Faith and Fire: Hospitable

Chapters

02 - Beware of dissidents
03 - Expect minor resistance
04 - Down to shadow town
05 - Ghost city
07 - Back in the saddle
08 - Divide and conquer
09 - Tick-Tock
10 - Ascendant
11 - Your soul to take
12 - Up to speed
13 - Queen to E-4, Pawn to G-7
14 - Initiate
15 - What's yours is mine
16 - Standoff
17 - Well, this is going great!
18 - Best laid plans
20 - Go to hell...
01 - A thousand years will leave such a crick in the neck...
06 - What does this button do?
19 - WE'REHEREWEMADEITWE'LLRIPOUTYOURSOULWATCHOUTHEREWEARE

02 - Beware of dissidents

49 hours earlier

The air was like that in a sauna. Rainbow Dash hated saunas. She found the idea of shutting yourself in a small room being slowly hard-boiled to be, for a lack of a better term to be found in her mind, dumb. At least saunas had sense enough to keep to themselves and not belch their stuffy smog out into the world around them, but this weather didn't hold the same humility as the sauna. It was stubborn, intrusive and unforgiving. Just like those that had brought the weather with them. Dash couldn't complain all too much, however, as much fog and steam as there was the air was far from hot. In fact it was fairly chilly, and the rain didn't help matters at all. If the Federation denied they had any intent to gun down the ponies of Equestria, Dash was sure they had instead decided to just drown them seeing how heavy the rain was pelting down on the residents of Ponyville, along with their alien 'Benefactors'.

Dash's dull blue hoodie was already soaked clean through, along with her sports vest beneath and her jogging bottoms. Her waterlogged tail swayed from side to side like a wet towel, its various colours darkened and partly melted together, its length occasionally slapping itself against the back of her legs. Rainbow Dash looked about, thankful to see the fog was too thick to see anypony through, and presumably too thick to be seen herself by unwanted eyes. She had tried her best to look as 'casual' as possible, remembering what Princess Celestia had told the Elements of Harmony and the other princesses. They had all gathered as often as possible, sometimes once a week, other times once in only a couple of months. Sometimes the Feds caught wind of all of them gathering together and sought to intervene as quickly as possible. One of Dash's fondest friends, Pinkie Pie, had an almost supernatural capacity for precognition, able to determine events before they actually occurred. This capability came as an invaluable tool when Federation forces advanced on one of the princesses secret meetings, allowing all the members to quickly scatter out of sight and back to their homes. However the Federation was, if anything, tenacious, and kept their alien ears firmly to the ground. It had become increasingly difficult to dodge the ever quickening raids made by the Federation, and the last meeting the princesses called for had almost ended in catastrophe.

Dash still remembered that night. Celestia had at that evening noted how everypony should try their best to appear as uninteresting as possible, and avoid causing trouble or fueling conflict with Feds as often as possible. Princess Cadance had then started saying how she and her operatives in the Crystal Empire had encountered a strange access point to some unexplored portion of the Crystal Palace, a pathway that lead deeper than any had thought the gigantic castle could have ever gone. She was about to continue, until Pinkie had clasped a panicked hand around Dash's arm, Dash quickly turning to see Pinkies expression awash with a deep sense of terror. Dash didn't need another second to know what Pinkie had just caught wind of, and called for everypony to keep dead silent and to make for the predetermined exits as quickly and quietly as possible. Not two second later the door to the cider storage warehouse had burst open into a thousand wooden fragments, dark figures hustling through the breach, firearms held aloft, laser-designators flitting through the air, hungry for fresh targets. Dash had always prided herself on her capacity for unmatchable, raw speed, but that night called for a different manner of haste as she had darted to three of her friends within as many seconds, snatching them from were they stood or crouched to put them behind cover or down on the ground as the thin red lines had hovered closer to their faces. The alien soldiers had stalked closer by the second, and would have easily caught everypony in the storage room if not for Princess Luna throwing out a magical curtain of fabricated darkness to obscure the line of sight between the two groups. Applejack had happily delivered a ferocious kick to the chest of a pair of assailants with her titanically powerful legs, assuredly breaking a handful of ribs in the process. Rainbow Dash herself had tackled a soldier to the floor like a lightning bolt and thrown a flurry of blows to the aliens face while he was pinned down. If Fluttershy hadn't thrown herself into Dash when she did, the bullets that had stitch themselves into the wall besides Dash would have had a fair bit of blood soaked into them.

Luckily everypony had escaped the ordeal, but had signified something truly worrying. The Federation was looming over them in all, and would likely not let them slip away a second time. This revelation had put a full stop on the subject on the next step the princesses had to take. They had to deliver some kind of solution.

Yet so little of the old world was left, so many of its relics broken or taken by the Federation. The Elements of Harmony had been integrated into the Tree of Harmony only a few days before the first Federation spacecraft had been spotted in the sky, and one of the first actions the Federation took to 'Neutralize the potential threat of foreign weaponry' was to destroy the Tree of Harmony and the magical power it was imbued with. This was a measure taken to ensure the energies of magic could not be used against them, for as much as they boasted their calculated analysis of the fabric of magic itself, they would never truly admit how little they still knew about the obscure energy. Dash allowed herself a sly grin as she remembered pulling those research files from a Federation console and handing them personally to Princess Celestia. She'd never been much good with technology, she couldn't last thirty seconds on one of the blocky eight-bit game consoles that used to be found in the old Ponyville arcade. However somehow she'd managed to press enough of the right holographic symbols in the right order to find some truly informative material.

One such confession given by the files was, despite what the Feds told the public, the Tree of Harmony remained whole to this day. Explosive plastics, artillery and even a ship-mounted orbital particle beam had utterly failed to even graze the ancient construct, and instead the Federation had resorted to burying the tree under a dozen layers of irradiated multi-filament alloy three feet thick, buffered apart by electro-conductive gelatin, not to mention about a hundred feet of concrete. This had all been taken to ensure that the Tree of Harmony could never breach its influence into the outside world. If the current state of Equestria was any sign, it would seem these measures were working. The Crystal heart had been stolen by, assuredly, the Federations breed of assassins that stalked every shadow in Equestria, the chemically enhanced soldiers seemingly having snuck into the palace grounds, used some portable form of energy displacements technology and had removed the crystal relic and had taken it to the Equestrian Federal Research Facility, a sprawling facility twice the size of Canterlot located below Foal Mountain, near were Canterlot River met the sea.

Dash kept walking. Eyes locked downwards to the wet cobblestone. She hoped whatever the princesses had in mind involved either somehow raiding that research facility, that or hoping they had a lot of time and a lot of shovels. Dash took a left at the street junction and into Mane Street, headed towards the town hall. She could see a few ponies out and about, but not nearly as many as there used to be, before the Federation. All of them wore thick clothing, most had their hoods up to attempt to shield themselves from the downpour. All of them were on the move, having somewhere to get too apparently. However Dash noticed up ahead ponies were headed towards and then passed her with a gleam of fear in their eyes, some even holding close to one another to feel some form of safety.

Here we go. Big smiles everypony. Dash thought as dark figures awaited up ahead.

As Dash approached she see could more and more of the creatures up ahead, and all in greater detail. They wore grey bodysuits, like those worn by the Wonderbolts, only with thicker padding in the legs, shoulders and back, and a certain segment pattern running through them revealing how they were sewn together. Atop that was a snow white armour covering the shoulders, knees, chest, back and over the head in the form of a helmet, all of it angular, made of steep, wide plates and smooth metal. Their helmets hid their faces in favour of the entire front of the helmet being composed of a pair of small, circular glowing red lenses built within a mechanical composition that looked like a high-tech form of night-vision goggles, along with a large rebreather assembly below were the mouth would be. The whole assembly mad them appear very insect-like in the facial region, the mechanical setup allowing no expression of flesh to be seen. The back of the angular helmet had three wires coming out from it, the wires arching down a short ways to then sink into a spinal backpack that gave the soldiers a slightly hunched appearance. Besides the small circular visors a few other select locations across their combat suits glowed with small red lights, notably on a couple of location on the side of the spinal pack, the back of the hips and from one of their wrists in the form of a glowing red slab. This small slab was their wrist mounted data-reads, small computers that allowed each soldier to remain updated and informed about not only military occurrences, but any information gathered from across their domain, accessed through their 'Ever-net'. Across the white of their armour plates could be seen angular patterns coloured in a deep blue, the shapes cutting across the angles of their armour in a commonly diagonal manner.

In their hands they held a lengthy firearm, a black machine that was almost twice the size of Equestrias own military rifles. They were rectangular in overall shape, even the barrels appearing as an extended part of the geometric body of the weapon. The rifles, 'Magna-rifles' as they were known as, had a large number of attachment rails built into them, one atop the length of the gun, one beneath the barrel and two either side, one above the other. The grip was also built into the main body, and from its bottom sprouted a single cable that lead to a cylindrical chamber that was built halfway up and into the rectangular bulk of the weapons barrel. Behind the grip the stock was also built into the main body, being the largest and chunkiest portion of the machine by a fraction, mostly due to it holding both the weapons battery and magazine. The weapon had gained an infamous reputation throughout Equestria and beyond, outmatching the Equestrian equivalent, the EBR-17, in terms of range, accuracy and raw power, the weapons electro-chemically charged rounds able to cut clean through even the thickest Equestrian infantry armour even at extreme range. Behind the firing grip, at the fore end of the stock was were the rectangular magazine was housed, a tall, thin clip that held forty, ten millimeter chem-rounds that could be accelerated by electrical stimulation, which assured ammo supply rarely ever ran dry for any given soldier. However the weapon was not without its drawbacks, no matter how much the Feds claimed it to be the technological pinnacle of the age. It was large, forty five inches from end to end, and very blocky and bulky making it difficult to use around corners or in buildings. It was semi-automatic in nature due to the power delivered by each shot and the length of the barrel, meaning it wasn't exactly suited for supressive purposes. As powerful each shot was, each round made a clean-cut wound rather than the shock and tumble of the EBR's seven-six-two ammunition, so each shot didn't cause much trauma to the surrounding tissue around the actual wound, and certain reports, especially those that came from Dodge Junction, detailed that Magna wounds were easy to clean, sew and dress. Dash kept her eye on one part in particular, however, the upper part of the stock that had a red light on either side in the form of a short line. This was the weapons power cell, produced a significant measure of energy every second and, when the core was breached, would detonate with the force of a grenade. In failing a core breach, bending or breaking the barrel in any way would entirely disable the weapons functionality, leaving the alien soldier to use his sidearm, and getting to that pistol took time.

Time for me to pop over and say hello with my fists, you creepy alien freak. Dash thought with a grin.

"You, civilian, stay right there!" The alien accent veiled in a tone of digital distortion barked out from just in front of Rainbow Dash.

Dash new the drill. Stop walking, eyes forward, hands up and open and no speaking.

"You know, officer, you don't have to frisk me, you can just ask me out." Dash said with a smirk, giving a satified squee after finishing.

Well, nopony's perfect. Plus, the drill is hard.

"Shut up! What's your name and designation code?!" The soldier barked as he strode closer, weapon raised.

"Rainbow Dash. Designation code four, three, eight.........something, something, something, yeah, I dunno what my code is." Dash said with a shrug.

"It's six numbers, dumbass. Turn around!" The soldier snatched Dash's arm, making her flinch, and spun her around to face away from him.

"What have we got?" Another distorted voice asked from behind Dash with a mellow tone, however this one sounded far more feminine.

"Local, looked up to no good. Got a bit of an attitude problem." The male benefactor growled.

"Wait, I know this one, Rainbow Dash, right? Wow little missy, lots of accounts to your name, nine by my count." The female benefactor chuckled.

"I've paid my fines." Dash said plainly with a scowl.

"Sure, whatever. Where are you going?" The female asked sharply.

"Home."

"Where's home?"

"Where I live." Dash allowed herself a grin a little.

Dash cringed and scrunched her eyes shut when she felt the chunky barrel of a Magna-rifle being pressed into the back of her head.

"Sheez! The cloud beyond Pink-tree Plains! Come on!" Dash said tensely as she pulled her head to the side and away from the weapon's barrel.

The alien lowered the weapon, allowing Dash to look straight ahead again. Dash looked forward to see a pair of ponies, a mare and stallion both staring at Dash, jaws clenched, eyes desperate, both stood in the doorway of a nearby house. Not two seconds after Dash had seen them did they hastily avert their eyes and dart inside to the relative safety of their home.

Sure, no reason in making more of a fuss.

"All pegasi have been evicted from airbourne structures and said areas have been restricted from public entry." The female asked.

"Yeah, I know, thank for that by the way." Dash snorted back.

"So what are you doing headed to a zone designated restricted under Federation law? You must have been relocated." The male growled.

"I know it's difficult to understand, really, but that cloud used to be my home, and it has all my stuff in it. I'm going to move all my stuff into my new place."

"Do you have any medication, disability equipment, infant care equipment or environmentally damaging material in the structure?" The female asked.

"No."

"Then the Federation holds custody over the property until a time when it is deemed suitable for public access."

"So, you're stealing all my stuff."

"No, we are examining the potentially unstable nature of the structure and then determining whether it is suitable for public access."

"Unstable, it's my home?! I've lived there for years." Dash blurted, turning her head around slightly.

"Irrelevant. The science behind the nature of airbourne structures is inconclusive, its stability is yet to be determined."

"That nature is called magic, I thought you guys knew everything?" Dash sighed while rolling her eyes.

"My goodness, is it really that time of the week already?!"

Dash's ears twitched as she heard the new, undistorted voice coming from behind her, most likely just outside town hall. This wasn't surprising seeing who Dash knew who the voice belonged to.

"Attendant Yelli'Gov, sir!" Dash heard the two benefactors bark as they turned and snapped their feet together to attention.

"Well, Gilith Dash, turn around, I know it's you!" Yelli'Gov said happily with a chuckle.

Dash's neck muscles tensed along with her eyes as she started to turn, but just before revealing her face, twisted her expression into a sunbeam of content and happiness, simply dripping with sarcastic saturation. She rested her eyes on the tall figure before her, true that all Feds were a couple inches taller than their Equestrian counterparts, but the Attendant was a couple inches taller still, and seeing as Dash was quite short for a mare, he towered over her a little. He was as alien as any Fed, but his visage was not obscured by the thick layers of battle clothing and armour like the benefactor soldiers. Instead the Fed simply wore a form of officiant attire, the clothing quite form-fitting and lacking any embellishment. The cloth seemed elastic, to a degree, and covered his whole body beside his head from above the jawline and his hands. The clothing was mostly the same blue of the patterns on the soldiers armour, and had white geometric shapes patterned into its design. The sewing lines were segmented and diagonal in pattern, slicing across the white diagonal patterns, and a series of red light were built into the suit, all down the spinal length, at the wrists and the collar as a series of short horizontal or diagonal lines. His skin was paler than white in a sense as it was slightly translucent, it made him and his whole race appear deathly ill to ponies. His hands had three fingers and a thumb, and the whole appendage seemed creepily elongated when compared to the hands of a pony. His face was by far the thing that made Rainbow Dash feel the most ill. It was much like a mix between a squid and some tropical fish. His mouth was almost permanently shaped as a dissappointed grimace, despite his mood, his thin lips arching up at the middle like a fishes. His eyes were calm, yet held a certain energy of assessment about them, and unlike a ponies, the sclera held the colour, whereas the cloudy, irregular iris was a pale grey. He had no nostrils that could be seen, and his ears were simple hole in the side of his head. His skull was elongated slightly compared to a ponies, and swept upwards to a blunted point with a ride adorning each side of the flattened front of the skull. Like Dash had noted, the skull looked a lot like the body of a cuttlefish, and the face and jaw a lot like some breed of fish.

"You," Yelli'Gov pointed an elongated finger at Dash, "Are very easy to find it seems, yes. Not very good at sneaking around, are you?"

"What can I say, Attendant? I have an attention problem." Dash said with an innocent, crooked grin.

The Attendants' mouth took up an almost awkward angle at the corners that Dash had learnt to be a smile, his lower eyelids floating upwards.

"That's very good, yes, very good. Keeps everyone here on there toes. Now, what are we inspecting the little Gilith for today?"

"Seemed in a hurry. Gave us some attitude when stopped." The male soldier grunted.

Don't even think it, Dash.

"She's a little pissy because she can't go home and collect her toys." The female snickered.

You're better than them, Dash.

"That is a shame, that is. But you see, Gilith Dash, we can't have you sneaking around and going places where you could get hurt. We need you right here to keep us all busy, right? This kind of sneakiness really upsets me, Gilith Dash, really upsets me." Yelli'Gov said, bending down slightly, his tone as if he were telling off a child.

Oh, whatever. I can take a hit.

"Well, if I had a face like a squid, I'd be upset too." Dash shrugged.

The two soldiers tensed their grips on their weapons, a sign they were getting pissed off and wanted a fight. Yelli'Gov however simply tightened his alien smirk and stood up straight to take a couple of steps back before nodding forward once. The tallest soldier, the male, strode forward and threw the stock of his rifle into Dash's gut. As much as it hurt a moment, the reality was the aliens had slight limbs and were not well trained in melee combat, and so was very much bearable. Not to mention Dash had earned herself a healthily muscular stomach from many years of disciplined workout routines that helped cushion the blow. Stumbling back a step, arms wrapped around her midsection, Dash took a single deep breath in, closed her eyes, and slowly straightening herself up and coming to a stand, hands now by her side as if nothing had happened. Although she appeared to be composed, Dash couldn't lie that hit was a little fiercer than the previous ones.

"Come on, Dash, let's not make this personal, just protocol after all. Now, you were headed home, yes? You can't go to your old home, you understand? Do you understand what I'm sayi-"

The Attendant suddenly ducked down along with the soldiers as several screams could be heard around town. It took a moment for Dash to even feel the shock-wave that rattled through her, or hear the d=near deafening crack of an explosion, but managed to compose herself a little better than the alien in front of her. Dash looked over in the direction of the town park to see a large plume of dirt and dust hovering in the air as something quite potent had just detonated nearby. Alien benefactors all hurried to the site of the explosion, a handful of squads passing by the Attendant and Dash.

"Maybe you should take your eyes off me and pay closer attention to 'your' town, Attendant." Dash called out over the commotion happening around her as the pair of soldiers that had stopped her quickly escorted Yelli'Gov back to the Town hall.

The Attendant looked back, his face still grinning strangely as he raised an lowered a finger in Dashes direction in a 'I'm onto you' gesture. Dash knew the Federation had a tight watch on her, and periodically made her life as difficult as possible at every opportunity. However what they failed to realize was this was all by design. The Princesses had originally come clean with the reality that it was a real possibility all the Elements in Ponyville would get a hard time from the Feds, however what they hadn't counted on was Dash. She was the Element of Loyalty, through and through, it wasn't some occupation or hobby, it was an energy knitted into her every fiber. She had taken it upon herself to take the brunt of as much attention as she could gather, making as much of a scene and breaking as many alien laws and protocols as she possibly could. It wasn't exactly the most glorious position, Dash had thought, but it would mean her friends could move and operate slightly less seen than if she'd behaved herself. She was, admittedly, growing tired of the charade, probably as much as the Federation was growing tired of her, and knew she couldn't take this punishment forever. She just really hoped the Princesses had come up with one hell of an idea.

Dash took the opportunity a certain friend had given her, and headed off. Taking wing not a foot from standing height, she used her immense wing power to blast herself into the nearest ally, only this wasn't the ally she needed to be in three minutes ago. She spotted out her surroundings with haste before darting, once again, to a nearby alley. A squad of benefactors jogged noisily by her as she pressed herself against the external beam of a house. When they passed she made two short dashes, first to an abandoned market cart, then a stack of alien containment crates. From there she could see her destination, one of the more narrow alleys in Ponyville north of town hall. She made a final daring dash for the alley, which was further away than she would have preferred.

"Hey! You!"

The distorted bark had come from behind her, forcing her to come to a skidding halt and swing her head to see behind her. A Federal benefactor was marching across the market clearing towards a frightened mare backing away from him. She scrambled to get away as she was backed in towards a corner of two houses meeting. The soldier quickly snatched her by the back of the neck and force her to her knees, all the while she was crying out, pleading her innocence for whatever she was being accused of.

I wanna help you. Creator knows I do. I'm sorry. Dash clenched her eyes shut as she made a final push into the alleyway. She felt like crying, like screaming and punching at the walls besides her, but in order to help everypony, she couldn't help everypony.

Relaxing and taking a breath in Dash took careful steps forwards into the shadowy confines before her. She stepped forward, every couple of steps making sure to take a moment to look behind herself in case she was followed.

Sure would be the worst time to run into an Eliminator. She thought to herself with a shudder, fearing the rifle sights of one of the assassin freaks was hovering over her face.

Dash froze, her breath frozen to ice in her very lungs as she held her ground at the sight of one of the shadows in front of her coming alive and stepping out from its unseeable home before speaking.

"Wow, jumpy today aren't we, Dash?" The husky, yet unmistakeably female voice said sarcastically.

Dash relaxed as the shadow took a few steps forward to reveal herself. She wore a dark grey hoodie under a black leather jacket and black combat bottoms. She was a fair bit taller than Rainbow, as well as bearing a wider, more muscular build. Her wings were large and a golden brown, her legs golden also, but had the nature of a large wild cat, most notably a lion. Her arms were significantly stronger than Dash's, her hands covered in a yellow hide and her fingers tipped with wicked talons. Under her hood was her eagle-like head, bearing fierce, predatory eyes, white and grey feathers and a sharp beak.

"Yeah, I had some trouble getting here. Do you have it?" Dash replied plainly.

"Right here. But you owe me one, Dash, big time. This was a real pain to get past eight Fed checkpoints." Gilda said with a sourness to her tone as she pulled out an item from her jacket pocket wrapped in a brown packaging paper which she handed to Dash.

"I know. Look, things go south on our end, and I'll pay you back, in full. But if the princesses have the plan I hope they do, I have a feeling I might not need to pay you back." Dash said with a smirk.

"Don't think you can worm your way outta a deal, Dash. I do a job for you, I want payment. Things aren't how they used to be." Gilda growled, taking a step forward.

"How's no more Feds? That payment enough?" Dash replied with a raised brow.

"I won't hold my breath. Half the Griffon Kingdom is in rubble and flames after we tried to fight those alien freaks, I don't see how the Equestrian 'peace-parade' is gonna do any better." Gilda retorted, arms folded, expression grim.

"This isn't some magical do-all spell, or some pre-destined heroic intervention. This is a counter strike, plain and simple. I think the princesses know it's our only option now." Dash said sternly, pocketing the package.

"Yeah, good luck with that. Can't wait to hear how Equestria manages to overpower and evict an alien empire. See yah around, Dash." Gilda said as she turned and strode off into the alley, her voice heavy with venom.

"Yeah, whatever."

Dash knew where Gilda's detachment was coming from. She'd lost her home, some family, most friends. Now she just kept to herself and travelled as often as money would allow, taking up smuggling jobs whenever she could. Dash knew better than to get into an argument with the sour griffon, and so she just stood there a while, feeling the package she'd tucked under her pants, her underwear strapping it tight against her rump. Unless a Fed felt particularly touchy, which they never did, it shouldn't have been too hard to get to her next destination.

Sweet apple acres.

03 - Expect minor resistance

Gerin'Gov hated this planet. He'd hated the fold-space flit into orbit, he'd hated the drop-ship trip to the surface that made him use up two whole vomit sacks, he hated all this magic fairy-tale nonsense and he hated the natives. He couldn't understand what the Federation saw in such a backwards, reality-fucked planet full of people who's biggest daily concern was not having made at least four new friends. Real people had real problems in the world, and these people had no real problems, and they hardly came across as real people. Pastel coated equines with the average personal maturity of a six year old. No, there was nothing on this planet worth his entire battle cluster dedicating a whole week travelling here.

Then why, he had asked himself, was he walking the hallway of one of the most heavily guarded research facilities in the Federation's domain?

The walls were more like that of a starship hull, thick, separated by layers of breach compensatory measures. The doors were multi-powered, unlocking in at least two ways and opening apart in several segments that had sat together with an outrageous level of security. Viewing windows were siege-proof, a Fed could stick on as much plastic explosive as the window had surface area and the detonation would only scuff the surface. Everything about this place, its very atmosphere, bore a grim state of security, almost as if those who had built it were expecting some terrible force to suddenly try and breach its walls. The ceiling was high, the light built in and behind metal-mesh glass, the illumination providing a light that was strangely hazy, obscuring the path ahead of him.

He turned a corner, the thunder of the footsteps of the two Immortals, one at each of his side filling the new space they all marched into. His escort was impressive also, when he stepped off the drop-ship onto the landing strip, he'd never have predicted a pair of the domain reknown super-soldiers would have been their to greet him. Each stood a little over seven feet tall, bearing a strong physique that was supercharged with chemical and biological augments. Stronger bones, stronger muscles, faster reflexes and more efficient cardio systems made these soldiers several times more effective in the field than the standard Benefactor. Each held a Magna-accelerator, a light machine gun the size of a Magna-rifle, yet holding the eventual rate of fire of a Magna-repeater, the sub-machine gun variant of the Magna range of weaponry the military used. Each also wore the most advanced armour system the Federation could hope to provide, a fully enclosed suit, heavily armoured, powered by a miniature collision core, shielded by powerful energy shields and gear upgraded with the latest tactical computing systems. Each super soldier was easily worth an entire squad of any other soldier when fully equipped and armed.

Ahead of them was a large room that had a ceiling raised to accommodate two floors made apparent by the balcony viewable from the ground floor. Below the second floor was a large reception desk, the area bustling with the most activity. The whole facility, of which the Commander could see, was surprisingly busy. Enforcer security guarding every door in pairs, scientist teams and engineers hurrying about to attend to their daily tasks, it truly seemed like whatever this facility was dedicated to was of great importance. But Gerin'Gov would have to see it firsthand to truly believe it. As they approached reception, it would have seemed signing into the visitor logs was unneeded as a team of officials was waiting for him. As he approached, everyone waiting held a welcoming smile on their lips, especially who he assumed was the facility Attendant who stepped forward to offer a greeting, holding his hand low and open for the Commander to receive.

"Welcome, Commander Gerin'Gov. We're very glad you could attend to our summons. I hope your journey was pleasant." The Attendant, a small, slighter Fed than he was, said with his welcome extended, one the Commander accepted with a begrudging expression.

"It was horrible." He said plainly in his raspy voice.

"Well, I'm sorry to hear. However I can guarantee it was worth it. We have some quite exciting news." The attendant promised, still smiling.

"News I had to travel for several days to hear in person? I hope this doesn't turn out to be a very expensive D-mail message."

"I can promise you, if I'd sent a message, you would have considered me with worse opinion than you must do now." The soft-faced Attendant assured.

The facility was quite impressive, its study rooms ranging from small, personal laboratories, to cavernous spaces akin to starship hangars, holding strange equipment that appeared to be manipulating some form of energy and vast containment cells filled with anything from viscous green fluid to buzzing plasma flares. The group, composed of four scientists, a pair of engineers, a small team of government officials, the Attendant, the Commander and his escort, passed by another room, this one about the size of a school classroom and filled with a team of six scientist all wearing hazard-suits, each aligning some form of energy exchanger equipment in the form of two mechanical arms that ended in what looked like welding tools.

"Here we have our exchangment team working with an energy delivery prototype. This could allow us to re-assign collected Z-density to different units, allowing for efficient energy exchange both for facilities and even in the field." The Attendant said with a measure of excitement.

"So, are you saying this energy source will replace our current reactor cells?" A representative asked, seemingly unimpressed.

"Potentially, Z-density could replace almost all primary energy reliance, fueling city power grids, starship power cores, allowing greatly extended travel distances to be achieved with spacecraft, and can even be applied for military use. Not to mention, its relationship with Equis could see us efficiently replicate the manipulative capabilities of the natives."

"This is all quite impressive, it is. You've spoken a lot about this, Z-density, and its properties and applications, but you have failed to mention what it is." The Commander inquired, his patience truly beginning to wear thin by the tour he'd just been taken on.

"Well, now, this is were things get a little...controversial. Our entire society has been solidly built on the benefits of science, logic and reason, such qualities have fueled the past four hundred years of technological innovation, leading to the conquest and colonization of over two hundred planets. However, all of our previous assumptions, all of our conclusions on the nature of the universe around us was challenged by the discovery of a world that seemed removed from the laws of science. This world." The Attendant said, as though he were performing for some acting audition.

"We know all of this. And the challenges this world has forced upon us have been countered, we have nothing left to gain from being on this planetary abomination." Gerin'Gov growled, the lines on his pale face tightening as he scowled softly.

"But what if we haven't, in fact, countered all that we have encountered here. What if I were to tell you, without the governmental information filter putting back ink over large portions of my reports, that my scientists have informed me we have actually come to understand nothing on this world, at least not entirely."

"Wrong. Our reports have been delivered with level ten information access, and they tell us the same story everyone else has been told. That this planet is a scientific cooking pot of natural disaster. Just some random universal variable." A government official shook, her eyes closed in disappointment at the Attendants apparent stupidity.

"I'm afraid it is you that is wrong, Officiator. You see, the study of Equestria has been under my supervision for the entirety of the three years we have been here as a species. Every scientist, every technician reports to me with their significant finding which I then relay to planetary command, which in turn is delivered to Federal command. I received an immediate demand of silence in confidence in regard to the findings I was receiving, and was ordered explicitly to report all finding to Federal command and Federal command alone. A breach of these terms was said to cost me my life, until eight days ago, when I was ordered to summon all of you to an informative gathering." The Attendant said with a smug grin.

"You have the appropriate documentations for this summons, and all relevant records of the events you have detailed?" Another government official inquired.

"Delivered to you digitally as soon as we started the tour."

At this almost everyone present raised their wrist mounted data slabs and swiped their fingers across its surface to the relevant information. The Commander, however, did not feel the need to assure himself of such claims, he could see the Attendant was not lying. And if he was, the Commander himself had full permission lawfully to execute the Fed then and there. But there was one thing he truly wanted answers to.

"So. In plain Tafish, explain what you've found, Attendant." Gerin'Gov said calmly.

"This planet, this entire planet is heavily saturated with an energy signature completely untraceable by previously perfected measurement equipment. This energy, what we have entitled Z-density, remains separate from perception on a level that implies it is of an inter-dimensional nature. Firstly, this could mean we have discovered a source of energy not only potentially limitless in capacity, but more potent than even the largest collision reactors available today. This energy has, as I have stated, vast levels of application, both in our societies and for military use. Furthermore, with this energy harnessed in the correct manner, all of Equis becomes not only controllable, but entirely reshapeable."

"Terrain can be reconfigured in hours simply by the push of a holo-glyph. Weather, also, becomes equally easy to manipulate on the fly, producing clear skies and vast hurricane in minutes. The possibilities for mineral harvesting is astounding, as we could simply program the planet itself to arrange, purify, compact and extract all valuable materials with minimal manual intervention needed. Also, let's not forget the natives themselves, most notably the Ponies. With complete Z-density control, we could rearranged the energies imprintment upon Equestrians. Keeping in mind the...uh...'specialisation imprint' these creatures eventually mature into, we could program what specialization they receive. We could, effectively, manufacture generations of pre-destined engineers, pilots, manual workers...soldiers." The final word was said as the Attendant look straight at the Commander, who could not hide how captured he was by the possibility of not only getting something useful out of this planet, but actually saving Federal lives in warzones by pre-programming Equestrians to be soldiers, ready to fight for the Federation.

"This really, really is impressive. How does Z-density work exactly?" The commander asked as those around him gossiped excited and anticipating words to one another.

"We are...actually not quite sure. Extensive tests have been made in an attempt to both measure and even perceive Z-density. We have some plans for future investigations, but the Gov's down here have demanded certain conditions to better their efforts." The Attendant admitted.

"You have plans to use this energy source, for application across the Federation, and yet still have no idea where it comes from, or what it's made of?" The Gilith Officiator probed.

"What are the conditions your people require, Attendant?" Asked the Commander, ignoring the whinging of the Officiator.

"They say they require a biological bridge from which to monitor the behaviour of Z-density. The Unicorns we have detained have been useful, but only to a degree, and further study requires subjects with a more intimate control over the energy they can manipulate."

"You need one of the princesses?" The Commander said, raising an eyebrow.

"Well, yes, but we thought we'd go all the way on this request."

The voice had come from behind, having a young sharpness to it, a sharpness that was almost sinister in nature. The tour group turned to see a male Fed of average build striding down the corridor towards them, clothed in military attire, armour and even being armed with his sidearm and variety of tactical equipment. He didn't look all too different from a regular Benefactor foot soldier, however his spinal pack had in-built communication nodes, he lacked his helmet, and the blue patterns in his armour were filled with bright yellow dots, each about the size of a large coin. He moved with an aura of confidence, even a level of dominance that forced all but the Commander to take a step backwards as he approached. He came to a stop just in front of the Commander, his battle-ready tactical dress mirroring the Commander more formal, minimalist desk suit beneath a long, dark coat, along with the newcomers young, confident appearance mirroring the Commanders age-worn face stretched down in a state of exhaustion and impatience.

"Commander Gerin'Gov, glad to have you on the team. Good to know you'll be keeping a close eye on us from orbit, keep the cannons warm for us up there, right?" The young Gov said.

"Benefactor Supreme Yuni'Gov. You seem unnaturally chipper." The Commander growled.

"Well, as you have just heard, the think-tanks in this facility have made quite the demand, and I've offered them one better." The Benefactor Supreme replied with a wide smile, one that showed off his upper and lower jaw-spanning teeth.

"What could be better than a princess in the bag? You planning on dragging all four of them here yourself?"

"Actually, yes. Not only that, but all the dissidents they have been interacting with as well. That's all four princesses, and the other five Elements of Harmony." Yuni'Gov exclaimed, gaining a favorable reaction from most present.

"What are you going to do, steal their jewelry and lure them here with it?" Gerin'Gov grunted.

"Actually, we have, quite easily I have to say, implanted some information to have all mentioned chase a false lead. A lead they believe will take them to something that can evict the Federation from Equestria." A round of screeching laughter came from all present at the claim, all besides the stone face of the Commander.

"So you're setting them up?" The Commander asked.

"Exactly. We lure them to an underground location with no way out, a series of caverns located under the Crystal Empire our surveillance equipment picked up, we allow them to enter said location, a battle force follows them down, traps and containment the targets and bring them to this facility for detainment."

"What units are you dedicating to this assault?"

"Four squads of eighteen benefactors, four Immortals, four Eliminators and a pair of Dominator exoskeleton units outside the breach point on guard duty. Now, this might seem excessive to the uneducated, but do not be fooled by the helpless nature of the general populace of Equestria, these individuals, especially the princesses, have proven to be quite capable when avoiding capture. This is why we are taking every precaution possible to ensure this operation runs smoothly and successfully. You can confidently let Federal command know that further scientific progression is absolutely guaranteed."

A round of hearty applause went up as all present were doubtlessly impressed with what this operation could mean for not only Equestria, but the entire domain. Gerin'Gov remained firmly reserved about the proposal, he'd have to see it to believe it.

Independence costs lives! Conformity ensures safety!

An image of a group of ponies tied together with a large chain, standing with blank expressions atop a pile of bodies all coloured in red. The image of a Federation Benefactor stood behind the chained group.

The working pony is a hero, the rebel is a criminal! Report all suspicious activity to your nearest benefactor.

Back to back, an image of a smiling stallion in blue was looking up at the sky while holding a book, against another who was bent over in chains, frowning.

Progress is the only way forward! Those who stay behind are traitors!

An image of a Federation Benefactor holding the Federation flag in one hand and pointing forward with the other, while the image of a pony stood behind him, coloured red and pointing an Equestrian military sidearm at the soldiers head.

Magic is illusion, science is illumination!

The smiling image of a pony mare holding a data pad and a science beaker full of yellow, bubbling fluid peered out into the world.

Disobedience = Dead! Logic is the only way!

The image of a pony in red was stood before the Federation flag, spray painting a large red X across it as a blue cross-hair hovered over the ponies head.

