“Ah’m sure ah saw something round’ here,” said a muffled feminine voice to the operative. Where… where am I?
“Well, what in the hay do yah think It could’ve been big sis’?” The soldier had been grasping his plasma sniper ever since... whatever the hell just happened. He only had one thought glazing across his half-unconcious mind," What just happened?" All he could remember was the operation. There was some sort of X-ray. Dressed in a robe and chock-full of psionic power. There were Mutons with a form of plasma weapon… a huge robot - wait, could it have been biological AND mechanical like the floaters? - that took many blows before going down and an extremely tougher variant of the floaters… But that doesn’t matter right now. What matters is that there’s a civilian on the UFO crash site.
He had quickly gotten up from the ground, taking in his surroundings. Something was off, and he knew it right from the start. He was in what seemed to be a field of… apple trees. This wasn’t a scorched forest, none of his squad-mates were in site, and there was no UFO what-so-ever in sight. Just him and a bright field… but there was those voices. Both had a southern accent to them, and quite a thick one at that. the operative began to ponder what was going on until he heard one of them beyond the bushes and shrubs he was concealed them. “Ah think It was somewhere right here. The operative’s mind shifted into full gear and worry. No one had known of the X-COM Organization, and no one would ever learn of it until Earth was out of the fray! Swiftly, he gathered up his items, running off his mental check list as he went. Plasma pistol: Check. Archangel Armor: Check. S.C.O.P.E: Check. He had quite a handful on him and he swore he heard four sets of footsteps closing in on him. His hasty attempt was complete with every bit of his gear in his inventory, and he knew what was coming next.
A feeling of pins and needles enveloped his body-a feeling he became accustomed to-as he began fading away, as if his body were being vaporized. Still, he could see everything as he made a mad dash towards a nearby tree. He made a small chuckle as he leaped straight up into the tree, remembering the time he was promoted to the position of Colonel for his tactics. He nestled in and let his sight take over, all that was below him becoming extremely clear-razor sharp one might say. The soldier felt quite confident until he saw the source of the voices. He thought there was FOUR people moving over to him, based off the sound of the many footsteps, but there was only two of them. They weren’t anything from the aliens OR Earth. One creature was Orange, with what seemed to be blonde hair protruding over its head and from it’s rump. It wore what seemed to be a southern or… cowboy hat and had a red ribbon wrapped around its tail. A smaller version ( about half the size of the original ) of the original organism tagged along with the orange… pony, having red hair and a light yellow body color.
The soldier’s mind had only thought going through it before he fell out of the tree. What… the… fuck. A thud had followed before darkness enveloped him.
It was a great morning on the Apple family's farm. The barn stood up over the land proudly, the sun shined over the fields with waves of warmth and light, and of course, the apple trees had sprouted bundles and bundles of delicious, juicy apples! The orange pony of the happy farmland had trotted right out of the home, hat sitting on her head with pride and a smile spread across her face. Seeing all the apples across the field, she knew one thing for sure. "Hooboy! Ah sure have mah work cut out for me today," she exclaimed with eagerness. She began to walk out to the fields of apple trees, but not before something particularly happened. A flash of bright white light had shone out from the trees, and slowly faded into a purple hue before disappearing completely.
This had already left the pony alarmed, but unsurprised. This stuff happened all the time, right? Her happy demeanor transform into a quite annoyed one as her ears had flopped down. "What's wrong now Twilight," She yelled out, but got no response. Just silence...and the chirping of birds. "Pinkie, ah swear to Celestia if yer just pulling mah leg here, then-," She yelled as she began to advance toward the site of the flash, but was interrupted by a small tug on her tail. "What's goin' on big sis? Why're you yelling' so early in the morning'?" said the culprit, a small pale yellow earth pony with red hair and a bow. "Don't mind me Applebloom. Just go back in and get some more rest," said the orange pony in reply, covering her annoyed expression with one of caring. "But sis, ah heard you talking bout' some pony pulling yer leg!," said the little filly, Applebloom. "I wanna see who it is!"
"Well, ah'm sorry sugar cube, but ah don't even know for sure what that was. For all I know, whatever that thing-er-ma-bob is could be dangerous! I ain't gonna take any chances of you gettin' hurt!"
