"Day Three: IMC Pilot Ramsey Oppenheimer, Last night I have encountered five bat horses spying on me until an Atlas I have reprogrammed to follow my orders found them hiding behind the bushes and when confronted by the Atlas, they back up into an arc mine I had laid down two days ago to act as a secondary perimeter. When I left the cave to investigate I saw them twitching on the ground and with a swift kick and stomp to the heads of each horse I have rendered them out cold and dragged their heavy asses to the waiting titans and had them be held in their hands to be used as prison cages. I had each one separated by at least ten meters so neither can do anything with the other and to isolate them to break their spirits but since they are aliens and do not speak English I would have to interrogate them the old fashioned way."

"On a different note, the MRVN has completed the doorway to the cave with four trees and made sure that it was a foot thick of wood and dirt to make it as protective as possible against anything hostile to me. His next set of orders is to use any spare lumber to create boxes for the ammunition, explosives and weapons and if later and I can find a pickaxe, start mining for metal."

"Lastly, I have finally managed to take a shit, I thought it would never come out and boy when it did I felt ten pounds lighter and that my shit had the density of a dying star. I could swear I can craft Thor's hammer with that dump and use it like he did but I highly doubt a heavy crap can even be used like that and still be considered a god's weapon of choice."

"This is IMC Pilot Ramsey Oppenheimer, signing off."

Turning off the recorder I went over to the pile of weapons and grabbed my Spitfire LMG from the top along with my revolver and spare ammunition before moving onto the arc grenades and the dead arc mine. What most grunts and pilots know that once an arc grenade or mine has been used it is destroyed, but actually when activated they only release their electronic payload and become a hollow shell, they can be recharged and used again, if you are smart enough to remember to plug it in for a refill and not shock yourself in the process. A dead arc mine is practically a heavy metal disk and often times used as a door stopper or a Frisbee when in the hands of bored pilots but today it is going to be used as an interrogation tool.

Opening the three inch thick heavy oak door I took my first look outside to see my captives are still being held in the hands of my titans and being squeezed ever so slightly to keep them uncomfortable, more pressure being added if they try to fall asleep without my consent.

Turning to the left I spot the pile of armor and weapons I had seized from the five, their dark colored armor would do nicely for a remodel into a pile of molten metal and their weapons as well but for me to do that I would need a large ass furnace to toss them in, and the only one I know of is back in horse town and I am not strong enough to even drag that large fucking thing back here let alone move it across a river.

"Warning: Multiple Threats Heading in Our Direction, Caution is Advised." the voice of a Titan OS said through my helmet and after flipping through all of the OS under my control I found it to be from my overlook on the mountain, the one holding a plasma railgun, an Atlas Titan that once belonged to a militia pilot named Timothy Wilson, that poor bastard died from radiation poisoning and several gunshot wounds. His titan was watching from the safety of the cliffside through the optical zoom interface and after plugging myself in to see what it was seeing I saw what it meant by 'multiple threats'.

It was a large squadron of flying horses pulling cargo wagons behind them which held boxes and other horses that couldn't fly with them. Guessing from how fast they are moving and how many there are I can safely guess that the five I had captured were just there to secure the titans and wait for these horses to properly secure and hold them. Not on my watch.

"Eagle_Eye, fire one shot at the lead cargo wagon, do not destroy it, simply clip it and wait to see if they drop below scope, if they don't then fire again and destroy it."

"Affirmative."

Standing on top of my titan I looked down at the five captives before promptly looking up at the mountainside and then seeing the tall tell orange glow coming from the long barrel of the railgun before it discharged, the bolt instantly flying out and from what the titan is seeing, slamming right into the first wagon and immediately setting it on fire and melting roughly half of the left side. Giving a fist pump I cut my connection to Eagle_Eye and jumped off my Atlas, landing on the ground next to one of the many captives, I have taken to calling them by numbers instead of anything to go by.

"So Number Four...how many do you think are coming to rescue your sorry ass? Fifty? A hundred? Maybe more?" I said in a light tone fully knowing that if this bat mare does decide to talk to me I wouldn't even be able to understand a word of it but if she could understand me then she would know that help is on the way for her.

"Nothing to say? Why earlier you were thrashing about trying to break free but all that did was dislocate a wing as it now hangs limply to your side, what a shame, I always wanted to see you fly after being tossed by an Ogre into a brick wall and see the fireworks happen. Maybe next time, no?" I patted her on the head before walking off to the next bat horse in line.