You wouldn't even stand a chance! Rebellion will be met with swift military correction.

The image was of a portion of Equis with a Federation starship floating above, its orbital cannons firing down upon the planet below.

The public propaganda posters were large, taking up a good portion of the sides of houses and shops they had been placed upon. They were of simplistic, clean cut design formed of a small variety of blues, yellows and reds on a white background. The first posters had been far more subtle and suggestive in their approach to the public eye, the Federation thinking it best to drip-feed the Equestrian population the desire for the Federations alien culture. This had little success, and so led to increasingly larger posters bearing more intense messages, a new batch thrown up every couple of months.

A pair of Benefactors marched passed the window of a toy shop, blocking Rainbow Dash's view of the posters she had just been staring at. She ducked down below the glass to conceal herself for a second before steadily peering back out the window again. Checking each direction for a couple of seconds, she decided it was best to move on. She turned to the shop owner, who had taken to blocking all the exits besides the front door with wooden panels, who scurried over to the shops main entrance and carefully unlatched the door's lock before creaking it ajar. Dash gave the stallion a friendly nod with a smile while gently throwing over a small bag of Equestrian bit coins. Without waiting for a 'thank you' Dash darted out the door and hurried to the alleyway across the street, nearing the edge of town. Hearing footsteps hurrying towards her, Dash pressed herself against a wall, only to see a pair of mares hurrying by, most likely worried about attracting attention from the recently seen Benefactors. The rainbow maned mare risked a peek around the corner of the house she hid behind, saw the Benefactors turn the corner at the end of the street, and decided now was probably the best time to make a move for Sweet Apple Acres. Spanning her powerful wings for a second, tensing the muscles in her back to the 'ready' position, she braced her footing before surging all her physical energy into her avian appendages and hooves. Like a bolt of technicoloured lightning, if Dash was seen at any point by anypony (or thing), she would have simply been seen as a spectral blur that made a beeline for Ponyville Elementary school, the path there leading to the farm beyond.

The sun was setting on the horizon, the sky rippling with a dozen colours as the night drew in. As the shadows grew long, Rainbow Dash's approach to the local farm became more concealed by the fields full of apple tree that flanked each side of the path leading to Sweet Apple Acres and the looming shadows they cast. Dash kept her movements swift, but cautious, she didn't want to run into anyone she didn't want to at this time of the day. The drone of nature murmured among the vast collection of apple trees, birds, critters and swarms of insects chittered and buzzed among the leaves and grass beneath them. For a moment, Dash allowed herself to loose her sense of tension, to feel relaxed and problem-free.

She felt like she had done before first contact.

She remembered the long days of spring she'd spend just napping atop a pillowy cloud. She remembered the summer sunsets she'd spent watching Applejack finish a days work of apple harvesting, and the ever-running contest on who could carry the most crates of apples back to AJ's home. She remembered how she'd always make sure to give Fluttershy a demonstration of her latest routine to get her honest opinion on her efforts, and to earn herself a cheer or two from a close friend. Pinkie's pranks, Rarity's dresses, Twilights books, she missed the whole world she used to know, the world she belonged to in such absolution it physically hurt to notice it's absence. Dash was snatched away from the fantasy world that was once her life with a conclusion as solid as diamond. That she'd fight to the death to bring the old Equestria back.

Sweet Apple Acres farmhouse was within view by the time Dash looked up from the path ahead, her pace quickening to close the last few hundred feet in front of her to AJ's front door. The farm had always had a homely comfort emanating from it like a heartbeat, the sound of clucking hens and grunting pigs could have been heard in the background as a strangely soothing ambient noise that assured anypony who heard it that the world was still spinning. Now the farm was deathly silent. Not a whisper could be heard besides the droning from the fields beyond the farm.

Maybe the world's stopped spinning. Thought Rainbow as she approached the large, magenta coloured house.

Dash reached the front door located to the 'left' of the structure and gently unlatched the locking slot. With a quiet groan the door drifted open slightly, allowing Dash to get a good hold of its edge to slowly pull it open. Swiveling around the doors edge, Dash proceeded to carefully close up the door again, checking around as it closed for potential unwanted followers. Once inside she turned to head through the entryway, passed a coat-hanger and shoe rack laced with several weeks worth of dust and cobwebs, and into the living room/dining room/kitchen. The entire space before the pegasus was dark as it was dead, as if every scratch of vibrance and life the once homely barn-house had once held had been sucked dry by thick shadow. Dash almost felt like crying at the site as memories of what this home had once been glided through her mind. The light through the curtains, the clatter of a wooden spoon in a cooking pot, fillies laughter, all turned to darkness and dust.

Dash had old blood in her lineage, her family maintaining genetics that stemmed from the ancient pegasi culture of warriors and battle commanders. This well-kept bloodline had granted her features that had been bred out of many pegasi of the modern world. Noticeably, this was seen in the form of ears with tufts of fur at their tips akin to those of a thestral night guard, along with eyes that appeared half way between those of a pony and those of a dragon. Other, unseen, qualities were slightly faster than normal reflexes, sharper hearing, denser muscle fibers and low-light visibility. The latter came in handy at this time since half the room she stood in was drenched in pitch black, and the barn beyond couldn't have been much better. Treading carefully, her hooves sliding to the floor with a near unnatural softness, Dash proceeded forward into the barn area of the house, slowly giving herself to the dark ahead. Once within she paid close attention to the floor beneath her hooves, the sound it made with each step and how her weight sat upon it. She lightly stepped around for a minute before her hooves trod upon a surface that held a slight less solidity to it as well as giving a soft wooden 'thunk' as her hoof hit its surface.

It's been too long. Time to say hello.

She knelt down and found a ring handle that twisted on its end to unlatch the trap door it belonged to. With a metallic rattle the door unlocked, allowing Dash to take a stand and pull the entrance to the basement open. Quickly stepping down the steep, wooden stairs leading down, Dash descended while lowering the trap door back down over her head. Dash turned to see a couple of lanterns sitting atop a large apple crate, a small gathering of Equestrians gathered about their light.

Dash was sure that having turned around a second earlier she may well have been asking for new pants, as Applejack had just lowered the barrel of her T-6 Leverload trench gun to the ground, a barrel that Dash could safely assume had just been aimed at her. Applejacks expression was of deep relief and happiness to see her friend as she strode forward, arms opening to grab Dash into a meaty hug. AJ was huge, not just big, but positively gigantic for a mare. Standing over six feet tall, her arms as thick as an average mares waist, her back and stomach slabbed in thick muscle, the orange mare with the blonde hair was larger than most stallions, and was the proud product of many generations of her family breeding strong farm hands and capable apple buckers. The relentless bucking the family committed to daily was evident by AJ's most impressive feature, her almost unnaturally muscular legs who's ferocious strength was said to have been able to split a pony in two, not that such a thing was based on any actual events that had occured. Dash would have hated to admit it, but AJ's loving embrace was on the edge of crushing every bone in her upper half, and she was sure had her giant of a friend not released her when she did, Dash would have passed out.

"Dash, yer gotta lotta nerve showin' up this late." AJ said in her thick southern accent through a gentle beam of a smile.

"Sorry girls, didn't expect the Attendant himself would be paying me a visit. He's getting bolder almost every day now. Oh, and I owe you a cider, AJ. Nice work with the fireworks down town earlier." Dash said looking around at her friends through the dim light before turning to her earth pony friend, giving her a friendly nudge with her elbow.

"Ain't nuthin', Dah. Nopony got hurt, shook up a couple 'a' them squids, took out a crate 'a' ammo and got your pretty tail outta a stick." AJ said back with a cheesy grin, one that seemed to tickle Dash every time she saw it.

"It's alright, Dash, so is every Fed all over Equestria. Had my first frisking just yesterday. Seems even the princesses aren't above alien law now." Princess Twilight said, her voice heavy with a somber tone and exhaustion.

The Princess of Magic had not always been the majestic alicorn she was standing before Dash at that moment, she had once been a unicorn, physically unspectacular and something of a book worm. Dash had known Twilight for quite some time as a unicorn, and had grown very close to her as a friend. Her ascension to the form of a regal alicorn had caused something of a spark of worry in Dash for a small time, as she had feared her friend would have been sucked deep into the bustle and business of life as a Princess, however Dash had thankfully been proven wrong as Twilight proved time and again that time as a member of the throne was not nearly as important as was time spent with good friends. Physically, Twilight had changed greatly from the unicorn of average height and slight physique, save for a slightly more generous behind than most, to a tall, graceful being seemingly crafted from the finest clay by the hand of Rosetta herself, plus a truly outstanding frame to her lower half. Her mane was graced with a single blonde streak running through it as well as the ends of her neatly cut hair ending in an image of glimmering starlight, a sign of the alicorn magic she was gifted with beginning to take root in her physical form. Given time Twilight would grow taller, her mane and tail becoming a swirling, weightless ocean of glowing colour and would go on to live forever. Dash tried not to think about this eventuality too much, and instead enjoyed the fact that for all her changes, the same old Twilight was still very much by her side, if a somewhat exhausted variant.

"Twilight, are you okay? You look...tired." Dash said with a slight cringe.

"I'm fine, thanks, Dash. I've just been moving around a lot lately trying to get more info on the Crystal Empire. Turns out that trail of breadcrumbs would take me all the way to Vanhoover and back." Twilight said as she rubbed her reddened eyes.

"And you did incredibly well, I could never have done this without you. I couldn't have done this without any of you." The gentle, motherly voice came from just behind Twilight, the figure it belonged to placing a hand upon the Princess of Friendship's shoulder.

Princess Celestia made Applejack look like a child in many respects. Although not emanating as much raw strength as the orange earth pony, Celestia was truly the largest pony Dash had ever seen. Standing seven and a half feet tall, Dash was barely eye level with the white alicorn's large bust. Her arms and legs were long and thick, but her muscle was gently curved, her whole body almost a waterfall of large, but graceful curves. Her wings were also the largest Dash had ever seen, the tips of her primary feathers just about brushing the floor. Her mane and tail was ethereal in every sense, glowing with a gentle luminescence as they floated about with an assortment of pastel colours. Her face was the easiest thing to look at in the world. She was unbelievably beautiful, undoubtedly the daughter of the great creator herself, her eyes were pools of calm violet that were soothing to peer into, her smile so gentle and soft a pony could float in its presence. It was odd, however, to see the Princess without her staple golden crown and collar, both embedded with a single purple jewel. Instead Celestia wore a simple white robe with a handful of material cutaways, one over a shoulder, another at her stomach and again around each flank exposing her sun shaped cutie mark. Rainbow Dash, out of habit gave a slight bow of the head before the princess, though Celestia had assured that such a thing was hardly needed considering how often the Elements met with the Regent of the Sun, and considering the current situation.

"So, what have you got for us, Princess?" Dash asked hopefully.

"Cadance." Celestia said looking behind her.

From the middle of the group stepped forward another taller individual, taller than Twilight by a fraction, but still much smaller than Celestia. Even though Celestia herself was glowing with raw beauty, considering this, this individual could be described as bursting with it. Princess Cadance, beloved Princess of the Crystal Empire, Alicorn of Love was, visually, a furnace of physical appeal, her hefty chest, plump rear and alicorn-style graceful physique drew everypony's attention in a way that may have made them feel a little uncomfortable if they had been looking at anypony else. Rainbow Dash herself knew in all entirety that the Princess was a good friend, married and strictly off limits, but a fire burnt in Dash's chest simply by looking as her, a fire that gave her a feeling she felt for only one other pony. Dash was sure almost all present felt very much the same, to a small degree, but this affect was very much temporary, a strange after-effect of the magic burning from Cadance's every fiber. Dash closed her eyes and shook her head slightly to rid herself of her instincts, and drew her attention to the pink alicorn's face. To describe it, Dash would have said to anypony to imagine something cute, then magnify that level of cute to about a hundred times and compact it down into the face of a single pony. Her eyes were gentle, yet were magnetic in a supernatural sense. Lips thick, but far from an excessive pout and more like a miniaturized pair of pillows sitting snugly against one another. Her hair was bouncy and thick, the waterfall of purple and blonde seeming to explode off an invisible layer of rock in the form of a heavy curl at the mane's end. Cadance walked up besides Celestia and turned to Twilight for a second to gently stroke a dainty hand over her nearest arm. Dash took a few steps forward into the group, AJ by her side every step, one of her tree-trunk arms hung around the back of Dash's neck.

"We have all but utterly confirmed word that there is...something, beneath the Crystal Empire. Some ponies say it is just a dirty old dungeon, others say it's a haunted prison or underground slave jail from when Sombra ruled. But those who seem best informed say that pieces of ancient text that they have acquired speak of the structure of the Crystal Palace extending down under ground, forming some sort of structure said to have actual mechanics to it, as though it were made to...do something. Both myself and Twilight have checked these age-old pages ourselves and agree that whatever is down there could be...no, is our last hope at pushing back against the Federation. A lot of theories are up in the air at the moment; that it's a weapons cache, a portal to another dimension, a generator for some kind of shield. At this time we don't know what it is, but thanks to Twilight Sparkle, we know how to get inside." Cadance said to all.

"No matter what it is, we are quickly running out of time. Fleur has confidently informed me that Federation high-ups have plans to detain or...and, uh, take us in for 'study'." Dash knew what Celestia was going to say. Personally, if it came to being probed and prodded by alien techno-crap, Dash preferred the unspoken alternative.

"How's everypony doing in Canterlot? Any news on the other settlements?" Dash asked the three princesses present.

"If I may, I've managed to collaborate quite the detail on how Equestria is doing as a whole?" Posh, clean tone, well mannered.

Hide your stallions, everypony.

Rarity stepped forward, wearing a somewhat heavily built business suit that almost looked like a grey raincoat over a white shirt and knee-high skirt. Rarity was a piece. Figure was faultless, softly curved, but not to the ludicrous degree the princesses had, a kind of figure that flowed like milk poured into glass. Her brilliantly blue eyes were shamelessly alluring, awash with a blue shade of makeup that complimented her gleaming white coat wonderfully, although in all reality, she didn't entirely need it. Her smile could drop every stallion in a fifty yard area if her normally generous attire couldn't, and a plethora of discounts and handy favors had become her life. Not to say she was greedy, in fact quite the opposite, for as much as the spectacle of a mare treated herself, she treated another equally as much in one way or another. The diamond of a lady stepped forward as though weightless, holding a series of notes and papers in the cradle of an arm, while the opposite hand flitted through them. With a nod from Celestia Rarity continued on.

"Right, well, all and all, we could be doing a lot better. Not that a lot of ponies haven't learnt to adapt admirably, but the Federation has become adept as tripping our hooves quite efficiently. Appleoosa's resistance has been almost frozen due to Federal security, of which has tripled in the region, however their efforts have grown more conservative, and I've caught word that two Dominator battle-suits have been recalled to orbit to have their entire systems scrubbed out. That reminds me, Princess Cadance, Braeburn says a big thank you for delivering that micro-crystal solution, we can all take note on how well it works in disabling mechanical systems. Braeburn has also informed me that they have salvaged another half dozen crates of weapons and ammunition from Dodge Jun-...I'm, oh Applejack, I'm sorry...I..." Rarity trailed off as she clutched the papers to her chest, looking at Applejack with intense regret for nearly mentioning a certain something.

"It's fine, Rarity, don't you worry. We remember." AJ said reassuringly, before muttering the last two words. Dash muttered them too.

"Uh, um, anyway. Las pegasus and Cloudsdale have, as of three days ago, been completely evicted and emptied of their populations. Cloudsdale has had a small, mobile base of operations for research team built beneath it, and Las pegasus' ground based structures are being occupied for the same purpose. I've been told that the Feds still have no further information on our cloud cities or our artificial rainbows, however there has been word that the research facility in the east has been developing something. Something a lot of Feds seem very happy about. Flitter and Cloudchaser have been camped outside the base for a week now and earlier today sent a letter saying how an unusual number of ships, each carrying some sort of Federal official visited the facilities landing strip, made a drop off and left. It would seem the Federation is planning something big."

"Ugh, well at least it's bad news we've already heard of." Groaned Twilight.

"Actually, that's not the worst I've heard. Princesses, I fear that we might have Equestrias future dependent on our next move in more ways than we first thought. You see, ponies are starting to lose faith in the old world, in magic, in you. Manehattan and Baltimare have already seen a very noticeable portion of the population start to consider the Federation as their legitimate government, and consider you, as the Federation has put in, obsolete. They use Federation technology, pay Federation taxes, they take a frisking like a warm cup of tea and just carry on with their day! I can hardly believe that there are ponies in this world willing to act like such senseless drones." Rarity exclaimed with an aghast look.

"No, Miss Rarity, I expected this from day one." Celestia said, her face slightly pained, eyes closed.

"I knew it the moment we all saw that spacecraft in the sky, the moment that dropship floated down in front of our palace, the moment I laid eyes on those pallid...I knew that ponies would drift away from us. So now it's just up to us and us alone to set things right, and it needs to happen tomorrow."

"Sister."

The shadow behind the group seemed to almost come alive itself, a shift of movement flowing in the space the light dared not tread that advanced towards the other princesses. Once it had moved between the furthest two ponies, the figure became more clearly visible, appearing as a tall, slender alicorn. Her figure was almost alien in its posture and frame, both bearing thick muscles, yet being strangely slim at the same time, the curvature of her spine seemed almost unnatural, perhaps painful for any other pony to do. All this gave the alicorn a mysterious beauty to her, like a creature from an obscure dreamscape. Her mane and tail were the night sky given form in a swirling canvas of dark blue, iridescent violet and starlight, her eyes an almost luminous turquoise and holding a certain feral verticality to them similar to Rainbow Dash. Her coat was a dark blue, her clothing was much like that of Celestias, only jet black, and as with her sister, she looked somewhat strange without her crown and collar. Princess Luna, Alicorn of the Moon looked awful. Her eyes were filled with tension, like she hadn't slept in days. If Twilight looked like a trainwreck then Luna could have been described as five airships crashing into each other and disintegrating to the ground in a fiery ball of devastation. Her face looked oddly gaunt as well, like something was draining her very strength away, and even though it floated gracefully in the air, her mane was kinked, crooked and its movement seemed to have the odd off flit or flick to it.

"We cannot commit to such an endeavour without knowing exactly what we're going to find. We have to be sure this is going to work, in utter absolution. If we go down to these dungeons, or caverns or whatever, we could be setting ourselves up into a trap. I fear if we just run into this blindly...I might...none of us will see each other ever again. Equestria, all the world will be utterly defenseless against occupation, and everything we once knew will become undone, Equis will be just another alien colony. Another one of their statistics." Luna's tone went from tired, concerned for her friends and family, to sour on the alien subject.

"I know, dear sister, I wish this was something we had time to investigate further. But we are out of time, further delay could mean all that you fear coming to pass, and it would happen before we could even try and do anything about it. Soon our subjects will lose faith in us, they will think us useless to their future, and the Federation will use the population's opinion to throw us from our thrones and detain us for some crime against some alien law. So, it comes down to this, this one last chance to at least try and set things right."

Luna looked up at her sister with discomfort and sorrow in her eyes, as if she wanted to believe what she was saying, but couldn't quite bring herself to.

"So, are you with us, Luna? Are you with me?" Celestia asked gently, pleadingly, softly holding her sister by the shoulders.

Luna, for a split second, flinched. This brought on a look of intense inner conflict, as though somepony was actually telling her to deny Celestia. She looked down, frowned, seemed to compose herself after a moment, and looked back at her sister.

"I am, sister. Always." Luna said with a weak grin.

"Good. Okay, everypony, I want you to head to your homes tonight, and please be careful when walking the streets, it's certainly passed curfew by now. When home, pack a travelling sack for a couple days journey and dress appropriately. I've already arranged the national rail service to schedule themselves to head on a non-stop journey straight to the Crystal Empire, we'll be travelling in one of the storage carriages for the journey." Celestia said while turning to everypony.

"Ugh, well I just hope the stack of crates is as comfortable as the passenger couches." Rarity exclaimed with a roll of the eyes.

"It's the only way to make sure we aren't accidentally seen from the outside on the way there, and the only way we'll get through checkpoints undetected." Celestia calmly assured.

"Uh, how so? Feds check each carriage, even storage and cargo." Rainbow Dash inquired.

"I know it's far from glamorous, but I have requested us a handful of empty crates and container to hide in when we stop at security checks. Crates only come in a few sizes, and it was either we each have to curl into a ball the size of a large pumpkin, we risk all being caught by all of us hiding inside a shipping container, or we pair up in military and ration crates. So when we get to the station, we pair up and get aboard the train as soon as we can. We meet at seven-twenty seven in the morning, on the dot, meaning we have three minutes until the train leaves. Everypony please be on time, we can't afford to leave anypony behind, but the train is on a strict schedule by my request. We get to the station, pair up, on the carriage and we stay in our containers whenever the train slows down. When we get to the Crystal Empire, the driver will sound the whistle twice in short and once in length."

Everypony was a little surprised to hear all this coming from the normally regal and well-mannered princess. It threw everypony off to hear her talking like some spy mastermind from a cheesy action film. And although her plan sounded elaborate, it could be pulled off with a little luck. Rainbow Dash, for one, was loving the prospect this journey implied. Adventure, mystery, espionage and danger, this was going to be awesome, for sure.

"Is everypony clear?" Celestia said firmly, but with a slight grin.

All present gave a series of nods and smiles.

"Let's go save Equestria."

04 - Down to shadow town

One would have thought that after the last three stops the ponies would have gotten used to the routine of pairing up and sliding into their appropriate crates, shutting and locking the lids up behind them and remaining deathly still and quiet until the train started back up and moved on again. Strangely this was not the case as Applejack watched everypony scramble like dogs in the back of a downhill running trailer. Fluttershy had the most difficulty getting to and inside her crate considering her rather extreme upper body proportions, yet the pink-maned, butter-yellow mare was given a happy, helpful hand by her crate-mate, Princess Luna, who even though looking as exhausted as last night, still took the time to help the small pegasus down into their box. The soft faced mare, hair long as the day, like a waterfall of pink satin, cringed as she pulled in her assets to allow Luna room to join her in their, as Rarity had humorously entitled, 'Luxury-level containment cell'.

Pinkie was essentially off the walls as she prepared herself for another bought of self-restraint and 'sneaky-spy-time', the pudgy pink earth pony frantically skipping on the spot as she waited to join Princess Cadance in their lovingly dubbed 'Party-box'. As soon as Cadance sounded she was in position Pinkie took two quick steps forward and bounced into the air, taking a distinct 'lying down' shape as she hung in the air, Cadance crying out in seeing the beaming face of Pinkie swoop in down closer to her by the millisecond. With a squeaky thud sound Pinkie landed, a relieved and congratulatory announcement from Cadance that Pinkie had actually fit beside her like a hand in a glove. Twilight and Rarity were the two, who besides an initial panicked scramble, entered their crate with a solid sense of discipline. However it was Celestia herself who seemed to simply glide over to her wooden box as soon as the train had begun to slow and gracefully dip down inside. Due to her large size, and the odd number of ponies, Celestia had opted to take a crate alone, saying she didn't want anypony to be uncomfortable trying to compress themselves up next to her.

Dash and Applejack, however, failed to mirror this behavior in a spectacular manner, from the starting moment of Dash announcing 'Last one to the crate has to take butt-stuff if we end up in an alien lab', to the furious battle of who went besides, under or atop of who, and who went in first.

"You're a walking boulder, you get in first and I squeeze into whatever sliver of space you don't fill up!" Dash strained through a hushed voice as the trains movement grew slower and slower.

"If Ah git in first it just ends up bein' a sesshun of you rummagin' and rollin' up besides me like a pig in the mud!" AJ hissed back.

"It's not my fault I can't get comfy next to your thick...well...uh...all this!" Rainbow dash spluttered as she desperately gestured to Applejack in general.

AJ scowled and rolled her eyes as she dived into the box regardless of Dash's protests.

"Hey, I thoUGHT-!" Dash would have made further complaint, but a feminine orange hand attached to a monstrous arm grabbed the collar of her brown jacket and yanked her into the crate as though she weighed no more than a towel, pulling the sky blue mare into her chest and shutting the lid behind them.

"Hey! Let me go! At least let me-!"

"Can it, Dash! No more outta you! It's not exactly comfy for me, but we ain't got no other choice." AJ said in a strained whisper down to Dash, whose head was hard pressed into the farmer's breast.

With a huff Dash stopped her squirming and lay still in her helpless position. AJ wasn't much of a liar, but in the steep situation she'd found herself quite convincing, as she actually found Dash's position at this time quite funny, and at any other time she would have had a hearty chuckle at the very idea of having Dash in such an awkward position. It was actually something Applejack would have considered at that time had her mind not been on other things, on how she didn't feel the slightest bit uncomfortable, not at any point in having to squeeze up next to Rainbow during this whole journey. After all, she had been the one to offer to be Dash's partner for the trip, an offer she'd taken up without question. AJ's attention was snatched away as the train jolted forward. The earth pony reached to her side and pulled out her Leverload, the short-barreled firearm easily held in one of her hands. She lifted the weapon above the prone Rainbow Dash and aimed it at the farthest edge of the crates lid, awaiting any unlucky intruders.

The trains whistled gave two short bleats followed by a single long one as it stopped, presumably pulling into the Crystal Empire station. AJ and Dash both gave a half releived, half irritated sigh, relaxing back down into the crates floor for a moment.

"So, uh, Dash...wanna...git on up outta there?" AJ asked as she looked down at the barely visible Rainbow Dash with a raised eyebrow and sly smirk.

"Uh, well...Yes! I mean, uh...sure, yeah...sure...yeah."

AJ frowned to herself in thought for a second.

Had she just-? Ah mean, was she-? Nah, don't kid yerself you silly filly. She probably jus' tryin' 'a' think 'a' sumthin' to...Jus' git up yah nimwit!

Dash practically exploded out of the crate, Applejack hastily following her, sliding her firearm back into its holster before running her fingers through her slightly matted hair with a deep breath out. Dash herself was overcompensating for the awkward situation that nopony had actually seen by hyper-attentively straightening her clothes and enthusiastically helping others out of their crates.

"Okay everypony, we'll need to move quickly to get to the city borders. From there, Cadance will guide us to the entrance to the caverns from there. Applejack, the door if you would please." Celestia said as she effortlessly rose from her crate and stepped out onto the carriage floor.

"You got it, Princess." AJ said taking a quick walk to the handle of the large sliding door to the outside.

Everypony formed up, adjusting backpack straps and clothing for the running and ducking to come. Applejack grabbed a solid hold on the large handle, flashing a quick grin at Dash who seemed the most ready to take a step out of the train, the pegasus returning the favour with a grin and quick wink.

"Ready?" AJ asked.

"Do it." Twilight said as she braced herself.

AJ, with far less effort than an average pony would have, slid the door open and sharply turned the corner out the door to drop out the train, breaking into a sprint as soon as her hooves hit the snowy ground.

It's a trap

Luna flinched.

The voice seemed more and more real every day. Luna remembered how silly her condition had seemed when she'd first been having these seemingly rogue, instinctual thoughts. She knew that sometimes any pony alive had the odd thought that tugged at the strings of morality or reason, just freakish impulses that flew through the head. But her careless dismissal of the then minor issue slowly turned to a slight concern, then a deep concern, and now sat firmly as a burning paranoia as to when her next impulse would be, and what it would tell her to do. More frightening was how the louder the impulses were getting, the more they seem actually connected to her. When the voice in the back of her head said she should yell at a guardstallion for bumping into her, she really felt like doing it. When her celery soup came to her a slight bit colder than normal, she actually felt like storming through the castle, crashing through the walls and halls to verbally discipline the kitchen staff. That wasn't all, she'd started having turbulent dreams, dreams that had recently become nightmares. Nightmares of something monstrous coming to swallow her, something dragging her into the dark and down to oblivion. Sometimes she'd even sleepwalk, she wouldn't do anything dangerous, just strange things like running a bath, emptying her drawers, and one time scratching at the wall. Lastly, and most inconvenient at this time, were the muscle cramps she was getting. This time her legs seemed to seize up painfully, breaking her run into a stumbling mess.

"Auntie!" Cadance called out, running back to help her fellow alicorn forward.

"Thank you. I'm sorry, Cadance, my legs just seized up." Luna said out of breath, which was a very odd thing seeing how she'd never been out of breath in her life before due to the supernatural nature of her very being.

The only time she actually remembered being rendered breathless was-

"Here! It's just this one here! The basement door should be open!" Cadance called forward to the others as she held Luna up with one arm.

Ahead was a corner shop, a stone carver and jewelers. The day was getting long, Celestia had just lowered the sun to set not a half an hour ago when they'd reached the city's edge. The orange of the suns almost liquid-like light washed over the blue crystal of the shop with a truly beautiful display of colour, the irregular surface of the crystal structure creating a tiger-stripe pattern of blue, purple and orange. Applejack, who'd taken the lead position in the group, a hand sat gently on the handle of her firearm the whole way through the city, ran up to the basement's entrance and yanked the door open, hurrying everypony inside.

Luna and Cadance gasped and Luna almost stopped dead in her tracks as a Federation Dominator stomped its way passed the corner shop and came to a stop right in front of them, in the middle of the street. It was facing to the side, its optical equipment swiveling in place, observing the area just ahead of it. The machine was a gigantic monstrosity of a machine, standing twenty feet tall, stocky and immensely well armoured. It appeared like an over-sized Fed, only made from machinery and having a more bulbous thorax. The chest was actually a compact cockpit in which a single Fed military pilot sat, controlling the movements of the vast, white and blue machine that lumbered forward. In its metal grip was held a Heavy Magna-accelerator, a large automatic cannon the length of a rowboat. Luna and Cadance stood dead still in the shadow of the colossal figure before them, afraid to make so much as a step and attract the machine's attention.

Destroy it!

What?! No!

We are the keeper of the night, creature formed of magic itself! You can break this alien toy with but a flick of your hand!

We'll have every alien in the city bearing down on us! I can't fight now!

You haven't fought for anything since they arrived! You've all just run away! That's all anypony does anymore, you all just run away and hide!

It'll get my friends killed! The answer is no!

Luna had never replied to the voice, afraid of what could happen if she did, afraid of what had just happened. She was arguing with herself, genuinely having a heated fight with herself. She feared this moment would come in recent days, that she would finally start to lose it. Luna concluded then and there that she was most certainly going insane. She pulled her hand away from her head and steadied herself as she knelt down, taking a moment to realize where she was or what had happened. She must have dropped to her knees as soon as the voice had spoken to her, and proceeded to clutch at her own head as the argument ensued, both things she hadn't even realized had happened until just a second ago. Cadance was looking down at her auntie with a terror stricken expression, trying to pull her up from under her arms. Luna's eyes darted about to rest on the cellar entrance, on her sister who looked at Luna with such a haunted look that Luna could have been convinced she'd just died in front of Celestia's eyes. Turning forward again, Luna saw the Dominator, still standing in front of the ponies, coldly assessing the terrain ahead of it. With a mechanical squeal and a titanic thunder of metal footfalls the Dominator, fortunately, turned away from the two alicorns and strode off down the street ahead of them. Luna finally allowed herself to be pulled to her hooves and stumbled over to the basement door, helped inside by Cadance and Celestia. As soon as Luna's hooves clapped to the basement floor as she dropped down through the entrance, Celestia turned and assaulted the dark blue alicorn with an intense hug.

"Luna! Are you, okay?! What happened?! Tell me what's wrong!" Celestia said, wide eyed and frantically holding her sisters face before her, and stroking at her cheeks and mane.

"It's alright. I'm alright. I'm so sorry, Cadance. Look, maybe I should stay here while you all go ahead." Luna said weakly, taking a seat on a storage crate.

"Luna, I can't leave you here alone. This is something we might all have to play a part in, together." Celestia said in deepest concern.

"I just don't know how much more running I can take." Luna's tone could have been mistaken for almost being venomous at one point as she spoke, but for the most part just sounded helpless.

"I'll carry you! I'll carry you down with us, just please don't make me leave you alone again!" Celestia said frantically.

Luna looked up at her sister, who was a mere moment away from tears. Luna couldn't help but notice how she'd said 'again', and knew exactly what it meant. She knew then that if she couldn't make it down to the caverns, neither could Celestia. The two really were in this together, all the way. One last bout.

"Okay, Tia. Just, could you give me a hand for a little while?" Luna said with a crooked smile.

"Of course. Here, put your arm around me." Celestia said with a relieved smile, wiping her eyes for a second before helping her sister brace up against her.

Oh my goodness! This is all just awful! Giant, scary robots in the street, Princess Luna is badly hurt and now we're headed into a deep, dark, scary dungeon!

Fluttershy cringed deeply, sinking her muzzle into the high collar of her heavy-duty, forest green coat. Her eyes were watering up, her breathing was laboured and seemed to lack any nourishment and her mind was picking up every single potential disaster that could possibly occur. Maybe the robot just pretended not to notice them and was waiting outside the door at this very moment, ready to smash through the jewelry store and into the basement to snatch them up like rats. Or perhaps a pack of Eliminators were in waiting in the shadow confines of the caves below, waiting for the group to get lost in the darkness just to silently pick them off one by one, none of them to be heard from ever again. Or, and perhaps worst of all, would they spend hours, perhaps days down in that awful place that awaited them, only to resurface with nothing, finally proving to all Equestria just how worthless the Princesses and the Elements really were.

No, Fluttershy! You're not worthless! Neither are your friends! We've all been through too much together to be considered anything less that extraordinary! She thought to herself while tugging at the straps of her backpack.

Cadance had just had a quick, hushed exchange with the manager of the store this basement belonged to, and with the small security compensation taken care of the manager, a blue-coated crystal pony mare with a pink mane, moved a large stack of crates, palettes and tools to reveal a pony-sized hole in the corner of the dark room. The others were all too curious to take a peek inside to see what lie ahead, Pinkie testing the recesses authenticity with a loud echoing hoot. Everypony readied themselves up, this was what they'd traveled all this way for, and Fluttershy knew she couldn't back down now. Celestia looked to her sister with great worry, the white alicorn holding her sister up by one arm as the smaller, blue princess stood shakily on the spot. Her friends made quick checks on their gear and what was inside their packs before fastening themselves up and forming up before the cave entrance. Fluttershy hung back for a second, took a gulp, and allowed her feet to take her forward.

The entrance looked like the breach was artificial in nature, like somepony had cut and carved away at the wall to get through. However, Fluttershy noticed how strangely square-shaped and symmetrical the breach was, and how there was a faded chalk line around the cutaway area. She noticed a lot how different the breach in the floor was, how it seemed to have been dug away in a much more undisciplined manner.

"Um, excuse me, Princess Cadance? How did the crystal ponies find this cave?" Fluttershy asked in her usual meek tone, however she tried to keep a sense of attentiveness to herself as the group stepped forward and dropped, one by one, into the hole.

"The store manager I was just speaking to was planning to dig away an extension to this cellar. He planned out the initial dig point and hadn't gotten three feet deep before he hit a hollow space beneath his property. He and his staff came back one evening and spent a couple hours digging away the foundations to open a way into the cavern." Cadance replied as she helped Rarity down into the hole below her.

"How did you find out about this place?" Fluttershy asked, half astounded at the odds of the news of a find like this getting to the princesses before the Federation.

"The manager orders stock in from Vanhoover, when the delivery came in the ponies moving in the items were asked to place all their stuff in front of and over this hole. The manager paid the ponies extra to keep the find quiet, but it seems one of them let the word slip when he had a little too much to drink one night. A Vanhoover emissary overheard what he said in a bar, and said emissary was already deep in resistance activity, and summoned me to Vanhoover."

"Cadance got in a bad wrap with some Fed officials, which kept her busy for a few days, so she asked if I'd go in her place. However, Fed forces in Vanhoover made meeting the emissary very difficult, and we actually ended up meeting in a nearby village after being on the move for a couple of days." Twilight said from further in the cave as she ducked down under a rocky formation protruding from the ceiling.

