

Twilight looked to Spike, "Alright my number one assistant! we have some research to do. Grab any books on ancient or prehistoric monster that you can find."

Spike saluted, "Right, you don't think that maybe its something those aliens brought with them do you?"

Twilight gave him a worried look, "I don't know Spike, I sure hope not." They both began to gather books for the night's research.

Pinkie Pie opened the door, "Hi Twilight! hi Spike! whatcha' reading?"

Twilight looked up, "We are studying to see what migh- WHOA! Pinkie what happened to you?" Pinkie Pie was not looking her normal self, her normally bright and puffy mane was sticking out in straight lines and the whole thing looked as though somepony had stuck it in an oven. Her entire coat was slightly blackened and a few spots of fur were entirely gone. In essence, it looked like she had stuck a fork in an electric socket.

"Oh nothing, I just found out that Ayla doesn't like to be hugged. I'm sure we'll still be good friends though! I just need to find a good way to apologize." She hopped over to Twilight and twisted her head around to read the title of her book, "Starswirl's Compendium of Monsters? Ooo why are you reading that?"

Twilight hesitated, a bit unnerved by Pinkie's condition. She shook it off, reasoning that if she was seriously hurt than she wouldn't be at the castle. "Well, Fluttershy says that while they were in the forest, they were attacked by a monster, but one that she had never seen. So, Spike and I are looking through all of the old books on monsters to see if we can identify it, no luck so far though."

Pinkie Pie went over to a pile of books and grabbed the book from the bottom of it, "It will be in this one, its always in the last book you check so I'll just save you some time." She began to flip through the pages, "How about this? It looks almost exactly like the picture Fluttershy drew!"

Spike and Twilight rushed over, sure enough, the creature in the book was the spitting image of Fluttershy's mouth-drawn sketch. Twilight looked at the name over the image, "Monstrous Genericus, also known as a Shadow Maw, was one of the greatest scourges of the early pony tribes before the unification of the three kinds of ponies. A vicious predator, it was designed to be the perfect hunter of earth ponies although it would also hunt unicorns if they were available. They are thought to have gone extinct when The two Royal Sisters established their rule and ponies began to become more organized, and more often traveled in groups."

Twilight looked up excitedly, "Pinkie do you realize what this means? A species that was though to be extinct is still alive in Equestria! We have to mount an exposition to see if we can find one and study it and" she was cut off by Pinkie tapping her on the flank.

"Umm, Twilight? Shouldn't we be more worried about the fact that pure evil pony-eating monsters are loose in the Everfree?"

"Oh, right, of course, I'll send Celestia another letter, maybe she knows more about them than this book can tell us." She jotted down a quick note and had Spike send it, "I'm sure everything will be fine!" Spike began to hiccup.

"hurk! I think a reply is com-ING, Twilight!" He burped up the letter and opened it. "Huh, its from Derpy, she said that a few ponies have heard about some kind of giant squid thing saving some ponies from a group of griffin pirates that were holding them hostage. Think its another alien?"

Twilight nodded, "I can't think of anything else it might be off the top of my head." she turned to Pinkie, "I need you to go and talk to Lonestar and the new one, Ayla, and see if they know what this is, if they do, get Vinyl, head out there and see if you can bring it in."

Pinkie sprang into a salute, "Sure thing Twilight! It'll also give me time to get to know them better!" She galloped of to the bunker.

===============================================================

Just outside the library a certain group of three fillies gasped. "Did you two hear that? Twilight said that there are aliens out there!"

Applebloom looked doubtful, "I dunno, Scootaloo we don't want raise any kind of trouble unless we are sure of it. Remember the last time we thought we had discovered aliens?" That particular incident had not been a crusade as much as a panicked race to the authorities which had landed them all several week's grounding.

Sweetie Belle grimaced, "Maybe we can just ask her about them, she might tell us."

"Right Sweetie, and maybe I'll be a Wonderbolt someday, if there really are aliens there's no way Twilight will just tell us. Did you hear what she said to Pinkie? Maybe we should follow her and see what we can find out."