This bat horse, number five, was a big fella and I had to use an Ogre to keep him pinned down since a Stryder would more then likely not keep him down for long. He was not moving, struggling or even trying to escape, he just simply stayed there and stared up a the sky and ignored me.

"So Big Five, wanna talk?" I said casually while he just looked at the sky and snorted at me, "Nothin' then, alright, well...I guess from now on, I'll just call you Brandon since you remind me of him, how 'bout it, do you like that name there buddy?" I said and he just turned his eyes to me before rolling them and went back to staring up.

"Fine then, see you later Brandon, try not to dislocate your wing like Four did." and like that I left the big guy alone to his thoughts, whatever they could be but for now it was time to check up on Three.

Three, was straight up mare and I knew she was one because of a few factors, A: The crotchtits, B: The really feminine build and long ass mane, C: The curves on her should belong on a human girl not a horse, and D: The crotchtits. Now normally I would not try to be so easily seduced by the opposite sex but this mare was really trying to get into my pants and honestly, honestly, I did let her think she was winning in the battle for my heart but that battle was lost a long time ago, hell the only person that had a snowballs chance in hell was a barmaid in Angel City, that girl had the looks, a hot ass, nice tits, and she was of Swedish decent so she had that sexy voice also.

"So Three...how's it hanging?" I said while Three was being held by another Atlas, her legs and tail dangling below the metallic pinkie as she struggled a bit in the giant hand before slumping down and holding her head up in a hoof, blowing a stand of mane out of her face.

Like the other two horses this one too didn't make a lick of sense when her mouth started moving but it is fun seeing her try to seduce me, its like watching a guy try to confess his crush on a girl at a rock concert and she cant even hear a single word he is saying, except this time its more like the other way around and her words are lost in translation.

"Yea, well sugar tits it is nice chatting with you but I will come back to talk to you later, try not to do something bad while I am gone."

And with that I checked on Two, this stallion was straight up shivering in fear and I used a Stryder to hold him down, I ended up kicking him a little too hard in the head and whenever I come into his range of vision he would just shrink away from me and just start to bauble nonsense.

One was a complete enigma to me, he would try to study the Atlas holding him in place when I wasn't looking but whenever I came over to him he would stare at me intently as if he is trying to disrobe me with his eyes. I don't swing that way but I know a few guys back in the barracks that do swing in that general direction.

"So One, find a way to break out yet?" I patted his head before he moved his dome away, clearly not wanting me anywhere near him. "No? Good, cause unless you are operating the Titan or in control of its OS then there is nothing you can do but stay there and be a good boy." and with that I was off to the perimeter and went straight to the river, fish being on my mind and my knife being the tool to collect my meal alongside with five more to feed these bat horses. I don't know if they would eat it but I am going to experiment with it and hope for the best.

One thing I learned while hunting in the river that runs near my cave is that the fish there is always plenty and they for some reason love to swim directly into my knife, I am not sure if they enjoy being skewered by metal or just like shiny objects but either way I get my meal along with the prisoner's meal so its a win-win situation for me.

It was on my way back to the cave that I saw through my A.P.R. scans that in front of me was a small group of those scorpion lions and before I had a chance to turn around and take a different route back to the camp I heard a twig snap and I on reflex spun on my heel and I was face to face with a scorpion lion and it was licking its lips in a hungry manner as I saw that its eyes were focused on the fish on my waist.

Watching the lion stare at my fish I decided to slowly walk away from it, hoping it would lure it far away from its pack that I could take it on by itself and not be mauled by a pack of them and be killed on the spot. As I led the lion away from its pack I felt on occasion a breeze being made and turning around a bit I saw that it was trying to swipe at my fish and take it for itself but each time there was a swipe I would move slightly faster and be out of its path and a small growl could be heard each time it would miss. This time though, it got smart and started to move closer to me before taking his swipes, I honestly felt a few times the tips of the claws scratching ever so slightly against my back and was when the beast finally got lucky.

Raising a paw into the air and took a swipe at me, the heavy paw colliding with my body along with its claws raking across my left arm, the protective bulk weave and metal plating made the claws ineffective in harming me but the meaty paw though acted as a battering ram and I felt pain shoot up my arm as I feel the bone at the elbow pop and bend ever so slightly out of place making me gasp out in shock then yell in pain, the impact alone lifted me a foot off the ground and launched me a crude four feet away from where I was as my Spitfire was thrown aside as I lost sight of it being thrown into the bushes.