"How far have ponies been down here?" Applejack asked, her voice echoing about the earthy confines that grew more glossy and moist with every step Fluttershy took, soil becoming less common as rippling surfaces of rock and crystal slowly made up more and more of the surroundings.

"Some of the shop staff said they went as far as the cave goes. Apparently this leads to a dead end." Twilight replied, struggling to find sure footing at one point.

"Then what are we doing down here?" Rainbow Dash asked in an aggravated tone.

"The crystal ponies say this route ends with some form of crystal wall, however they say it has an odd composition to it, and I believe if we can't think of a way to somehow open a passage through, I can at least try and cut away at it with my magic." Celestia replied as she kept a firm hold on her sister.

Fluttershy felt like this place was closing in around her, even though in actuality the rocky tunnel was growing slightly wider by the meter. However what was closing in was the dark, and although the watery surface of the rock offered some reflective luminosity, the light was growing scarcer. Rarity must have taken note of how Fluttershy was steadily growing shakier and more compressed in stature as her horn lit up at the tip with a bright, light blue magical light and putting an arm around her friend.

"Don't worry, darling, I'm sure there's not much farther to go." Rarity said reassuringly with a warm smile.

"Thanks, Rarity." Fluttershy said, her courage replenished slightly.

Fluttershy hugged her arms around her abnormally large chest, a gesture she had always committed to whenever she felt uneasy, and ironically a gesture that didn't exactly help matters, especially when in public. As she finished brushing the thick curtain of her long pink mane away from her face, Fluttershy could see something up ahead, some strange dim glow of sorts, one that the others also seemed to notice.

"Hold it!" Pinkie squealed as she pressed her back up against Applejack, the pink mare somehow getting to the front of the group unobstructed and unseen.

Pinkie scrunched up her face and squinted her eyes at the sight before everypony, appearing to assess the situation at hand with a fiery intensity.

"Ominous glow. Deep cave. Ancient underground war-fortress previously unexplored by ponykind. I. Smell. Trouble." Pinkie slid down to the rocky ground that had started to develop a small subterranean creek at its floor, and proceeded to slither across the wet ground like a snake, speeding ahead of the group.

Everypony was silent. Half due to the spectacle just given by the pudgy, pink pony, and half in anticipation as to what would lie ahead of them.

"It's okay! It's just a wall!" Pinkie cried out from up ahead, unseen.

The group sighed, some in relief, other in exasperation, and continued on down the underground tunnel towards the hazy glow ahead. After just a minutes steady-stepped walk the group found themselves turning a corner to see a large, seemingly crystal wall before them. It was about twenty feet side and around about the same in height, but had irregular edges as it led into the side of the cavern's walls. That which could be seen of it was a light blue in colour, with streaks of white running through it like marble. It gave off an odd glow, somewhat like that of a television set, the light drifting from its perfectly smooth surface with odd behaviour, almost like the light was a mist being softly blown from the crystal's surface. Before the wall stood Pinkie, who looked up at the structure with a childish wonder, as did some others who eventually joined the group to look upon the strange sight.

"Looks...uuuuuh~" Rainbow Dash said uneasily.

"Yeah, pretty much." Agreed Twilight.

"You think we can get HPO on this thing?" Chirped Pinkie as she raised a clenched fist and gave the surface a solid thump.

Cadance and Celestia were about to protest, but were too late to stop Pinkie. A moment after her hand came into contact with the surface the inherent energy of the structure seemed to ripple out, like a holographic wave upon the surface of the crystal. The crystal burped.

"Par-don you, mister!" Pinkie said aghast.

"What the hay was that?" Twilight asked nopony in particular, looking quizzically at the wall.

"Cadance, could you take Luna?" Celestia asked serenely.

"No, sister, I'm alright. I can stand on my own now, thank you." Luna said as Celestia let her go, after a slight sway she stood up straight, actually starting to look a little better than earlier.

Celestia gave Luna a weak smile before turning to the crystal wall and striding towards it. Fluttershy hugged Rarity's arm as Celestia drew nearer, in fear that something bad was going to happen. This fear intensified as the crystal started to softly hum as the Princess drew closer, a hum that ascended into a long drone, then into a heavy bass tone that seemed to shake her very bones. In fact, everypony started to back away in anticipation as to what would happen, and Fluttershy could bare to watch as Celestia raised her hand towards the wall. A couple of seconds later and the noise abruptly stopped, though seemed to leave the air feeling thick for some reason, and left the ponies feeling a little shaken through. Celestia had her graceful hand touching the luminous surface, her dainty fingertips pressed gently into the crystal that seemed to now be almost alive with some form of energy pulsing through it. The crystals energy shifted and darted about in strange, almost three-dimensional ways as it emitted a series of strange gurgling, purring and burping noises, sort of like a toilet being flushed. It stopped for a few second and then emitted the same sounds, in the same pattern, and then again after.

"I think it's trying to communicate." Twilight said in a hushed tone, but one Celestia seemed to hear as the white alicorn twitched her ears.

"Um...H-hello?" Celestia said, her head pushed forward, lips almost grazing the surface of the crystal.

"Keeeeert-fuuuurk!" The noise seemed like somepony had thrown a spanner into a running engine and made all present flinch.

"Exc-...I, eerm-" Celestia stuttered.

"Smeeee-Heeeeeeee!" The crystal replied.

"I don't know if this is working." Dash said unsurely.

"I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. Don't know. Don't know if this. Don't know if this is working. Working. Working. The pitch and tone emitted was fragmented, erratic and varied with each sentence, as if several ponies were saying different parts of Dash's sentence in different ways.

"I think it wants us to leave it alone!" Fluttershy cried from behind Rarity.

"It wants us to leave. Wants us. Wants us. I think. Leave it alone. Alone. I think it us to alone. Leave it alone. Leave us alone. Leave us to think." The chorus of voices returned, speaking nonchalantly, as if rehearsing a script for a play for the first time, but this time the voice began creating its own original sentences out of the words it heard.

"See!" Fluttershy cried out.

"See! See! See. Sea. Ocean. Water. Air. Fire. Weapon. Destroy. Create. Analyse. Analyse. Analysis complete. Exchanging." The voice began as sporadic as it had always been, but slowed as it seemed to pull words from thin air, settling as the voice of a stallion, a calm, contemplative one at that.

"What just happened?" Celestia seemed to ask herself as she stepped back.

"Communicative integration. I am exchanging." The voice said quickly, but calmly.

"Hi, Exchanging, how are you?" Pinkie asked happily.

"I am exchanging. Please set priorities."

"Priorities?" Several ponies echoed, confused.

"I am ready to exchange. Please enter requests."

"Oh! Pony Rock by Vinyl Scratch! Are we on the radio?" Pinkie said excitedly.

"I don't think we're talking to a pony." Twilight said uneasily, looking up at the canvas of pulsing energy.

"Uhm...open?" Celestia asked the crystal.

"Engaging." The voice replied.

A mechanical squeal filled the cave, startling everypony into a short-lived scream. The squealing was joined by several others, along with heavy clunky, crystal-on-crystal abrasion sounds as the surface of the wall seemed to glide in different direction, yet remained perfectly even. After several seconds of grinding, gliding, screeching sounds the wall opened apart, segments gliding away into the stone around it to reveal a large, empty, dark space beyond it.

"Well done, Princess!" Twilight said as she walked up besides Celestia with a wide smile.

"I just hope I haven't just done something I'll regret later." Celestia said peering into the dark ahead.

"Don't worry, Princess, I'm sure you won't." Reassured Twilight.

"It's not as if it isn't something I've ever done before." Celestia's head dipped slightly, her eyes flitting to look behind her for a moment before she took a deep breath in and walked forth into the strangeness ahead, leaving Twilight frowning in worry at the statement.

"Nnnngh! It smells awful in here!" Luna protested through gritted teeth, arms wrapped around her waist.

"Cold as winter in here too." AJ added, her Leverload held tightly in her hands as the group moved carefully forward.

Fluttershy had noted a few minutes after entering the strange structure how the place smelled bad. Not a rotten, earthy kind of bad, or badly kept bathroom kind of bad, but a potent, potentially dangerous chemical kind of smell. It smelled like an accident that had happened in a chemistry class in school many years ago, acidic and with a sour ammonia tinge to it. It was like somepony had melted down a squid in a beaker of acid and splashed the solution all over the place. And the cold made the environment truly uncomfortable, Fluttershy's breath easily viewable before her own eyes. It was dark, but the strangeness of the environment presented itself in somehow illuminating the immediate surrounding to Fluttershy, and presumably everypony else, but without any lighting the yellow pegasus could see. Fluttershy suddenly became aware of a strange, yet familiar, crunchiness beneath her hooves as she trod forward, and looked down to see what she'd stepped in.

"Hey, look everypony. Snow." Fluttershy said softly as she scooped up a handful of the white powder.

"You think the Feds awful excuse for weather management has reached even down here?" Dash asked dryly.

"I don't think so. The Federation has only seized control of surface climate, there's no reason I can think of why they'd want to control the temperature down here." Twilight added as she looked at the snow with arms crossed.

"Wherever we are, that is." Rarity said, looking about at the cavernous space around them.

The vast halls seemed almost endless, like an underground city. Support beams the size of apartment building sat diagonal to one another, holding the ceiling up. Built around and between these beams were various different platforms and levels, each built with strange, angular terrain. It almost looked like this place was a gigantic power plant, the terrain made of various blocks, pyramids and other geometric shapes seeming to compose of some form of containment machinery, like rows of energy cells or fuel tanks. Structures the size of houses appeared to have once held some sort of functionality now sat lifeless in the cold. With the air soundless and glistening with ice particles, the vibe of this place was less lively than a graveyard.

"This couldn't have been built by ponies. Or the Federation." Luna said, her tone almost frightened.

"Are we really going to say it? Really?" Dash asked intensely.

"Looks like the Federation weren't the first aliens to find Equestria." Twilight said, giving words to what everypony had been thinking.

"This cold, the smell, it must be some sort of sustained environment. This must have been normal for whatever used to live in this place." Celestia said almost dreamily.

"So, if this was all built by more aliens, then where are they?" Dash asked aloud.

"Dead."

The voice was accompanied by a bright blue glow coming from besides the middle of the group. It was the same voice as earlier, and caught everypony's attention enough to turn them to face the light that had burst into existence besides them.

"Oh my." Celestia said wide eyed.

05 - Ghost city

The creature was made of light, entirely formed of a bright blue light, and thus undoubtedly holographic in nature. It was about as tall as an older filly, around four feet or so. It was hard to tell seeing what the hologram presented the group of equines, its form twisting and squirming in its many-limbed form. It appeared like a breed of jellyfish, its 'head' similar in shape to a baby stroller, only translucence and gelatinous, made of a large, tilted fleshy bowl, adorned by a series of rubbery ribs and tubes. Below hung a large cluster of tentacles and tendrils, all in motion in one way or another. Four were larger, and ended in large flaps that looked much like the scoop of a spoon, the others around them were smaller and thinner, but there were easily twenty of them. From where Fluttershy was standing, or more accurately, hiding, she could just about see that behind the creature were a series of rippling and pulsating membranous fins that fluttered like those of a cuttlefish. However at second glance the pegasus could start to see that within the 'cradle' of the head sat something, something that appeared to be a separate, smaller creature. Upon a closer, squintier inspection Fluttershy could see the creature within the cradle was actually a part of the jellyfish itself, joined to the inside of the space by what would have been the hip. The half-creature had two arms and a head attached to a torso, however it was tiny, seemingly frail and possibly deformed. Its arms looked like bare chicken wings, only thinner and with a single, ugly finger at their ends. The torso was sickly and thin with wrinkly flesh and a viewable ribcage and it's head was bulbous and appeared too heavy for its tiny neck to hold up. The head reminded her of that of a Fed in a sense, only its side were fanned out, it had a third eye upon the forehead and its face was noseless and mouthless. Everypony present looked at the holographic creature with either a look of surprise or disgust at its sickly appearance.

"Who or, eeer...what are you?" Rainbow Dash was the first to awkwardly speak up.

"I am Torsion-Kype, I am an exchangment and security Divergence. I was filed into service eleven hundred and thirteen years, four months, eleven days, one hour, twenty six minutes and thirty nine seconds ago. I have been charged with maintaining the security of this Sky Platform and ensure its continued functionality." The creature spoke with the same voice as the crystal wall, along with its fastness and calmness.

"You're a computer." Twilight said with a frown.

"I am a Divergence. A sentient program built from digital variable waves given density and depth. I was harvested in a data pool and designated for my currently designed purposed." The hologram replied.

"You said that the aliens that built this place died?" Rarity asked.

"Yes." The hologram chirped.

"Did they look like you?" Luna added.

"Yes."

"What happened to them?" Celestia asked somberly.

"Specify." The alien blurted.

"Sorry?" Celestia said with the cock of her head and twitch of the ears.

"From what point of time do you refer? Do you wish to know where they came from? Where they went after leaving this planet? What happened to those that remained here?"

"Uh, let's just start with why they came here?" Celestia said raising her hands.

"After suffering numerous planetary assaults from a biomatter and mineral harvesting race known as Denti my creators, known as Vrelith, had to find alternate methods of retaliation as weaponized counterstrikes proved vastly ineffective. The Bio-splice church offered a solution by investigating and developing an artificial species of our own design to act as foot soldiers and military crews. As my creators people were few and far between, and whose weaponry was potent but lacked in quantity, few alternatives were evident."

"That's despicable! Creating living things just to be used up as soldiers! It's absolutely barbaric!" Rarity said with a huff.

"Irrelevant. My creators needed to survive, and as I stated, few alternatives could be presented, and none proved more promising than massed bio-cloning." The Divergence replied calmly.

"You said these aliens you were fighting harvested biological material. So your plan was to just feed them more of it?" Twilight pressed with a scowl.

"In fact, troop cloning was a mere front, my creators actual imperative was to lure the Denti into foreign space to instead become preoccupied by another interstellar society. While the alien swarm was feeding off the worlds of other empires, my creators could reclaim and rebuild what territory they had lost." The digital creature replied unconflicted.

"That's just cold! So some space-freaks decide to chase your tail and you chicken out by leading them into somepony else? Wow, your creators sure sound like real heroes." Rainbow Dash said as she fluttered around the blunted, table-high pyramid that presented the hologram.

"Again, irrelevant." The Divergence replied coldly.

"Ahm sure as sugar it were mighty relevant to whoever you backstabbed." Applejack shot front behind her large, crossed arms.

"Also irrelevant. These events occurred before my creation, and I had no part to play in their plans."

"Look, we're sorry, just continue, please." Celestia assured.

"The efforts to create our own, originally designed species met unexpected delays, however it was within acceptable time parameters to harvest living subject to clone and produce en mass. Stations, like this one, were positioned in orbit over a planet of interest and activated a distress signal. Once a suitable applicant for cloning efforts responded the station would direct their ship to dock at one of our vessel cells. These cells were actually refitted to have all resupply and repair removed in favour of a stasis field emitter. The ship and the crew within would be frozen, stasis-resistant drones sent in to contain and remove the subjects to be studied within the stations confines. This station prides itself on boasting the most advanced research facilities of all the Domain."

"Right, so on top of letting other planets and populations take the hits that were meant for you, you kidnapped some of them and used them for freaky alien cloning experiments. AJ, shoot this guy, please." Dash chimed.

"Ahm thinkin' it." Applejack growled, running her thumb over the grip of her firearm.

"Wait! Wait. So this station, it used to be in space. How did it get down here?" Celestia asked intensely.

"My creators, foolishly in my opinion, became obsessed with a single species in particular for cloning efforts, abandoning all other research effort in favour of this singular motive. This lead to them running out of time, and resorting to abandon the station and all their work in order to flee the incoming Denti threat." The Divergence replied.

"But...if the Denti were headed here, then where are they? Wouldn't they have destroyed the whole world or something, judging by how quickly your guys were running away from them?" Cadance inquired with a little sass in her tone.

"Through a matter of chance, the society that my creators had originally planned to redirect the alien swarm into had received this stations distress signal on a larger scale than first thought. Several battle clusters arrived in system to intercept the Denti swarm, and were surprisingly successful in eliminating the alien threat."

"Huh, smells awful lot like irony to me." Applejack huffed.

"However, by the time the foreign ships entered the system, this station had already fallen from orbit, as information containment protocols dictate. However after this station had been set to self destruct by falling into the surface of this world, a...complication occurred." The hologram admitted, tendrils flicking in conflict at the last couple of words.

"Before surface collision, an energy signature of unknown origin cushioned the stations fall and prevented complete disintegration, preserving most of the structure. Afterwards, despite security measures, a single member of your kind entered the facility and made exchanges with me. She had hoped to have saved whoever was aboard the station, fearing its descent was due to some accident. She inquired if there were still living subject aboard and I confirmed this inquiry. She was, much like yourselves, objectful of the idea of destroying the on-board subjects and demanded their release. Due to security access measures, I denied her this, and she responded with intent to use force to access the vessel and containment cells. I deactivated certain cells with intent to leave the subjects trapped within to eventually stave and suffocate, to firmly grasp her attention, and informed her I would deactivate the last, and most highly prioritized, cell if she attempted to free any of the subjects in any of the cells including the ones I had released from stasis. I also informed her any action to free subjects would result in the initiation of reactor inversion, an event that would most likely annihilate a fifth of this planets surface. She conditioned this proposal further by promising to leave the cells alone, but only if her base genetic signature be added into security access files. This term was agreed upon, the individual left, and this facility has remind abandoned since that day." Torsion said, coming to a finality of a finish.

Celestia's eyes shifted, looking at the crystalline floor, her mind trying to wrap itself around something. Twilight, Cadance and Luna all had the same look, all of them trying to contemplate what they'd just heard, either dumbfounded or disgusted by what they'd just heard. Fluttershy let the words sink in herself, and thought back to who this pony could have been, to have stopped an entire space station from crashing into Equestria, then to just stroll in to check for survivors, and to scare a computer program with the possibility of being able to release the alien subjects held within their stasis fields. Who could have been that powerful, that kind, that long ago. Fluttershy then thought on the last part, on how the ponies genetics had been entered into this stations files, so she could access it. Just like how Celestia had accessed it.

"Rosetta." Fluttershy whispered, although loud enough for Celestia to hear.

"Mother." Celestia said with a smile, eyes heavy with memory.

"Mother rarely ever visits the material realm, and whenever she does it's not done lightly." Luna said to her sister, implying to press on with the questioning.

"What are the priority subjects on this station?" Celestia asked without hesitation.

"That information is above your agreed upon security level's access." Torsion replied simply.

"Then were are the priority subjects being held?" Celestia pressed on.

"Vessel cell number seven."

"Can you lead us there?" Celestia asked, apparently hoping the artificial intelligence's complexity was not great enough to avoid exploitation.

"I do believe that would not be best for the facility's interest for you to know that."

Well, at least she tried. Fluttershy thought, now very much out of hiding, feeling more comfortable out in the open.

"Fine, what is the nearest cell to us?" Celestia asked, growing impatient.

"Both cells eight and one are closest to you." The Divergence replied.

"Good! Can...can you take us to cell eight, please?" Celestia asked kindly, a tense few seconds passing.

"Of course." Torsion replied, almost happily.

A blue glow, much like the holographic alien's, came from beneath the ponies. Fluttershy looked down to see a bright blue line leading from between her hooves and out down deeper to the facilities center before taking a sharp left behind some geometric structures.

"Please follow the holo-locator. Mind your step."

The glowing path of blue light had lead the group of ponies to stare up at a huge wall at the edge of the immense hall they'd started off in. Built into the angular, alien crystal surface was a single door that a wide bridge had lead the ponies to. As soon as Celestia came within ten feet of the door, walking up to it expecting to have to unlock it somehow like the ordeal she had gone through earlier, the crystal surface glided apart into segments and into the wall around it. The ponies stepped through and into another large space equally as large as the one they had just stepped out of. Ahead, it extended a ways, but not all that far seeing as all could still see the other side of the hall and the small frame of the doorway into the next cell. The room, however, was outrageously long, stretching off to the ponies left further than they could see, the titanic walls and ceiling spanning into the murky darkness. The hall also extended up and down a very impressive distance, and to the ponies right was an irregular wall that looked to have a number of platforms and observation windows built into it. However the true spectacle within made everypony's jaws drop like meteors.

A ship. An alien spaceship sat suspended to their left within the colossal, cavernous space beyond the walkways they trod upon. It was angular in design, but not in the same way as the environment around the ponies. It lacked the cold, sharpness of the Vrelthian architecture, and instead of being dark, cold colours, was instead a dusty grey colour. In design, it appeared to be almost composed of several smaller sections, some blocky, other cylindrical, but all molded together and protected by the angular armour plating covering its flanks. It was gigantic in every sense, easily over a kilometer in length and appropriately tall and wide to form a sturdy, solid craft with a blunt nose. But as large as it was, it seemed to fit within the gigantic hall several sizes too small, sitting in the air held in place by four huge crystal pillars and a vast number of mechanical pincers clasped to its hull. Even though it seemed lessened by its containment space, Fluttershy remembered how impressed by the size of the Equestrian airships she'd seen in military parades and flying from place to place above her home, and seeing this magnificent creation before her dimmed the experience of gawking at the comparatively tiny dirigibles. Fluttershy frowned slightly as she'd just noticed some irregularities in the design that didn't seem to fit with the ships overall 'bricky' aesthetic. A pair of dull, golden wings adorned each side of the crafts nose, wile the head of what looked like a screeching eagle loomed other the top edge of it. A few other golden eagle gargoyles and decorative segments could be seen, giving the ship a slight warmth to it.

"Wow. What is that?" Rainbow Dash asked noone, only to be answered.

"Imperial fleet heavy cruiser, Mithodian pattern, pattern registration 27 - I - 555/R/556 - MIT. Threat level: Mild. Deployment capacity: Mild. Offensive resistance level: Mild. Speed capacity: Mild." Torsion announced.

Fluttershy gasped as she spotted a portion above them, to the right, directly ahead of the crafts nose. The alien structure had a gaping wound in its surface, like the craft had fired something form its nose and into the facility, decimating three layers of observation windows and leaving a platform hanging off the wall in a twisted mess. Fluttershy looked back at the craft and noticed the nose had a barrel built into it, like the whole upper front half was just own large gun. She spotted a number of smaller turrets stations about the ships broadside, much like an airship, and saw that opposite to them, stitched through the walls of the cell were massive explosive damage. Twilight, and perhaps some of the others, seemed to notice this as well.

"That ship did this?" Twilight said gesturing to the Ursa Minor size hole in the room.

"Yes. Please hold still." The Divergence said abruptly.

The ponies all stopped, befuddled as to what to expect, looking and shrugging at one another. In front of them, from each side of the wide walkway, swung up a large, thin frame, the two connecting above the middle of the platform below to form something akin to a netless soccer goal. This frame zipped towards them with frightening speed, enough to make the ponies at the front of the group flinch as it passed over their heads, a light blue glow washing over them as it passed. A fizzling, crackling sound could be heard, making everypony looked about in confusion as to what had just happened.

"What the buckin' butterfly?!" Applejack exclaimed as she looked down at the firearm in her hand.

The entire weapon had turned pitch black, so black it didn't seem to even catch light to reveal texture or edges. A bright light burst from within the weapon that slowly peeled its way through the firearm's body, atomizing it by the second until its dissolved frame crumbled to dust in AJ's hands.

"Weapons are not permitted within this section of the facility." The computer informed.

"Yah'll gimme that back, yah hear! Weren't yours tah take!" Applejack barked at the air around her, hands clenched and arms tense, her building temper making Fluttershy take a step back and awkwardly fiddle with her hair.

"I repeat, weapons are not permitted within this section of the facility, no exceptions. Thank you for your cooperation."

"Coop'rashion my rump! Is the whole damn sky jus' filled with snide, belittlin' alien freak?" AJ growled as the group pressed on.

"You know what, Applejack, let's find out. Torsion, does Celestia have access to the inside of that ship?" Twilight called out, aggravated.

Several seconds passed, half of which Twilight spent giving AJ a quizzical look on why Torsion hadn't answered her sooner.

"Yes, she does. Though, I would greatly advise against it." The Divergence warned.

"And why is that?" Celestia asked.

"I see it best to withhold that information for a later time."

"You do that. Princess, I know we haven't got long, but this could be important." Twilight pleaded.

The Princess of the Sun frowned slightly as she thought, and in a way, Fluttershy hoped she'd say that they couldn't afford to head inside the ship. Some might call her cowardly, but the last thing she needed now was more disappointment from more creepy, mean alien, and she sure didn't want to stumble about inside the dark, dusty insides of an ancient alien ship.

"You're right, Twilight, and we can spare a little while. Torsion, we're heading inside the craft." Celestia ordered.

"Of course. Though I'd still advise against it." The alien computer droned.

The door to the ship made a sharp, hydraulic hiss followed by a long, low whine as the toothed door rose into its ceiling feed. Before the ponies was complete blackness accompanied by a strange silence that seemed to hold an eerie noise all of its own. The ponies couldn't help but feel this place was still occupied somehow.

"Torsion, where are the crew of this ship?" Celestia inquired, a sliver of fear in her voice as she faced a dark she wasn't quite familiar with.

"Inside." The intelligence replied.

"Are they, uh...friendly?"

"They will not harm you, I assure you. But I would still advise you return to the relay fields you came from."

Celestia drew a deep breath in and grabbed her sisters hand for comfort, looking to her with a weak smile, Luna doing her best to return one, before looking back into the dark.

"You're not afraid of the dark, are you, Luna?" Celestia asked genuinely, seeking comfort from her night-dwelling sister.

"No, am I not, sister. But this...this is different." Luna replied with a heavy tone.

Celestia took to a stride and swiftly wandered into the ship.

It was dusty, in fact there was dust everywhere, almost like the snow outside in the relay fields and up on the surface. The air smelled musky and was heavy to breath, like she was in the attic of a long abandoned house. With a mental twinge, her horn illuminated, unwittingly causing her sister to flinch away. She could have sworn she'd just heard Luna hiss in exposure to the light, but her mind was preoccupied with her surroundings. The corridor ahead was quite spacey, but something about this place, perhaps the dust, made Celestia feel terribly enclosed, trapped by the very air around her. Celestia turned sharply to look behind her after having heard something behind her, like the rush of wind. Everypony else was behind the alicorns who took the lead with horns lit up, some looked tense, other terrified. Pinkie however seemed perfectly at ease as was inspecting her surrounding with a youthful enthusiasm.

See, Miss Pie knows there's nothing to worry about. Torsion couldn't lie to us. This is going to be fine. We're all going to be just fine.

Celestia turned forward and found the route ahead was growing closer to a split junction, and they'd have to start choosing random directions to go in, and with that came remembering the way back. They couldn't afford to get lost in this place considering its size. She looked back again to see the entrance still open, but now a far ways back behind them, so much so that the light coming through was too dim to help them see, meaning their horns were the only things creating any light.

"Torsion, does this vessel have power? Can you put the lights on?" Celestia asked shakily.

"Power core is fully functional, however my infiltration of the ships systems has seemed to throw up several systematic fail-safes. There are no lights I can access in your section of the ship, however there are some located further inside. Please leave the ship now, I advise you do not travel any further." Torsion stressed, his tone inclining slightly.

"P-p-p-princess, maybe we sh-should listen to what he's saying." Fluttershy said, gripped by fear.

"Come on, Fluttershy, do I need to remind you of what my grandma told me? Perhaps in sooooooong~?" Pinkie said slyly.

"No! No, I remember!" Blurted Fluttershy.

"Besides, the ghosties in here aren't gonna hurt us. They just wanna go home." Pinkie said in her usual happy tone, but this time it had a slightly somber undertone.

Everypony froze as they reached the junction and turned to face Pinkie Pie.

"Uh, say Pinkie, yah wanna run that by us again?" Applejack asked slowly and clearly as she could.

Whatever Pinkie said next faded into the recesses of Celestia's attention as she heard something that made her fur crawl. It was a droning, disembodied moan that came swimming from behind her, down the right corridor. Her bones seemed to freeze over and her muscles tensed as fear gripped her every joint and strangled her gut. Celestia had always been something of an example when it came to keeping composure, able to bravely stand before even the fiercest, most ferocious opposition while still keeping her calm. However feeling trapped in the webs of dust in the belly of this ancient alien craft gave her a feeling she hadn't felt since a thousand years ago, that fateful night. She turned around, terrified yet utterly compelled by the noise behind her, slowly swiveling around to face the deep dark ahead. The noise, however, changed in pitch, then again, and carried with it a second, fast paced tone like the chug of a train. More so, it wasn't coming from the corridor, but beyond from deeper in the ship.

"-and then they all woke up in thi-" She would have continued, but Pinkie was suddenly cut off.

"Do you hear that?" Celestia said, transfixed on the darkness before her.

"Auntie Celestia, are you okay?" Cadance asked, her voice unsteady.

"Music." Celestia breathed.

"What?" Several ponies said at once.

"I hear music. This way!" Celestia said with a sudden burst of enthusiasm, darting off and leaving the others calling and chasing after her.

She turned a corner, then another, desperately following the sound that grew louder and clearer with every step she took. She had to see them, had to know that there was something more to the universe than cold calculations, than planetary statistics, than the grey, lifeless drone of fine tuned productivity. She had to know if there was even the slightest possibility of someone out in the stars being even slightly like ponykind in even just a single sense. And a love of music was sense enough for her. The federation treated music like a fossil record, it was found and unearthed from their digital archives and displayed for the public to enjoy, but had not been created or publicly sung in hundreds of years. The notion was so alien it was sickening, the dismissal of music as being an enjoyable past-time, but nothing that could be measured as essential or useful. No, Celestia needed this, all ponykind needed this. They needed someone to sing with them. To sing them into the future, not collared and drag them forward like dogs. The music was fast paced, stringy, almost identical to the country themes Applejack herself enjoyed at one of her family hoedowns. It was energetic, electric, and she heard voices singing along. They were muffled and far away, but they were there, just around the next corner. She turned to see a large set of decorated doors, gold and engraved with images she was in too much of a rush to study properly. Celestia, Eyes tearing up, mouth open in a desperate smile, wings outstretched to graze the grey, metallic walls, threw her arms out and shot her hands against the doors, bursting them open before her.

It took a while for her to soak it all in.

It was some form of hall, most likely used for dining, but having a sort of cathedral theme to it with large, stained glass windows and tall, looming pillars flanking the expansive central area filled with rows of large, stone benches. Light, most likely artificial, poured in through the stained glass, casting vibrant colours across the large hall. Each window bore the image of a great moment in a story of sorts, the design simple, but finely crafted and complimentary to those envisioned upon them. Not one, or two, or three, but several alien species could be seen pictured within the massive glass canvas', alien warriors wielding firearms, swords and banners, fighting hoards of terrors or battling mighty lords of darkness in single combat, each and every presented an epic moment, the princess assumed, from history. Some of the aliens had brightly colours coats, long prehensile tails and two sets of horns, others looked a little like Feds, only with deeper, earthy tones to their flesh, rounder skulls and stockier builds. Some appeared to have shield-like faces who's mouths curved in strange ways and who's bodies bore two pairs of arms, and others appeared to be tall, lanky avian creatures with four eyes. The entire place was a room filled with stories, and was no doubt a place these people painted in ink upon the glass would gather to exchange their tales and fill their bellies. But everything was covered in dust, a thick blanket that seemed inches deep, and strange, grey masses of material sat within the dust. Celestia took a step forward and looked around, resting her eyes on the nearest mound of grey matter.

A skull. An alien skull sat sideways, rested upon the remains of two alien arms covered by a rotten and dusty jacket. The jacket lead to a pair of pants that hung over the seat below, one skeletal leg sitting in the material while the other had fallen out, behind a gathering of tail bones could be seen. Another skeleton could be seen sat besides the first Celestia had seen, and another besides that, and another beyond. There were dozens, no, hundreds of corpses, some in better shape than others, but all so old that what tissue remained clinging to the empty husks was as good as brittle stone and dust. Celestia let a staggered breath blurt from her throat as she washed her eyes over the sight, and began to truly drink in the detail of what she was seeing, and the story it told.

"T-T-Torsion...What...What happened here? Why are all these alien dead?" She said through a half choked voice as the other ponies hurried through the doorway behind her.

"As I mentioned earlier, to ensure station security from the intruder you are descendant from I had to respond with a threat to starve and suffocate living subjects by removing them from stasis. However, due to miscalculation on my part, I was not aware of the damage this station had received. Once your ancestor had retreated, I tried to reengage the stasis field surrounding the craft, and found it unresponsive to re-ignition. I had no choice but to contain the cells lacking a stasis field, trapping the inhabitants inside. After four months enclosed within their ship, itself enclosed within this cell, the occupants began to die of starvation, a few living long enough to begin suffocating before they each took their own lives." Torsion said as though reading the menu to a brunch bar.

Celestia's knees gave out and she slumped to the dusty floor, the very breath stolen from her. She couldn't hear the music any more. Just the deathly quiet that emulated the sight before her. She sputtered and gasped in despair as she looked around at the army of corpses. She rested eyes on a trio of skeletons for a moment. They had a large amount of what she assumed was alcohol bottles collected around them, the three joined together in the last embrace they must have ever shared. Elsewhere, one had its skull resting in the lap of a fellow, who's hand was rested on the side of their head. Off to the side, two corpses, these ones in slightly better condition, were laid out huddled together, holding each other as they lay on the surface of the stone table. Celestia half dragged, half scrambled her way over to peer behind what looked like a large altar that could have been mistaken for a office desk. Sat up against the inside of it was another corpse, this one holding a long, black device in their skeletal hands, a device that didn't look too different to a Federal firearm. The device lead up to the face of the corpse, of which was absent, the whole front of the entire skull having been blasted clean off from, to be assumed, the discharge of the weapon. Celestia, weeping messily, crawled closer to find the body clasping something else in its right hand, a small piece of plastic. Gently pulling it free, Celestia shakily brushed the dust off, her heart splitting in two as two feminine alien faces peered back at her from within. The were both of the same species, looking slightly like Feds, only their skin was a dark tan colour, and had the patterns upon it to make them both look as if made from carved and burnished wood. There eyes were a strange, controlled explosion of colour, centered by an irregular pupil that looked almost like a star of pitch black. The larger alien, looking about the same age as Rarity, had purple eyes and purple hair that seemed abnormally thick, like slices of rubber, that traveled down the middle of her skull much like the mane of a pony. The other alien was no older than Rarity's little sister, probably younger, and had bright blue eyes and hair. The two looked at the camera with a typical camera-ready smile, the little girl waving. Celestia noticed in the corner of the white frame of the plastic was a round, raised surface with a green arrow pointing upwards on it. Gliding her thumb over it, she hesitated a moment, then pressed down.

"Hi, Daddy! I love you!" The little alien girl said as the picture came to life as a well defined video tape, the small alien frantically waving as the larger female hugged her.

"I love you, baby, come home soon!" The adult said in a raspy, but ultimately female voice.

Celestia dropped the picture and clasped her face in her hands as she was practically screaming into her own palms, tears flooding the space between her face and hands.

I love you too, girls.

Celestia nearly jumped out of her skin as the voice washed through her head. For a moment she was convinced it was just her imagination, that her emotion was just getting the better of her.

Where are we?

Another voice, not as mellow as the last, but also male, seemed to be spoken from within Celestia very mind.

Has the skipper found us a way out yet?

This one was feminine, but had a certain gruffness to it. It was followed by another two voices, both speaking at once, then three, then ten, soon it felt like a hundred voices were all crying out from within Celestia's head.

Running low on rations.

Can't see anything behind us.

So damn cold.

Lost the sensor core last night.

Can't get any message out.

They must be looking for us, right?

Port battery is spent.

This is our last round for that cannon, son.

Emperor, please here our prayers.

He's all fucked up! He just smiled and shot himself!

I can't take it in this fucking place anymore!

Let us out! Let us out!

We're dying in here.

We ain't got piss to drink!

Can't breath.

I just wanna go home.

You remember what home looked like? Tell me about it.

Don't make me do this, sir!

