Crimson

Rainbow Dash and Applejack galloped towards the edge of the Everfree, their breaths heavy as they raced towards the mysterious burst of energy from where Twilight was, apparently. After hearing that their friend was at the epicenter of the blast, from what Spike and Fluttershy knew, the two had bolted straight over to help the Princess in any way they needed to.

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Five stepped through the bushes of the forest with ease, hearing the twigs snap against his armor as a chorus of pleasantries compared to the talking of one Twilight Sparkle. Of Ponyville. Formerly Canterlot. Who happens to be the Princess of Friendship, whatever that meant. Student of some kind of stupid named ruler, and was still talking despite not having any input from him whatsoever. Despite his reluctance to try and tune out everything irrelevant, he had learned that Twilight was indeed a female, so he could refer to her as such, and that her species was called "Pony," which he didn't care much for. He growled quietly to himself as she continued to assault his hearing with more useless speech.

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"And then, after she got trapped by those rocks that she had set up, a giant boulder came straight down for her! I was just... stunned, that everything just started to collapse around her! But, before any of us could do anything, Maud just shot straight for Pinkie, and when she got to the boulder,"

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'I swear to God, I'm going to rip open a Slip-Space rupture with my own hands, hunt down whoever was in charge of the MJOLNIR, and beat them to death with their own legs for not thinking about putting in a FUCKING MUTE BUTTON!' he thought to himself.

Just as Five was about to punch a tree down to calm himself, the lavender form of Twilight stopped ahead of him, and silence greeted his ears. For half of a second.

"We're out!" she called.

Five charged through the canopy and felt the squish of dirt meet the underside of his boots. To his sides, the dark trees and shrubs were swiftly cut from his view as the dark night sky surrounded his vision. Before him were massive grassy fields, untainted by any kind of ruins or scorch marks. Beyond the fields was a small town of some kind. It was almost entirely dark, and barely had any buildings taller than a couple of stories, maybe three at most.

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"There she is!" Rainbow Dash called out.

"What in tarnation is that!?" Applejack responded, spotting a red metal beast on two legs.

"I don't know, but let's give it a 'Welcome to Ponyville Gift Basket'!" Rainbow shouted as she took to the air.

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Five looked down to his right, where Twilight was standing. He was about to speak before his motion tracker blared with a red streak that sailed straight for him. On instinct, Five whipped around in time to catch whatever it was that was moving for him. Upon turning, something slammed into his chest and sent him into the air. While his shield was flaring, however, he grabbed whatever it was that had collided with him, and reversed the situation by slamming it into the ground.

When his momentum came to a halt in the dirt, Five looked down at what had attacked him, and found a blue pony with wings in his grasp. While his shields were recharging, he took his right hand and grabbed at its hair, yanking the pony from the small mound of dirt and holding it out in front of him. As he did, however, his motion tracker picked up another attacker coming from behind, again. Five spun around to see an orange one with yellow hair and a hat charging at him as well. The Spartan hefted the blue one up and quickly threw it directly at the second one. When they collided, Five drew his Assault Rifle from his back and fired a few rounds into the dirt by the pile.

The two attackers yelped and tried to jump back from the explosion of dirt and metal before a transparent purple dome rose above them. Five turned to his right to see Twilight running between him and the other two, a shocked look on her face.

"What are you doing!?" she yelled.

"Defending myself," Five replied angrily. "They attacked me out of nowhere, so I responded as such."

"That doesn't mean you can just hurt them!!!"

"Yes, it does."

Silence took its hold over the group before Twilight took a breath and spoke again.

"How about, we all just calm down, alright? We clearly got off on the wrong hoof, so let's just... start over, alright?" she offered.

Five stood still as he looked into the transparent dome, and found that the two that had attacked him were staring at him with scared looks in their eyes. He lowered the MA5D slowly and eased his stance before nodding.

"Fine."