The little filly had expected this to happen, so she unleashed her secret weapon. She'd sat on the ground, tail tucked up and eyes wide, and said,"But Applejack! I could get a cutiemark if I do this! And I really really need one! Don't yah remember me and the Cutie Mark Crusaders?"
Applejack hadn't even taken a second to respond to her. "Ah said that you could get hurt! Ah'd never forgive myself if somethin' ever happened to you!"
"But please?" "No!" "Please?" "NO!" "Pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee-"
Applejack knew she'd have to give in at some point. That darn filly wouldn't just give up too easily. If anything, she'd probably already have a cutiemark for persistance if there were such a thing! "Alright! You can come along, but if you even go as far as a foot away from me..."
"YAAAAAY," Applebloom had squealed out at her success.
Applejack rolled her eyes, letting out a sigh. It was going to be a long day, wasn't it?
The two approached the site of the flash cautiously, until approaching a group of bushes. "Ah'm sure ah saw something round' here..." said the orange pony with confusion. "Well, what in the hay do yah think it could've been Big Sis," questioned her little yellow sister. Applejack was just about to respond when she heard the muffled sound of hoof steps in the grass to her side. Both ponies turned to see what the source of the noise was only to be greeted by nothing. Nothing at all, just thin air. And then the sound of leaves shuffling in the trees. It didn't take long for them to find out what caused it as something had dropped to the grass with a thud, appearing almost out of thin air. It looked almost like some sort of monkey, but... it held some different things. One was a silvery sort of tube that held some green... stuff inside. Another was almost the same as the first, but much smaller. It was covered in something that was completely black, with the exception of silvery sorts of parts in certain places. One could go on and on about the different things that this creature had, but Applejack didn't need to know anything else. Her eyes were wide with surprise as she took off. "Get back inside Applebloom! Don't question it," she yelled out between pants. The only thing she thought was that she needed to get the others, and she needed to get them fast.
“So… What is it,” asked the curious orange mare to the purple unicorn who was observing the… creature with an intense eagerness.
“I don’t know AJ,” replied the unicorn. “But one thing’s for sure. It’s not from around here…” Applejack had gave a small snicker before Twilight had turned to her with a questioning gaze. “What Sugarcube? You wouldn’t expect the good ol’ science mare here to say that there’s an actual alien visiting our planet?”
Twilight had just shrugged off the comment. After all, why get upset at all when there’s an extra-terrestrial right in front of her? The first thing to catch her attention though was the items that were held by the unconscious creature. Two silver contraptions were laying to the side of the creature: One being long with a green substance that seemingly coursed through the object in question, the other being much shorter than the first, but still having glowing green lines and spots amongst the surface. The second thing to interest the scientist was what the creature was wearing. It wore a sort of black hat that leaned to the side and had a symbol-a stretched out pentagon with two lines crossing through the middle that crossed out what seemed to be a sphere, 3 star-like figures lying between the space of each cross- designed into it. It also wore some sort of darkly tinted glasses, which kept anything from seeing what was presumably its eyes. Moving downwards, the creature sported a seemingly bulky black suit that covered all parts of the body below its head. Two tubes protruded from the back of suit in a way that each tube’s long side was parallel to the back of the suit.
“Would you mind telling me how our guest got here,” asked Twilight, who had taken on an interrogative tone.
“Well partner, ah was just waking up fer’ a day of working on the orchard here until some sort of purple light flashed out by Everfree Forest. When ah went on down to check it, nothin’ was there except some sort of hoof-print. I was about to go back until ah heard somethin’ rustlin’ up in the apple trees. Turns out it was this feller’ right here, who fell out the tree after a moment.”
Twilight was quite perplexed by this. There has to be some reason for this creature’s sudden appearance. It can’t just appear for no reason, right?
“That’s quite unusual AppleJack… shouldn’t we tell the others about this… thing though?”
“Ah’m pretty sure that this would start up quite a buzz in Ponyville, and ah don’t need every pony in town to be crowdin’ around mah family’s farm. It’d be pretty hard to get anything done round’ here if we’re swarmed, yah know?”
Twilight had a small frown on her face, but soon replaced it with a look of understanding.
“Well, should we go ahead an’ move this feller here to the barn?”