Applebloom nodded, "Sounds like a plan to me." She held her hoof up and the all bumped it, then they proceeded to stealthily follow Pinkie Pie in a way that anybody would immediately notice if they were not Pinkie Pie.

They followed her all the way to the edge of town, where they watched as she went into a small storage building. "Now's our chance girls! lets rush in and prove aliens exist!" They ran in and barged through the door, only to find an empty room with a few boxes in it.

"What? where'd she go?" Applebloom looked at their surroundings, seeing no trace of the pink pony.

"Maybe there is some kind of secret passageway in here?" Sweetie Belle Suggested with a shrug. They searched the walls for any kind of hidden lever but found nothing.

Scootaloo then had an idea, "Hey! how about if we each hide in one of these boxes until she comes back?! then we can see where the passage is!"

Applebloom gave her look, "Have you been reading Rainbow's Daring Do books Scoots?"

"Huh? What? No! Reading is for eggheads." she avoided looking Applebloom in the eye. "Lets just hide already." They opened up one of the boxes and all hoped in, however they did not expect to fall about six feet. They looked at one another with a mixture of fear and excitement. They got to their hooves and began to creep towards the voices of Pinkie Pie, and a gruff older stallion.

"You said that it was a giant squid? Well, unless you have that kinda thing 'round here anyway I don't see how it can be anything else but Admiral Swiggins. We should head out and grab him, he won't cause trouble but he has a bad temper when it comes to any kind of pirates or smugglers, we should head out tomorrow with this... Vinyl person you mentioned."

Scootaloo turned and looked excitedly to the other two, "That proves it! there are aliens in Equestria!" Applebloom and Sweetie's excited smiles quickly turned to expressions of fear. Scootaloo looked behind her and saw a terrifying demon with three glowing eyes and green skin right in her face.

"Hi, what are your names?" *THUMP*, three unconscious fillies lay on the ground in front of Ayla. She sighed to herself and took a breath. "Hey Pinkieeee! I think you brought some of your friends here by mistake!"

Lonestar and Pinkie ran into the hallway, "Aw hell, who are these three?"

"Oh that's just the CMC, I don't know what they're doing here though."

"Can I kill them?"

"NO! Dagnabit Ayla you can't just kill anything you see. What should we do about them Pinkie?"

"Hmm, I'll go get Twilight, She'll know what to do." She bounced off towards the ladder, "If they wake up try to be nice to them, they're my friends!"

Ayla looked after her with a bit of a scowl, "What is it with her and being obsessed with friends?"

Lonestar just shook his head, "You know, if you weren't such a psychopath you might have some friends your age. Once we find the team we should see if these ponies can help you with that, they seem to know a lot about it."

Ayla just shrugged, "Who needs friends my age when I have you guys?" She gave him a hug as best she could while wearing her cuffs. Lonestar was shocked by the display of emotion, he wasn't aware the little nut job even cared about anyone.

"Umm... thanks?" He patted her head a few times.

===============================================================

Far away from Ponyville, about two miles off the coast two coral poachers were hard at work, stealing rare and endangered specimens of coral to sell. One of them surfaced and passed his bag to the one manning their small boat, "Whew, got a good haul this time!, I'm sure glad these fish can't tell anyone about this, we'd be locked up for years."

His partner answered in a rough Manehatten accent, "Yeah, yeah, yeah, but they can't, lets just get outta here before anypony tarts to come to the beach, they might wonder what we're doing out here." He went to gun the motor but found that the entire engine had been ripped off.

"What in the hay happened here?!" The first thief came over to look.

"Y-you don't suppose a shark did that, do you?"

A third voice rang out, it had a very proper and angry tone to it, "You're going to wish it was just a shark in a moment you rapscallions!" They whirled around and saw a horrible creature in front of them. It looked like a squid but it was wearing some kind of armor with a tank over its head.

The braver (or stupider) of the two drew a diving knife and charged it. The thing simply sidestepped him and smacked him overboard with the anchor attached to one of his tentacles, "HA! You brought a knife to an anchor fight lad!" it turned to the second diver, who was shaking in fear. He raised his anchor again but before he could strike he dove into the water and swam away screaming about killer squid. Admiral Swiggins laughed quietly to himself, "Ha, another victory for the Admiral!"