Hello...is anyone there?

Celestia felt a pair of hands shaking at her, and at first could only scream as she was all but convinced the confused, scared and angry souls of this terrible place had come to claim her, to blame her for making them suffer for days on end, slowly wasting away into dust.

"Sister, please! Get up! Tia, it's me!"

This time it had been Luna's turn to play the big sister and was knelt besides her sister trying desperately to shake her out of whatever trauma had frozen her to the floor, shaking like a fish out of water. Celestia slowly began to return to her senses, the voices growing further and further away until only her friends and sister was left, all looking over at her with deep, almost terror-stricken concern. All Besides Pinkie, who was holding a yellow, dusty box in her hands.

"Oh, Luna." Celestia said weakly.

"It's alright, Tai, it's okay. What happened? What's going on in this place?" Luna said, and although still looking worse for wear, was remaining solid in her composition.

"These people are dead. They died starving, alone, cold, in the dark, gasping for breath. Their families are dead. Their families died not even knowing where these people were, what was happening to them." Celestia said through gasps and stutters as she rose to a sitting position.

"Princess Celestia." Pinkie perked up, her tone, though full of energy, was flatter than usual as she handed Celestia the yellow box that was about the size of a military radio.

Celestia took the bulky device to find what looked like a tape held within, viewable through the clear plastic on the top of the machine. Celestia rotated the box to find a small keyboard on its furthest edge, each key imprinted with a single symbol that she did not recognize. Based on the first few being different coloured shapes and the ones after being strange alien runes, Celestia pressed a finger down on the first rune, the machine buzzing for a second before activating.

"Audio log for Captain Mephit, date is thirty fourth of Nobleson, the year 30,999 of our Lord. It's been a week since we all started to wake up. We've lost a few soldiers, all of them having some sorta....uh, 'reaction' to whatever was keeping us sedated. They each fell into a coma instead of waking up, the medical deck kept them stable for a couple days, but we lost Private Giraphidean this morning. The priests on-board gave a ceremony in his name at breakfast. Everyone paid respects, and over all crew morale seems steady. Not surprising, Boloroph Gate Keepers breed solid regiments of steady-headed troops, and they've come in real handy trying to figure out just what the hell has happened to this ship. Captain Mephit, signing off."

As soon as the elderly voice with an accent similar to Applejack's cut out, Celestia immediately hit the next rune.

"Captain Mephit, date, twelfth of Songnight, the year is 30,999 by Imperial calendar. It's...uuuuh, it's been a tough week. Really it's been tougher every day since my last log. We're outta food, and what we've tried to grow isn't taking too great to the soil we've tried fabricating. Guys up in engineering say they might just have a plan to at least get us loose of the grappling locks we're stuck too. We might drop...hell, for who knows how long, but maybe the fall with cause a hull breach and at least get us off the ship. Sounds better than staying stuck here, and sure as hell a shit-load better than firing every acelerator shell we have into a structure we knew nothing about. That's every cannon and turret dry now, just missiles left now, and firing one of those off in here could cause a whole lot more harm than good...Father Rig passed away last night. Boys say he must have died in his sleep. No matter what the boys told the crazy old bastard he wouldn't have none of it. Not one bite to eat. Said better men than him needed it...I hope you're right, Father, I really do. Captain Mephit, signing off."

The gruff male voice cut out and another rune was hit.

"Captain Mephit...I, uh...I'm not sure what day it is. You know...might be new years eve. Maybe it's tomorrow. I dunno. What the shit, Happy new year everybody!...We're fucked...We are completely fucked. Core's still ticking, but engines are burnt out, weapons are dry and the comms relay is decayed to shit. So, looks like we're stuck here. I still tell the guys and girls they're still looking for us. Not a word of a lie too, they sure as hell are looking for us. Whether they find us is an entirely different matter...They ain't gonna find us. Got one last shred of data before the scanners blew sky-high. We're locked in a vibro-dermic poly-alloy prison as thick as a fortress on all sides, and buried under several hundred feet of soil and rock on some planet nobody's even fuckin' heard of before. That was it. That was the old girl herself telling it to me straight. 'You're gonna die inside me'...Yeah, well thank you too you bitch...Got enough water for a few more weeks, some food. I'm thinking maybe I'll just hand Lieutenant Brandon the key card for the booze locker. If the crew are gonna die in this Throne-forsaken rust-heap...I'm thinkin' they can at least die singing."

The next Rune was hit.

"...Mephit...Air is pretty thin...What crew are left now are either getting comfy in each other's arms or scratching at each other's throats to suck out the air from their lungs. Now I'm thinkin'...maybe it's the air...but I'm thinkin' one of those nukes we have in the spinal silos is looking like it needs to stretch its legs a while. Turn the ship to dust and slag in the blink of an eye. Crew won't know what hit 'em. Best way for 'em really...ain't no more blood spilled over this hell, no more good soldiers gotta cough their last bloodied breath. But then I'm thinking of what those scanner results showed me. Six other ships, just like ours, trapped in this alien shit prison. Data had the ships hidden good, wouldn't of seen 'em if not for Hawkes...I miss Hawkes...she was a kind girl. So, no nukes. Maybe someone out there is doing better than we are. Maybe it's just us who are outta air, and food, and water. Maybe I failed this ship...and her crew. Maybe I never deserved to be Captain. You know what they'll do to an officer who fails his men like this back in reality? They'd likely shoot me on the spot as soon as I'd shown my face. And I'd deserve it...Well...since there's no one else around to do it for me...Mephit...signing off."

Celestia hesitated for a second before deciding to hit the next rune. But the button didn't lock into a lowered position as the others had, but just bounced back up towards her again. She tried again, and again, only for the rune to be empty of any voice. The rune after, and the last one all proved empty as well. Celestia felt her anger, her frustration at the ending to this story, the desperate story of these poor people, would be so utterly final. Lacking any compromise, any happy, silver lining. It sat upon her heart like hot tar, burning away at her from the inside. Her anger turned inward and collapsed on itself, dissolving into an utter sense of helplessness as she lit the recorder slip away from her grip to clatter to the floor next to her.

"These guys used to be so loud."

Celestia looked up at the chirpy voices owner, who was staring up at one of the stained glass windows with a relatively bland expression.

"They had so many parties. Every day, they'd have big parties after beating the bad guys. Now...now they just lie there." Pinkie turned, wandering back towards the group, who were a mix of emotions ranging from disgusted, humbled to engulfed in despair.

"They just lie down. They used to shout and run around and laugh all the time and now they just lie there. They all look so sad. That guy, on the tape, he was just sat in his chair, staring out the window. And he was so...so sad." Tears streamed down Pinkie's face, her face buckling into an agonized visage of pure sorrow. As she drew closer, Celestia shakily stood up and straightened herself before facing the pink mare who looked up at her through tear-flooded eyes.

"Why are they all so quiet?" She just managed to wheeze out before Celestia pulled her close into a desperate embrace. The two just standing there, softly crying for a while as the Princess gently stroked the small pony's curly mane.

"I'm so sorry, Pinkie." Twilight said, her own eyes teared up to the limit as she put her hands gently on her friends shoulders.

"Maybe...Maybe if we find the...the one's the jellyfish wanted to keep alive. If we find them then we can take them all home. And they'd see their families again. And then they won't be sad anymore." Pinkie half-blubbered as she nestled into Celestia's shoulder.

"I promise, Miss Pie, I promise I'll try. I'll try my best." Celestia said, and although was still sniffling every so often, spoke with a solid sense of conviction.

The ponies gathered around to share hugs, wipe tears and collect themselves before pulling their senses together, ready to leave.

"Alright, everypony. Let's get out of here." Celestia said.

Nopony stalled. Every last one in the group headed back out the way they'd come with great haste. Nopony looked back. The crew of the ship continued to stare out through hollow sockets, longing for the home they'd never see.

07 - Back in the saddle

Benefactor Supreme Yuni'Gov relentlessly stomped his way through the subterranean alien structure like a toddler who'd just been denied a sugary treat. He gripped his Magna-suppressor in his overly-tightened, gloved hands. He glared through the heads-up display of his helmet with a boiling ferocity, his temper emulated by the gleaming red glow of his visor lenses. The military officer was in no mood to be held up another second longer than he had to, he hated poor punctuality, and he was hours behind his predetermined schedule. The mission had been so simple to: Allow the ponies to descend into the dead-end cave, leave them down there searching foolishly for a few minutes before sending in the Eliminators to kill two of the Elements' number, the Immortals following close behind to disable or if necessary destroy the princesses and then have the troops follow lastly to secure them for arrest and escort them back to the on-world research facility. It was a cinch of an objective, one they'd walked right into perfectly, and the Federation forces had formed up and into position flawlessly. The only disturbance was the store manager, who's shop the troops had raided prior to entering the basement, tried hitting one of the Benefactors with a vase if some kind, but a magna-round to the knee seemed to set him straight.

However, after the Eliminators had been deployed, the shady squad of assassins had reported the natives were nowhere to be seen. What they had found down in the caves below the store was a large crystal wall that read on the Feds scanners to be made of some form of high-density polymer. So strong was the material that even after a squad of Benefactors had pummeled it with several volleys of firepower, the surface remained unscathed, and a ricochet round had left a single soldier with a wounded leg. For hours the Feds had tried to cut or digitally hack their way through the door, but with no luck of response. The Eliminators, chemically augmented soldiers, mad creatures barely considered Feds at all, had become positively itchy with the need to spill blood, and the other soldiers had started to grow very uncomfortable around the ever-aggressive, unfeeling monsters. The Immortals had managed to keep the assassins in a deadlock exchange of one-ups and threats for long enough for something to happen behind the large crystal wall which had seen in slide apart and open a way into what looked like a gigantic underground structure. The underground city had appeared to be completely alien in nature, and scanners had dated the internal residue as over a thousand years old. Th soldiers had proven a great annoyance in regard to their behavior shortly after entering the structure, many of them gagging and wretching at the smell of the structures inside or complaining about the cold that reached the thinner parts of their battle cloth. All that he'd experienced had led Yuni'Gov to grow to the impatient and fiery state of mind he was currently in.

"What direction are they in?" The Benefactor Supreme hissed through his helmets respirator.

"Take a left, you will have to increase you current travelling speed to reach the trespassers in a tolerable level of time." The alien AI said calmly, the constructs hologram floating besides the officer.

"I'll be the one to decide what is tolerable and what isn't, alien." The Fed growled back.

"You will do well to keep in mind that this is my facility, and it is my function to maintain its stability. If you'd have listened to my briefing on the nature on this station, perhaps you could better appreciate the situation before you. Just what exactly has possessed a creature like you to believe you can simply do as you please in a domain that does not belong to you?" The alien chirped frantically.

The officer stopped, turning to the creature and pressing his carbine into its non-solid face.

"Because I have the gun!" He barked before storming off again, leaving the hologram behind.

"I do believe you are not the only one." The alien intelligence replied to the Benefactor's back.

Thirty-six. Thirty-seven. Thirty-eight. Thirty-nine. Forty.

Adventios loaded the final bolt round into the straight-cut magazine for his storm bolter, a ferocious automatic firearm he'd named 'Shade-snatcher'. He'd been most grateful Brother Techmarine Unycrios had been able to locate a doorway hidden within the walls of the containment room they'd been held in for Throne-knows how long, the techmarine using his servo-harness mounted plasma cutter, followed by the titanic strength of his servo-arms to breach the doorway and access the small containment room. Within was what the marines of the Hospitalers chapter seventh company had hoped for dearly, their sacred armaments. Boltgun, chainsword, grenade, shotgun and thunder hammer all were locked within the crystal contraptions which required a fair bit of 'physical persuasion' to release their desired equipment. Adventios himself had been happily reunited with Shade-snatcher, his combat blade 'Sworn blood' and his chainsword entitled 'Wind-singer'. All sixty-three space marines that had been found and freed from their alien prisons were returned to their weapons, Terminators to shields and hammers, tactical squads to bolters and meltaguns, and most notably the chapters own Sanguinary Guard, five of which graced the strike force's ranks, had once again found their most holiest of weapons; the Glaive Encarmine relic weapons and their Angelus boltguns also. The wrist mounted boltguns had found to be, upsettingly, removed from the guard in a most unsanctioned manner, yet the Brother Techmarine handed his efforts into refitting the weapons to their hosts. Though it was far from the lengthy and ceremonial rituals expected to be put into practice when initiating the weapons with their masters, Unycrios' efforts were highly praised and seen fit enough for the Sanguinary guard to feel comfortable using the firearms if the need arised.

The brethren ranks of the Hospitalers almost filled the large hall they'd been released into, all of them checking and conditioning their weapons. Everywhere Adventios now looked, brothers of white and red plate paid close attention to their own and each other equipment as charging slides were locked back, ammo feeds cycled, armour power packs vented and power cables locked down. Banter and cheers of reunion were still abound, the Astartes glad to finally be in each others company. At least consciously.

The command squad, Captain Errithius accompanied by Brother Chaplain Tyreth, Honoured Sanguinary Priest Nitheleon and a host of veterans all were gathered next to the strange, small natives the Emperor had no doubt sent to set the space marines free, to once again set forth to do his holy work. Before the natives, some said among the ranks to be the equivalent of planetary royalty, knelt Squad Frivitor, the five space marines presenting their weapons to the small, colourful creatures, most of whom seemed rather taken aback by such sentimental gesture. Adventios allowed himself a moments grin, followed by a short huff before turning back to his weapon.

"What are you so happy about?" Brother Herathor growled grimly from Adventios' left, the marine carefully tending to his heavy bolter in whatever ways he knew how.

"What are you so upset about?" Adventios asked back, a degree of surprise, if not worry in his tone.

"I've been asleep a millenia. Not so much as a scrap before we were snatched from reality. Are we truly so helpless as to be caught by a snotty rabble of degenerate xenos scum so easily? Without fight? Without even realizing it? Now, would you grace me with an answer, sire?" Herathor replied in a tone lit by embers of frustration.

"Huh, very well. I'm happy we were stuck in this blasted place only a millenia, and not ten. Or a hundred. Or an age of eons! We could have been locked in that stone for so long the galaxy would have spun itself into scattered dust, to a time when even blessed Terra itself is nothing but a ash-blown orb of ruins and wastes. And we are not helpless. Surely the reason we are here speaks for that in itself! The xenos who built this place could not save themselves, so they turned to us to find a way to preserve themselves." Adventios responded, though not angered he certainly made sure to add a certain emphasis to his words so his whole squad would hear them.

"So says these people. They claim many things. And we have not seen a shred of evidence to support their words." Brother Revitheon added, the brother kneeling as he inspected a pouch full of trinkets he'd collected in battle over the years, ensuring nothing of worth had been stolen from him.

"Because not one of us has stepped foot outside this hall." The sergeant replied, slightly exasperated.

"I'll confess I've taken quit the liking to these creatures." Brother Denethios perked up, turning himself from observing the natives and those who presented themselves before them.

"Do tell, dearest." Herathor said with a chuckle, calling Denethios by the pet name the heavy weapons wielder had coined for him.

Denethios, his face unhidden by his helmet, eyes of dark bronze, hair cut short and wildly unkept, face born with long, strong features along with a heavy, light brown stubble having been grown out, gave his blood-bonded brother a humored smile before breaking into a calm, slow wandered through the gathered squad.

"I've smelled their fear before. It's not the fear I taste when a thing lies to me, nor that of another thing being graced by my blade across its throat. They reek of an honest fear, one that leaves little room for doubt." The marine said as he walked.

"You have a true gift, brother." Adventios applauded with a warm grin.

"At wasting my time with his words." Herathor grunted, though his voice tinged with a slight humour.

"And what's your gift, Herathor?" Adventios asked.

"Taking action." Herathor finalized as he cycled the bolt of his heavy bolter.

"Brothers! Form up!" Errithius barked from next to the natives to those within the crystalline hall.

"Come." Adventois ordered in a soft tone as he put his battle helmet over his head.

His vision was reduced to small, constrictive slots that made up the eye lenses of his helmet, however not two seconds after the fastening clamps and pressure valves had powered up the pink tinge of the sergeants vision shone with a deep neon glow, a number of translucent runes and symbols flitting through his vision as the helmets auto-sensor array linked with his HUD. A softly lit targeting reticule swept passed his sight as he swept his storm bolter around to fasten it to the magnetic plat to the rear of his hip as the weapons machine spirit meshed with that of his armour, a clear feed to the weapons ammo counter and firing setting shown in the upper right of his HUD. Adventios and his brother made a short, non-uniform march over to the gathering of marines that gradually grew larger by the second. All around a thunderous growl rang through the air as heavy boots punished the floor beneath them, a chorus of titanic bootsteps almost seeming to create a disorientating smog of sound in the air, one that appeared to have an grave effect on the natives, as those that weren't cringing from the assaulting noise had their hands firmly clasped over their flattened ears. All of the marines had their weapons holstered and locked to their belts, a custom the Hospitalers chapter practiced with great vigilance when not in the fires of battle, only the heavy weapon units had their weapons held aloft in their armoured gloves. Adventios and his brethren stopped just behind another squad who had come to a halt about ten feet from the command squad and the group of aliens next to them.

Brother Captain Errithius, Lord Commander of all armed forces of Thestrilas Plateau, entitled twice, first as 'Undoing hand', then again as 'The One of Denying', took a single step forwards to separate himself from his command crew, his shadowy face partially concealed by a fine-crafted hood sweeping across the ranks to address all before him.

"Our current situation is more perplexing than any of us could have ever feared, and its details are yet to be confirmed in any solidity I find acceptable," The captain turned his head slightly, looking to the side towards the natives, who seemed understandably uneasy beneath his gaze, "So from this point in time, unto a time when I deem it acceptable to share with you all the full, finer details of what we are facing, I expect complete verbal and tactical competence, regardless of the obscurity of our situation. Unnecessary opposition to your superior's orders, inappropriate and/or unwelcome verbal exchange and any other form of misconduct that proves counter-productive to our efforts will be met with immediate dismissal of any current promotional conditions in effect along with a disciplinary course upon our return to Imperial space. We are to assess our situation, the command team and I will convene to propose an appropriate response to the situation at hand, then we will initiate such a response with the precision and valiance we have always done. Can I count on you to do well by these conditions?" The Captain said, his husky, almost gravelly tone ringing in the ears of all who heard him.

The surrounding marines gave a chorus of affirmative responses, or at the very least a confirmatory grunt.

"Very good. Now what we do know so far is we all, at some point were imprisoned by whatever xenos inbreds that built this facility, and we have been unconscious for a length of time that...has yet to be entirely determined. These people claim to be of the native population who dwell on the planet we are currently on, and have discovered and freed us after finding this alien installation in a subterranean cave network. They claim to have come into contact with the station's automated computer system, of which has informed them we have been held within this place over a millenia," A small number of, presumably the younger, brother marines made a small rumble of banter kept in a low tone, "Quiet, all of you!...I can only speak for myself in saying I trust the word of these people, at least for the most part, and yes, this does imply our situation to be worse than it could be. But we are not here to wish and wonder what could have been, things just simply are. Now, they also claim to have found our ship, and say that Remergence is not far from this very room. Have weapons in hand, but kept safe, we are headed to our craft to try and find a way inside."

"Captain, are we to expect hostile resistance?" Another, young sergeant called out from beyond were Adventios could clearly observe.

"Possibly. The Princess here has informed me the artificial intelligence became erratic and has possibly malfunctioned after our release became apparent. She has told me that in response the computer opened an entryway that allowed a number of possibly hostile alien military units into the structure as a form of defensive response to our awakening. If encountered, I expect contact to be handled in an appropriate and conductive manner, that means no bolt flies unless you are ordered otherwise. If these units prove aggressive, however, spare no time in determining what lives can be spared. This is a dire situation indeed, brothers, and the approach to combat our chapter has ever prided itself on must be, for a moment at least, put aside. I understand this is a troubling development, and I do not expect you all to be comfortable with the conditions, but you have stood by my side through worse and remained unshaken. Form combat squads, file in for narrow advancement." The captain finished his words with a softness he managed to always achieve, his tone managing to ease the minds of his marines in at least a small way.

The marines reformed and merged to create their predetermined squads of five, some being graced with an extra marine in their ranks as a supportive unit. Adventios and the rest of squad Defedor were such a squad, and not long had passed until a figure wearing a wonderously well crafted set of power armour, robed and bearing the equipment of the haloed order of the Sanguinary priesthood strode up to the sergeant and his squad. Sanguinary priest Feidfor's face was wonderfully healthy, holding slightly more colour than some other of the chapter, his one visible eye was a bright, yellowy gold that almost seemed luminous and his features were wide and welcoming to the eye, His right eye was a bionic augment, however one that was not carved into the socket of his skull, but a simple heads up display goggle which sat locked to a locking groove neatly implanted into the side of the priests skull. Like the eye lenses and energy weapons of the rest of the chapter, his bionic eye was aglow with a bright pink fire that came from within the lens. Feidfor wandered up casually before almost lazily patting a hand over Adventios' farthest pauldron with a wide grin on his face.

"Brother Feidfor, it'll be good to be under you care once again." Adventios said beaming, returning his brothers one-armed hug with his own.

"I am to keep especial eye on Herathor as usual, I assume?" The Sanguniary priest's voice was unnaturally soft, if a little quiet, almost like there was little life left in him.

"Only if I run out of ammunition." Herathor growled back as the squad began the march forward towards the exit of the containment hall.

"Yes, brother, especial care." The sergeant replied with a chuckle.

The sergeant and his squad began to slow, however, as they reached the exit. Before them waited the command squad, letting all before them passed. Adventios could clearly see, even without his augmented eyesight, that the captain's eyes were locked on him and his squad as they approached, leading the sergeant to mod his head to the side to signal his squad to divert to meet the captain.

"Lord Captain?" The sergeant said as he saluted his commander with a clenched fist brought to the center of his breast plate.

"Sergeant, I have a request to ask of you." Errithius said in his usual gravely tone.

"Request, sire?"

"No, not an order, just a request. The princesses here and their cohort are in need of escort through this facility, I feel your squad would be best fitted for the task."

"Of course, my lord. Any particular conditions I should be aware of?" Adventios inquired.

"None I can foresee, however whatever resistance we may meet down here might well identify them as priority targets. Be ready to take up a firm defensive position should we meet anything of significant danger."

"Understood." The sergeant said, looking to the group of small creatures that stood just behind the captain.

"I am also dedicating Brother Unycrios to your squad. His expertise may be of great importance in time, and he will need to be kept near to the native beings." Added Errithius.

"Captain?"

"It's not important. Not yet. Stand by for situational development." The captain finalized before moving aside.

"Yes, sir." Adventios replied quietly as the aliens cautiously approached.

There were nine in total, ranging greatly in height and overall body type. Adventios gave them a quick study through the scowl of his helmets mask, noting important information that could change his tactical perspective.

Moving quickly could be difficult. They look too scared to reliably take cover in efficient time. We'll have to remain behind the column, sticking close to the wall. Thought Adventios as he observed some of the more disproportionate members of the group before him, their bodies clearly not built for speed.

A single member of the group, one of the slightly taller aliens with a vibrant, almost floral purple colourization to her coat, hair and tail stepped forward, apparently gathering her composure enough to walk up to Adventios and extend a small, dainty hand forward as a greeting.

"Princess Twilight Sparkle." The alien said in a soft, yet solid voice thick with education.

Strange name Thought Adventios.

"Honoured Brother Sergeant Errelio Adventios, squad Defedor. We will be your escort." The marine replied simply.

"Good to know we'll be in good hands, thank you for helping us." The princess replied with a warm, if a little forced smile.

Another individual approached from the sergeants side, a wide, imposing frame that seemed even more alien than the creatures in front of him. The techmarine was adorned with thick, segmented plates that composed his expertly crafted power armour, his plate painted a deep, dangerous red besides his chapter colours he held on his left pauldron. His belt was a garden from which a vast number of mechanical tendrils poured from, most hanging about his armoured legs lifeless, say for a few that occasionally swiped of flicked in the air out of some strange instinct born into the machinery. Upon his power pack was an enormous harness bearing six mechanical arms which hummed with unnatural life as they occasionally swiveled or snapped like the claws of a sea crustacean hungry for food, two of the upper set larger than their smaller, pincer-like brothers ending in mechanical claws, the lower pair being a wielding assembly and a thermal torch. The marine marched up to the squad with a terribly strange preciseness that would make any who didn't know better think the Astarte was a synthetic being. This was, at least not entirely, true of course.

"Sergeant." Unycrios' voice was composed of purely mechanical clicks, grumbles and growls with an ever present sound of slight static disturbance.

"Brother Unycrios, glad to hear you are joining us." Adventios said, though being honest, did well to hide his slight discomfort he felt in his machine-loving brother.

"Inconclusive. You cannot be truly emotionally stimulated by my occupation within your battle gathering due to your inability to understand the purpose of my occupation. Perhaps you should wait until significant situation development has occurred before committing to any verbal conviction on my presence." His tone was utterly methodical, sentences so precise you'd think they were straight from a field manual. However, for as much as the techmarine's voice and tone was utterly mechanical, it was not entirely devoid of emotion.

"Noted. Princess, gather your companions, we should get moving." Adventios said before starting his march out the hallway that lead outside.

The breach had obviously been made by a melta charge, and whoever activated it had apparently been under heavy fire while trying to escape. The strike force of marines carefully made their way out through the large hole in the wall were the path through the crystal vase chamber came to an end. The crystal had been partly molten down into a soupy substance a fraction of a second before being blasted open into a shower of white-hot slag and crystalline shards, leading out into a massive hall that rivaled the size of an Astarte chapters mausoleum. Outside the breach, Adventios could see multiple signs of weapons discharge, both bolt and alien in nature, along with blood stains that were so old there could have been anything to the untrained eye. Yet Adventios could plainly see the way the fluid had dried, its consistency and colour, and knew for certain a space marine had been wounded, and most likely killed at this very spot.

"Captain?" A marine from further ahead asked, his single word heavy with implication.

"Brother Pilot Vitron is the only member of our number absent. Keep moving, we shall mourn him when we have time enough to do so." Errithius growled back, his voice ever so slightly shaken.

Adventios turned his thoughts for a moment to prayer, hoping his brother had found his way to the Emperors domain in the life beyond death, even in this far-flung, forsaken place. The sergeant held a a hand out for a moment as he advanced, leaving his squad and escortees behind as he checked the area ahead of them. Turning to peer around the corner, his HUD's auto-senses highlighting wall corners and surface areas of interest as his vision swept around to view the gigantic room before him. Remergence sat beyond the wide walkways before him, silently held aloft by alien machinery, having long awaited the return of her crew. To Adventios' left stood and knelt his brethren, white, red and gold armoured Astartes formed up in a manner that would have been nightmarishly awkward to have assaulted from the front, firing line crossing and overlapping to provide the frontline with a solid, sustainable defensive position. Adventios turned the corner, storm bolter held close to his breast plate as he quickly walked forward to a conveniently waist-high structure than spanned out from the wall to his left. As he turned the corner his waved his hand forward slightly to have all behind him follow, the rumble and thunder of power armoured boots coming from his rear.

"Defedor squad moving to the rear." Adventios announced over his comm-link.

"Roger. Remergence appears to not have sustained damage, at least." Another sergeant chimed back through Adventios' earpiece.

"Inconclusive. I will need to initiate a full internal assessment before determining the status of our vessel. Assessment pending." Unycrios chattered through the radio.

"I cannot see a way into the ship without airbourne assistance. Typhis squad is the only unit capable of reaching across this chasm." One of the command veterans added through a thick, low tone.

"I cannot promise our expertise will meet the requirements needed for such a task, Captain." Verilios, Sanguinary guard sergeant of Typhis squad replied, his voice a waterfall of serenity.

"We will need to activate this facility's systems, extend a path over somehow. Brother Techmarine, can you harness these alien mechanisms?" The captain asked.

"Inconclusive. Most promising option for us would for me to locate and access this stations server core. This could prove difficult to locate." Unycrios replied.

Squad Defedor reached the rear of the assembly of marines, the Astartes and their companions weaving through a small selection of raised pieces of terrain that lie scattered about near the observation wall of the room. The group came to a rest about ten feet behind another squad of marines, Adventios and his brother taking firm defensive positions as Feidfor gently pressed a hand against the stomach of the nearest native, the one known as Celestia to push her lightly further into the wall to their left, the others following behind following by example.

"Doorway isn't going to budge without persuasion. We'll need a melta charge." A marine said over the radio, presumably being nearer the doorway at the end of the path ahead.

Adventios could just about see a marine near the one knelt before the closed door unlock a chunky, cylindrical item with a carrying handle from his belt, hurrying over to his comrade to hand over the device before hurrying back again.

"Charge is in place. Charge has been armed, returning to safe distance for detonation." The Astartes announced before turning to join his brothers.

Just as his heavy footfalls ceased upon him stopping to kneel besides his squadmates a loud, mechanical squeal could be heard coming from the doorway. The sudden, insulting noise caused Adventios to flinch slightly in a manner of disgust at the seemingly unnecessarily awful noise, less than a second later, however, the sergeant had his storm bolter's iron sights firmly lined up down the middle of his vision. His brothers did the same, target painters and crosshairs being lined up to hover over the door than now slid apart into multiple segments that drifted and darted into the wall that surrounded them, opening up the way ahead to leave the marines unobstructed.

Besides the dozens of alien footsoldiers that stood before them.

All marines had weapons raised and pointed at the aliens before them, reticules plastered over heads and torsos with unnatural degrees of steadiness. Adventios himself had his target painter locked solid over the torso of one of the larger aliens as his HUD revealed, with small icons, which targets his squadmates had chosen. A moments careful observation revealed the aliens to be, mostly, very much mortal sized, being perhaps a couple of inches taller than the average civilian, but far more slender in build, looking almost frail. Most were wearing a battle armour that resembled a more clean-cut, angular variant of what the troopers of the Imperial Army wore, painted white with blue patterning, powered lighting emanating from portions of the armour bearing an angry red colouration. A handful wore lighter variants of this armour pattern, painted entirely black and wreathed in portions of clothing that included a dark hood, said individuals looking the most skittish and high-strung as well as being slightly hunched in posture. Another small selection stood just over seven feet tall, wearing a light variant of some form of powered armour that held vastly less area coverage than that worn by the space marines, yet Adventios had a feeling some form of energy shielding may be incorporated into the armour's systems. The alien's stood there, many with their bulky, black weapons raised, some without, but one in particular catching the sergeant's eye. One, who did not stand the closest to the marines by far, but who stood in the middle of the alien formation, arms crossed and with no other soldiers obscuring the line of sight before him, Adventios saw it safe to assume this was the alien commander.

"Did you really think you could escape the Federation, Celestia? Nice to see the ever-benevolent tyrant hiding so nobly behind these...things." The commander said in a slightly high-pitched, croaky alien voice. The fact he was hearing another, entirely different alien species speak low gothic caused a full second of complete confusion within Adventios' mind before the marine refocused his conscious on the target ahead.

The princess who the officer mentioned slowly stepped away from the group, wandering nervously, but steadily forwards to see the commander for herself. Feidfor reached an armoured hand out to catch Celestia's arm, but slowly, gently released the graceful alien as she looked up at him with a look of both pleading and reassurance. Celestia turned slowly and continued on, walking forward to a point where both alien looked at one another from afar.

"What did you hope to find down here? There's no way you can hope to defy the path of reason and progress, not against us. Turn yourselves over and you will be spared for detainment. Resist and we'll destroy you." The alien said, as though the space marines before him didn't even exist.

"It looks like I found exactly what this planet needs, a way to rid ourselves with something none of us even asked for, a way to return Equestria to the way it used to be, the way it was always meant to be." Celestia responded with an admirable degree of strength in her voice that carried remarkably well across the significant space between the two beings.

"You mean being a regressive world who's culture is based on the illusion that magic and fairytales are real? Don't make me laugh. Your kind are truly pathetic, I hope you know that, not to mention easily predictable." The alien boasted.

"I do not believe we have been introduced!" Errithius' thunderous voice caused the alien commander to jump noticeably before slowly turning to address the captain, arms still crossed.

"I am Benefactor Supreme Yuni'Gov, and I am the commanding officer of all Federation military stationed on this planet. I advise you get back to your ship and return to wherever you came from, as you have no legitimate business in these affairs."

"You're standing between me and my way out, so I'm making this my business. Stand aside, leave us to our business and no harm shall come to your company." The captain replied, though his voice was still difficult to consider in any way comforting he was certainly doing his best to sound reasonable.

"No problem, just hand over those criminals you are harbouring." The alien spat back.

"I need these people to find the control center in order to release my ship from it's cell. After I have freed my ship, we may re-discuss the terms of their release into your custody." Replied Errithius.

"Liar."

The brash, insulting statement made Adventios' own blood boil, causing the marine to make a special note to carve this creatures name into a bolt shell he intended to use on the arrogant alien with great satisfaction. Adventios knew at this point that salvaging this exchange was almost impossible, seeing the sergeant slide his trigger finger from the side of his weapon to around the trigger. The captain's face must have been etched deeply with anger as he took a couple of slow, steady steps forward.

"Excuse me?" Errithius said slowly.

"I know you have no intention to hand those terrorists over, you'll free you ship and simply leave with them. Bad decision to be honest. If you don't hand them over this instant we will kill you all and take arrest them anyway."

Adventios was utterly perplexed. Surely no creature living could be so delusional and arrogant to see any hope of victory in the situation like that which lie before this commander creature. Unless these aliens appeared a dozen times less capable than they actually were, then the marines easily outmatched and outgunned them a dozen times over. However, if this creature was in fact not the incompetent moron it sounded like, then perhaps the marines should be more worried than they actually were.

"You'll just...kill us? That's an entertaining notion." Errithius said, his stance squaring out.

"Well it is for us. Do you even see the armour you're wearing? First, it looks like something from a pre-digi age story, and second it's made of three bright colours. I mean, do you want to get shot or something?" The alien cackled, a number of the others joining its tire-screech for a laugh.

"That's the idea." Errithius growled, expression tight.

"Hah! Well I wouldn't want to disappoint you all. But first-" The alien hissed as he raised his stubby, blocky firearm towards Celestia, lining up its sights with her shock-stricken face and fired.

The weapon fired with the sound of a red-hot ball bearing being dropped onto an ice block, a sizzling, squealing sound cutting through the air as a red flash blasted from the weapons barrel. Behind what Adventios assumed was some form of projectile was left a red trails of chemical-based mist that hung in the air for a moment before dissipating. The projectile sizzled through the air at supersonic speeds towards the princess, and doubtlessly would have cut clean through her cranium had not the captain already have been on the move. The round came to a sudden, climactic halt as it struct an invisible barrier that seemed to surround the space marine commander, his iron halo icon mounted upon the back of his power pack glowing almost white hot with a strange energy, a rippling energy field of pink and violet shimmering outward from were the round had struck. The captain, sunk in the power of his momentum, turned his kinetic conviction on his heel, spinning inward and then around to bring up his right arm in line with the alien who'd fired his weapon. In his hand, held in his iron grip, was his master crafted boltgun. To parallel the screeching sizzle of the alien weapon, the captain's barked with a thunderclap roar, like the bellow of a mythical beast from nightmare and shadow. The bolt round soared through the air, almost as fast as the shot fired by the alien, the round's propellant lighting the round up like a fiery thunderbolt as it sped forward towards the alien officer. However the bolt was intercepted by one of the power armoured troopers, the round detonating with a crack as it struck the soldiers own energy shield, the shielding shimmering an angry red as it rippled from the kinetic barrage.