Quickly standing back up raising my good right arm into a fighting pose I lifted up my broken arm and got a good look at it, the bone was not poking through the skin and the pain was mild so it was just bent in the wrong direction. Jumping backwards I saw the lion scorpion take another swipe and this time I was ready as my right hand gripped the data knife that was strapped to my thigh and waited for it to strike at me again.

"Auto-Titan engaging hostile wildlife."

When I heard an OS say that over the com system I had a fraction of a second to see an orange blob fly through the air in front of me before hitting the lion thing in the head, making it explode everywhere along with half of its upper body. Well explode is such a strong word, its more along the line of melted and/or reduced to a pile of goop and from where I am laying down, it certainly left a smoking carcass that has the smell of cooked meat.

Looking at the cooked corpse at my feet and trailing the trajectory all the way to the mountain top I gave a quick wave and a thumbs up before walking over to wear my weapon was tossed picked it up, flicking off a few twigs and bits of mud off before sitting down by the tree it landed next to and placed my support weapon on my lap before looking at my arm and rolled my eyes and muttered a small string of curses at how unlucky I was today.

Staying in place I let my Spitfire stay in my lap as I reached around to my left arm, grabbed the forearm and with a tight clench of my teeth and a mental count of three I popped my arm back into place and proceeded to grab my LMG before slinging it around my back and got off the ground and grabbed the dead beast by the tail and started to drag it back to camp.

"Heavy ass fucking lion beast...have to be all ballsy, come after me when I got my lunch, try to steal my fish, and break my arm? Now here I am, dragging your sweet smelling meat around.......and what the hell is that smell?" I shouted out that last bit making a few birds take flight out of fear, the smell of cooked lion meat was strong but the pungent odor of something foul was also on the rise and when I realized that it has been roughly twelve minutes of me dragging a corpse through bushes, roots, rocks and grass that it had enough time to loosen up and lose its muscle control in its bowels, so evacuation was imminent.

Yelling and swearing as loud as I could I dragged the shitty lion all the way back to camp and in a rage I kicked a nearby leaning tree hard enough that my metal boot left a large foot shaped dent into it and as I went past it I heard the sound of wood snapping under pressure and weight before glancing back to see it slowly tumble over and land on the ground in a heap of leaves and branches.

After what should have been a few minutes of me going out to get breakfast and coming back to feed the prisoners, it has ended up taking forty-nine minutes to get from point A to point B and back to A since carrying a heavy ass corpse while it smelled like shit and ass while its cooked meat from the railgun round was attracting unwanted attention and I had to fire my revolver a few times to scare away any pest that dared get too close and tried to eat my lunch and dinner before me.

As soon as I arrived back at camp I dumped the corpse by the Stryder currently rotating a chicken snake on a spit roast over the roaring fire and once the bat horses saw what was behind me they all had the look of a starving person eyeballing their first actual meal in a long time, the big one infact was actually drooling at the smell of the bat lion being so close.

Moving over to my cave I opened the front door before handing the six fish to the MRVN walking by, sliding past him, and finally switching weapons from my Spitfire LMG to a silenced and standard optical scope Longbow-DMR Sniper Rifle as this weapon would be needed for my plan to return back to that town to gather more information on the horses that live here and to see if they could be a viable threat to me in the future.

Once I had everything that I needed for this little venture I exited the safety of my cave home to be greeted by the sight of a wood wolf staring at me from the safety of the forest trees providing it with ample amounts of cover but just as our eyes connected with each other it was abruptly ended when the wolf ran off back into the forest to never been seen without the aid of an A.P.R. unit or a sonar scope.

Walking back to the entrance of the camp I waved at the prisoners as two of them raised their heads to look at me, Four had the decency to wave at me before I left the safety of my titans but seeing how those five won't survive long without any means of getting water or probably any horse food since they might not like fish or bat scorpion lion meat.

"Well guys, I'll be back soon enough and I will bring back food and water! Hopefully water since I doubt you want to drink bourbon for the next few days." and with that I started to walk out and into the woods, my destination in my mind and the items I need to survive are bound to be there and if not, then I guess buckets and pans will do.

Ponyville

The town was still in the same condition I came in on with the exception that there are now a few guards out on patrol walking about in groups of three, each one keeping their eyes peeled for any danger or in this case, looking for me. I was standing on the outskirts of the town in the borders of the trees, the low hanging branches and bushes providing ample amount of cover and shade and from the safety of the low hanging branches I raised my rifle and peered through the scope, the lens magnifying everything I am seeing and enhancing my vision with a periodic wave of blue and orange.

"Hmm....three guards a group, each group being within spotting distance of another group....a small group of flyers moving in a large circular pattern overlapping two other groups....this is going to take some, no ALL of my cunning to get past them all and succeed in my mission.'