Prolouge

Lonestar was not having the best day. It had started off just like any other morning onboard the main ship of the Awesomenauts, with the genetically engineered space cowboy up early and already eating breakfast before most of the crew was even awake. As he ate, Voltar the Omniscient floated by in his brain tank, his long red caped fluttering behind him. He nodded to Lonestar as he floated past him and into the kitchen and began to have his drones prepare some breakfast for the rest of the mercenary crew. The egotistical genius was capable of incredible things with the power of his psychokinetic abilities and the robotic minions he could deploy, but he was a surprisingly good cook when the crew wasn't on a job. One by one the other members of the team began to make there way to the table in various states of awareness, towards the tantalizing smell of Voltar's cooking.

"Hiya Lonestar!" Lonestar looked up from his newstablet and saw Ayla sitting across the table from him. "So what are you planning to do with our down-time until we get hired again?"

The cowboy scratched his blue beard, "Well, I reckon I'm gonna go to the gym and practice my Holo-Bull wrangling, what about you missy?" he somewhat dreaded her answer.

"I'm going to see if I can convince Mr. Vinnie to let me take a ride on Spike! It'll be so Fun! We can fly around and play cops and robbers!" Lonestar had been expecting something of a much more violent nature and was relieved to hear that the girl was just going to be playing make-believe with the plankton crime boss's trusty companion.

Ayla was no ordinary little girl, the three-eyed, green skinned eight-year-old was one of the last of her race, the Sadak, and possessed extremely powerful psychokinetic powers. She had lost her parents to the great Sevenelevian coupon wars, and her foster parents were scared of her love of violence and disturbing sense of humor. So they had her put in a school for social re-adjustment. She did not take this well however, and committed seven acts of arson in roughly three days. Now in a maximum security psychiatric ward she went berserk and killed half of the guards in her escape through a series of walls.

As Ayla began to eat her eggs, Lonestar looked down at his plate and realized it had suddenly disappeared, he quickly looked around the room just in time to see Gnaw take a bite out of his breakfast and his plate. He leaped to his feet and charged the acid spewing war dog in the hopes of salvaging his meal, "NO, GNAW! BAD SKROGGLE". He was too late however as Gnaw, seeing his approach swallowed the rest of the plate whole and ran off into the ship's corridors.

The rest of the team began to laugh and Leon Chameleon, resident stealth artist, called out in his definitely-not-French-accent "Maybe next time you should try to resist shouting your lungs out mon ami" Lonestar just glared and set off for the gym.

As Lonestar exited the Gym after a rigorous rodeo simulation he heard a voice by his foot say, "Hey buddy, youse ain't seen Spike anywhere has ya? I ain't seen him since breakfast." Lonestar looked down to the source of the voice and saw Vinnie, a plankton about a foot tall wearing a red fedora. Although not physically intimidating, Vinnie was a criminal mastermind who was able to use his brains and the considerable brawns of his friend Spike the giant pufferfish to preform amazing feats on the battlefield or at a local bank.

Lonestar thought back on what he had heard Ayla saying at breakfast, "Oh I think Ayla is playing Cops and Robbers with him, it sounded harmless enou- WHAT IN TARNATION?!?!" It was at that moment that a massive explosion rocked the ship, there was a made rush by all of the crew to any veiwscreen or porthole to see what had caused it. They were greeted with the sight of one of their shuttles making a beeline for the hanger and about thirty attack ships in hot pursuit firing ion torpedoes. The shuttle just barely made it to the dock and the crew hurried down to see who had been occupying it. Upon reaching the dock they found Ayla and Spike, both with rather embarrassed looks on their faces, "Ummm sorry guys, I didn't think they would chase us past that wormhole." Ayla sheepishly said.

Voltar spoke up in his robotic German voice, "If I hand hands I would be face palming right now, vat exactly did you two do?"

"Weeeell I may have tried to mug some lady, but it turned out she was a senator so their entire private security in this system came after us," she perked up, "but now we can just blow them up now right?"

Ted McPain, an Ex-Marine who was basically a living stereotype said, "Well we could if we didn't have all the ship's weapons deactivated for maintenance, we should probably make a tactical retreat unless we want to get our bacon cooked by these guys.