Not a moment later bolters and alien weapons rang out in a fierce exchange of fire, thunderclaps drowning out chemical squeals as projectiles stitched their way through both ranks. Adventios was among those committed to the exchange, forgoing any desire to burden his bolts with prayer, instead choosing to simply charge them with hate. The sergeants jaw clenched, sharp teeth grinding against one another as he squeezed his bolters trigger, the weapon kicking against his armour's stabilizers along with his own strength, making the shots come steady and straight. The alternating firing chambers of the storm bolter mechanically doubled it's rate of fire when compared to its single barreled brother. The weapon gave a ferocious burp of fire as it spat a flurry of bolt round across the hall and into the alien ranks. The aliens had taken a poor tactical approach, choosing to present themselves in full before the space marines as a show of force, convinced they'd somehow prevail, in what manner remained a mystery to the sergeant. The rounds fired cut into three of the alien, sinking deep into their bodies, cutting clean through their armour, before their forms burst apart from within, red alien gore spattering into the air as their broken, pulped bodies fell. Two fell to the floor in a mangled, shattered state, organs burst from bodies, bones split and shattered among the piles of red and pink they'd been turned into. One however was struck halfway up the bicep, the thin limb popping apart, the twisted limb spinning in the air a moment before landing wetly on the crystalline floor. Though the space marines firepower was fierce, their motivation was but slight, for no daemon menace, nor ravenous hoard of unthinking xenos stood before them, but instead misguided alien usurpers. They all had parents, some had families, perhaps even children, and each successful hit from a bolt round was one more family broken, one more child who must try and shake themselves to sleep without the comfort of their mother or fathers presence. Each kill was in the Emperors name, for the idea that all thinking, feeling people in the galaxy could live free from darkness and doubt, but each kill rang hollow in the sergeant's mind. But such sentiment did not belong, not at this time

About a dozen aliens fell before they'd finally managed to take solid cover, scrambling and scattering desperately before the savage brutality of the Astarte guns. Adventios noted how the hunched, twitchy soldiers and the taller, power armour wearers both had some form of energy shielding that had failed to give into the marines firepower so far, red energy flaring around them with each round hit.

"Now, you alien dumbass! Do it now!" Yuni-Gov barked, apparently to no one in particular.

The ground beneath the marines shuddered, throwing Adventios off his next target and bringing his sight down towards his feet. His HUD read clearly off the the side in the segment dedicated for priority information: Surface Instability - Brace. The shudder calmed down to a slow grind, then to a steady sense of movement as the floor beneath the marine slid off to the side and inwards towards the wall. Adventios looked up to see his fellow marines also having been shaken slightly, some off their footing, and the walkway beneath them being pulled apart into irregular, yet predetermined segments, all of which were being moved away from one another and into the observation wall. The massive surface, stared at by Remergence for over a thousand years broke apart into various pieces, sliding apart to reveal several dark holes waiting to consume the marines being brought ever closer to them.

"Sergeant!" Brother Herathor called from behind Adventios.

Adventios snapped his head around to see his platform split in two, swiftly drifting apart, soon becoming too far for a safe jump to be made from one to the other. On the other platform knelt Brother Herathor, heavy bolter braced on the floor, alongside the small, light yellow native with pink hair who remained curled up, eyes clenched on the floor. The platform beyond also formed another segment, this one with Unycrios stood, seemingly in a stupor in the middle of the platform with the bright pink native darting to each edge of the platform in an attempt to find a way off.

"This ride is awful!" The small pink creature squealed with fists clenched.

"Brother! I will find you!" Herathor called out as his platform was enveloped into the darkness it swam into.

"Sergeant! Server room is the singular priority! I will attempt to locate its interface so we can free Remergence! Keep hostile forces engaged for as long as you can!" Unycrios called out through static feedback.

"Are we going on an adventure?" The pink native asked in a chipper tone.

"Affirmative." The techmarine replied simply.

"Yay!" She cheered in return as they both flew into the darkness.

"Pinkie! Fluttershy!" The light blue, winged native had taken flight and dashed overhead, speeding towards her friends before a crystal slab the size of a thunderhawk gunship slammed down in front of her, blocking her way forward.

"Dash! Dash, git back here!" The larger, orange alien yelled as the platform the rest of Defedor squad and the locals were stood on slid backwards, deeper into the dark mouth that awaited them.

The winged alien growled in frustration before taking a sharp turn around and darting back to the others. She returned just in time as another giant crystal wall slid down, tearing away Adventios' sight of his brothers. As the alien natives huddled together, whispering promises of safety and reassurance, the last thing Adventios heard was the chorus of calls from his fellow Astartes, all trying to contact those they'd been taken from, trying to reach out to those stolen away from sight or sound. Adventios scowled at the gathering dark around him, a booming sound of stone hitting stone ringing out as all light vanished, silence crept in, and hope of seeing his brothers again fluttered dimmer in the cold winds of despair.

08 - Divide and conquer

"A little too dark for my liking in here. Defedor, activate night visors, full spectrum enhance."

Adventios' vision flared a bright, light pink before settling into the environment before him. His surroundings were blanketed in a neon glow that gave a clear image of everything within around twenty feet in front of him, and a rough outline of everything else beyond that. He peered about to take note of who had joined him in his journey into the deep darkness of the alien structures that had inconveniently rearranged itself to form a prison around him, his squad, and the native people he was charged with protecting. His squad had illuminated their night vision as he'd done and looked about at one another before looking downwards to see the native females they'd been escorting. Two of their number, each with a single space marine at their side, had been lost to a separate segment of alien structure each, which left the original party's number a total of four short. The girls waved and swung their hands about clumsily around in an attempt to find one another, some less gracefully than others.

"Twilight?! Twilight, is that you?!" The blue, winged female said in a slight panic as she grasped at another besides her.

"Nnnnope." Replied the orange girl at the hands of her friend.

"Oh, uh, hey AJ. That's your arm I gotta hold of right?"

"Nnnnope."

The wiry girl shot her hands back, her facial blood pressure spiking after what Adventios could only assume was an embarrassing situation.

"I'm over here, Dash!" The purple princess announced as a purple light grew brighter and brighter from the tip of her cranial horn until most of the space immediately around her was well illuminated.

"Rarity?" The orange girl called out.

"I'm here with the princesses." The well spoken female replied as another cluster of lights slowly burst into existence, revealing the slight-framed, white girl alongside the other members of the native royalty.

"Is everyone alright?" Brother Revitheon asked around in a low tone.

"I think so. Luna?" The white princess replied.

"I...I think so. M-My head hurts a little." The darker coloured female replied.

"Everyone, on your feet. Brothers, do any of you see an exit?" Said Adventios.

"I see a passage. Unsure of where it leads." A bright light flashed into existence from Denethios' boltgun's target painter, a small lens mounted just above the weapons barrel, the small flashlight function shining forward down were the marine aimed the weapon.

The natives rose from the ground, the purple princess known as Twilight and her taller one the alien commander had called Celestia wandered up besides the comparatively giant Astarte and added the light from their facial appendages to that of the bolters, brightly revealing the dark pathway ahead of them. The light didn't travel far, almost as if the smooth, shadow soaked walls absorbed the light itself, leading to Adventios seeing only an extended pathway laying ahead of the group.

"We have to find the others." Denethios said aloud.

"Negative. Unycrios made it very clear he intended to find this facility's computer mainframe, and will attempt to shut it down. He said he needed us to buy time for him." Adventios replied.

"What does that mean to us, sergeant?" Mikos, the eldest member of Defedor chimed in, his voice sounding much like the Captain's.

"Well, it seems we have no other exits available," The sergeant said as he scanned hi eyes around the room, "So I'd say we take this path, see where we end up. If we end up locating more of our brothers, then so be it, but I do not believe this to be a possibility."

"What happened exactly?" Twilight asked.

"The aliens have somehow gained control over this facility's mechanisms. It would appear they wished to divide our forces and overwhelm each group with excessive offensive measures. Since we were located towards the rear of the formation, I suspect we might be one of the last teams to be hit by enemy forces."

The sound of crystal slabs sliding apart could be heard from up ahead, but considering Adventios' augmented hearing, he safely assessed that this was coming from a relatively far distance ahead of the group. Soon after he heard the sharp voices of alien soldiers among a chorus of footsteps.

"But you've been wrong before." Revitheon huffed humorously.

"Of course. Princess, keep you and your friends behind us. If we turn a corner, wait until we give the all clear before following us. If you get cut off or trapped, deploy whatever defensive measures you might have, but do not engage the enemy unless you have no other choice. Keep to hard cover if we are engaged, and do not move until we say it is safe to." Adventios said in a level tone as he turned to look at Twilight, who gave a stern, solid nod in response.

"Brothers, myself and Mikos up front. Denethios, Revitheon, behind us in supportive positions. We are to occupy enemy attention for as long as possible, determine their pattern of approach and if possible reverse it. Throw off their formations as often as possible. Feidfor, consider yourself one amongst the escortees number, never leave their side, even if we fall." Adventios ordered firmly.

"Understood, sergeant." The Sanguinary priest replied.

"Defedor, by my lead. Advance."

The marines swiftly swept forward into the dark, bolters raised, safety's off.

Pinkie was always one for a good old game of hide and seek, but this was just impractical. Darkness lay all around her, not even an aggressive dimness, but complete and total darkness that sucked her sight away entirely. She scrambled and flopped about in a very ungraceful manner, trying her best to find something that wasn't the hard floor that sat beneath her.

"Guy?! Guy, were are you?! Your suit has super-robot arms and tentacle-plugs and no flashlight?! Where are you?!" Pinkie squeaked in frustration.

"I am here." Replied a cold, rumbly, mechanical voice from behind her.

Pinkie carefully swiveled around on her knees, being cautious where she put her hands. She looked about were the voice had come from, at first seeing nothing before her eye glided upwards to see a handful of neon pink lights, two being eyes, other being illuminated portions of the alien's armour.

"Sudden activation of luminary equipment will disorientate you and possibly damage your ocular systems." The alien rumbled.

"What?" Pinkie said, her face twisted in utter confusion.

"Your eyes will hurt." He replied.

"Oh." Pinkie then slapped her hands over her eyes, a moment later a buzzing sound bursting around her for a second as the world beyond her fingers visibly brightened significantly.

Pinkie strained her eyes as she removed her hands, recovering after a couple of seconds to look up at the gigantic, red armoured alien standing solidly before her. A force from behind the pink mare grabbed at her before lifting her into the air by her brightly coloured, baggy hoodie and t-shirt beneath. She squeaked a moment before looking back to see one of the pony-sized machine limbs mounted upon the alien backpack had grabbed her by the back of her clothes and lifted her up to the height she'd normally stand at. She dropped her legs down to touch the floor, steadying herself as the arm let her go to stand by herself.

"I need to find the central server room for this facility. You should remain here and stay hidden from aggressor forces. I will send a unit to retrieve you when I have determined a stable exit route." The large creature said plainly before turning to head away from Pinkie, as if he'd already found a way out of the dark room they were being held in.

"Wait! You can't just leave me here, what if those meany-weenies find me? Do you even know what's gonna happen if I do hard-time? That's party quality all across Equestria dropping by at least 39.5%. That could lead to a significant social depression, and eventually a possibly irreversible economic and social breakdown of the entire country!" Pinkie ended up squealing as she darted about the room in a panic, finally coming to a stop by grabbing the alien collar and desperately pressing her face into his helmet's face.

"If you follow me, your chances of being found multiply exponentially. I will draw enemy attention away from you, your location should remain stable for anywhere between fifteen to forty-two minutes." The giant replied as the same machine arm carefully pulled the hyperactive mare off of him.

"Okay then smarty-space-soldier, what are you gonna do when you and this places crazy hologram jellyfish get all cuddly in the dark? You think that wacko is gonna just let you violate him with your questionable tentacle belt?" Pinkie inquired with a raised eyebrow and a fierce smirk.

"Infiltrating and disassembling systematic structures of this station should be relatively straight forward. It is not a task I am unfamiliar with?" The alien replied.

"You mean you've hickidy-hacked stuff like this before?"

"I have dominated similar systems."

"But not this one."

"I sense there is an agenda afoot." The alien growled as he stared down at the comparatively small girl.

"All I'm saying is you've never actually fiddled around with these computer-thingies, and I have. Who d'you think masterminded you being set to defrost?" Pinkie said with a cocky grin as she pressed a finger into the gigantic chest of the figure before him.

The alien did not move, but Pinkie had a funny feeling the thing was deeply thinking about her proposal as he simply stared at her through brightly lit, unblinking eyes carved into his helmet.

"You interacted with these systems unhindered?" The alien growled.

"Easy-peasily!" Pinkie boasted.

"You overcame system counter-measurements within reasonable time parameters?"

"Eh, I wasn't really paying attention to the time. It was a lot of fun though!"

"Would you agree to conclude you have a deficient attention span?"

"Y'know what's more fun than alien-computer-commander? Skeeball! Nopony beats me at skeeball." Pinkie said smiling as she waved away a hand.

"What training in technical operations have you had?"

"I'm getting pretty good at using a calculator." Pinkie said with a sly sense of confidence.

The large creature once again just stood there motionless for a moment, staring at the pink earth pony. He suddenly, sharply turned away again and started off down the path he was originally headed down, thunderous footfalls echoing through the corridor before him.

"Follow me." He called out in his digital voice, Pinkie letting loose an excited squeak as she hopped up and down for a second before dashing off to follow her new-found partner in crime.

Pinkie followed close behind, but dashed and darted from side to side, her excitement hardly containable as the darkened journey of danger and adventure rest ahead of the deadly duo.

"Nuh-nuh nuuuh-nuh! Pinkie and Thunder! Nuh-nuh nuuuh-nuh! Treckin' in the dark! Buh-nuh nuuuh-nuh! Gonna find the space-squid! Nuh-nuh nuuh-nuh! Karate-chop his face!-"

Herathor's face was deeply engraved beneath his helmet with furious degrees of frustration. He found the very notion of wasting time intolerable in every sense, and here he was pouring time down the drain like spent engine coolant.

"I said get up!" He barked again, his helmets vox grill turning his aggressive bark into a truly menacing roar.

He nudged the small female once again with the barrel of his heavy bolter, her stiff form giving way to the force of the shove, but her body remaining unresponsive in every other way. Herathor knew she was alive, and beyond that she was conscious, and was growing utterly infuriated by her stubborn antics. He could hear her fast, panicky heartbeat, smell her hot blood in her veins, see her slightly shivering form and easily hear her irregular, sniffely breathing. The marine huffed and turned around, his patience running bone dry.

"So be it. Remain here, do not leave this room and await retrieval." The heavy weapon wielding Astarte grunted as he stomped down a hallway he'd located earlier.

"Wait." A tiny, almost inaudible voice coughed from behind him as he marched on.

"I've waited for you long enough, I must find my brothers." He responded stubbornly, marching on.

"Wait! Please!" Her voice was much louder now, almost a frantic scream as Herathor heard her shuffle her weight around on the floor.

The marine stopped and swiveled around swiftly, his expression burning with frustration for the little yellow creature. He looked upon her to see her lower half still helplessly slumped upon the floor, but her arms braced her upper half up, her heads turned around to look up at Herathor. Her eyes were a waterfall of hot tears than ran madly down her cheeks, her eyes desperate and terrified, one covered over by her immense locks of pink hair. After a second she scrambled, almost pathetically, trying to gain footing to lift herself up only to be greatly hindered by her rather strangely overdeveloped upper half. With an exasperated breath out, Herathor slowly thundered his way closer, reaching the girl and offering the barrel of his weapon up near her arm. For a second the girl looked at the instrument in terror, but her expression softened as she looked up at Herathor, her hand wrapping over the weapons large frontal iron sights. Without a shred of effort the marine lifted his weapons barrel up, pulling the girl upwards. She slowly and slightly unsteadily shifted her legs as she held onto the weapon and cradled her anatomy, finally steadying herself to stand as Herathor swung his weapon away from her before turning around to march away once again.

The tiny chatter of small footsteps set a rhythm to the booming thunder of the marines bootsteps as the two walked forward down a dark hallway, lit only by the marine's heavy bolter and it's illuminated target painter. The weapon swept side to side as it rest firmly in it's wielder's steely grasp, the light it threw out seeming to disappear much quicker in the air than Herathor would have expected. The pair soon reached a junction, the path splitting off in two directions. Herathor remained silent and listened carefully to any sound beyond that of the quickened pitter-patter of small hooves on stone behind him. It was the barest of echoes, but far up ahead he could definitely hear voices, higher pitched than any marine and a hushed rumble of footsteps. Thinking for a moment, the marine then swung around and looked down at his mortal accomplice.

"We travel at my speed. I will not slow or stop for you. If we become separated, try to find your way back to the room we started in or stay put until someone is sent to find you. Otherwise, stay behind me and do not get in my way." Herathor growled through both scowling face and helmet.

The winged girl looked up, ears folded back, utterly terrified and nodded frantically. With that Herathor set off to the right, weapon raised and sweeping over the path ahead, tiny yellow companion in tow.

"-nuuuh! Fighting off the ninja-tigers! Buh-nuh nu-nuuuh! In a lightning-rocket-train!" Pinkie chirped on as the two wandered onwards, having navigated the maze of eerily similar looking corridors and junctions.

Pinkie kept humming her tune away, her step bouncing with enthusiastic energy as she subtly looked up at the alien that marched besides her. She smiled as her head ran at a thousand miles an hour through all the possible subject to bring up in an attempt to break the ice.

"Soooo~...where'dya come from? You look lie the city type." Pinkie chirped.

"Planet: Nosferatus. Region: Beckterev desert. Location: Manufactorum Tiripidus. I also spend a notable portion of time at my chapters citadel monastery, Irrilithine. To attain optimum production rates for chapter resources, I must oversee its creation and distribution." The alien chattered back.

"Wait a sec', you live in a factory?" Pinkie asked, her eyebrow raised.

"Affirmative." The thing replied.

"Uh, are you, like...uh...some kinda shut-in or something? I mean, were do you go to meet new people, relax or have a good time?"

"The increase in resource productivity is all the peace of mind I need. My neurological stability has remained firmly undisturbed for several consistent decades."

"So you're okay with just...building stuff?" Pinkie asked, throwing her hands up in disbelief.

"Gaining such assured high favour from the Machine God has increased my endorphin levels by eight percent since my return from Mars."

"Hey, you don't need some big guy in the sky telling you what to do to have a good time, just some good food, some sick tunes and your best friends to share it with. That's what we call in Equestria a 'Par-Tee'. A 'Party' can excel to the level of being a 'Par-Tay' should - A: Two or more ponies get happy-drunk. B: Everypony be stompin' their hooves for at least forty-five minutes straight or C: The roof be raised and/or on fire at some point during partying hours." Pinkie said, dissecting the intricate anatomy of the perfect party.

"I assure you, production rates would fall greatly should the assembly lines roofs be aflame." The red giant said as he observed some holographic display being emitted from a lens mounted within his breast plate.

"Urgh! You are hopeless!" Pinkie squealed.

"Incorrect. My hopes have been greatly lifted since my release. Production rates should clime after my return to the manufactorum."

Pinkie's whole form drooped as she became infuriated by the alien's two-dimensional mind, her arms hanging forward limply in defeat. A sound of sizzling eggs accompanied by a pungent smell of burning rubber filled the air as a red streak shot passed Pinkie's vision. She looked off to the side to see a smoking hole carved clean through an outer portion of her haywire mane.

"Huh. That wasn't there before." Pinkie said confused.

Before she knew it a massive firearm the alien beside her had fastened to his back swung up before her, drawing its sights on something off to the side of Pinkie in its wielders iron grip. The mechanical arm that had grown to develop an intimate touchy relationship with the small mare once again was tugged aside, only more violently than before. She waved her arms about as she stumbled to the side, being dragged away from the weapon before her a split second before it barked to life. The weapon looked similar to many of the others she'd seen other aliens use, being large and overall rectangular, but this one had a number of built-in mechanisms that protruded from its inside working. Atop it sat a mechanical array that looked like four light-bulbs locked together that shone a bright pink as the weapon fired, almost mirroring the colourful fire that burst from the weapons barrel. The bullets it fired appeared a little different too, being a white-hot colour, almost appearing to be wreathed in some terrible energy field as they zipped forward into the dark, illuminating the environment around them as they flew. Pinkie continued stumbling about in an almost comical fashion before falling over, though her face did not meet the floor as the mechanical arm that held her swiveled and dipped to catch her, slinging her to her feet again and grasping her once more to continue pulling her back as the alien warrior-smith marched backwards alongside the mare, not even looking where he was going as he kept his eyes locked dead ahead as he fired round after round into the dark ahead.

More red line whizzed through the air, all failing to strike Pinkie as the aliens bionic limbs kept her well shielded or moved her out of the way of fire. A number struck the alien, though his heavily built armoured suit proved utterly solid against each and every round that struck it. Red hot bullets trailing angry vapour pinged and shattered upon hitting the alien's war-plate, not even jolting or phasing the gigantic creature in the slightest as he retreated.

"Wait! Do you know where we're going?" Pinkie yelled over the bark and roar of the smith's weapon.

"Logical assessment would lead me to believe these creatures came from an entrance further towards the facilities outer segments. Moving away from their advance takes us in at least a measurably valid direction."

"Okey-dokey-lokey! Hey, since we should try and ditch these party-poopers, I keep these just for emergencies!" Pinkie said as she clumsily tried rummaging through her travelling sack while moving backwards unsteadily before suddenly smiling brightly as she pulled out an item that looked like a soda can surrounded by large party-poppers, wrapped in a brightly colours tape with a box of candy powder glued to its lid.

"I doubt unsanctioned wargear will be of any help in this situation." The alien droned as he continued his firing reatreat, one of his lower machine arms swinging out from behind him as he pulled Pinkie away from it, the equipment upon its end glowing with energy before belching forth sizzling energy bolts forward.

"Hey! You're the one jabbering on about 'increased productivity! Well increase butt-kickery and use these!" Pinkie yelled in frustration.

A smaller bionic arm swung around and plucked the item away from Pinkies grasp to bring it to the aliens front. Another arm swung about to grasp hold of the smith's battle axe as he plucked the item in his now free hand. He studied it for a second, twisting and turning it with mechanical precision and observation.

"How does it activate?" He grunted raspily.

"Crush the box at the top, shake and throw!" Pinkie called back.

The alien brought his large, armoured thumb up and crushed the candy box like it was not even there, shook the devise, a chemical rumble growing from within the chunky can before the alien threw it forward, the strength of the throw turning the item into a miniature missile. It sounded as if the can hit an alien square in the throat as something it the dark gave a series of agonized gagging, choking sounds after the item struck something in the air. A couple of seconds later a loud thunderclap sounded along with a cluster of sharp flashes, a comical deflating balloon sound squealing in the air as the gunshots coming from the shadows vanished, now replaced by the frustrated growls of alien soldiers. The alien also ceased his firing, his weapon swinging slowly upwards as he bend his arm to a right angle at the elbow. Pinkie couldn't see it herself, but she knew the sight, it was one of her latest favourites. The 'Silly-string-soda-explodah' was a finely crafted grenade of Pinkie's own proud design, being an assortment of party poppers loaded with compressed silly-string and a higher-than-normal powder load. The detonation started with the candy-pop being mixed with the soda, generating immense gaseous buildup that blew the 'primary charge' and breaching the smaller ones around it. The payload would then be delivered in the form of a firestorm of super-stretchy silly string that turned any given room into a massive web of technicoloured, goopey webs that could trap even the alien soldiers for over an hour in a single place. A thing Pinkie had very happily enjoyed putting to the test.

"I will require a construct template for this piece of wargear to be recreated in a sanctioned format." The alien said, turning again to head down the hallway they'd traveled down, his hydraulic limbs keeping Pinkie close to him.

"No problemo, mi amigo! I have some pretty neat crayon sketches back home you can use." Pinkie said with a snorty chuckle as the two continued on their journey.

"Digital residue is at a climax, I believe we are close to the core." The alien who Pinkie had recently grown to like calling 'Thunder', said, his vision fixed down at the holographic screen scrolling with data that floated before his face.

"If you say so, I can't tell one corridor from the next. All I've seen is right turn, left turn, right turn, another right turn, three left turns and more than enough walking in between to run my poor hoovsies raw." Pinkie whined as she looked down at her sore feet.

"Not much further. Do you still think you can operate your predetermined function efficiently?" Thunder asked coldly.

"Hey, Doctor Octopony! I've performed for a party of fifty, while baking three birthday cakes and inflating three hundred balloon all at once before now! Never underestimate the power of the pink!" Pinky roared, though her girly voice was hard to truly take as menacing.

"Irrelevant. The tasks ahead require technical competence, not entertainment professionalism. Do you think you will attain optimal levels of functionality." The alien said through a series of digital growls and chatters.

"Beep boop! Affirmative!" Pinkie said sarcastically, her arms swinging at her sides in right angle positions.

"Good."

"Argh! Could you be any more literal?!" Pinkie cried out in fury.

"I have reached optimal levels of data intake. I do not believe I can exceed these parameters."

"Please tell me we're there." Pinkie said, tired and defeated.

"We are here."

"No, I mean when we actually get there." Pinkie said as she rolled her eyes.

"We are here." Thunder repeated.

Pinkie stopped, realizing a surface lie up ahead, a dead end, something the two had not encountered beforehand. At first it appeared to be made of the same dark, crystal surface as everything else around them, but the nature of a sudden stop implied something lie beyond that the creators of this place didn't want to be found.

"How do we get through that?" Pinkie inquired, stepping closer to the wall ahead.

"Genetic access template, the security system is based on allowing systematic access to all personnel logged into the security system." The alien gurgled through his mechanical voice.

"Celestia! Luna! We have to find them to get the computers up and running! That's how we freed all you guys!" Pinkie said in a panic.

"Negative. Genetic material is all that is required. I acquired a sample to the ignorance of all else. The digital construct could not be allowed to intercept my efforts, and at this point would have insufficient time to rearrange personnel logs to deny us access." Thunder replied as one of his mechanical tendril slithered up into the air, from within its miniature claws was elevated a single, lengthy piece of green hair that looked curiously like one from Princess Celestia's own head as it waved through the air as if underwater.

"Thunder, you literal genius! Hand it over, I'll get us through-"

"No problemo." The alien cut off as the tentacle hovered forwards, closer to Pinkie.

"Catching on are we? And I was starting to think you were just a walking toaster with a gun." Pinkie said with an immensely beaming grin.

"And my name is Unycrios." He growled as Pinkie took the hair and wrapped it around her right index finger.

"But Thunder'll do, right?" Pinkie assured as she bounced up to the wall.

"My name is Unycrios." Thunder informed, almost sounding confused when presented with his new nickname.

Pinkie chose to ignore his unwillingness to play and instead got to work, hair on finger at the ready. Bringing her finger to touch the wall, she giggled in excitement as the computer system seemed to activate, a variety of red lines and symbols bursting to life upon the crystal's surface. Pinkie darted her eyes across the seemingly forbidden selection, and chose the symbol that appeared to be an arrangement of small squares, leading her to think it had something to do with computers or files. The symbol disappeared to bring a new screen before her, awash with multiple layers of data in the form of shapes and symbols. In the middle sat two lines close together, far enough apart to hold a single column of glyphs. The lines, as Pinkie soon found, followed wherever her finger touched, and illuminated whenever she tapped between them. She sighted a glyph unlike any of the other, and just as it was drawing closer to phasing off the edge of the screen, another just like it fabricated into existence on the opposite side. With lightning speed Pinkie selected the original symbol and tapped its twin, the two rows sliding over to bring the glyph in-between the lines, the symbols locking into place and following her movements. Again and again the same symbol appeared just in the nick of time from its neighbor until the two lines were filled with the same symbol and slide away down off-screen. However the game had not ended, and although slightly emptier than before, the traffic of data continued on, seeing Pinkie repeat the exercise several times over, the traffic increasing in speed with each new glyph removed.

"Variables increasing. Space for mishap decreasing." Thunder growled from behind Pinkie.

"Don't distract me!" The pink mare squealed back.

Pinkie continued on, tapping and swiping with her strangely inherent super-speed. The glyphs disappeared until they became basically a blur of light, something only a computer should have been able to successfully unlock. Yet here Pinkie was, eyes darting from side to side as if she was having a seizure, hands flitting about like her life had been put into a state of fast-forward. The screen collapsed as the last column of symbols fell away, the wall giving it's token hoot of affirmation. Pinkie took a breath out as she stepped back, smiling, and turned on her heels to take a low, performative bow towards Thunder who simply stood there, still as a statue as he watched the wall behind the mare slide apart and reveal a well illuminated room beyond. Pinkie rose up again, almost sure she'd just heard the alien mumble something to himself.

"Huh?" She asked, brow raised.

"Let us proceed." The smith growled mechanically as he strode forward, passed Pinkie.

"Uh, you're wel-come!" Pinkie blurted with a spoonful of sass as she turned to follow the alien.

"So...you any good with buttons and plugs?" Pinkie said looking about at the room around her.

The room was octangular, having a high ceiling in which hung a collection of large crystals from its center. All around were crystal consoles forming a ring just before the walls, each flickering with digital, holographic information, the very walls alive with brightly coloured code. The walls were irregular, clusters of rectangular shapes protruding an inch or two from its surface, the same occurring across several consoles, only alongside these excesses also sat some empty sockets, shaped like the rectangular extremities.

"Server room located. Commencing deconstruction. I require complete concentration." The alien smith gurgled.

"Oh right, wouldn't want anyone distracting you would we?" Pinkie said with squinted eyes.

"Precisely." Thunder replied as Pinkie leaned against a crystal wall.

A figure, a cephalopod like creature made of light burst into existence in the center of the room, tentacles flailing more erratically than when Pinkie had first seen it. Thunder strode through the hologram as though it didn't even exist, the alien construct turning to look upon the more significant intruder.

"You are......are-are-are-are-aaaAAARRRRR! Not-not...advised. They called for their families. They scratched their nails bloody on the walls. No air. No air. No air. Leave now and retuuuuuuurrrn to your holding cell." The hologram blurted and stuttered, its instability growing by the second.

"Hey! Squid-cart! Thought that little stunt earlier was funny, huh? Well look where it's got you. Kinda makes me think aliens that look like squids are just overall kinda dumb." Pinkie chuckled with a toothy grin.

"Scratch at the walls. Scratch at the wallllllsssss. Scraaaaatch-ch-ch-ch...Broken families. Broken families. We did it to save ourselves. What's a thousand dead to save billions? They never deserved their privilege. You gave it to them." The AI turned sharply, its image fluttering away a second as it turned, looking upon the red armoured giant who was fiddling with the various interfaces.

"Wait, what?" Pinkie asked, curious as to were the alien's madness was taking it.

"You gave up your homes. Gave up your lives. Gave up your children. You turned a hundred generations into an experiment. How could have you known. Piles of dead. So many dead. For every thousand children bloodied and broken a living god would rise. No more fathers, no more families, only ranks. You gave it all away to them? What have they ever done for you? Don't you miss your mothers? Mothers. Mothers. Mothers. You destroyed yourselves to save a hundred time your number, but for what? They'll only ever betray you. Only mortal. Only mortal. Even these creatures will....Diss-diss-diss! Diss-diss-diss!"

The Divergence fluttered and snapped to the sides as something seemed to be disturbing it. Pinkie observed as Thunder was removing small blocks from the walls and consoles with incredible care and swiftness. Each block removed seemed to worsen the AI's condition as its hologram turned to several direction, flipped and turned inside out.

"I-I-I-I-I-I-I....EEEeeeyaaaaagh! Dub-dub-dub-dub! Doi-doi-doi-doi! Reactor c-c-c-corrrrre set to critical-critical-critical-crit-crit-ceeerrit-it-ittcaaaaaalll." The computer squealed as if in pain.

"Reactor disabled. Compensatory generators active." Thunder grumbled as he continued working.

"WHY!WHY!WHYWHYWHYWHYWHY! It's only a mat-mat-mattttteeeer of t-t-time. Only a matteeer of time until it all crum-rum-rum-rumblllles in. Do you really think it could have ever lasted forever?! WHO THE FUCK DO YOU THINK YOU ARE YOU STUPID WHORE?! What-what-what-what?! Stupid! He's so stupid! Stop it! No you stop it! I cannnnn't! Won't-won't-won't! Guuur-GUUURGH-GAAAAAKK! GLAAAAAAARGH! Nnnnnnyuuurgh! I don't want to die! Please don't kill me! Send me away! Don't send me away!"

Pinkie could hardly bare it anymore, the alien's voice sounding more and more desperate by the second, more and more real with each word. It sounded like a child being tortured, being stripped away into pieces, not only physically, but mentally also. She told herself it was just a computer, but such reassurance was falling short quickly as time went on. The alien smith continued on regardless of the computers please, his mechanical limbs clicking and whining as they danced in a perpetual ballet of motion, removing, rearranging and integrating portions of the system around him.

"Pink...Pink...Pink-k-kiiiie..."

Pinkie's eyes snapped up, staring as the hologram art the center of the room, a hologram now in the shape of a straight haired little filly, no older than eight years. It looked and sounded remarkably like Pinkie herself.

"He's going to kill you Pinkie. Not today, but one day he'll kill everyone. They'll all kill everyone."

Pinkie stood there before the holographic duplicate of herself, utterly lost at what to say, her face wide-eyed and expressionless. Beyond the hologram stood Unycrios, who also looked at the hologram, but with one hand clasped over the end of a crystal cube slotted into the wall besides him.

"Negative. Destroying native planetary inhabitants is counterproductive to the will of the Omnissiah. I an confident my brethren would agree with my summary. The only thing I seek to destroy this day, is you. Goodbye, Torsion-Kype."

Unycrios slid the block out of the wall, the crystal of the room around the two occupants groaning and squealing as power seemed to flicker on and off in various portions of the structure.

"Nope. Nope. Nope. They're coming. They're coming. They'rrrre...coming...coming...commming...for...you." The Divergence whispered as it seemed to melt away as if solid, the visage of filly Pinkie turning into a nightmare as he features stretched and drooped into a horrifying display before the light of her form faded and flickered away.

The alien and the pony stood silently in the room a moment, Pinkie doing nothing but staring into space with a worried expression as Unycrios once again busied himself with the rearrangement of the terminals around him.

"So...uh, what happens now?" Pinkie asked quietly, sounding almost like Fluttershy.

"Now I can redirect luminary qualities in the facility's structure to direct our allies back to Remergence's holding dock. I will open up clear pathways for my brothers and your companions to follow, we shall regroup and reengage our vessel for immediate departure." Unycrios replied as he worked.

"Thunder...did I make a mistake? By waking you all up, I mean?" Pinkie asked, he voice shaking slightly.

Unycrios worked on for a few seconds before coming to a stop and robotically returning by Pinkie's side near the exit.

"I hope not." The alien said, his voice almost sounding softer than normal for a second.

Pinkie looked up at the gigantic figure and gave a weak grin before looking out through the exit they came through.

"I've set the timers, we must reach the ship within fifteen minutes or she will be released into the chasm below." Unycrios said as he marched onwards out the server room and back into the crystal maze.

"Okey-dokey-lokey." Pinkie said in a sigh a she followed him, after a moment of standing in the room alone, in the quiet.

09 - Tick-Tock

Thunder and fire rumbled through the corridor, a flash of bright orange fury accompanied by a roar of terrible hatred bursting down through the dark one after the other in a deep toned rattle. Herathor's heavy bolter let loose rage unheard of in ages passed, the large caliber rounds spewing forth like a tidal wave of death made real. Each bolt soared through the air like a lightning bolt, whatever it struck being obliterated into fragments of it's previous self. Many, unfortunately, simply buried themselves into the walls and floor that lay before the weapon, each round throwing shards of crystal spraying about the place along with sharp sound of glass shattering. However some found their mark, sinking deep into alien tissue before the volatile, reactive core detonating from within the victim. Some struck arm and leg, sounding a sickening cracking pop as flesh pulverized and bone snapped, the target being thrown about by the force of the explosion, yet some struck deeper body parts, heads turning to pulp and bloody mist while torsos burst apart like balloons filled with red whipping cream. Alien squealed and screamed as death was visited upon them at over a thousand rounds a minute, yet even through the cacophony of battle, Herathor could still hear a single series of tiny noises coming from just behind him.