Once my course of action has been decided I started to slowly move at a snails pace to the edge of the town, my eyes looking around while at the same time periodically looking through the scope to see if there is anything coming down the main road, the same one I am taking to town. Seeing that there is not a single horse coming my way I stepped out of the shadows of the foliage and moved to a more shady part of the buildings, my eyes still searching for any signs of hostile horses or anything that would blow my cover and there is still no sight of a roving patrol of guards or any civilians taking a stroll.

Wondering where the hell the civilian horses are I kept on creeping about, turning my A.P.R. at regular intervals, keeping track of the guards milling about being loud as hell in their heavy metal armor, and the occasional flap of wings overhead of the aerial guards but I think they are failing in their spot checks cause I just walked on by a small group of flyers.

It was about three minutes into the town that I found where all of them were currently located, a large open section of the town and it was filled to the brim in what I think are cart stalls and horses, lots and lots of horses and smaller horses also and talking to a small group of the mini-horses was a zebra. Now at this point in time I have stopped trying to put things together about what is going on but after seeing that this planet is under the control of horses in a multitude of colors and variety, it is also inhabited by zebras, I swear to god I can't take anymore of this shit.

Ignoring the possibility of a mental breakdown I slowly backed away from the edge of the building before doubling on back towards a building that held a sign with a large ruck sack and a trio of assorted fruits, not sure what the building could possibly contain but seeing that the entire town's population was at the stalls so I can maybe say that it is safe to start looting some homes to find what I need, after all I am fairly certain that they won't notice a few pots and pans missing.

Just like the first time I was here the back door of the target building was unlocked and with a twist of the knob and a light push I entered the building to see a small thrift store of sorts, and inside laid what I can only think of things I could possibly need all in one location.

Sauntering over to the desk near the back door I peered around to make sure that this place was indeed closed, and looking around and seeing that the front door had a open/closed sign on it and was currently 'closed' since the 'open' part was facing inward towards me, and it was even better that this place had a cash register and it too wasn't locked or even empty. Staring at the cash register I tried to figure out how to open it but when I found a little button that didn't quite match what an old fashioned one have I pushed said button to see what would happen and it just so happens that it causes the register to open up, revealing a lovely row of gold coins, five rows of ten.

I may not be good in the knowledge of currency and mercantile but what I do know is that gold is a very important metal and it is always seemed to be used as a means of monetary value, and seeing that I have quite literally struck gold I am going to invest it in something important.

Like a new gun or the Icepick Data Knife.

Or maybe a new toilet cause the one in my room in the Colossus always seems to fail on me when its I am at the moment of truth and when my stomach is about to explode from chef surprise.

Pocketing the money into an empty magazine pouch I looked around and sort of looted the place or how a few burglars called it 'liberating', and liberate I did as I took a couple of buckets, rope, more thick nails, a paint brush and tubes of blue and silver paint. With all of my ill gotten goods I placed them a large trash bag that these fine horses have left for me in their back room, everything fitting nicely in its slightly snug home and with a heave I lifted everything onto my back and left through the rear entrance with all due haste since a thief should not be caught with his pants down while on the job.

Rushing back to my hiding spot in the trees and bushes I dropped off my acquired loot and made a quick look around before running back to the town, a few things I still need like some sort of fabric to be turned into an IMC flag, some whet stones to sharpen the ax that I took, more thick nails for my soon-to-be-outpost, and some salt to make jerky.

My friends said that there is a wide variety of jerky and it comes in so many forms like chicken, beef, roast and from what my more healthy friend said, fish jerky. Now what most would be thinking why would one go for fish jerky when beef jerky is always available and tasted a hundred times better? Well cause for the fact that I am probably no longer near an IMC or Frontier world or even have the possibilities of returning to one so the access to the best jerky known to mankind is out of the question so going to next best is now part of the plan, I mean really how bad could fish jerky be?

Crawling through the shadows of the alleyways I nearly bumped into a patrol of guards, I ducked behind a dumpster as they approached and tried my best not to breath or even move a muscle and to my luck they just kept on trotting by, none the wiser that I had just flipped them all off while crouching and moving backwards.

In all this was looking up to be an excellent day, I had my ill gotten goods and now I was looking for a large spool of fabric to be used as a flag, and what a surprise it was when my back bumped into a tall fence did I look behind me to see that I was staring up at a fairly large carousel with the exception that its a building and there are no plastic horses with poles in them all around the edges.

'Huh...I wonder what this building is for....certainly not a carnival ride or even a home...'