“Probably AppleJack. This thing’s probably going to be panicked when it wakes up. It wouldn’t hurt to get it contained…”
———————————————————————————————————————
The two ponies had finally gotten the (quite heavy) alien to the barn. It was tied up and sitting on a bale of hay at the time, still unconscious at the time, and the two ponies had one thought at that point: what now?
“Um, Twi? What in the hay are we supposed to do now,” asked the worn out orange pony, panting little after between every few words.
Of course, Twilight didn’t have an answer at the time. She had been sitting on a small bale of hay before one idea hit her. An idea she wasn’t too sure about.
“Well… We could find out a bit more about it.”
Applejack gave her a questioning look, and asked,”Now what do yah mean by that Twilight?”
“I remember reading about a certain spell that could allow me to enter any creature’s mind. The problem though was that I needed to be up close to the creature in order to… enter it’s mind. I never could find any pony willing to be a subject, but now…” Twilight had turned over to the armored E.T.
“Hold on there Twily! Ah’m sure it’d be rude to start pokin’ around in some random thing’s mind,” said the country-raised equine.
“Well… This could possibly be my only chance to see if that spell was just a lie or the real deal. I don’t want to waste this opportunity.”
Applejack wanted to stop her, but a certain curiosity took over, and won her out. She still had a nervous feeling as she watched her purple friend walk over to the alien. She watched as the unicorn had stared at the thing, and began lowering her horn to its head.
“Here goes nothing,” Twilight said as her horn began glowing.
———————————————————————————————————————
Black. That’s all he saw. An infinite plane of pitch black. Nothing else was on the man’s mind besides his past, distant and recent memories. Above all were those… things he saw. They looked like candy-colored horses! And one had a hat. A fucking hat! Out of everything he’s seen while he was with the XCOM organization… Even that royalty looking fucker. It looked frail as hell - excluding the helmet - but it had psionic powers beyond anyone’s expectations.
He could still remember the echoing voice it sent him. It sent chills down his mind as he stared straight into its eyes.
SUBMIT!
SUBMIT!
NO HOPE!
SURRENDER!
He could still remember his life flying in front of his eyes: His birth, his Russian family, enlisting as a soldier, and being recruited for XCOM… until Clank had saved him with a Kinetic Strike. He could remember Clank, the tough guy of the group. The first of humans to go under Cybernetic Augmentation; The first to don the MEC suit. The only one who could handle it. Then there were the others-
“FUCK,” The operative yelled in his conscience. He could feel something piercing his skull, almost feeling like a knife with a plasma blade… if there ever was such a thing. Still, he knew something was trying to break into his mind! He knew because of the many times those Sectoids tried to mind-rape him. He was ready since the last time he was a victim of mind-control, ever since he volunteered for the gene labs. Since he had gone under genetic modification. Nothing had ever violated his mind since then! NOTHING WILL NOW!
———————————————————————————————————————
Applejack had seen Twilight begin to struggle not even five seconds after she began her “snooping” around with the creature.
“You ok there Twily,” the farmer pony asked, worry obvious in her voice.
“Yes… Maybe… Ugh,” Twilight had strained out. Something was holding her back from delving into the creatures mind. Wait, not just holding back - pushing her out! Something was being directed back to her, but she didn’t know what it was. This never happened before! Nothing has ever been able to resist magic, unless they had magical abilities themselves, but this thing didn’t even have something to concentrate magic! Hay, it didn’t even show any signals of magic, but somehow it was resisting? The last though that ran through Twilight’s mind was,”How!?” before she stumbled back into a wall of the barn, pain searing through her mind and eyes wide with surprise.
That is, until she saw the creature move. It only twitched a bit at first, but that quickly stopped. The creature had been able to tear apart the rope that binded him, an audible snap being heard before he jumped off the hay bale. Twilight’s iris quickly shrank, fear evident in them, as her mouth gaped open. The creature shrugged what may its shoulders, and rolled its head with audible pops and cracks before it unholstered the large silvery tube, which began to hum and automatically expand certain parts. The two ponies soon found themselves face to face with a pulsing, green energy as the creature pointed at them, swiveling from one to the other.
It didn’t take long before it spoke in a low, ominous voice.
“Who... The FUCK... Tried that!”