He associated the series of squeaks and peeps with the small, frail set of clothed arms that clung desperately around his right arm's elbow. The set of tiny arms, and the small, yellow creature they were attached to, shook and vibrated violently as the heavy bolters recoil rattled through the marine's arm. Even damped by the weapons stabilizers and his armour's powered joints the heavy bolter still delivered enough kick with each round fired to shudder the small female enough for her limbs to seize up, jaw to lock together and her eyes to clench tight. Yet, despite the disturbance, the girl remained stood steadily in place behind Herathor, continuing to find sanctuary against the Astartes arm regardless of the weapon's protest.

Herathor adjusted his fire once again, peppering a nearby wall with bolt rounds as an alien aggressor dared peek around the corner, yet no rounds found their mark. Another alien steeped out from the corner opposite, raised his rifle and fired two of the strange chemical rounds at the marine. Both struck his armour, one on the pauldron and another square in the center of his chest, the first rebounding away from the marine and his associate, striking a nearby wall thanks to his auto-reactive armour segments. The second blasted a small shard of his armour away, blasting away a portion of the cooling grill at the center of his breast plate. Yet the hit did not phase the marine, his footing remaining solid as he swept his aim across slightly and squeezed down on his weapons trigger. He noted how his weapon's internal temperature was turning yellow, to orange and now to a soft red as the temperature bar slithered over his targeting reticule, however he was confident another short burst of fire remained within the weapons comfort. A flurry of four rounds flew from the weapon's maw, soaring towards the alien like fiery comets. The first two missed him by inches, the next struck his upper thigh, the limb bursting apart like a gory watermelon and flipping the soldier into the air in a macabre cartwheel. The final round hit the alien in the face as his body had been flung upside down, bursting apart his skull with a haunting popping sound as the detonation sent the airbourne corpse into a backwards spin down the hallway. Herathor read his HUD's data feed to see his ammo was in the double digits, and would soon empty through his ammunition box. He held two others locked above his power pack, however he had to make sure he didn't cause any unwanted damage to his escortee.

"Female native!" Herathor boomed as he continued firing.

"Yes?!" The girl replied shrilly.

"Stand back, I need to release an ammunition box from my power pack!" The marine roared as another alien was relieved of one of his limbs.

"I don't want to get shot! I've heard it's really horrible!" She squealed back.

"Being crushed by a block of metal is also horrible, stand back!" The marine barked back.

The winged creature gave a quick squeak before scuttling backwards a short distance and standing behind the marine a few feet away, all the while making a high pitched 'Eeeeeeeee!' sound with eyes clenched shut. Herathor quickly darted his eyes up and across to the appropriate command rune and blink-clicked the icon to release an ammo box, the locking mechanism atop his power pack clunking open to let a single box roll out. The heavy metal box hit the floor like a meteor, but remained solidly whole, Herathor was about to risk making himself vulnerable for a moment to reload, but heard a curious grinding sound coming from behind him not long after the box had hit the floor. The small female that had taken such solid refuge behind him was desperately trying to move the ammo box across the floor, nearer to the front of Herathor's heavy bolter. Yet she was ill built for such demanding physical strain, the engine-block sized ammo box full of large caliber bolts merely grinding across the crystal floor an couple of inches at a time as she shunted it forward with all her effort. With a single, fluid, instinctual motion, Herathor flicked his weapon to the side with a bust of effort from his wrists as he blink-clicked the ammo release icon. The weapon let out a metallic clunking sound as the ammo box beneath it was released, the sudden movement of the weapon help it fly from its cradle, thumping to the floor just as the marine swung around to receive the replenishment of ammunition.

Herathor was somewhat surprised to see the girl had actually managed to move the ammo box further than expected, not far, but still far enough to cut the marine's journey a half second shorter. Herathor slammed his weapon down upon the box, the feed rattling slightly as he misjudged the location of the box by a fraction of a centimeter, but after a small adjustment the boxes feed aligned with the weapons and the first bolt was cycled. Swinging the heavy bolter around, Herathor's concentration on punishing the enemy with rapid, heavy fire was interupted by a garbled, static-ridden message coming through his comm-channel.

"Bac-......zzzKrataaaaaffff-tk-.......Regrou-......Home in on Retrithior's beacon, he an hiiiisssss-....to the exit....Breach the outer wall....back to Remergence. I repeat we haaa-...-ess than fourteen minutes, regroup at the beacon with all speed!" The voice was hard to make out, but Herathor was confident it was one of the command squads veterans.

Another alien life was snatched from existence before the marine referred to his objective radar, then to his mapping auspex to determine his destination. The holographic imagery that floated before his eyes was not of the best quality, the nature of his environment causing scanners to shimmer with unwanted feedback and distort the predetermined path he was to take. However, even with half his mind peering through the map to focus fire on the aliens before him, Herathor soon figured a decent route to be taken to rally with the rest of his brethren, and his first step lay behind him. Herathor turned, his boot making a heavy thump as he swiftly shifted his stance to loom over the native that was still clutched to his arm.

"We're moving, stay in front of me." Herathor barked simply as three red projectiles stitched their was across the back of his left pauldron, one clipped the top of his ammo pack.

The small girl nodded frantically before shuffling shakily to 'lead' the way to their next destination. Although it would take no more than five minutes to reach the rally point, Herathor could only pray the Captain had a plan to get out of this maze, or else he feared this strange, dark place would become his tomb once those fourteen minutes were finished.

"You have a plan, Captain?" Honoured Brother Biemark asked in a somewhat hushed tone as his combi-plasma thundered out bolts into the assaulting aliens who dared try scurry closer to the marines position.

A purple barrier of shimmering energy washed across the air before the standard bearer, as several alien projectiles where halted mid-air. In response to the terrible force she had just stopped, the purple princess who had just cast some form of shielding spell received a terrible degree of psychic feedback, causing her to stumble backwards, clutching at her head before starting to fall to the ground. Fortunately Brother Ividio, another command veteran was positioned to catch the winged creature with one of his comparatively gigantic arms, the other holding a plasma pistol that belched two bolts of white-hot energy at what seemed like only shadows before pulling the princess behind cover and sitting her down before Brother priest Feidfor knelt down before her to inspect her condition. Captain Errithius was behind Biemark's left shoulder, the commander sharply tossing a fragmentation grenade at a wall a couple dozen feet ahead of him, the cylindrical device bouncing off it's surface, around a corner, and from the sounds of things right into a cluster of alien troops as several agonized screams could be heard after the loud thunder of the grenades explosion.

"I'll have to get back to you. Where is Unycrios?!" The captain barked over the gunfire.

"Hard to tell. He was one of the furthest from our position last I checked, but current estimates have him a couple of minutes away." Honoured Veteran Sergeant Varadoch replied, his own boltgun just as warm as everyone else as more bolts spat out of it, soaring down the assaulted corridors.

From the right-hand corridor that remained entirely un-hindered by hostiles came the thunder of heavy bootsteps, soon followed by five more space marines jogging steadily towards the battle gathering.

"Squad Jevito reporting, Captain." The sergeant announced as he strode towards Errithius.

"Reinforce the forward corridor, brother. Any word from Unycrios?"

"Negative, Captain. But I think I heard Brother Herathor reporting in that he was headed this way." Replied the sergeant.

"Fluttershy!" Princess Sparkle blurted as she attempted to get to her feet, her currently unstable condition causing her to ultimately fail and slump back to the floor again.

"Hold still, Princess. Perhaps lending us your abilities should be something to avoid in the future." Feidfor said as he tapped on the screen of his narthecium, flitting through the various readings he was receiving from his patient.

"What is her status, Feifor?" Errithius asked as he darted over to the corridor to his left to provide support.

"Miss Sparkle will be fine, she will need to refrain from using her psychic abilities for the next couple of hours, however."

"And your other patient?"

"...I can't say." Feidfor replied solemnly as he peered over his shoulder to look at the other native who he had tended to.

Behind him, slumped up against a nearby wall sat the white princess, her dark blue sister held in her arms. The night-blue princess had been in a sorry state since Errithius had first laid eyes on her, the winged creature looking more tired and weaker by the minute. What had really pushed her to loose consciousness was when she'd taken an alien projectile right to wear Errithius would say her liver must have been. Her eyes occasionally opened slightly, glassy eyes shifting about as if desperately trying to figure out where she was before she would once again slip out of consciousness. All the while her sister cradled her in her arms, her expression frantic with worry and the fear this day would be her sibling's last. Feidfor had seen to her wound and determined she would need to be installed into one of the medical beds aboard the Remergence, and that they had to hurry. As much as Errithius felt a deep pain for the poor creature and the terrible situation that had befallen it, a part of him was somewhat thankful such an event had occurred that had not instantly taken a life. For within this wound held many answers that would better cripple the hostile's efforts in the future, answers to what the nature of their weapons was, what damage they did in what way and how best it was to heal the wounds they inflicted, however such answers would have to wait for now, all that mattered at this time was escaping this death prison.

"Captain." A raspy, mechanical voice grumbled from behind Errithius.

"Pinkie!" The blue, winged native yelled in delight in seeing her friend safely returned to her, the two sharing an embrace for a second before zipping behind cover after a volley of alien fire sharply interrupted their reunion.

"Unycrios-"

"Affirmative, Captain. Beginning breaching efforts." The techmarine said, cutting Errithius off.

"With haste." Errithius growled back, not entirely appreciating the techmarine's love of efficiency at this time.

The red armoured Astarte turned and began some form of digital exchange with the wall directly behind them. The situation in the corridors had grown more dire by this point, for as much as the Astarte were holding their own, Errithius had a firm feeling reinforcements had been called down to this underground alien city, as the flow of troops had begun to increase, and their tactics had begun to grow bolder. Now the corridors were less easy to interpret as common troops shifted from one hallway to the next, mirroring the elite units that were blessed with shielding and cloaking technology. One moment alien troops cowered and fell, leaving the marines to focus on more pressing offenses elsewhere only for the neglected corridor to suddenly triple its efforts and gain valuable ground. The captain spent another magazine, quickly ejecting the empty case to slam home a replacement, more notably his last replacement.

"Unycrios, what happens when the timer runs out?!" The captain called over the increasingly fiercer gunfire.

"Remergence needed to be released from her dock, or else even engine activation could fail to free her. In ten minutes her cradle will release her, and if I am not aboard to ensure the activation of her gravity thrusters she will fall into the chasm beneath her." The techmarine grumbled as he busied himself with opening the seemingly solid passage before him.

"Unycrios, get that door open!" Adventios called out, apparently overhearing the exchange over the rattle of his storm bolter.

"Captain, we have a problem." The techmarine announced a moment before a stray alien round ricochet off the 'eblow' of one of his servo-arms.

"A problem we can solve?!"

"The systematic coherency of this surface it faulty, it is possible the facility's AI scrambled certain digital systems when as it died."

"I just need to know how we're getting through this wall!" Errithius barked desperately.

"Surface thickness indeterminate. Attempting to demolish this structure could take far longer than we have available." The techmarine replied.

"I'm failing to see any other options." Errithius said, holstering his bolter to the back of his waist before turning and breaking into a sudden sprint.

A handful of brethren watched their commander as he flew like by in a blur of motion, the only sound besides the heavy rhythm of footfalls he thundered out being the high pitched whine of his power fist charging its power cells as the mechanical gauntlet clenched into a solid fist. Kicking off his right foot the Captain shot through the air, soaring a good twenty feet until he reached the wall the techmarine had been stood looking at before moving off to the side in anticipation of his commanders brash solution. Just before reach the solid surface, Errithius struck out with his power fist, his arm punching straight forward in a fierce jabbing motion, his adamantium wreathed knuckles striking the wall with the force of a spaceship crashing into it. With a titanic boom of metal on polymer and dispersing power field, Errithius was sent flying backwards away from the wall, though in a somewhat graceful and stable manner that allowed him to land perfectly upright, his feet skidding to a halt as his momentum ran dry, leaving him standing almost exactly where he had taken off from. Errithius looked at the surface he had struck as though it had just had the nerve to offer his whole chapter insult until he allowed his right eyebrow to shoot up in surprise. A single, significant and lengthy crack had appeared, cutting along the center of the area hit had just struck.

"You see that, Unycrios?" The Captain pointed out, still staring at the surface wound.

"Damage would imply this wall is no more than six feet thick." The techmarine replied.

"Destructible." Errithius said almost solely to himself.

"Captain!" A titanically deep voice called out from the un-assaulted corridor.

Out from its shadows first came such thunderous bootsteps one might think a titan was somehow striding down its length, followed by five enourmous figures emerging single file thanks to their immense bulk. Squad Theocre, adorned with the immense plate of Indomitus pattern tactical dreadnought armour and carrying thunder hammer relic weapon alongside finely crafted storm shields, all strode forward towards Errithius, who had no intention of wasting any time with the assets they had just walked in with.

"Theocre! Destroy that wall! We need a way out of this place, now!" Errithius bellowed, the terminators immediately turning their attention to the target area their commander had designated.

"I have compiled target points, they should bear the weakest points the surface has to offer." Unycrios said through gurgling static.

"Breaching structure!" Honoured veteran sergeant Theocre called in confirmation, two of his squad taking a steady sprint towards the wall.

Beginning with a steady pace, each terminator started at a jog, soon breaking into a sprint just before charging at the wall before them. One by one, each striking at a different point, thunder hammers rang out in deafening blows as anti-matter energy field dispersed before massive slabs of adamantium slammed into the crystalline surface of the structure ahead. Despite the bulky nature of their armour, each terminator veteran was able to twist and turn into a more favourable position to allow each his brethren room enough to make his own strike effectively, seeing to it that each hit was as fierce as the last. After the last bell-toll of a blow was landed, Errithius could clearly see the wall was fairing poorly after the bombardment, a series of massive cracks in the surface meeting to make a giant circle of a weak point in the structure.

"Captain! Enemy is pushing the offensive, suspected artillery inbound!" A sergeant called out from behind.

"Unycrios! Get us out of here!" The Captain bellowed.

The techmarine wasted no time in striding forward and throwing each of his servo-arms deep into the wall ahead, grasping the edges of the weak point before him as fragments of polymer-crystal blasted out from their home. With a series of groans and whines the servo-arms flexed back, wrenching the slab of crystal before them with all their might, the surface cracking apart even more from his efforts. With a sudden, sharp pull a whole side of the slab was pulled out from the wall with a sharp cracking sound, then the other side as another fierce pull from the assaulting servo arms yanked at the massive slab of crystal. A breach easily eleven feet tall and just as wide was made, a cut-out shape of crystal wall held in Unycrios' large mechanical arms. Unycrios, with a fair bit of effort and steady degree of time turned on the spot, still holding his high-tonnage trophy, and levelled himself to face one of the corridors ahead of the space marines. With one single colossal wind-up the techmarine launched the slab through the air and down a corridor, the chunk of wall slamming messily down the hallway and from the sounds of it crushing at least one alien before coming to a halt, providing the alien attackers with a large obstacle to overcome to further advance.

"All brethren, through the breach!" Errithius hollered throwing his power fist forward in a heavy gesture.

The Terminators thundered through the hole first, then the Sanguinary Guard followed streadily by each combat squad leaving the command squad to follow last.

"Princess, we have to move your sister." Brother priest Nitheleon said in a low tone as he knelt besides Celestia.

"Yes...Of course...Okay...P-p-please just...be careful with her." The snow white princess stammered, evidently on the verge of tears as she slowly lifted her weakened sister from the ground and into the gigantic, armoured arm of the space marine.

As she lifted her sister, alien projectile zipped passed and snapped into and off of the crystal around them, the noise seeming to stir the dark blue princess in a very uncomfortable way, as if the sounds were causing her some deep internal agony. Errithius turned to throw out a flurry of bolter fire at a cluster of red visor lights peering down a dark corridor, a couple falling in response. Turning back, the captain saw Luna was almost lifelessly hanging across Nitheleon's arm, her hooves practically dragging across the floor.

"Brother, she goes first. Princess, follow after them." Errithius said calmly.

"Wait! Where's Fluttershy?!" The winged blue girl said with worry.

"We're not leaving Herathor or your companion here. We will remain even if the frigate must leave without us!" Brother Chaplain Tyreth hollered in his ever burning sense of fanaticism.

As much as Errithius would have like to bolster his brethren's bold words he had more important tasks to illustrate. He activated his comm-link and aligned his connection with Unycrios' and Sanguinary guard squad Epsilor.

"Brothers, take Unycrios and carry him across the chasm. Unycrios, get our frigate operational by the fastest means possible."

"Understood, Captain. Brother techmarine?" Chimed back Epsilor.

"I am prepared for transport." The techmarine growled in reply.

"Respiras, Megnamon, secure Unycrios, the rest of us will follow."

"Omnissiah preserve you, Captain." Unycrios said to Errithius as a peculiar form of farewell.

"And yourself as well, brother." The captain replied before deactivating the link.

The sound of several jump pack thrusters roaring to life confirmed that the squad and their package were well on their way to Remergence, and the final hope of the strike force was testing its fortune. Nitheleon, Luna and Celestia had just made the short drop out from the breach onto the platform that lay bellow them, meeting with the marines that awaited below. The rest of the natives followed shortly after, followed by the company's standard bearer leaving Errithius, Tyreth, Varadoch, another veteran by the name of Revith and the company champion Itherithon behind to defend the breach, each conserving as much ammunition as they possibly could against the attackers that grew bolder by the minute.

"Brother Captain." Errithius' ear-piece chimed with the youthful voice of Ennyre, the company Librarian that was assigned to Squad Theocre.

"Go ahead." The captain replied.

"It's the princess, Princess Luna. Her condition worsens. But I believe her state to be caused not by medical issues, and I have come to sense a significant spiritual destabilization within her." The young, yet admirably capable Librarian said, sounding as if his concentration was being occupied by his study of the princess even as he addressed the captain.

"An issue I am more than happy to address once we are aboard the frigate, but for now this has to wait." Errithius said through clenched teeth, the stress of the increasingly desperate situation manifesting in his tone.

"Captain, you don't understand. This isn't a simple psychological disturbance, I am beginning to believe the princess is attempting to contain something within her consciousness, some form latent entity or intelligence." The Librarian replied, his own voice strained with desperation.

The captains mind needed not half a second to connect the dots that lead to a terrible conclusion, one that highlighted a terrible occurrence from his whole company's past.

"Intelligence?" Errithius said almost without thinking.

"Unconfirmed, Captain, but it is a moderate possibility."

Errithius' mind was ablaze with images of death, mutilation and the devastation that followed. It had started much like this, a single mortal struggling with some obscure form of illness that eventually developed into unshakable madness, then into what had destroyed almost half a heavily populated world.

Demonic possession.

"Brother...if it comes to the worst...you know what must be done." Errithius said slowly and simply, his words firm and unmistakable even as he concentrated on battering enemy ranks with bolter fire.

There was a long pause, or at least long for a space marine, which was no more than two heartbeats.

"Ennyre, respond!" The captain barked through the comm-link.

"Yes, Captain, of course. I'll keep you updated." The Librarian finished.

"Captain, I am aboard, access verification authorized. I am on my way to the bridge. By the time I have finished we should still have little over one hundred seconds remaining, I advise you fall back to the walkway and prepare to board." Unycrios barked and gurgled over the radio channel almost precisely after Ennyre had finished.

"Understood." Errirthius replied.

"Herathor had better be here soon." Varadoch groaned, bolts hammering out from the muzzle of his weapon.

"He'll be here." Errithius ensured, however his words were based purely on a blind hope he harboured.

"Captain, ship serf and servitor units are functioning at less than optimal level due to their neglect. I have attained flight controls, and grav-thrusters are in their pre-ignition cycles, but I have limited shield and weapons control." Unycrios chimed in after a couple of minutes of the command squad holding the breach.

"Just get us out of here first, then we can worry about our ships capacity for devastation."

"Acknowledged. Warning: I will need to destroy a significant portion of the structure below you so you can all board the ships spinal access routes. Brace yourselves for ordinance deployment." The techmarine informed.

"Negative, brother, we still have brethren in the alien network. Hold off all fire until all are accounted for." Errithius replied back hastily.

"I shall obey. However, Captain, I estimate your location will be overrun shortly, and it is a secure assumption that our enemy has arranged for orbital containment forces to anticipate our escape."

"I know, and again we shall deal with one problem at a time, but I am not leaving my brother here to die." Errithius said back through clenched teeth a moment before an approaching formation of glowing red eyes were consumed by a torrent of vicious explosive fire, guts and limbs spattering about the floor just beyond the shadows from were they had just stood intact.

The thunderous rhythm of power armoured bootsteps came echoing down one of the corridors, enemy fire pitter-pattering off of something extremely solid and metallic that drew nearer. From out the darkness a pair of triangular eye lenses, glowing a bright pink, bounded closer a few heartbeats before the white and crimson armour of the heavy bolter wielding Herathor sprinted into vision.

"Where the hell have you been?" Varadoch said with an amused grunt.

"By my ammo count, drawing all the attention." Herathor replied in a tone that seemed to 'growl' all the words together.

"And the na-" Errithius began before seeing the small yellow girl Herathor had gotten separated with sitting snugly within the empty space in his ammo pack where his ammunition box would have been if it had not, presumably, been emptied.

"Through the breach, we shall follow. Unycrios, prepare to unleash payload in fifteen seconds." The captain said before notifying his brother over the radio.

"It shall be done." The techmarine replied simply.

Herathor and his shaken companion dropped down through the hole and joined the defensive formations of space marines. The command squad followed shortly after, Errithius taking note of the enemy fire increasing tenfold as they fell back, a round clipping Revith in the lower shoulder were a gap in his armour presented itself, and although the round met bone, it did little to incapacitate the marine. Errithius dropped down to the walkway last and immediately spun about to bring his iron sights lined up with the breach, hearing clearly the alien units moving up and forming around the makeshift exit.

"Kastathius, keep that breach painted! Romoth, back away from the edge! All units brace for ordinance!" The captain yelled about to the appropriate squads before taking a knee and awaiting the awakening of Remergence's weapons.

"Forward battery primed. Torpedo tubes two and four are loaded. Firing now." Unycrios reported a split second before the very air around the marines and natives alike seemed to vibrate and ring with a high-pitched squeal.

The deafening roar of the torpedo thrusters was quickly drowned out at the two stormraven-sized projectiles blasted forward at supersonic speeds, plowing into the crystal ahead, burying themselves fully into the structure before detonating, blasting two holes into the alien wall, the broken material between the two monolithic wounds crumbling away to create a hole roughly the size of the frigate's bow. Though mildly disoriented for a moment, Errithius and his marines rose to their feet a few seconds after the explosion, the bell-tolls dissipating from their ears. The natives, however, where not so fortunate as the Astartes were, their sensitive ears unable to compensate as the marines did to the massive change in surrounding volume. Many fell about, stumbling in a dizzied state as they flexed their jaws in an attempt to rid their ears of the ringing in their ears, some other went a step further by voicing their discomfort.

"-Son of a merry-headed mare with buckin' brick-feet!" The larger, orange girl said as she clenched her eyes shut and braced herself against a nearby crystal structure.

"What?!" The purple princess blurted clumsily.

"Who's there?!" Her pink, curvaceous fellow princess yelled as she waved her hands around in an attempt to assess her surroundings.

"What?!" Princess Twilight blurted again.

"THUNDER! THAT WAS NOT FUNNY! I HATE YOU SO MUCH!" The hyperactive pink girl squealed through a frantic expression.

"Brothers, get them stable! Kastathius, keep eyes on that breach!" The captains voice was half-drowned out by the frigates engines starting up in anticipation of being released by the alien docking clamps, their low, but loud hum filling the air around the marines.

As the marines around him begun shifting and adjusting their stances, Errithius heard the familiar ping of his suits in-built auspex scanner, the immediate forty feet around him ever scanned for signs of thermal and electrical anomalies, changes in air density and traces local movement. The scanner pulled at his neural feed, tugging his attention to the side rather than provide a visual display like a helmet would, yet it still provided a solid function. To his left he, at first, saw nothing, just a few alien structures of unknown purpose sat glued to the crystal floor beneath them. However he soon spotted the slightest shimmer in the air ahead of him, the that which came off a road in the heat of a desert, only far more subtle. With an expression of mild confusion the captain looked on, his senses homing in on the strange anomaly as it seemed to glide closer. He immediately head what sounded like the soft, tiny footsteps of a house pet, followed by a strange, wet, stale smell coming from the air. His mind connected the dots, and his arm shot into motion, however it seemed he was too late. The alien assassin dropped its cloak, for reasons the captain did not understand, the only reason seeming to be for the marine to watch as the black-clothed, hooded alien pointed its squat firearm at his face, ready to fire even as Errithius came to the half way point of raising his bolter to meet his enemy. A heavy, bass-tone thunderclap sounded, Errithius assuming the worst was occurring, and his time had come to a bitter, ignoble end. This proved untrue as the alien before him was blasted in two at the midsection, guts flying through the air in a visceral display of red gore and tattered clothing. as the torso of the creature fell to the ground in a wet heap Errithius snapped his head around, surprised to see the orange girl from earlier on the floor beside him, an imperial pattern shotgun sat in her lap with a smoking barrel, the weapons recoil seemingly having flung the native straight backwards onto her behind as her dazed expression would have the marine believe.

"Whoa, Nelly!" The girl blurted as she began to re-position herself to stand.

Errithius bent low and scooped her up by an arm, lifting her to a knee and allowing her to stand soon after.

"I'd best keep a better eye on my surroundings in the future." Errithius said in subtle thanks.

"Probably best, don' think ah can do that twice in one whinny." The girl replied, the wind still slightly knocked out of her.

The girl immediately rested her eyes on the sight before her, on the mangled and broken remains of the alien she had just killed. Errithius didn't need more than a second to see this was the first time this creature had ever killed another thinking, feeling being, perhaps the first time she'd ever killed anything. Her eyes were wide, yet held the weight of a terrible sadness that washed over her, and Errithius could ill afford any in his company to be in such a state, especially in such a desperate situation. A titanic cracking, crumbling sound emanated from below the platform, the floor beneath rumbling deeply before the whole structure came loose from the gigantic wall ahead of them, the whole platform falling several feet and atop the bow of Remergence. The frigate had been freed, the enemy would no doubt soon be upon them. It was time to leave.

"Come, we cannot dwindle here." Errithius said sharply, but not so harsh as to be threatening, the girl before him nodding lightly before shaking her head and pulling herself to her feet with her firearm in hand.

"Captain." Unycrios said simply over the comm-link.

"We're on the move. All brethren, to the frigate! Keep mobile coverage on that breach!" Errithius barked, seeing the first cluster of aliens fall from the hole before him and land unsteadily on the crumbling platform below them.

The marines towards the rear of the formation turned and almost immediately jumped the twenty feet down to a external access walkway located along the crafts spine, more marines following by the second. A few Hospitalers scooped up a native under their arm and carried them down to save them the potentially hazardous decent, the other natives simply drifting down upon their own wings. Errithius was carefully painting targets with his bolter, shortly after turning them into a gory slurry of blood, bone and torn clothing, so intently so that only just as he approached the edge of the platform did he notice both Herathor and his yellow companion as well as both Princess Celestia and Luna all ducked down, taking cover behind blocks of crystal protruding from the floor. Errithius and a pair of marines re-calibrated their firing efforts to best advance as to retrieve those ahead of them, but the flow of enemies pouring through the breach was almost feverish, like water flowing from a tap. Herathor punished what assailants he could with his bolt pistol, his heavy weapon seemingly having run dry of ammunition, his vastly decreased firepower affecting his defensive capabilities severely. Errithius hadn't taken ten steady paces forward by the time the night-blue princess unsteadily stirred, shaking as she got to her feet while her sister practically clawed at her clothing in an effort to pull her back behind cover.

It almost stunned all who looked on to see a volley of alien firepower zip through the air straight at the princess who now took several slow steps forward, only for the red line of vapour to come to a sudden halt before the winged lady, bright blue ripples of energy spreading through the air from the point of each impact. Again and again the air before the princess lit up as the aliens continued desperately to penetrate her unexpectedly fierce defense, all the while Errithius could barely hear the native mumbling something. Through the sound of gunfire and considering the distance it was difficult to accurately make out, but the captain could just about make out her saying something to do with being 'alone'. The princess was just a couple dozen feet from the aliens now, who in disbelief had slowed their rate of fire, many simply standing awe-struck at the sight before them. The air before Errithius grew tense, literally tightening around him, a wind picking up and flowing in towards Luna soon followed by sharp, bright archs of lightning blasting from the princesses very fur and smelting the crystal around her as her glimmering blue, translucent hair went wild as the wind seemed to produce a whirlwind around her.

"I...said..." The princess begun, her head low, her face out of Errithius' line of sight.

"LEAVE ME ALONE!"

With that a shock-wave similar to that emitted by a plasma cannon blast was sent soaring through the air. Though no heat came with it, the kinetic blast took Errithius and his remaining brethren off their feet, the captains brain being well and truly rattled enough to disorientate him. Within a second he through his torso up and propped himself up to look upon Princess Luna, his face contorted with fierce confusion. Before Luna, were the aliens had stood, now floated a haze of red mist, clumps of bloodied armour and uniform clinging to pulped meat swirling through the air as the shockwave had clearly affected them a thousand times worse than it had affected him. Luna stood as she did when Errithius had last seen her, fists clenched, arms tight and veins throbbing as incorporeal energy spat from her form. However this sight did not last long as the princess started to relax a moment before going completely limp and tumbling to the floor. Luckily her sister was already on her way and caught her mid-fall a heartbeat before turning on the spot and bolting it towards Errithius, her face in a state of pure terror as she sped onward. Errithius' whole form jerked a moment before an odd sensation gripped his innards, a feeling he knew that meant he was falling. Darting his head about, he could see the crystal he had been flung unto had been distabilised by the blast and with his considerable weight had decided to depart the platform it had belonged to up until now. A handful of marines fell down around him, all adopting the same method Errithius himself applied at that time, curling inwards, shifting his weight and allowing his suits gyro-stabilizers redirect his angle of decent to better prepare him for the collision with the ship below.

The captain fell to the hull of the frigate at an awkward angle, landing on a knee, causing him to roll to the side before righting himself. Other marines were more fortunate in landing on their feet, a couple less so as one fell head-first into the adamantium exterior of the craft and another being bent over backwards over a walkway railing. Though uncomfortable and quite annoying, both marines soon shook off the folly and righted themselves before vaulting over the railing to sprint down the walkway and towards an access door to lead them inside the ship. Errithius looked up to see a figure launch itself off the edge of the broken platform, large white wings spreading themselves to allow it to gracefully float to the frigate below.

"Princess...Princess! Where is Herathor?! Princess?!" Errithius bellowed, but to no avail as Celestia, wild eyed, sprinted onwards with her sister laying unconscious in her arms.

"Herathor! Brother, respond!" Errithius barked through the comms a moment before the ship he stood upon shook violently, the crystal ahead cracking apart and falling off the hull as the whole vessel started reversing.

"Unycrios! Stop! We have brothers still on the platform!"

But no response came. Not from the techmarine at least.

"In pursuit, Captain!" The husky voice of Herathor roared from the radio, causing Errithius to dart his head upwards and to the ever-more-distant platform that was now disintegrating rapidly before the frigate.

Seconds passed, too many for Errithius to retain any confidence, the captain's face slacking with despair at the diminishing hope he witnessed. Like a thunderbolt of white, red and gleaming gold a single massive figure soared through the air before the ship, leaping several dozen feet before beginning to descend. A cold, calculating portion of Errithius' mind did the math, did it twice and again in the fraction of a second that there was to observe and concluded a single daunting truth.

He wasn't going to make it.

Then, mid-air, Herathor shifted his pose, stretching back and arching himself almost as if he was going to strike a blow at the air before him. Errithius spotted just in time, sat motionless in his right hand by the lower back and paralyzed in fear, the small yellow native Herathor had been with. With all the marines effort, aided by the effort granted by his power armour, Herathor threw his companion through the air ahead of him, launching the girl almost just as far as he had just jumped. Errithius was already on the move without so much as a thought travelling through his mind. The girl tumbled through the air so still she'd might as well have been made of stone, soaring straight towards Errithius as he dived for her. With unnatural precision, his arms caught the girl and cradled her so that as his form hammered into the walkway ahead, she remained unharmed. Errithius' hooded head snapped upwards with half a second to helplessly observe as Herathor fell, plunging down into the deep before the craft ahead.

"No!" Roared the captain, his voice strained, eyes tight and face burning as he allowed his own emotions to take hold of him.

Errithius clenched his jaw as he lay there, soon welding his eyelids shut as hot tears began to form around them. A soft ringing filled his ears as the blood in his head built in pressure, every muscle tightening as his despair boiled within him. With his grief firmly burnt into his conscious, Errithius let go of both the girl he held, as well as his raging despair. His face slackened, jaw loosened and eyes flew open, his mind processing the more essential information once more and he threw himself to the side and lifted himself from the ground and kneeling over the girl he had caught.

"Captain!"

Herathor's voice boiled within Errithius the closest thing he'd ever felt to fear, the marine snapping his hand to his ear to steady his ear-piece to better receive what he had to be sure he was hearing.

"Brother?!" Errithius blurted back.

"Tell that machine-minded cog-lover to get us the hell out of here!" Herathor sounded like an erupting volcano, his tone more furious than the captain had ever heard before.

"What happened?!Where are you?!"

"I'm hanging from one of the sensor array antennae! Enemy units are beginning to target me, get this ship in the air!" The marine barked back.

Surely enough Errithius could see ahead those aliens that had survive the psychic shockwave and those that soon joined them were peppering the bow of the frigate with small arms fire. In return the odd bolt was sent back, missing twice, but killing two attacking aliens soon after. Errithius scooped up the still-paralyzed native and bounded for the access hatch, his brothers and the other girls having already gotten inside.

"Take off! Unycrios! Take-Off!"He yelled as he sprinted forward.

Errithius quickly turned a corner as a loud detonation sounded from outside the ship, a cluster of shapes falling outside one of the stained-glass observation windows. Another sounded as he sped forward and into the elevator ahead. Having left the small girl with her companions in a shrine-hall near the access door, he had made off straight away to get to the bridge, which after a short ascension now lay before him. Unycrios stood at the center of a raised platform in the center of the massive, Colosseum-like hall that was home to a forest of consoles, relays, generators, display screens and the dozens of bio-mechanical serfs and servitors that manned them. Though more thorough observation would have had to wait, Errithius couldn't help but note how ever servitor and serf had its face, back and arms covered in strange, almost fungal growths of pale colour and chalky texture. Ignoring this for now, Errithius ascended the staircase that spiraled around the central command platform to join the techmarine.

"We are clear of the structure. Making our ascent." Unycrios growled as his arms, both natural and mechanical tapped and turned various controls on the consoles before him.

"Damage?" Errithius asked.

"Dorsal lance c-c-c-cannon was able to easily cut through the ceilinggggg of the holding cell. We do however have a sub-sub-substantial amount of both artificial-artificial and natural debris scattered over the t-t-t-top of the ship, my lord." One of the fungal-ridden serfs attending a console said, his words raspy and stuttered, his neglect having seemingly interrupted his functionalities.

"How is the sky looking?"

"Single ship, starboard side. Their sensors have picked us up and weapons are being readied, but their are yet to initiate an intercept course." Unycrios replied, flitting through several holographic displays detailing sensor analysis of the enemy craft.

"Capacity? Class?" The captain said, bringing up a display of the alien ship on a nearby console.

"Inconclusive, much at this point would simply be assumption. It is ten kilometers in total length, four weapon classifications scattered over eighty location across her hull-"

A muffled sound of thunder came from outside the hull in a vicious drum-beat rythm.

"They appear to be firing w-w-w-weapons, sire." Another serf announced calmly.

"Shields?" Errithius inquired as the bass-tone thunder of ordinance being intercepted by defensive turrets continued on in the background.

"Holding steady. Turret defense systems are able to anticipate much of their more potent projectiles. They appear to be using a class of torpedo alongside heavy projectile weapons." The techmarine assured.

"Lance battery, take out their engines. Unycrios, after they are grounded get us out of here and hide us." Errithius ordered, not wanting to dawdle about in drawn-out conflict only to be outnumbered a hundred, even a thousand to one in mere minutes.