Questioning the building laid before me I slowly peered around before making a slow circle, my eyes looking any means of entry and it was easy to spot a few windows but when I found a side door that has been placed almost at a perfect ninety-degree angle with the front door with the exception that instead of being slightly better made and painted, the side door was cut in half horizontally and seemed to be made out of oak or yew, either of the two and it was unlocked while the front was locked up tight.

Looking to my left then to my right I jiggled the doorknob for a while and with a smile the door opened up partially, only the bottom half pretty much opened up but with a bit of a blind reach and a grope later the top half opened up and I walked on it, ducking a bit just like the other times I had to walk through a horse building.

My first impression on what appears to be a kitchen is that it is...

"White....why is it always white? I mean sure it is a nice color and all but still...it reminds me too much of the damn hospital and that fucking doctor's face...my god it just screamed 'imminent rape' and I just wanted to kick his bloody teeth in! Seriously what gives! Paint it blue, red, green, yellow, hell I would even go for the worse color imaginable, orange!" I almost shouted that last part, the color orange is not my on my top ten for many reasons, and one of them is that it belongs to a certain species of hostile fauna from the Leviathan System.

Fiddling around with a coffee pot and a toaster I wandered around a bit before coming to a closed door and after trying to walk into the next room only to go helmet first into the sturdy wooden portal, my face smudging up against the inner visor and with an irritated huff I took a step back and wrapped my hand around the doorknob, twisted and pushed and resulted in the same thing of not moving an inch. Growling a bit in anger I decided to try the exact opposite and oddly enough it worked, I wanted to slap myself on the forehead for not thinking that a door would exist that would be a pull instead of a push.

Rolling my eyes at my own stupidity I take a tentative step inside and my eyes catch one of the many prizes I am looking for.

'Cloth...spools and spools of fabric...ripe for the taking, now I need a blank slate spool so I can easily paint the IMC symbol....now where can I find a stark white or beige...oh...there it is....'

Resting on a table near a sewing machine ready to be sewn together into whatever it is the seamstress has planned for but for now it is to be postponed because that roll is coming home with me. Grabbing the roll from the table I tightly wound it up to the point where it couldn't fall apart unless someone messed with it and seeing how it was now in my possession I highly doubt that anyone would try and take it away from me.

Giving the spool room one last once over I tracked my steps back to the kitchen and as soon as I did I heard the sounds of the front door open up and as soon as that happened I quickly closed the doors behind me but I failed that when I heard the sounds of hooves coming over to me and once that happened I ran fast and hard and as soon as I heard the sounds of the door opening up I turned a corner, turned on my pulse and scanned around, my DMR close at hand and the spool in the crook of my arm and a chest pocket full of gold coins.

What I expected to happen was to run into a patrol of guards but instead I ran into a familiar sight and bumped into the same grey coated, dirty blonde and amber googly eyed winged mare, and boy was she happy to see me.

Staring down at the wall-eyed winged mare I helped her up, dusted her off, patted her on the head and went back on my way but when I turned back to see if she resumed whatever it is that she was doing, I saw the sight of her flying right at me but at a more leisurely pace and before long she was trotting next to me, her head underneath my left hand thought I started to scratch between her ears and as soon as I did so she let out a sigh of content and for me, it felt like I was petting a dog since she was almost acting like one.

'I wonder if these horses are not in any way related to dogs or if they are like this cause I have hands? I bet its real fucking hard to pet or scratch something when your only appendage is a blunt hoof.'

Keeping up with me I stalked down the roads, avoiding patrols, staying low from the flying guards and occasionally pocketing things that doesn't belong to me but the mare underneath my hand does not seem to care all with the exception that I keep on scratching her ears.

It was after an hour of me scratching this grey mare's ears and breaking into homes to grab things on my list that I eventually ended up dumping off my loot at the bush and somehow being directed to her home which is actually pretty comfortable even though the sofa is a bit low and I had to let her lay on my lap while I scratched those ears of hers and pet her mane, something that was oddly calming to me when the usual calming agent of a shot of whisky and a snort of coke does the same trick.

As I continued to scratch and stroke this mare the sound of the front door opening and closing quickly before the sounds of tiny hooves quickly pattered into the room we were in and when I turned my head to see the source of the noise I saw a mini-horse staring up at me, it was a slightly lighter grey/purple coat version of the mare on my lap with the exception that this one has a horn but had the same mane and eye color, I can probably guess that this is her child...not sure how one goes from wings to a horn.