The crew agreed and the ship began to make a hasty retreat. However the large headquarter ship was not built for speed and they were unable to outrun the cruisers. As more and more explosions rocked the hull the chase seemed to be over, "QUICK! EVERYONE GIT YER TAILS TO THE DROPPODS, THEY'RE OUR LAST SHOT!" Lonestar shouted. The crew all boarded their own pods and began to jettison from the wrecked ship.

However, because their scanners had been damaged in the battle they were completely unaware of the massive black hole that they were all flying towards. As they fell in one by one, one of the security guards looked to his Co-pilot, "You wanna go in after them?" he asked. "Hell no are you crazy?" was the reply, "All troops fall back... we lost them but I doubt we have to worry about them anymore."

Meanwhile in Ponyville Twilight Sparkle and her friends were out on a hill, looking up at the night sky, "Okay everypony! if my calculations were correct, The main part of the meteor shower is going to be coming in about ten minutes!" They were all very excited for this event, the astronomers in Canterlot had estimated that this would be one of the largest and most memorable meteor showers in over a century, and the time of year was just right to be out late at night to watch it. They all sat back and eagerly looked up waiting for the rain of space rocks, "oo-ing" at the occasional stream of light.

Rarity excitedly said "Girls! look over there, its coming!" They all whipped their heads around to where their friend's hoof was pointing. A beautiful stream of colors and lights flew across the sky in a dazzling display of nature's beauty.

Pinkie Pie pointed upwards, "Ooo look at that one! Its really bright." Twilight looked at the meteor in question. It burned with a furious orange light and seemed to almost be getting bigger.

Her eyes widened "GET DOWN QUICK!" They all dashed to the other side of the hill and ducked down, just in time to see the flaming ball scream overhead and into the Everfree forest behind them. There was a small explosion among the trees and they all looked at each other unsure of what to do next.

Rainbow Dash then took flight a few feet of the ground and hovered, "Well I don't know about you grils but I'm going to go and check that thing out!" She began to fly to the woods but Applejack grabbed her by the tail.

"Whoa Nelly! we don't know what that thing was! It could be some kinda monster, I ain't takin' any chances with that."

Twillight nodded, "She's right, we have no idea what that was, Lets head back to town and I'll write a letter to Celestia first thing." They all agreed and began the walk back to town, not noticing the other unusual meteors fly overhead in various directions.

A pleasant robotic voice sounded over the speaker in Lonestar's pod, "Arriving at uncharted planet in thirty seconds, twenty-five, twenty, fifteen, ten, five, four, three, two, one." The pod hit the surface of the planet and exploded, instantly vaporizing all of the technology and leaving a very cramped and angry cowboy in the middle of a dark forest. He looked around and saw nothing but trees and menacing eyes watching him from the shadows, "... Well shucks"

Arrival

Lonestar had absolutely no idea where he was going. Upon landing in the middle of a forest on some planet he didn't recognize, with no signs of civilization in sight, he picked a random direction and set off, hoping that he would find some kind of intelligent life. However this strategy was turning out to be unsuccessful as he had been walking for about eight hours straight now, his genetically engineered body required very little sleep so he was able to keep trudging all throughout the night. The sun had finally started to rise, and he was glad for the extra warmth it provided as he quickened his pace.

Twilight hadn't slept a wink all night, she had been completely restless thinking about that close call they had had with the meteor. She got up from her bed and trotted downstairs to get a small glass of water. When she arrived at the bottom of the steps she found spike, asleep and snoring in his basket. She smiled fondly at her number one assistant and carefully stepped over him. She walked over to her shelves and picked out a book called [Asteroids, Meteors, and other astronomical Objects and began to read through it.

A few hours later she was finding that what looked like a meteor most likely was something completely undocumented by science. The color and brightness of the burn it had when flying overhead was completely off for normal meteors entering Equestria's magical atmosphere. She pondered this information over in her head, if it wasn't a meteor, what was it?

The next day the six ponies and spike had gathered in the library, they were discussing the mysterious object and the reply letter Celestia had sent to them with instructions.