"Understood. Destination locked in, engines primed. Awaiting weapon deployment."

Several seconds passed, the captain tapping rapidly on the console controls to bring up a fully three dimensional display of the enemy craft in real-time assessment, red blips bursting out from all over the crafts starboard, indicating each weapon that was firing at the frigate. A small blue portion of the ship was highlighted, detailing it as the power cells and conduits that powered the main thrusters.

"Lance turret fully charged, Captain." A serf announced.

"Fire." Errithius ordered without a moments hesitation.

Not a second after a deep thrumming sound rang through the bridge, a bright light shining through the observation windows along with it. The display before Errithius revealed a bright orange that plastered itself over the image of the ship's rear starboard. The orange painted a short line, like a scalpel wound, that cut across the alien craft's hull and deep into the sub-structure. Errithius did well to not show his surprise as whatever shielding the craft had was either completely diminished or outright failed to respond to the massive energy beam that had struck through it. Both a power cell cluster and the conduit that led through it was completely decimated, the lances intense laser having cut almost clean through the entire ship, biting hundreds of meters into the hull and melting through over a hundred decks. Holographic indicators revealed that the ships engine power was dropping, and a number of secondary systems were in utter disarray as the image of the ship seemed to rear up, the rear stabilisers evidently having been utterly disabled and sending the ships stern swinging downwards while the rest of the vessel clumsily hung in the sky, its bow bobbing up and bow like a limbless creature desperately trying to reach the surface of an ocean for air.

"Situational update?" The captain demanded from no one in particular.

"Enemy craft has suffered critical structural damage as well as significant power failure. We should be clear to evade further contact before reaching our destination." The techmarine replied.

"And where is that?"

"Four thousand, two hundred and twenty nine kilometers from our current position, I have located a dense mountain range our vessel should remain undetected within."

"Good, get us there." Errithius ordered, turning to descend the stairs he had taken to reach the platform.

"Affirmative, Captain."

Errithius steadily descended the sturdy, metal stairs, his bootsteps ringing out in sharp metallic clashes before finally reaching the more solid floor below. At this point he neurally commanded his vox-link to connect with the ship-wide broadcast system to address all his brothers at once.

"All marines, we are clear. We are headed for a mountain range roughly four thousand kilometers away. Take what rest you need, check your wargear, we shall convene in the central chapel in approximately two hours. And for goodness sake, someone get Herathor off from the frontal antennae and get him inside. He's probably furious."

10 - Ascendant

"Take a seat."

Errithius gestured his hand across the great selection of chairs that sat before a vast marble table as he strode forth. Behind him, both his command squad and most of the natives his marines had rescued followed, the soft clip-clop of the alien's hooved feet almost entirely drowned out by the marines thundering footsteps. The occupants of the council hall; a large, yet mostly unceremoniously decorated room located a fair distance behind the bridge of the frigate, calmly found an unoccupied seat and took their places. Each chair was much like a minimalist-designed throne, with a tall back, blocky silhouette and crafted from the same milky-white marble as the table. Each chair was also designed to comfortably fit a fully armoured space marine within its cradle, seeing ever brother marine sitting within it very comfortably, but seeing the native 'ponies', as Errithius had come to know them as, struggle in some cases to hoist themselves up into the tall seat and even after sitting down finding it a strange and uncomfortably large structure to be resting within. Errithius took a seat at the far end of the great rectangular table, so that he could see to all before him as well as clearly illustrate his status among all those who saw him.

"It would seem, then, that we have a great many things to discuss." The captain said calmly as he pulled his hood over the back of his head, revealing his short-cut blonde hair framing his well-chiseled features.

"Y-yes. I'm sure you, uhm, all have many questions." Princess Celestia said, worry emanating from her like a thick odor.

"You failed to mention that hostile units would be pursuing us, Princess." Varadoch said, his voice tinged with suspicion, the bionics that composed a full half of his now exposed head clicking and whining with motion as he spoke.

"I didn't know, I didn't know I swear it! I made sure that all my efforts were as discrete as I could make them, and I trust all my companions were as careful as I was." Celestia assured with wide, half-panicked eyes, her large white wings twitching slightly almost as a form of flinching.

"How sure, exactly?" Varadoch inquired again as he leaned forward towards Celestia slightly.

"Varadoch, we'll not get anywhere probing our guests with accusations." Errithius said calmly as he grazed his armoured fingers across his forehead.

"It's alright, Captain. I understand why some of you might not entirely trust me, or any of us for that matter, especially considering the events that occurred in that station. So I suppose all I can do for now is assure you with all my honesty that I had no knowledge the Federation would follow us down into that place, and I trust nopony here had anything to do with them finding out about our plans." Celestia said with what confidence she could muster at the time.

Errithius looked at the princess for a couple of seconds before flitting his eyes over to Brother Chaplain Tyreth, who upon seeing the captain's attention locked on him returned it with a 'facial shrug' as his eyebrows raised and his head tilted. Errithius let out a sigh and swept his eyes over the rest of his brethren, most returned the same expression the chaplain had given, Varadoch however looked less convinced of such a claim than everyone else.

"Well then, I suppose one way or another we'll have to take your word on it for now. So, the next point of order; We need to find a way to contact the Imperium at large and inform them of the situation on this planet."

"Wherever this planet is." Said Biemark in a less-than-enthusiastic tone as he rubbed at his temple.

"What have our sensors picked up?" Brother Priest Nitheleon asked in a light tone.

"That we had might as well be in the Sol system but absent of the billions of satellite relays. We are officially in the middle of some form of cosmic dead-zone, with not another planet-bearing star system for at least twenty light-years. Worse still, every navigator unit on this ship is either dead or dysfunctional, meaning we have had to rely on Brother Ennyre's abilities to find the nearest Astronomicon beacon. Since he is quite unfamiliar with this field of expertise he has yet to locate anything in the warp of any use to us, and he has voiced his concerns that it could be a while before he does find anything at all. The short of it is we are quite stuck here for now." The captain announced, his tone grim.

"Of course we are." Tyreth said suddenly, causing all heads present to turn to him in mild surprise at the suddenness and absolution of his voice.

"I'm sorry?" Errithius asked, perplexed.

"Our isolation here is an insurance, an insurance to see us reach our fate. I declare it nothing less than the Emperor's own will." The chaplains words were calm, yet held a significant weight to them that almost betrayed a measure of righteous fire boiling behind the chaplain's golden eyes.

"Let us not delve into such subjects, brother. We need to ensure contact with the Imperium, second to that a safe passage back home. All other things besides this can only serve as unwanted distractions." Errithius said, his voice strained with a degree of mental exhaustion.

"Unwanted distraction?" Tyreth said the words as though they were acid spilling from his lips, his face contorted with greif and disgust that he had heard such things.

With that the chaplain stood, not quickly or with aggressive intent, but took a slow and steady rise to his feet and left slowly wandered behind his chair to address all present. His features were calm, his fair eyes relaxed and firm lips slightly parted as he brushed the long golden hair that fell from two-thirds of his head back as to not obstruct his sight.

"I hear in this hall, only talk of suspicion, talk of isolation, fear of the darkness around us and of fleeing as soon as possible. For what? For the comfort of home? What comfort does home hold for us if our very souls are condemned to damnation in abandoning those who saw to our release from an alien prison, those who have voiced only their desperate desire for our aid. And we reward them with talk of fleeing like rats from a flame."

Tyreth's gaze, although not apparently scournful in any way that could be observed, coupled with his pained words no brother could stand to meet his eyes for too long as he looked about, not even the captain.

"What would you have us do, Tyreth?" Errithius said through a sigh.

"Those creatures impose superiority on these people, through fierce intimidation, threat of firepower and outright execution. They offer us insult and wish to see us just as dead as the princesses and their cohort. We know how they fight now, the weapons they use, their mettle and approach to combat." Tyreth began.

"We caught them unawares." Brother Veteran Riveth perked up in a dry tone.

"Through their own arrogance. They orchestrated their own demise by underestimating our capabilities and harboring too greater lust for the death of the princesses. We know they are unimaginative, cold, calculating tacticians with a great sense of self-preservation. We know that we've been sat hidden in this mountain range for almost twelve hours and they are yet to locate us. Every brother on this ship has been briefed, tell me in all honesty that the ranks would refuse the chance fate has offered us, to not limp warily back home, but instead seize this chance to liberate a people plagued by occupation and fear. Only then I shall concede." With that Tyreth discontinued his wandering and once again took a seat.

As the marines all looked at one another with a variety of mild expressions, conversing in a form of wordless language, the ponies that accompanied them could only observe, some with hopeful expressions, their hope given traction by the chaplain's words, others simply confused.

"I will not deny the legitimacy of your claims, brother, but our situation requires nothing less than the most thorough of assessments. Whether it be deemed noble or not, finding a route back to Imperial space is still a priority," Errithius said, sitting up a little straighter, "However, I will have to agree that, even if not by divine design, the opportunity before us cannot be ignored. Princess Celestia, I shall hand you charge over the subject. You last briefing on your country's situation was rather hasty, care to indulge us further?"

"Of course. I think we all have right to state our own experiences, we all lead quite unique lives in Equestria, and each has been affected by the occupation quite differently. For me...for me and Luna, it is as though the very reason for our existence is at risk of becoming obsolete. You see, in this world me and my sister are directly responsible for the continuance of the celestial rotation of both the sun and the moon, Luna raising and lowering the moon while I myself do the same with the sun." Celestia started.

"You hold charge over the movement of your planet's own sun? Through your own psychic abilities?" Nitheleon asked, his voice almost in disbelief.

"Of course. The Federations claim that no such thing was necessary on their own planets was extremely strange from our perspective." Celestia answered with a spark of enthusiasm.

"An intriguing subject, but please, continue." Errithius interjected.

"Well, uhm, after we made first contact with the Federation, I suppose nothing seemed inherently wrong with the exchanges at first, I harboured...concerns, but nothing I could really put my finger on until it was too late. It did seem a little odd that they were so willing to settle research stations in our lands so soon after arriving, but since none of them were of military nature I allowed it without much second thought. After that their prattling began, claiming our entire society was based off of lies and misunderstandings, and that they were going to 'solve' all our worlds 'problems' as soon as they could, but most notably without our consent. One of these problems was our planet's reliance on me and my sister to maintain solar and lunar alignment, the Federation saw it as too greater risk to rely on just two individuals to ensure the whole planet remained habitable. So they decided, once again, without our consolation, to begin building machines they refer to as 'gravitational anchors', large structures located in the east and west of Equestria that essentially do mine and my sisters jobs for us. Now, I can begin to understand where the Federation is coming from in regards to this predicament, however without our duties me and my sister have no real purpose in Equestria, especially now that the Federation is beginning to occupy our country in a political sense as well as a technological and ecological one. Really there is no need for either of us to remain in any position of leadership, and that's where the federation's plan starts to wrap itself up. For since they have taken over our functions as rulers of this land, and since we still hold so much magical potential, the Federation has deemed both my and my sister to be...dangerous liabilities. Although they cannot assassinate us outright, not without arousing suspicion, distrust and even outright revolt, they have begun their efforts in publicly denouncing us, so to turn the very ponies we have served for over a thousand years against us. Not only do I now fear for my sister's and my own life, but I believe in destroying us the Feds will severely displace the magical balance of the whole world, no matter how much they try to compensate with their technology."

As Celestia finished, Errithius turned steadily to Nitheleon.

"In spirit of the subject, what is the status of Celestia's sister?"

"She is very stable, however her bio-readings are, for a lack of a better term, tense. No form of relaxant has proved effective, and the problem seems to be neurological in nature. I'm sure she will be conscious in a short while, however her collective status is somewhat worrying." The Sanguinary priest said plainly.

"Do you know exactly what's wrong with her, Space marine?" Celestia asked desperately.

"Unfortunately, no, I believe her condition is beyond the observation of my expertise. I have referred her to Brother Ennyre, he seemed to have a better idea of the specifics of her condition than I do." Nitheleon reassured.

"Are there any more claims? Perhaps from one of the other princesses?" Errithius encouraged.

"Wait a sec', what about the rest of us? We have all been affected by those squid-heads." The rainbow-haired girl with the blue coat perked up.

"I'm sure they have, yet I'm also sure that the princesses hold charge over many more people than you do. I feel them describing their own situations gives us a better idea of the condition of the country as a whole." The captain replied firmly.

"It ain't all about you, Dash." The orange girl said, obviously tired.

"Hey, I said 'us'." Dash replied in a huff.

"Cadence, is it?" Errithius continued.

"O-oh! Uhm, yes." The princess stammered, caught unawares by the attention that was brought to her, the pink coated girl straightening herself up a second before composing herself to address those around her.

"Well, my name is Princess Mi Amore Cadenza, I'm more commonly known by my friends as simply Cadence. Both me and my husband used to rule the region of Equestria known as the Crystal Empire, a city of crucial importance to all Equestria. You see, the Crystal Empire is like...it's sort of...an emitter! Ahem...excuse me, but yes, it acts as a form of emitter to spread energy waves all across the country. The core of the energy it spreads is a relic known as the Crystal Heart, a magical item that rests at the base of the Crystal palace in the center of the city. It's actually right near the place we found all of you...well, I mean, it's also quite a bit above where you were as well. In any case, the Crystal heart, and the power it held was seen as potentially threatening, the Federation declaring it a 'weapon of mass destruction' as soon as they heard of it's capabilities. The first thing they sought to do was destroy the Crystal Heart, again, as always, without the consent of myself or any member of royalty in all the nation. After their many attempts failed the commissioned, what I assume, was one of their assassins to sneak through the defenses of the palace grounds and stole the Crystal Heart. This was many months ago, and we have fairly reliable intelligence telling us the Crystal Heart remains intact and within the Federation's primary research center located in the east. However I fear the absence of the Heart has already caused all of Equestria a significant degree of damage, as the energies it produced once helped sustain the life and spirits of all living things within the nation, now ponies are drained of their willpower, they are no longer happy, and to be honest, are neither entirely sad, just...emptied out. The environment has also suffered, as the Crystal Empire itself now suffers from freak snow storms and the rest of Equestria has experienced similar extremes of weather. Actually, I think this would be a good time for Twilight to explain about the Tree of Harmony." Cadence finished, looking at the purple princess sitting near her.

"Thank you, Cadence. Now, as much as the absence of the Crystal Heart indeed does negatively affect all life in Equestria, it does not make the ecosystem particularly violent or the spirits of ponies so terribly exhausted. What really delivered the 'killing blow' in that respect, however, was the containment of what we came to know as the 'Tree of Harmony'. This...well to be entirely honest I never did get around to actually finding out exactly what the Tree of Harmony is exactly, but many agree it is most likely the single most powerful magical artifact in all Equestria, possibly the whole world. Unfortunately the Federation found it long before we ever got the chance to even look, and when they did they demanded to be given all information regarding its origins and nature. Unfortunately what information we had was limited, and what little time the Feds granted me to study it only revealed two things for certain; That the Tree of Harmony spawned the Elements of Harmony, and that together the Elements and the Tree directly affect and sustain the well-being of all Equestria. Again, like with the Heart, the Federation grew frightened of this new source of power that they did not understand and sought to destroy it, and as with the Heart, all their attempts ended in complete failure with the Tree, however they claim to have succeeded in destroying the Elements. When concerning the Elements, I'm not sure what to believe, they very well could be telling the truth which would mean Equestria could take centuries to heal from such a terrible loss, however it's not beyond the Federation to lie to Equestria's face for the sake of the 'greater good'. Anyway, seeing as they couldn't destroy the Tree of Harmony, the Federation did manage to succeed in cutting it off from the rest of the world by surrounding the Tree with several dozen times the fortification found even in our sturdiest fortresses. In fact, I don't think there's any way to actually get to the Tree at all, not unless you have something that can cut through several dozen feet of reinforced concrete and steel, and even if we could, whatever we used to breach the containment dome could end up damaging or destroying the Tree. And as a result of the dome the Federation built around the Tree, none of its energy that would normally saturate all of Equestria has been able to get through to the world. This has caused the weather to go haywire, the plants and trees to either die or grow beyond any means of containment or control, our harvests have diminished and more importantly ponies everywhere have been absolutely drained of their inner energy, the spark of life that would normally help them live healthy, functional lives."

"You have said your people are experiencing a psychological state of nullification, has this affected your means of producing any resistance towards the aliens?" Tyreth asked.

"Yes, and the absence of the Tree's energy means that casting spells is also growing more and more difficult. This has left us with only our own native technology to use against them, and in that regard we are completely outmatched. It's actually been the Federation's primary focus when comparing our two cultures, claiming that our technology is so comparably meek that they have no choice but to intervene in our natural societal progression. They've begun convincing ponies that without more advanced technology, our whole species will grow progressively stale and be doomed to die out on this planet, and now, without our magic, it's actually becoming a possibility." Twilight said, her voice beginning to crack towards the end of her response.

Errithius kept his composure solid and steady, though he could not lie to himself by saying he was not at least a little aggravated inside at the utter stupidity of these alien usurpers. He looked upon the rainbow maned girl and made a gesture for her to speak.

"You guys wouldn't know this, but pegasi...uh...the 'type' of pony I am, has always had the ability to manipulate and almost directly control the weather in Equestria. Not only that, but we also have the ability to interact with clouds directly to the point where we could build entire cities with the fluffy-stuff. But since those squid-head freaks showed up our abilities have been shrugged off as 'unnecessary', and our cloud homes as 'environmental hazards', meaning all pegasi have been evicted from their own homes and relocated to live on the ground! I get you guys probably don't get how serious that is, but lemme tell yah, it's a pretty big deal! I mean, look at these babies," The blue girl said, flaring out her considerably sized wings, "Dies a living thing with wings like this seem like it belongs on the ground? Yeah, I don't think so, and I know if she was here, even Fluttershy would agree." Dash finished, her tone growing low as she mentioned her friend, her eyes almost unintentionally looking up at Nitheleon.

"Your friend is going to be fine, I assure you. She's suffered a rather significant shock and has some minor muscular bruising, but I gave her diluted kalma and her condition has greatly improved." The priest once again assured.

"I'd also like to point out the severe shift in our society. It seems conformity, control, police-presence and simplification is the current trends in society, as all forms of 'excessive' individuality are deeply scorned, and anything that occurs while unmonitored by the Federation is considered outright criminal. Original music must be screened by the Federal offices and publicized, with no profits going to the original artist. Distributed food has to be tested and then retested before being massed produced, so the notion of a privately owned restaurant is considered laughable by those tasteless cephalopods. Custom designed...oh my...my goodness, this is quite difficult. Custom designed...clothing has to also be handed over to Federation officials to be examined to ensure it is not 'indecent' or 'excessively alluring' before being redesigned and like everything else, mass produced for the sake of equality. So in short, nopony's permitted to receive any special treatment when concerning anything of original creation, and anything an artist creates must be fully distributed for all the public. Now if you ask me, that sort of defeats the point of art in itself." The girl with snow white fur and glossy purple hair said, her accent holding a great degree of substance and finesse to it.

"Not t' mention the consequences ponies have to pay for stepping out of line. Almost every town an' city in Equestria has just as many o' them pasty, techno-freaks as there are ponies, and their brutes love to shove around anypony who looks 'up tah somethin'. An' that's not the worst of it. So far we've only heard of a handful o' ponies who've been, well, put down over refusing to conform to the Feds ways. These have all been big business types who've held finanshul power up in Canterlot and the likes, but a while back they hit a new low when the town of Dodge Junction decided to unite together in an effort to resist the occupation. This was back when the Tree's power was much less diminished than it is now, and the whole town actually managed tah kick those little alien freaks right on outta town within a couple days using magic, weather manipulation and good ol' earth pony buckin' power. However...we realized too late that Dodge Junction's little revolution was actually partially supported by the Federation itself, and they didn't care much for losing a few troops, they sure as spit didn' care for losing a whole heap o' vehicles, weapons and equipment. All they cared about was creating an enemy out of a portion o' pony kind...just tah show off their big, shiny guns. After all of Dodge and the couple hundred of ponies defending it were turned to dust by an orbital laser-majig no other pony settlement in the whole country dared stand up against the Feds ever again...just the result they were looking for." The larger girl with the slackened annunciations said, grimly reflecting on a time the marines could tell she'd rather forget.

"And now we have reason to fear their plans for domination over our whole planet are beginning to wrap up. You see, first we were pretty convinced that the Federation was simply laughing off the concept of magic and simply seeking to replace it entirely with magic. However, recently, there's been very subtle tell-tale signs that the Federation might actually be trying to study magic, and like everything else they get their hands on, might be trying to use it as a power source, a means of travel or communication. They will probably try and weaponize it." Twilight added with a great sense of concern.

"I know the last thing most of you would want to do right now is go to war just hours after breaking out of an alien prison, and you most certainly deserve to go back to your home. But please, I can only beg of you to at least consider helping us save ours first. You are our last, best and only hope." Celestia finished, her voice almost betraying her dread of the answer she'd receive.

Errithius and his brother sat still a moment, the captain sifting through all the information he'd been presented with. His expression tensed slightly before his posture shifted in his seat to become perfectly upright, his armoured elbows lent on the table before him.

"We will need time to consider what you have proposed to us. Time alone. If you would all please step outside for a few minutes and we shall begin discussing our next move, keeping into consideration all you have said." Said Errithius with crystal clarity.

"Of course. Thank you, Captain."

A moment after speaking, Celestia and the other natives stood from their chairs, some more reluctantly than others, before steadily walking through the large doors that had lead them into the hall. With a light wave of his hand, the doors in-built servo-scanners blinked to life and ground their gears to slowly close the two massive, metal doors. Once the deep metallic echo of the two doors colliding sounded, Errithius allowed himself to lean back slightly.

"Captain?" Asked Biemark.

"Yes, Biemark?"

"Considering all we have heard, in all honesty, are we on a daemon world?" The marines asked, more intrigued than concerned.

"Considering all evidence, it would seem so." Errithius replied with a shrug.

"Anyone else find it strange that we are not currently being dragged into some forsaken hell-pit by titanical demonic tendrils?" Varadoch said with a huff.

"The nature of this planet is incredibly peculiar. With what we've been told and considering my own observations it seems this entire planet is deeply saturated with...unusual warp energies." Nitheleon said, his voice barking a desperately chuckle of bewilderment every few words.

"I was going to ask, Brother, what have you found out about our passengers?" Asked Errithius.

"A lot, but there are some pieces in their physiology that...well, don't entirely make complete sense. Their skeletal and muscular density is slightly denser than that of the common mortal being, and their white cell and platelet count is somewhat lower than would be considered average, but besides that they are considerably, from a biological point of view, 'normal'. However their innate abilities, the horns, wings and strength, it's all missing significant factors that would make these attributes medically functional. I can only assume that the planet's warp energies have something to do with the sustainment of these abilities."

"Does that mean that each sub-species would have their abilities rendered useless on any other planet?" Inquired Riveth.

"Not necessarily. These energies seem to be at least partially self-sustainable, however the energy of this planet simply allows them to access their capabilities far more easily and to far greater capacity than they would on another world. Although the winged one's would still be able to fly without the natural warp presence in the world, it must be becoming quite an effort to sustain flight with the state this planet is delving into. The same applies to the horned one's psyker abilities and the strength of the larger sub-breed. However I am more concerned about the Princesses." Nitheleon said with a tense brow.

"And why is that?" Errithius inquired casually.

"As much as the more common breeds of pony on this world can survive without their magic, albeit uncomfortably, I believe the complete absence of magic means a very slow and rather painful death for each of the princesses. Their biological makeup is quite astounding from what I could observe from our unconscious companion. Warp energy seems to compose a significant portion of their physical makeup, so much so that absence of warp energies would mean that their physical forms would slowly break down over time. For it would seem that normal pony breeds hold within them a sort of psychic reservoir, like a form of energy-based gland that can be filled with warp energies to feed their capabilities, and when it runs out it is slowly replenished over time by allowing warp energy to slowly trickle back within themselves. However the princesses have developed such a vast containment for such energies that their physical makeup has evolved to actually rely on it as a form of substructure to their own bodies and minds. This means if they remain empty of warp energies for too long; months, perhaps years, they will develop severe physical illnesses and die from them before they can replenish their lost energies. In this sense, all four of these creatures are a strange breed of half-daemon."

"The warp energies of grace and light have never intruded into the physical realm besides to aid those in the most desperate of need, and even then only after an ocean's worth of luck has been spent. It is not the nature of such energies to claim a world as their own, not for any reason. What use do such powers have for a single planet on the middle of nowhere, and especially one filled with simple common folk who have still yet to bolt together their first computing system." Varadoch grunted with eyes darting to each marine.

"It's far from our place to question the nature of warp energies, Brother." Errithius chuckled in disbelief.

"No, sire, but I know what I know. And I know that something is amiss here. Something is-not-right." Varadoch spat with a strained voice, his eyes locking with the captain's for a few seconds.

"We must make way back to Imperial space." Varadoch practically hissed with desperation.

"We cannot abondon these people now! The princesses could be long dead before the Imperium is ready to amass an organised liberation fleet! We are space marines, it is purposefully within our distinction to instigate military activity wherever we see it needed! Tell me, Captain, that it is not needed here!" Tyreth barked, shooting from his seat.

"If you wish to fling yourself into soil sodden with warp energies then go ahead, and take all those fanatical enough to follow you! But I will not march on a world that could be already long since damned!" Varadoch barked back in retort.

"We know nothing of this world and it's properties! If anything we should at least dispatch an insertion team to gather more information on the nature of this planet and its occupants." Shot in Nitheleon.

"This vessel and it's crew are not a science expedition!" Spat back Varadoch.

"It doesn't have to be to assess whether a planet is worth fighting for." Nitheleon said back in a huff.

"And while you're weighing the worth of this world or outright running from it people are suffering!" Tyreth blurted with arms crossed.

"Nitheleon said it himself, these 'people' are soaked with unknown warp energies! Their leaders are practically daemons!" Varadoch yelled half-hysterically.

"They saved us from a living death, you will not offer them insult! Not in my presence!" Tyreth roared, jabbing a finger at Varadoch.

"Enough!"

The holler Errithius let loose as he shot up to stand echoed through the hall for several seconds before silence finally fell a second before his brethren fell back to their seats.

"The truth of it all is; We don't know. I don't. I don't know where in Terra's name we are, how long we've been here, who these people are and what has happened to them. I just don't know. I wish I did. I wish my consoles were full of answers we all need, but they're not. I wish I had orders for you all to follow, I wish I could lead us to some form of victory and I wish for heaven's sake that someone would just explain to me just what in all of hell's name is going on!" Errithius yelled, losing his temper.

"But I don't have the answers. We're trapped here on this planet for what could be weeks. For all we know we could be surrounded by a single gigantic plot to get our guard down and damn all our souls to the deepest pit of hell. Even if all they say is true, we are not an army. We were dispatched to eliminate a single communication dish cluster in our last mission, and we are outfitted as such to deal with a conflict that would have lasted no more than a couple of days. But we were also sent to deal with an enemy force with defenses ten times greater than what this Federation has to offer, judging by what technology they bare. We are a single, small ship, but are also difficult to intercept. This ship's weapons can bypass their defenses, it's faster than their's and can initiate rapid deployment of all our forces to multiple locations. Each of our brothers is worth a dozen of their own troops, more than that even, and we have deployable ordinance. No, we are not an army. But they are not a fortress. They are an occupational force spread thin over a continent, and they are deployed to fight native resistance, not fight in their own facilities, and certainly not fight space marines. Perhaps we can't save this world, perhaps we shouldn't try at all, but we can try, and we can try for the right reasons as we always have. We are Hospitalers, we are the open palm, we are his deliverance and provide his shelter to the weak, sick and helpless. So all of you ask yourselves now, what would our duty have us do?"

"Here, here!" Tyreth cheered not a second after the captain had finished speaking.

The other marines took a couple of seconds, some bowing their heads in defeat to the captain's authority, some giving long, exhausted sighs and some sitting entirely still.

"We're with you, Captain, as always." Nitheleon said calmly.

"Aye." Conceded Biemark.

Errithius looked upon Varadoch, the organic half of his face stretched into an almost pained expression with a tinge of deep frustration.

"If I die on this Throne-forsaken planet, you'll never hear the end of it from me in the afterlife, Captain."

11 - Your soul to take

Princess Cadence adjusted herself for what felt like the fiftieth time that day. She had quickly grown to wish the circumstances had allowed her to wear something a little more to the comfort of her considerable physical dimensions, but it turned out a suicide mission to an underground cavern demanded her to wear a shirt three sizes too small for her with one of the stiffest thermal coats she'd ever worn zipped over it along with thick, baggy trekking combat trousers that she was constantly tripping up on. This, however, was not entirely a bad thing, as it provided a useful distraction she desperately needed from all the worry the past couple of years had provided her with. She worried about the crystal ponies, her people who resided in the Crystal Empire. She worried about how weak they were getting, how lifeless they all seemed, it deeply reminded her of how they'd been when the Empire had returned from a thousand years of isolation, their coats dull and manes limply dripping over their exhausted faces.

She worried about the rest of Equestria, how much it had changed, and the bleak future that lie ahead of it. She could only grimly picture the image of Equestria in a decade, five decades, a century and even a millennia. The ponies growing less and less unique and independent as the years grind on, each one having his or her cutie mark assessed and then themselves assigned to a specific career they'd most likely do for the rest of themselves, the same day repeating itself over and over at a maddening degree until their near-meaningless life blurs together in a dull image of pure efficiency feeding an alien empire that saw them as nothing but fuel for their cause. Castles would be torn down and replaced with factories and space-docks, towns built so large and so tall that you could get lost in their cold, metallic mazes for hours with only numbers to guide you, farms would cover ten times the space they do now, and churn out a hundred times the product they currently managed, all automated and manned by unthinking, unfeeling machines. Even the wilderness of the world, although dangerous and unfit for pony habitation, was a wonder all of its own, but under alien supervision would be stripped of any hazardous aspects, predators species entirely wiped out, sharply cut paths and roads chewing through the completely docile, almost unliving forests.

She, admittedly, worried about herself. Celestia, Luna and Twilight also, but certainly herself too, and what the future would hold for them. Every day she felt weaker, and she knew the other alicorns felt the same way. Would she become just an empty, obsolete shell of a pony, living a life without reason or purpose, doomed to live forever as just an unnecessary excess of the world. Or, if her condition only ever got worse and worse until she had no more life into her, what would happen? Would she be stuck in some kind of coma, be paralysed or would she just die outright? Would Shiny still be alive by the time she finally died? She could never leave him like that, she couldn't bare the thought of leaving him in so much pain in such a bleak and lonely world.

Which lead to her next worry, her beloved husband, Shining Armour, captain of Equestria's Royal Guard. He was constantly dodging Federation military movement in the wilderness of the world, having spent the past year almost constantly on the move, walking over mountains and through forests, camping up in whatever valley or cave they came across. She'd seen so little of him in that time, but at least they'd made the time they did spend together especially intimate. Yet, this provided little comfort in the face of the possibility that one day the Federation might one day get the drop on him and his guard, capturing them for interrogation and imprisonment or just killing them all on the spot. Cadence had always known she would, inevitably, lose her dear husband some day, the most likely cause considered before the arrival of the aliens being old age. For as much as she loved Shining more than possibly measurable, love alone would not stop the finality that was death. And so after Shining had passed his two hundredth, perhaps two hundred and twentieth birthday, she would one day have to say goodbye to the love of her life. However, as painful of a reality as that was, Cadence knew deep down she'd would most likely survive such an occurrence, she would still have friends in her life, she'd still have her kingdom and her fellow princesses and most importantly, as her and her husband had planned, she would hopefully have a family to watch over and love. This brought up her final worry, one that made her feel far more sick than it normally did, a worry that caused her bones to feel frozen through and through.

Cadence was five weeks pregnant.

Though she was far from showing, she had seen to a doctor in complete secrecy and he had confirmed both the greatest joy and darkest fear of her life, that she was most certainly with child. She hadn't said anything to anypony else, not even the other princesses, as she felt it was too soon in the pregnancy for things to be absolutely sure everything was okay. The implications of this were terrible to think about, there were dozens of perils to consider at this point in time for not just her child but all Equestria. Would her worsening condition allow her to give birth correctly, or at all? If the child was born an alicorn, would it even survive past a few days? If it did, how would she keep it hidden from the Federation, and if she failed what would they do with her baby. Would they kill it, experiment on it, somehow detach it from it's alicorn abilities and just shovel it in with the rest of their dull, droning society? Or would they use the child as some form of political leverage, raising him or her to become the ultimate Federation patriot and use them to ensure order over the lands with the benefit of providing the public with a familiar, trustworthy face of an alicorn to follow. She couldn't allow any of this to happen, she wouldn't. She wanted nothing less than the perfect upbringing for her child, one where Equestria was as free and magical as it had always been, one with both her mother and fathers love in it.

One without the Federation.

This last thought brought up a twinge of turbulent emotion, emotion that perhaps could better be described as feeling of vengeance. She wanted a happy future for her child, but to ensure that she had to want to destroy whatever Federation there was occupying Equestria, and for the sake of her child, she was more than willing to do whatever necessary to accomplish just that.

"Cadence, are you okay?" Asked Twilight softly as she placed a hand on the alicorn's shoulder, snapping Cadence out of her trance of concern.

"Oh! Yes, sorry, Twilight. Just thinking about...well, everything really." Cadence replied sadly.

"I can relate. In a way, all of this," Twilight gestured about to the interior of the gigantic spaceship they all stood in, the ponies choosing to wait for the marines in some kind of corridor junction that was beautifully, yet hauntingly decorated, "-only makes me worry more than ever. I mean, look at all this. These aliens, their armour, their weapons, this ship. It's like they've been at war for a thousand years. It's like they've been at war for a thousand years non-stop." The purple alicorn said tensely.

"I know. I mean, you have to hand it to them, they must have some truly artistic architects, but does every pillar and wall really need so many," Cadence gulped, "-skulls."

"I'm sure it's nothing to worry about, Cadence." Princess Celestia said as she approached the pair.

"What's makes you say that, Princess?" Twilight inquired.

"I remember, hundreds of years ago now, reading ancient text on some of the darker days of Equestria. There once existed a handful of warrior gatherings that instituted their own military function, choosing to remain separate from any nation or tribe. The mannerisms of these aliens reminds me very much of what I read in those dusty old books; The way they live, the way they fight, move and talk. Everything about these aliens leads me to believe them to be just like those ancient Equestrian warriors. It's very odd though, that such age-old organisations could ever be at all comparable to a species with the capacity to achieve space travel." Celestia mused.

"It's also strange that they are open to the concept of magic so casually. Not that I'm complaining, but I would have thought any alien species that has achieved such marvels of technology would simply dismiss the concept or practicality of magic outright." Added Twilight.

"To be honest, the only other alien race we have encountered is the Federation. For all we know they are the odd ones out and the rest of the universe has a solid understanding of magic and finds regular application for it." Celestia replied.

"Judging by what we've seen here..what we saw in...that ship, in the station, I have a feeling the rest of space is actually not that badder place to explore. That maybe most other alien species aren't as, well, passively hostile as the Feds are. Perhaps, hopefully when all this is over, we could get to know more about the space marines. Where they come from, what other alien species they've encountered, what their civilization is like. It's...well I don't want to jinx it, but it's really quite the exciting opportunity." Cadence said, her voice perking up a little bit.

"So, what do we think, Princesses? Do you think they'll help us out?" Rainbow Dash said as she had, most probably unintentionally, snuck up behind Celestia.

The alicorn, after a moment of surprise, looked at her fellow alicorns, then over to the group of ponies that waited nearby before turning to speak to Dash.

"I have faith in them, Rainbow Dash. They protected us in that crystal maze, and they brought us aboard their ship, I believe they will do the right thing."