Before I could say or even utter a word the mare on my lap started to say something and per usual I can't understand a lick of it and the smaller horse said something back in a girlish tone and soon enough the mini-horse jumped onto the sofa, went to my right leg next to what I think is her mother after she moved aside a bit and rested her head upon my knee and stared up at me with those adorably large amber eyes.

Normally I would resist the temptation to coo at such an overly cute and adorable sight but seeing how I haven't had the experience to deal with children or even had the pleasure of having one of my own, I let my guard down for just a tad bit and I instantly regretted doing such a thing at a moment of weakness cause now I can't stop petting the two of them and saying how cute the smaller one is.

I am sucker for cute and adorable things.

'I wonder what the titans are doing back at camp...hopefully holding the fort down and not killing my hostages or causing unneeded damage to the camp.'

Back at Camp

Titan Model: Atlas, Designation: Thumper

"Engaging Scouting Route."

Grabbing the 40mm Cannon from the ground and checking its ammunition container for the status of being full, a green confirmation goes through my circuits and with a brief signal to my operator that I have begun my pre-planned path from the center of Outpost Alpha, along the sides of the mountain bordering the outpost, through the bog that contained the four-headed hostile lizard, up to the ruined fortress and back round.

Rotating my central eye to its proper housing position I stormed out of the front entrance and hooked a right and moved alongside the fourteen foot tree walls, my upper sensory node looking at the five alien prisoners before resuming to look forward, all senses being needed to accurately paint a map of the current region my operator and the other OS's are in.

The journey through the forest was a quiet one at best, the local wildlife has been avoiding me due to my size, armored appearance and the occasional show of power by stomping on or squeezing the life out of any hostile fauna that would dare show any type of force against me. Entering the bog was simple enough, movement has been slowed down to ensure proper footing and to get a proper layout of the land, the four-headed beast was nowhere to be seen since its beat down by Sparky a day ago, but seeing how this place has no real use besides being a bog and nothing else, it has been moved to the folder of 'Ignore' while pretty much the forest being moved into the 'Industry, Housing, Resource' file right next to 'Important Idea's'.

Walking through the trees in the deeper part of the forest was a bit tricky as it was easily solved by crouching down and slowly trudging along at a reduced speed, the cost of speed was worth it when I came across a ravine and almost ended up going over the side and from what an enhanced zoom has shown me, falling into a river that leads somewhere unknown. Scanning this side of the ravine for a way to get across safely without risking any damage to myself and soon enough I found a bridge leading to the other side but it just happens to be made of wood and rope and many planks are missing so that is a bust for now.

Moving back to the beginning of the forest and the bridge I waited three seconds to warm up the quick-dash engines to turn on and as soon as they became active I pushed myself out of the trees with all possible haste, the heavy thuds coming from my feet anchors can probably be heard deep within the woods and as soon as my foot touched the edge of the rocks I heaved myself into the air and turning on my dash engines, the extra thrust sending me to the other side and safely on stable solid stone.

"New Path Detected: Following"

Looking down at the slightly used path that held the occasional stone brick I noticed that this was a road of sorts and whatever was at the end could be a place to gather new intel or useful resources to the operator.

"Current Objective: Recon, Altered. New Objective: Reconnaissance New Path and Possible Settlement."

Back to Ponyville

Ramsey's POV

Shaking my head at the thought that something could possibly go wrong with my titans I resumed petting the two horses resting on my legs, my head tilting downward to see that my time thinking has evidentially led to time passing by and for the two to fall asleep, while giving the occasional sigh from my hands scratching their ears.

'Huh...I got the magic touch to put horses to sleep with petting and scratching of the ears....just like the dogs back home.'

Tilting my head back against the wall I let out a content sigh, thinking that my break from thievery and mischief has been extended for an indeterminable amount of time and I was going to use that time to rest in a home that had a soft sofa and two living leg warmers.

It was during this happy quiet moment that there was a knock on the door and seeing how I was ambushed by cuteness last time I decided to play it safe and turn on the radar pulse, the blue color overlapping everything as orange waves coursed over my visor and just as I turned it on, there was four horses standing outside the door, three of them were guards cause they had on the obvious armor and roman helmet combo but the fourth horse standing next to them, I saw no horn or wings so this was a standard horse, but what gave it away that this was not a random search.

"Motherfucker....there goes my relaxation time...." Muttering under my breathing I quietly lifted up the two sleeping horses and placed them down gently before grabbing my DMR from the floor and rushing over to the second floor.