Dear Twilight, Applejack, Rarity, Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy and Spike,

In regards to the letter you sent me informing me of the mysterious object that crashed into the Everfree forest, I believe that the best course of action would be to investigate the crash site and see if you can discern what the object is. Upon doing so, please immediately send me a letter detailing your findings. I would love to be there with you for this but several other strange objects such as this have been reported across the night sky and I am trying to keep the press from causing a panic.

Princess Celestia

Rainbow Dash gave the group a smug look, "See! I told you we should've gone and looked at that thing, even the Princess says so."

Rarity gathered herself up, "Well if the princess needs our help then we shall do all in our power to help her!" She was met with a cheer and they began to plan out their search into the Everfree in way not-at-all-exactly-like-in-Dragonshy.

A ways into the forest they began to find traces of the object. Traces such as a section of trees in a ten foot radius that were completely burnt down with a large crater in the center.

Fluttershy gasped upon seeing this, "Oh my goodness! What if there was anything living here?." she flew over to the charred husks to check for any signs of life.

"Umm Fluttershy? I think we have a bigger problem to worry about on our hooves." Rainbow dash said with a worried tone. She pointed to the edge of the burned foliage, "Look, there's tracks leading away from it." They all looked at the strange tracks and then began to quickly run after them talking to each other with emotions ranging from excitement to terror as they ran.

"I wonder what it looks like? Maybe it will have a bunch of eyes all on the same head! and then it will have another head with all of its noses!" Pinkie Pie rattled out as she bounced alongside Rarity.

"Uurgh Where do you come up with these things Pinkie? That just sounds dreadful." Rarity replied with a disgusted look on her face. She then promptly ran through a patch of mud and was splattered from hoof to mane. She gave a look of complete irritation in no real direction and continued on with the others.

The sound of galloping hooves reached Lonestar's ears as he plodded along, much of his motivation gone. He began to think about what situations this might lead to, "Well, this ain't any planet I recognize so I doubt its a posse after me, it sounds like a lot of whatever it is though, better be ready. He quickly un-holstered his rapid-fire blaster and began to finger his dynamite and Hyper-Bull generator as they closed in on him. A cacophony of bright pastel colored ponies burst through the undergrowth and right into his line of sight, he cautiously kept his blaster held downwards in case they were intelligent and friendly. This didn't seem very far fetched to him as he had been created by a semi-sentient race of cow people. He decided it would be best to wait for them to make the first move

The purple pony which appeared to be the leader by her position in the front of the group spoke up, "Uhhh, hi?" Lonestar was relieved, they spoke Inter-Galactic Basic which was the standard language that was used across the majority of the universe. He decided that the best course of action would be to introduce himself and not immediately lasso all of the Horse-like species like every fiber of his cowboy body was urging him to do.

"Er, Howdy, I don't suppose you folks would happen to have any kind of food would you? I'm starving and the squirrels that got cooked in my landing didn't taste very good." He thought that seemed like a peaceful enough thing to say but he was surprised when the yellow one with a pink mane and what appeared to be wings just passed out completely. "What's wrong with her?" he looked at her prone form with interest.

Aother winged one with the mane that looked like an insane hippie had dyed it rose off the ground, "If you think you can just come to our world and kill animals to eat them, you've got another think coming!" She raised her front hooves in what appeared to be a boxing stance, although it looked so ridiculous that Lonestar couldn't help but smirk. "Lady, if you wanna take me on feel free, but its gonna end up with you hogtied on the ground looking awful stupid."

Twilight butted into the conversation before it could escalate into a fight, "EX-cuse me but I don't suppose that we could take this conversation back to the castle? These woods aren't safe and we'd like to be able to talk to you with more pleasant surroundings."

The cowboy looked at her suspiciously, "you ain't gonna try and trap me or nothing are ya? 'Cause that ain't gonna end well."

Twilight's eyes widened and she hurriedly explained what she wanted, "Oh no no no, we just want to ask you some questions about who... and for that matter what you are, we've never had contact with your species before."

Lonestar sighed, "Well fine I guess, but I'm watching you." and with that they began to make their way back to Twilight's castle.