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Celestia felt her hooves slam onto a hard, cold surface as metal rung all around her. She slowly looked up to watch as her surroundings changed into something out of a Science Fiction movie. In her vision, as opposed to buildings, metal walls rose up out of the small area of metallic ground, and lights danced across the high-rising structures. At the edge of her hazing vision, she could make out the form of several Equestrian Royal Patrol Airships fleeing from the structure, as a large number of flames rained down between them. The Princess felt one of her legs give out, and as she fell, she could see the silhouettes of several creatures that she recognized almost instantly: Changelings. They all were running through the field of metal, towards one of the buildings, and before her, almost out of view, was their Queen, Chrysalis. She looked as though she were trying to run towards Celestia's collapsing form, but before she could make out the look on her face, a metallic beast rose in front of the Sun Princess. Its exterior was entirely red metal, save for its face, which looked like a pane of golden glass. All around its body, a familiar green glow pulsated and fueled it, giving Celestia an eerie sense of familiarity. It stood on two legs, and when it looked down at her, it raised an arm that held a small cylinder. When the small object was high above them both, it shot out twin blades that seemed to be made of light, before bringing it down onto her with the might of a vengeful God.

"GAAAAAAAH!!!" Celestia screamed as she rose from her bed.

Celestia raised a hoof to her face and pulled away to find cold sweat dripping down it as she gasped heavily in the empty chamber. Before she could gather herself, however, the doors to her room burst open and gave way for a group of Guards.

"Princess!" one of them shouted. "Are you alright!?"

"I... I'm fine," she panted. "Just... just a bad dream..."

The Guards all holstered their weapons and gave a bow.

"Our apologies, your Highness."

"Don't fret, you were doing your jobs very well. Return to your posts."

They gave one last salute before marching out of her chambers, the doors clanking heavily as they closed. The alicorn rose from her bed and looked towards her large set of dressers, where her royal regalia was stored. She looked into the mirror as she approached, and tried to focus on the image of the metallic beast.

"What was that?" she asked her reflection. "Was this another vision, like what happened with Sombra or Tirek? Why was Chrysalis there?"

Celestia raised a hoof to the surface of the glass and examined the reflection of her eyes.

"What was that power it had? I thought I sensed something familiar, but what?"

Her thoughts were interrupted as a flash pierced her vision in the mirror, causing her to shut her eyes in reflex. Celestia turned to the balcony and gaped when she saw a small, intense light coming from the Everfree Forest. She focused her magic and began to pull out her regalia as her mind began to race with thoughts of what could make that kind of presence.

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Five stood firm as the two mares, who were named Applejack and Rainbow Dash, brushed themselves off after hearing Twilight tell them that Five was an alien that crashed in the Everfree, and not some kind of monster.

"I... guess I'm sorry for tackling you, then," Rainbow Dash said hesitantly.

"Just know that as an official of the UNSC, I had every right to do more than just throw you at each other and fire warning shots. Be glad my situation is delicate enough, as is."

Twilight huffed and stomped over to him as she spoke.

"You could have seriously hurt them! Can't you just apologize for that!?"

"Because I'm far away from any kind of communications outpost, or even any kind of contact with UNSC space. I have no way of getting off this world, nor do I have any way to contact my kind. If you were in the same situation, would you just openly trust anything and everything that came up to talk to you, let them attack you, and only try and defend yourself when it's too late?"

Twilight was visibly shying away from Five's rather harsh answer as the other two looked up at him in fear.

"I don't care if you think I'm mean, or violent, or anything. I'm a soldier, and I have an obligation to my role in the UNSC."

The small lavender form of Twilight began to still as her now quiet voice spoke up to him.

"Why are you a soldier?"

"Because we needed soldiers, where I'm from, alright?"

Five looked around to see that the small aliens were slightly trembling in his presence, and he inwardly cringed.

'Goddamnit, I'm going to regret this, aren't I?' he thought to himself.

"Fine... I'm sorry that I shot at you," he said to the other two. "Can you take me to wherever it is we needed to go?" he asked Twilight.

The answer never came as a flash of light came from behind Five, and before he could react, a blast of heat sent the Spartan flying into the forest once more.