As soon as I reached the final step on the stairs I heard the front door get kicked in, waking up my two little leg warmers immediately and from what I heard they both tumbled off the sofa and landed on the floor with two distinct thumps followed by them yelling and screaming while I made my escape by opening a window in the bathroom, crawled through the small opening and rolled onto the roof before running off the side of it and landed on the stone road with a grunt and immediately took off in a random direction, keeping the radar pulse on.

Running between buildings is easy for me, but outrunning a bunch of horses wasn't, I had to periodically suddenly shift myself into a different direction before they can start to effectively gain any ground on me while I had to on occasion duck and slide under passing flying horses making their runs at me. Hell doing all this reminded me of the fighting at Angel City when we were looking for Barker and McAllen.

"Shit!" I shouted as I slipped on a wet patch of mud, my boot sinking in a good inch before I quickly caught myself and started to sprint again, the radar pulses showing me that I now had six guards to my rear, and at least all of the aerial guards watching overhead and the occasional guard dive-bombing in vain attempts to capture me but when one got particularly close to grabbing me I made the innate decision to even the odds.

Timing it just right I waited for one of the flyers to come down to try and grab me, my head on a swivel as I kept looking back at the guards, seeing them gain on me and when I turned my head up to the sky I saw one race down towards me, wings beating hard and just as this one guard got so close to grabbing me, I ducked down out of reach, waited for the guard to on by, and with my excessive training I grabbed the back leg before slamming him down in front of me just in time for my left foot to step between his wings, and the sounds of metal groaning from weight stress followed by something cracking. A horse screamed out in pain and I evaded capture, the six on the ground chasing me stopped in their hooves as they tended to wounded flyer while the others still in the air keeping an eye on me but that too was soon lost when I managed to make it back to the forest.

Huffing slightly under the tree line I watched as the flying horses circled around in loose groups for about three hours and soon enough they left the area, reverting back to their old patrol route and leaving me with a sigh of relief that they gave up so easily cause a usual IMC patrol wouldn't leave the area for at least a few days or until they are ordered back to their patrol routes.

What was supposed to be a simple raid for supplies turned into an evacuation of sorts with me being the evacuee, and before I could make a proper escape into the wild I had one last thing to do. Hefting my acquired goods over my shoulder I made my way through the woods, ignoring the occasional bird trying to land on my antenna and with a well said 'shoo' and the random hand wave to get them to leave me alone I was happily on my way home, that is until I came across an unusual sight.

Built in the within the boundaries of the forest was a shack of sorts and with a quick peek through the windows I saw that it held some sort of tribal masks and a large metal cauldron in the center. Now at first I thought it was strange that this forest had someone besides me living within the wooded foliage but seeing how that this world is filled with winged and horned horses then I can guess that they could live anywhere as long as they have some sort of roughage like grass or hay and seeing how this home is out in the sticks then this horse must get it imported or from the store in the horse town.

"Whoever lives here must be brave or suicidal...or both but hey they got some guts to rough it here with the bat lions and chicken snakes." I said to myself before moving around the home and into the general direction of my camp, and it wasn't before long that I climbed a twisted, gnarled grey tree to see where exactly I am currently at and I dropped back down to the ground when I found myself on the right track when I saw a tiny flashy speck on the edge of a cliff up top a tall mountain.

It was during my lone walk however did I find out where the cargo wagons landed with all the horses dragging behind them. They all landed within the forest, cleared out a large enough section and created a large enough military camp to land, disassembled and placed aside their wagons, large rows of tents were erected and even a latrine system was established. How they managed to do all this within a few hours and not get caught by my titans is beyond me but seeing how they must be at least a hundred strong and that they all looked like highly professional soldiers.

Leaning against a random gnarled tree I peered around the corner before slinking along other twisted, gnarled trees and with a happy grin on my face I can see that this camp is just getting into the swing of things and that all it would take to ruin things would be a fire or a bit of chaos.

Turning on my Active Pulse Radar I saw the many bodies of the horses moving about in what I see are scheduled patrol routes and it was with this in mind that I went around the camp while keeping my head down and still holding my grin I creep on by until I lost sight of the camp behind me and was now knee deep in the forest and was close to my camp because from the open breaches in the tree top I could see the mountain getting closer and closer until at long last I was back home, and not a moment to soon, MRVN was feeding the five bat horses some bat lion meat and the look of ecstasy on their faces proved to me that bat horses do consume and enjoy the taste of meat.

Before I could think on what else these horses would love to put in their pie holes but before I could think of testing out the chicken snake meat I felt the vibrations of something big coming behind me and when I turned around I saw Thumper walking up behind me, his 40mm still held tightly in those large metal hands of his.

"Hey boy, where have you been?" I said while going over to my cave home, grabbing the knob I gave it a light twist and a push before placing the nails down inside but the rest went back outside.

Looking at my helmet watch I saw that it was just a measly two in the afternoon so I had plenty of time to watch my enemy, to study them, find out what makes them tick, figure out any weaknesses they may have, and to see if there is any way I can sabotage them to the point where they would have to make a tactical retreat.

Going back out of the camp I quickly started to sprint back in the direction of the horse camp, my adrenaline transfusion I underwent kicking in as I felt myself feel lighter then air and moved faster then any other pilot in existence with the exception of one piloting a Stryder with its dash core activated. Barely feeling the wind moving across my body I flashed through bushes and shrubs, my steps can't even be heard by my own ears as I felt my blood pumping but soon it came to an end when I stopped at the edge of their camp and quickly set myself up in a nearby tree and covered myself up in a branch and a few leaves but it was good enough at the time.

Pulling my Longbow-DMR from my back I placed the stock to my shoulder and looked through the scope as I could still hear my heart beating in my ears as my eyes are fully dilated from the pump of adrenaline coursing through me, the crosshairs going across the heads of each horse in the camp with me occasionally making it bounce up in a fake shot, sometimes even muttering 'Boom, headshot' as I imagined their heads asploding into a fountain of gore as it normally would if I shot a Militia grunt of pilot.

Laughing to myself I wiggled a bit in the tree and that action brought the attention of a single guard, this lone horse looked just like all the others and had a white coat, golden mane and earthy colored eyes but in this case they were blue. Tilting my rifle away from the guard as I stared down from branch to see the guard come closer I decided to take a course of action and have some fun with the lone stallion slowly walking toward me.

Waiting for him to get closer I rotated myself onto the balls of my toes and waited, and waited, and waited until finally the stallion was underneath the branch I was on and I immediately slid off the piece of wood and landed onto his back and with all my weight I forced the horse down onto the ground and hit him upside the head with the butt of my rifle and rendered the guard unconscious. Dragging him into a nearby shrubbery I stripped him of his armor and placed it into a different bush and with an evil grin I climbed up a different tree and went back to spying on the horses.

"Hmm....several tents all in rows and columns....what I think is the supply depot is located at the upper left side of the camp with the rest of the disassembled wagons and lastly the commanding officers tent was at the center of the camp so infiltrating to get to the leader would be impossible without a cloaking system or some really good luck." I said to myself and no one in particular, my vision returning to the scope as I spied on a few horses going to the latrines I smirked at the possibility of me going over to the bathrooms and stealing all the toilet paper but seeing how I went through that nightmare I decided against it, no one should have to go through a toilet nightmare unless it is a well planned prank and that they had an emergency roll squared away for just such an occasion.

What most people do in their off time is their own thing but for me, I do absolutely nothing but listen to music, gamble on how many Militia we can kill, swap in burn cards for something better, check on the Spectre racks and see if I could put my name on one of them without getting caught but seeing how I am on a planet with no electronics, no booze as far as I know of, no porn, no internet, and no double bacon cheeseburger, so I now have to improvise.

Taking my Longbow in hand I made my way over to the latrines and waited for there to be at least one horse to be here alone, my plan to ruin one horse's day is about to begin and with a stroke of luck I heard the sound of someone going into one of the ten bathrooms and closed the door behind them. With a strong kick to the left side making it lean away from the rest I heard the sounds of someone yelling inside followed by a scream of pure agony, the smell that followed was quickly snuffed out when my helmet sealed itself away from the outside world but the damage was done.

Some unlucky horse just got covered in piss and shit and that smell will more then likely never come off.

After that I just resumed spying with the occasional mock headshot, my eyes drifting to each horse before bouncing the rifle up and before long my time here was running short.

As soon as it turned ten o'clock at night I decided to pack it in and go back home, my camp still secure by the time I make it back and once I entered my cave home I closed the door and set aside my DMR by my bed along with my Wingman, and once I was on my bed of leaves I closed my eyes and went off to the dream realm, hoping that my dreams this time would be pleasant or calming but instead it was of a day that will forever live on in infamy for me.

And I wasn't the only one experiencing that dream, as I too soon found out that there are things in this world that would dare break into the minds of others just because they think its their job to protect others as they sleep.

"Get down!"

Author's Note

Sorry for the delay, I was working on this chapter while finding a job online, and also that the chapter had to be split in two parts because if I left it in one chapter it would have been moving way to fast.