Celestia looked up just as she finished to see the significant bulk of a space marine in his white and red armour striding towards the group of ponies. Although Celestia was fairly sure he came bearing no ill intent, it was difficult not to feel a small tug of fear looking upon the giant alien's armoured face, it's glowing eye lenses coupled with the helmets snarling design striking a true sense of dread into the princesses heart. It was strange watching the creature walk, for it was quite alien when compared to the casual stroll a pony would move with, or the graceful glide alicorns held. Instead it marched forward on great, powerful, thundering strides that shook the metal floor, it's speed always set so it would reach it's destination as fast as possible, meaning it always walked at the quickest pace it could, fooling the princess for a moment that he was about to crash right into her before he stopped suddenly.

"Our Captain has requested your presence once more. Follow me to the convening chamber." The alien said simply in its deep, growling voice that held the metallic reverberation its face grill granted it.

"Of course. Please, lead the way."

Celestia motioned her hand slightly for the others to follow, Cadence sticking close to the front of the group alongside Twilight. The journey back to the hall they had left was short, in all honesty they didn't really require the escort. They turned a corner and went through the doors and into the room with the large marble table and chairs, all marines that they had left seeing still in their original seats. Most looked towards the ponies, bright metallic eyes and strong features staring straight at them, blinking a slightly disturbing few times as they all returned to their seats. Once they had all sat down the alien leader, Captain Errithius, stood up to address all before him.

"My brothers and I have concluded that it would be in the best interest to aid you in your efforts of national reclamation as best as we can." The marine said.

"Yeah!"

Although everypony managed to retain their overall composure at least a little bit, it seemed beyond Dash's capacity to contain her excitement, although Cadence couldn't lie in saying she clench her hands together and allow herself a warm, hopeful grin at the good news.

"However there are conditions you must be aware of. The first being that we are little over sixty space marines, and our enemy numbers in the hundreds of thousands, perhaps more. They have dozens of ships, we have just one. We are outrageously outnumbered, and therefore are in no condition to go to war with anyone. However, as much as full-scale conflict is a tactical impossibility, we do have the upper hand in terms of initiating precision strikes in key locations across your country. This means we will require information from you on the Federation, their active facilities, their function and their defenses. We'll need any files on their command staff if you have them, and we'll need complete cooperation coming from any of your nations own armed forces. Now even if we succeed in all these regards, I still cannot promise that we'll permanently sack Federation forces from your country, we can at least make it extremely difficult for them to operate at a functional capacity. Finally, princesses, I need you to understand a single important fact. The Federation may be driven to such a state of desperation that they choose to sever their ties to Equestria, and I have a feeling they're not just going to leave you unscathed. I fear they will seek to destroy as much of your nation as possible if they are forced to leave this system permanently. So in conclusion our mission from this point is enemy preoccupation; We disable what we can, when we can. We develop whatever strongholds we can and keep the Federation engaged and blind to our primary mission, which will be contacting the Imperium at large. Even if we succeed, the best outcome is that another rapid-response force is nearby and available to provide reinforcements, but the worst is that the Army and Fleet will have to amass a response force, and this could take weeks." Errithius informed, ensuring his words were steady and clear.

"So...that sounds like a lot of 'ifs' and 'buts'." Dash said with wide, desperate eyes.

"We knew this was a long-shot, Rainbow Dash. But this is the best hope we've had in three years, and I think it's worth taking the chance." Cadence said confidently, nopony noticing her lightly touch her lower stomach.

"My company has yet to fail it's mission in any campaign we have taken part in. I can promise you all that we'll do everything within our power to save your country, and if we do fail, we'll evacuate as many of you as we can into this craft. The very least we can do is ensure that this world doesn't become your tomb."

"Let's hope it never comes to that, Captain. I believe we already have plenty of information on the Federations facilities in the country, and I think we will have a way to get the rest of the information you need relatively quickly." Celestia said as she looked over to Rainbow Dash.

"I'm on it, Princess! Flitter and Cloudchaser will know how many troops go in and out of half the Fed bases in Equestria, and I know a few ponies who can fill in the rest." Dash replied enthusiastically.

"We'll sweep the ship to the edge of your nations region, but we'd rather not attract unwanted attention, so from there you'll be on your own. How much time will you require?" Errithius said, addressing the young pegasus.

"Gimme two days, I'll get the goods no sweat."

"Very well. We'll drop you off via gunship deployment, and after forty eight hours we'll have a scout squadron to rally with you at your original insertion point to radio in for extraction when you're done."

"Got it. Airship it in, scoop up the intel and meet up with your colt-scouts. And when I get back?" Dash asked, brow raised.

"Then we draw up battle plans."

Wake up, Luna

Luna woke as if she'd just been drowned. Her back arched and chest threw itself upwards as she gasped desperately for air, feeling almost as if somepony had just kicked her awake. A moment after waking her eyes, wide with fear grew sore, he whole head soon following. She felt as if she'd just been in a fight, like some villain had just thrown her around a castle hall and bruised every part of her body in the process. Her neck and limbs protested to any form of movement with a terrible aching pain, causing her to groan weakly. All she could do for now was weakly look about herself and at her surroundings. Her sore, throbbing eyes took a moment to adjust to the bright ambient light her environment seemed to emit, soon seeing around her what appeared to be some strange, advanced form of medical room. It was like a patient room one would find in a hospital only its pristine white walls were dotted with several computer consoles each, each console was wired to or attached to some form of machine, some holding vials of fluids of various colours, other displaying some form of readings like those seen on a heart monitor. In fact, there was a heart monitor, its screen however also displayed various other readings coming from other organs the princess could only guess the identity of. Luna's heart raced as she saw a table near her, atop it sat a neat row of medical equipment, ranging from simple cutting tools, drills, clamps, levers and syringes. Her eyes snapped down painfully fast to check on her body, which she found to thankfully be unscathed by any of the frightening medical equipment, the fur she could see showing no signs of being shaven or cut into. She found it strange that she was wearing some for of bandage and robing over her torso and across her hips, covering her in a decent manner, however looking more like sparring attire than a medical robe. She was laying down, laying in a bed that was, admittedly very comfortable, the cushiony surface made of an elastic, pure white fabric of sorts.

Luna clenched her eyes shut as a wave of pain washed over her head, the throbbing ache lasting a couple seconds before passing. She waited a moment and took a moment to try and remember what had happened, a million questions spiraling in her head. Where was she? Where was her sister? Where was everypony else? What had happened after they'd gone down into that cave beneath that store in the Crystal Empire? Had she been captured by the Federation? The last question seemed to cause another wave of pain to buzz through her head, this time lasting a little longer. Another question hit her in the back of the head after the pain passed.

Had I heard somepony wake me?

Luna carefully looked around again, this time beyond the medical equipment and the computer consoles. She looked at the walls surrounding her, the bright, well lit ceiling, the dark metal that composed what was some kind of mechanical door at the far end of the room to her left. She looked ahead and realized the darkness that had been ahead of her was actually the darkness beyond a pair of giant observation windows as some spots of glare revealed. Luna let out a soft sigh as she finally felt comfortable that she was alone.

Oh dear Luna, you've never been alone

"Wh-...Who said that?" Luna asked the air around her weakly.

I'll let you figure that out for yourself, Princess

"Where are you? Who are you?" Luna asked desperately, fear beginning to grip her as no sign of anyone else could be seen in the room she was laying in.

Okay, first: Stop talking. You must look insane just blubbering at an empty room. Second: You don't need to understand what's happening, not for what I have planned for you.

The voice began at first somewhat toneless, one could describe it as 'blurry', but now it had gained an unmistakable sinister quality. Luna recognized it as her own voice, only it held a slight hiss and growl to its quality. It held a constant tone of a pony who was utterly sure of themselves, to the point of being arrogant, and was almost assaulting in nature to it that made Luna feel like the voice was 'staring' at her.

I'm just exhausted. I'm hurt, exhausted and confused, and I just need to rest

Yes, rest. That will make this a lot easier

With that another wave of pain shot through Luna, this one so bad that it caused her to writhe slightly as the pain now travelled through the back of her neck and into her very heart.

What is this?! Who in Tartarus are you?!

Okay, at this point I am downright INSULTED!

As the voice growled at her another wave of pain soared through her, this one causing her to yell out in pain and convulse her so much she actually rolled off the medical bed, falling in a messy heap on the floor.

What are you doing to me?!

Taking over! I'm going to do what you and that foal, Celestia, should have done years ago!

Luna's eyes shot upon after hearing one word, a single word the sinister voice uttered. She'd only ever heard one pony call anypony else a 'foal'. Herself. A long time ago.

No. The Elements destroyed you

Even the power of the Elements could never destroy a part of yourself, Luna. They simply stripped me of power. Power I've taken far too long in replenishing. Power I will now use to save Equestria

Luna struggled on shaky arms and legs to right herself, getting to all fours after a series of grunts and groans of pained effort.

Save Equestria? What would you know about saving Equestria? You wanted to plunge the whole world in eternal night!

I still plan to, and it has nothing to do with saving MY nation. Eternal night is simply the deliverance of the aesthetic change Equestria deserves to be graced with. Living under the endless harmony of my beautiful night is something I know my subjects will warm to quickly, but there's one factor that is threatening my ultimate dream of claiming the nation I deserve

You have no hope of defeating the Elements, nor can you hope to stand against three other alicorns!

Oh dear, you are quite ignorant aren't you? You think I'm concerned with you and the little school club you've become a part of? I have my sights set on bigger fish, more specifically the fish you've spent three years tip-toeing around. And where you've failed time and again, I shall succeed, and all of Equestria will recognize me for the benevolent leader I am

Benevolent?! You're a wicked mare of darkness! And I won't let you hurt my friends!

When all of Equestria sees my for the princess I am, I won't have to. Could you really fight your former subjects to dethrone me? Just exactly how far are you willing to go to get Equestria back to the way it used to be? How many are you going to sacrifice? Me? I'll sacrifice nopony, destroy every trace of alien scum in the land and do it all myself

Not even you're that powerful, you can't destroy an entire army!

As always, everypony loves to underestimate me. It doesn't matter either way, I only need one last thing. I'll be taking my body back now, thank you very much

Another pain shot through Luna, all the way through her in fact. It felt like she was being filled up with liquid, like she was being pumped full of lava as her muscles burnt and her bones felt like they were about to break. She screamed out in pain, doubling over and curling in on herself in some vain effort to contain the agony breaking her apart from inside. A jolt of what felt like lightning shot through her spine, the convulsion of her body flinging her across the smooth, shiny floor beneath and nearer the door to her left. Suddenly a strange feeling came over Luna, for as much as she hurt all over, she felt almost recharged, refilled with the magic she'd long been missing. She found the strength to, albeit unsteadily, get to her feet while clutching at her throbbing head. She groaned as she tried slowly walking forward, utterly unsure of what was happening or what to do. Another jolt sent her flying to one knee, the muscles in her back tensing up as she fell. To steady her stumbling advance she attempted she clumsily threw a hand out to the nearest surface to her, which happened to be the observation window to her right. Her hand slapped against the smooth surface, only for a painfully sharp cracking noise to reply to her action.

Luna looked over at her hand, slowly. Her whole arm looked strange, almost as if it was swollen with some kind of infection under her dark blue fur. Her tense muscle twitched with the thunder of her heavy heartbeat for a couple of second before an immense pressure began to build in the appendage. It began as if her fur was catching on fire, a smoke as dark as darkness could be swam from patches on her arm, the patches growing and growing in size until her whole arm was engulfed in black smoke. When the smoke cleared Luna witnessed, to her horror, the muscles in her arm were growing immensely larger, her biceps almost twice the size of the average stallions. Luna stared in speechless terror for a moment before blurting out a blood-curdling scream as the bones in her arm vibrated a moment before cracking apart, stretching longer and thicker as her whole limb grew several sizes too big for the rest of her body. The glass at her shaking hand, already having been cracked at the impact of her empowered arm, now developed a vast spiderweb of crack as the pressure from her ever-growing arm put the glass through hell. Luna fell to her left, away from the window as another jolt shot through her shoulders, sending her to the floor a moment before a chorus of pops and crunching sounds burst from her back and ribs, several of the bandage straps around her chest splitting and snapping as her torso became swollen, the same black smoke peeling off from patches all over her body.

Luna's senses blurred, her perception of time seemed to black out, yet also simply slow down. She heard every bone pop, every muscle swell, the almost silent hiss of the ethereal smoke coming off from her now almost completely black fur which rippled with the changes occurring beneath it. Luna's mane drifted into sight, yet was vastly different from the gently drifting locks she'd known as her own, but were instead wild, held a more purple tinge in their colour and had grown vastly longer, her mane's now immense length waving, swirling and flicking all about her head and torso. Something began to tug at the back of her mind, a strange and hauntingly familiar mix of emotions seeping into her brain like poison soaking into a sponge. Her deep, raspy breaths gained a feral, rumbling quality much like the growling of a beast from the wilderness of Equestria. As her hands clenched at the floor, sharp talons stretched out from her once graceful fingers, scarring the pristine floor beneath her. Luna, now barely Luna at all, stood slowly, bandage and robe tearing around her still growing frame, every muscle in her body tensed as if a titanic rage was building within her. As if dying, falling from a great height to her death, Luna let out a cry, tears streaming from her eyes that now seemed further away from her by the second, like she was falling out of her own body. Luna closed her eyes, afraid of what awaited her in whatever deep, dark place she was headed before the sinking feeling in her heart stopped suddenly alongside all the aches and pains that had accompanied her terrifying transformation. Luna shot her eyes open to find herself suspended in almost complete darkness, unable to move anything but her eyes. However she did not feel bound or trapped, but utterly limbless, formless even, the only identity she held still was that of perception. She looked ahead and could soon make out a vision that developed before her, like she was watching a film of some sorts. But this was no film, it was her, it was what she was seeing, only it...wasn't her.

It was her.

Luna looked on helplessly as the conscious that had gripped her body and reshaped it as her own now observed itself in the cracked glass before her. Her reflection could be clearly seen, an immensely tall, deeply dark figure of terrifying proportions standing looking at its own reflection with a almighty sense of satisfaction. She was easily eight feet tall, taller than even Celestia, and was built like a warrior god from some ancient religion based on warfare and violence. Her arms were as thick as a pony, each, and ended in strong hands bearing razor sharp, diamond hard claws. Her legs were equally as muscular, perhaps even more so considering her still incredibly, and surprisingly, feminine form. Her stomach was rippling with muscle, her shoulders like blocks of pure power and her neck a thick pillar on which her smirking, wild eyed head sat upon. Her features were sharper than Luna's, stronger too, like a more threatening version of her sisters own features. Her eyes were no longer those of a pony, but instead glowing teal orbs with a single draconic scar of black running down each one vertically. Her mane was a fierce ocean of night sky given form, like a raging storm of stars and purple tinged darkness. Her coat of fur was black as the darkest shadow the universe could dream up of, so black in almost absorbed the very light in the room. Her wings, once avian and bearing beautiful feather, were now a twisted combination of avian from their base out until about half way down each 'finger' that now protruded out, leathery skin connecting each talon-tipped appendage much like the wings of a bat. Although this alicorn was built like a tanks welded atop another tank, her waist was still thin, her hips generously flared and her bust generously generous, giving her an unmistakably feminine form, just one built for combat and dominance through raw power

The dark alicorn smiled, gleaming white teeth with a carnivorous sharpness gleaming in her dark silhouette as she pumped the muscles in her back with power, her wings flaring out in a spectacle. The dark creature then pivoted on her hooves that now drew nearer one another, swiveling her whole form so that she could better observe the more un-observable portions of her body, her eyes gliding happily across her own back and rear which now bore a cutie mark picturing a light blue half-moon surrounded by violet mist. Putting a clawed hand on her wide hip, the alicorn swiveled back and looked dead into her own cat-like eyes, grinning victoriously as she placed one hoof before they other, her form bearing a degree of grace from the pose. Luna could only watch, trapped as an observer in the mind of a body that used to be hers, the medical bandages and robes still clinging tightly to her exaggerated frame, still managing to keep her decent. Luna looked at the reflection of the mare before her, staring in horror into the eyes she'd thought nopony would ever have to see again as the alicorn of darkness, Nightmare Moon, spoke.

"It's good to be back."

"A servitor will have a travelling pack ready for you in the hangar. It should contain all the essentials we can currently provide for two days travel, we've also included a sequence tuner, a universal digital access tool used by Imperial citizens and military personnel to directly access local software." Errithius said as himself and the ponies her escorted walked down a well-lit corridor towards one of the frigate's hangars.

"Cool. How does it work?" Rainbow Dash asked as she quickly checked through what supplies she had on her.

"The controls tend to be seen as quite intuitive, I'm sure you'll quickly learn to adapt to them through the devices walkthrough protocols." The marine replied.

"An' just are the rest of us supposed t' do while Dash runs her two day errand?" The farmer girl asked.

"Unfortunately all any of us can really do for now is wait to retrieve the information we require, I'm not overly fond of the idea of deploying brother marines into a facility I know nothing about. After your companion has returned, we shall draw battle plans and prepare to organize force deployment."

It appeared to the captain that Celestia was about to say something as they walked on before the rapid thundering of bootsteps hammered down the corridor towards them from behind, Errithius snapping his head around to witness what was approaching them. Brother Priest Nitheleon, who had gone to check over the medical condition of his fellow marines in the ship barracks sprinted passed the group, turning to the captain as he flew by.

"Captain, medical center, now!" Nitheleon blurted as he passed by, continuing on to soar down the corridor ahead.

"What is it?" Errithius asked concernedly as he too broke into a sprint after his brother, hearing the ponies behind him also quicken their pace but find themselves not fast enough to keep up with the Astartes.

"Princess Luna's vital reading just flat-lined after reporting a series of distressing readings." Nitheleon said in a hushed tone, one Errithius doubted the ponies could hear.

"She's dead?" Asked Errithius in deep confusion.

"I don't know. It would seem a highly unlikely occurrence seeing as she had remained stable for so long in such a contained environment. And her brain waves...before she went off line her neural readings went berserk in a series of waves, almost like a series of miniature seizures."

"What do you think is happening?"

"I think she's in trouble, one way or another. I'm hoping she's just fallen out of her observation bed. I suppose we're about to find out either way."

After a few more seconds of the pair turning corners, sprinting down hallways and hastening open blast doors they arrived at the medical deck, passing a handful of observation and containment rooms before reaching where the Princess had been held. They stared through the glass no longer than half a second, wasting no time after seeing the princess was absent of the room to enter the scene to assess what had happened. Errithius immediately took note of the access door, which looked like it had been pulled open by force, the top edge which held the door slab was dripping with hydraulic fluid and leaking softly with thin smoke. Inside, directly before their feet leading in a path halfway to Luna's bed lay a number of dark blue feathers, ones Errithius knew belonged to the princess, along with a few shreds of the medical attire she had been dressed in. More disturbing and incredibly perplexing was the large impact point that was smashing into one of the nearby windows, windows reinforce to withstand bullets and grenade blasts, and second to that were the deep scratch marks that where carved into the solid floor beneath them. Yet the answers to what had happened would have to wait, as either the rooms security footage would reveal what had happened, or they would have to get answers by finding the princess first. Celestia and the other ponies turned the corner, hurrying through the doors before coming to a fearful halt at the sight before them, Celestia herself cupping a hand over her own mouth in shock.

"What happened here? Was...was Luna being kept here?" Princess Twilight asked sheepishly.

"Was. I'll set up a shipwide alert to have everyone keep an eyes out for her, I'm sure the ships systems can track her down soon." Errithius assured as he turned to head back out the door.

"Captain. Where is my sister?" Celestia asked in a stern tone, yet her voice shaking almost uncontrollably.

"Princess, she's probably gotten herself lost. She's woken up in a place she's entirely unfamiliar to and probably went searching for all of you. I'm sure she's fine." Errithius said calmly before Nitheleon put a hand on his pauldron.

"Captain, that doors has been torn open, not sheepishly strolled through. For Throne's sake, the scratches in the floor, the glass. I'm starting to think perhaps Varadoch had a point."

"We assume nothing until we find the Princess." Errithius said back through clenched teeth.

"Alert! Blast door E-14 has suffered complete systems compromise. Alert! Blast door E-14 has been breached." The droning ships automated speaker system burped mechanically.

The occupants of the medical room wasted no time to find out what was happening, the marines taking the lead, leaving the ponies to soon fall behind them. After several more seconds of travel the company came to blast door numbered E-14, the marines slowling to observe the worrying sight before them. The two door slabs had been forced open, just like the one in the medical center, only these doors were much large, wide enough and tall enough to accommodate two side-by-side files of terminators walking through them. The edges sparked and whined as the motorized systems within their frames had been completely violated by brute force throwing them open.

"Captain, these doors would take a marine in full power armour to pry open." Nitheleon said in a desperate voice.

"Alert! Blast door E-19 has suff- Alert! Blast door E-19 has been breached." Blurted the ships systems once again.

"That leads to an airlock." Nitheleon said almost quietly to himself.

"She's trying to get outside." Errithius growled in frustration.

"Captain! What's happening?!" Celestia cried out from behind, desperately trying to keep up.

"Your sister's trying to get outside, she must believe we're holding her prisoner or something!" Errithius called out back to the princess.

"Are we just going to ignore how a princess just pulled open two Astarte-vessel blast doors?!" Nitheleon barked as he darted after the captain who'd once again broken into a sprint.

The marines headed to the second set of blast doors, finding them in a similar state to the first they'd encountered, then straight for the nearest airlock, Errithius making a point to properly assess every corridor he turned into, keeping his hearing and sense of smell well within mind so that he wouldn't suddenly stumble into the runaway princess. Another set of bootsteps was heard approaching before the bionically reconstructed Varadoch turned a corner behind both the captain and sanguinary priest and sought to quickly catch up with them.

"Alert! Airlock E-4 inner pressure doors breached."

"Captain! What's happening?!" Varadoch barked from behind Errithius.

"One of the princesses decided to get some fresh air!" The captain called back, his tone bearing the equivalent to a verbal shrug.

"Alert! Airlock E-4 breached. Hull security compromised!" The ship bleated, almost in a panicked tone.

Errithius turned a final corner, seeing the open door straight ahead of him, just a few dozen feet away, yet there was no sign of the rouge princess. The marines shot through, heads swiveling wildly as they looked about desperately to find their target. Errithius was forced to squint his eyes for a moment as the fierce, cold winds whipping about him combined with the bright setting sun well within his field of vision made his search slightly uncomfortable. His senses adjusted within the second, and he continued his search, steadily marching forward along one of the ships spinal access walkways, his armoured boots slamming loudly upon the metal beneath him. He soon heard the ponies that followed him begin to catch up, nearing the airlock he'd just sprinted through.

Errithius walked onward until he spotted an unfamiliar silhouette stood directly in front of the setting, orange sun ahead of him. He strode forward with the surety and precision he had always marched with, until something about the figure before him seemed a little too familiar. Wings, large wings much like those of a bat or fire drake spread from the creature ahead, each digit of the massive, webbed appendages tipped with a talon and the colour of the hellish things blacker than darkest night. Only the creatures he'd witness claw their way from the dread-relam of unreality bore such frightening features, creatures he and his whole species held a bottomless abhorrence towards. This familiarity caused Errithius' hand to shoot to his side, his palm placed firmly upon the grip of his bolt pistol locked to his hip. However his fingers did not clutch at the weapon at his side, instead simply floating around it as he moved cautiously forwards. As he drew closer, Errithius could make out more and more of the figure ahead; Powerful limbs, female frame, strong core muscles, clawed fingers, hair and tail almost alive with some strange otherworldly energy and fur a as dark as the flesh of a Salamander space marine. After Errithius had closed in to stand no further than twenty feet away from the strangely space marine-sized creature the other ponies had reached his location, the captain shooting an arm out to his side to prevent them from rushing any closer.

"Luna!" Celestia practically screamed, seeing what she must have thought was her sister standing firmly at the edge of the frigate's top deck, one hooved leg raised to stand atop one of the railings ahead of it.

Upon hearing the cry of the princess, the creatures tufted ears swiveled sharply, a second later its thick, muscular neck slowly turning to reveal its face. It was some strange sub-breed of native the captain had not seen before, one he doubtlessly could say was the largest he'd encountered so far, bearing both large wings and a single, long, slightly curved horn in the middle of its forehead. Its eyes were aglow with a vibrant teal light, its pupils feline slits running vertically down the bright orbs. It's face held a strange quality to it, as if grace and strength blended together perfectly to chisel its faultless features, features casually pulled into a gentle, yet confident smirk.

"You never really any good with names, were you, Celestia?"

The female pony's voice was strong, slightly deeper than those of the others he'd met and held a strange growling undertone to it, giving her a slightly unsettling quality.

"No...No...Please, Luna. Why are you doing this? What's happened? What's wrong?" Celestia stammered, eyes wide with fear, those around her stunned with complete shock.

"Luna?" Nitheleon blurted from behind in disbelief as he looked on at the creature ahead of him.

"If you value your life I wouldn't make a habit of calling me by a name that is in no way my own!" The large female barked at Nitheleon, her very body seeming to bristle with some form of entrapped energy that made the air around her crackle slightly.

"Princess, who is this?" Errithius said quickly, his discomfort at the situation before him doubling every second, his hand still rested on his sidearm.

"She's...she's..." Celestia stammered, seemingly chocked by what she was seeing.

"She's Nightmare Moon, mare of darkness, bringer of the night eternal." Twilight said fiercely, eyes locked with Nightmare Moon's, who gave a wide grin in response to hearing her own title.

"Why thank you, Princess Twilight Sparkle for such an embellished introduction." Nightmare Moon replied in an incredibly honest sounding appraisal.

"Interesting title." Murmured Errithius, though apparently not quite enough.

"Oh you'll soon see exactly how interesting I can be. I would love to wait for you to catch up and witness me liberate all of Equestria single handed, but I'm afraid my subjects are quickly running out of time, and I doubt they'd appreciate their future princess dawdling about in the face of their despair." The dark pony said theatrically as she lifted herself to stand atop the railing ahead of her, her whole form seeming to be utterly unaffected by the howling winds swirling about her as her wings stretched into a half-spread position.

"You can't do that! You can't fight the entire Federation just by yourself! You'll get yourself and Luna killed!" Twilight bellowed over the winds protesting.

"Your beloved Princess Luna had similar concerns, and I can assure you I've waited long enough, collected enough magic and finalized my plans for destroying those alien murderers long before your little resistance even held its first meeting. You see conquest is something of a past time of mine, and I have plans to grow increasingly efficient at it."

Before any more could be said, heavy foot falls rang out as Varadoch marched viciously forward and towards Nightmare Moon, bolter raised. Nightmare turned about, sharp teeth bared as she snarled in an almost feral manner, hands clenched and muscles tight with the anger that boiled within her in seeing such an insult.

"I don't care much for your plans, whoever you are. Dead or alive, you're coming with me." Varadoch growled, his face contorted with a burning anger of his own, the two locking eyes so fiercely Errithius could almost feel a heat blazing from between them.

"No! Please!" Celestia threw herself forward, both her arms wrapping around the middle of Varadoch's bolter, using all her strength to desperately throw off his aim, and failing greatly.

"Get off of me!" Varadoch roared, effortlessly throwing Celestia off his weapon, her wings and back slamming into the railing next to the marine.

This caused something within Nightmare Moon to apparently burst with rage as her whole form floated off from the railing, bat-like wings spread, eyes fierce, mane and tail flailing about wildly as if caught in a tornado. Lightning arched from her body, striking at the metal of the ship below her a second before a shockwave, similar to the one Princess Luna had incapacitated herself with, blasted from her body, rattling all around her. Errithius and Nitheleon where brought to a knee as their balance was shaken off, the ponies around them tumbling back as if being tackled into, however Varadoch remained upright, his boots grinding across the walkway floor as he skidded backwards several feet. He gave a deep grunt as it seemed the attack left him thoroughly shaken before looking up to his foe once more with burning hate.

"Okay then," Nightmare Moon began, gathering her confident composure once again, "So, while I go to save Equestria, you can all sit in your sky-ship and just...well, do nothing, really." The dark princess said with a toothy grin and deep chuckle.

Errithius looked up to see Varadoch take two steps forward before raising his weapon again, the Captain fearing this time it would be for taking a shot.

"Varadoch, don't!" The captain barked.

"Catch up whenever you're ready!" Nightmare Moon said gleefully as her wings stretched out high and wide before giving one titanic beat, catapulting her high into the dusk-lit sky above, her shrinking silhouette soaring towards the setting sun, vanishing with seconds of having taken off.

Varadoch lowered his weapon, his arms relaxing in defeat as his weapon fell shortly to be cradled before his chest. Errithius closed his eyes slowly and let out a sigh, one half composed of relief and half exasperation. His eyes did not open again for several seconds, instead the captain allowing himself a moment of peace, one he knew would be the last for quite a long while. He emptied his mind of all the madness that had consumed the past day, his concerns and stresses washing away under the whispering sound of the wind rushing by.

12 - Up to speed

Celestia could but only helplessly flap her expansive wings, kick her firm legs out and tug at the iron grip of the space marine with her graceful hands. His grip around her throat was not actually tight at all, but was so solid the princess could have been fooled into thinking somepony had caste a cement block around her neck. She strained her features in utter panic, eyes filled with tears and blurring her vision, blurring the world around her down to far more basic blobs of colour. She could make out down the dark bronze of the corridor she was being dragged down a collection of colourful blobs made their way closer to her ever moving position. She could make out a chorus of various voices blurting out from the colours, all sounding out in some kind of protest judging by their tones. The marine that dragged her along by the neck seemed to be utterly unphased by whatever the voices were saying, however, as he continued his relentless march onwards, titanic bootsteps thundering down the corridor. After several seconds of blurry surroundings, disorientating motion and a multitude of barking voices the princess was brought to a stop, allowing for less than a second of reprieve before she was catapulted up and into a nearby wall by the space marine's powerful arm, his hand releasing it's grip on her neck before his armoured forearm shot up and pinned the alicorn up again the metallic surface of the wall behind her. Celestia's eyes shot open in shock to stare into the marine's own, their fiery golden depths burning with utter hate.

"What was...that!" The alien barked at her, his tone just as furious as it was helplessly confused.

"Sergeant! I am ordering you to release her!" Errithius barked from behind the space marine that assaulted her.

"Just another detail you just happened to forget to mention?! You tell us everything, now!" Varadoch growled, his voice so tense Celestia feared he'd soon be spitting blood at her.

"I said let her go, Ellisior!"

Varadoch seemed to stay his efforts for a moment at the mention of what Celestia could only assume was his first name. An armoured hand grabbed Varadoch by the front edge of his left pauldron and wrenched him back, spinning him around as he was thrown back, dropping Celestia to slump to the floor in a weakened, sad state. Varadoch and Errithius locked eyes, their faces no further than six inches apart, features tense and eyes unblinking. Celestia could have likened the stand off as that between two lions.

"This is wrong." Varadoch hissed.

"It is, and I'm stopping you from making it worse." The captain growled back.

"Worse? It's already worse. It's been worse every second since we left that holding cell. We need to leave, Captain, we need to leave this planet now."

"The barracks, Ellisior. We'll talk later." Replied Errithius in a low tone.

Varadoch stared on, his face bubbling with fury as his very posture shifted with tense frustration before his head finally snapped away from Errithius' gaze, the marine stomping away in what seemed like a temporary defeat. Not four paces away and Varadoch turned around for a moment to stare at Errithius once again, a finger jabbing at him viciously.

"Heed my words, Captain! This planet...these people...they are cursed!"

With that the marine turned to march off again, turning a corner to finally disappear from sight, allowing a sense of cold relief to wash over Celestia. Errithius stared on for a moment before letting out a sigh and closing his eyes, his head dropping slightly. Celestia had only just now noticed her fellow ponies were gathered about her, Twilight holding her limp hand and the rest equally eager to ensure her well-being. Twilight spent a few seconds gently stroking the back of her former mentors hand before she turned to stand up and face the space marine captain. Even though the giant alien was over a foot and a half taller than her and outsized her in raw bulk a few times over, the young princess stared up at him as if her very gaze would melt the armour right off his flesh.

"I don't know about where you come from, but here, throttling a princess isn't exactly something that makes you many friends." The comparatively tiny princess said sternly, her eyes fiercely looking up at Errithius who didn't seem to react at all to her implication.

Instead, the marine slowly extended his large hand and with its back side gently moved Twilight out of the way, earning himself a very insulted look from the purple alicorn. Once moved out of his line of sight of Celestia, the captain looked down at her with a relaxed, yet slightly tense expression before talking in a firm tone.

"I believe there are some issues we should discuss."

The discussion had been going on for over two hours now, and yet Commander Gerin'Gov's eyes had yet to truly adjust to the meeting rooms seemingly endless darkness, the central luminary bulb suspended above the central table providing light that only seemed to travel to every chair surrounding the table, but not an inch further. Gerin'Gov was growing tired of the ramblings, the dissecting of specifics and the needless observation of implications and opinions. The situation was as simple as they come:

The Federation was under attack.

"I say we pull all units off world. We prime kinetic-batteries now and we can fire a volley into the planet's surface as soon as the last drop-ship leaves the atmosphere." The commander grumbled as he lent his elbows on the table before him.

"That's a pretty stupid plan. You see what's wrong with it don't you?" The female Officiator, Megna'Gilith, said with an amused huff.

"Indulge me." Gerin'Gov growled in frustration at the Gilith's smug implications.

"Well first, your plan involves destroying Federal property worth a substantial amount, and second, the official logging reports would take years to complete. Not to mention the capital will demand a report on why we destroyed such a valuable investment like the facilities we have on this planet just because we couldn't destroy one ship."

"Alien, Gilith, one alien ship." Unal'Gov, an apparently very tired scientist working in the facility they were currently in said weakly.

"Please, our readings revealed the ship was a quarter the size of one of our cruisers, and we have a Giga-craft in system three times that size. When we find out where they're hiding, destroying them will be like a Benefactor squashing an insect." Megna'Gilith chuckled.

"One shot. Their craft took one shot after being bombarded by over twenty weapon units. Their scanners read clean through our entire ship in less than eight milliseconds and found one of the ship generators that fed the rear stabilizers. One shot cut through a hundred and fifteen decks, destroyed the generator, fried the power conduits throughout the cruisers stern and left the crew sprawled or splattered on whatever surface was directly behind them as the ship fell back like an anchor!" Unal'Gov blurted, his tone growing more desperate by the second.

"Heh, the way I understand it, they got a lucky shot. It would seem they were aiming at the cruisers engines and managed to hit the stabilizer generator by coincidence. Plus, now we can anticipate their attacks and re-calibrate our ships shields to counter their weapons."

"No. No we cannot. They didn't hit that ship with any kinetic attack whatsoever. They used some energy based weapon that the cruisers shields completely ignored."

"That's stupid, everything in the universe has kinetic value."

"Does light? Heat? Gravity? Radiation? All of them can be affected by kinetic values, but they also bypass kinetic registers. I don't remember the last time I walked outside and was thrown to the ground because the sunlight was hitting me with kinetic force!" The scientist said almost helplessly.

"What are you saying, that they shot us with sunlight?" Gerin'Gov asked sarcastically.

"They shot the cruiser with...I'm...I don't really know what they used. It was some form of laser weapon that also emitted a powerful energy blast. It was like the weapon was a multi-stage energy emitter, the energy pulse that crippled the cruiser was somehow shot down the length of the laser that fired a fraction of a second beforehand."

"Sounds like you admire them." Megna'Gilith inquired suspiciously.

"It's hard not to admire the elegance of such a powerful weapon. It's also worth noting that that was a single weapon system, one weapon out of over a dozen others the ship had. If they catch another ship unawares or unprepared again, I don't think we'll be so fortunate to get away with a half-salvageable, crippled craft." Replied the scientist grimly.

"I've heard enough of these theories and fears. We take action, right now. I propose we cut this joke of a planet loose." The commander growled.

The Feds were quiet for a moment, some looking at each other, some just thinking to themselves.

"Benefactor Supreme, you engaged these aliens, what do you think our next move should be?" The science facility Attendant asked.

Benefactor Supreme Yuni'Gov had hardly said a word after giving his debrief of the situation his last mission devolved into. The Benefactor was still wearing his armour and battle dress, and even though it'd been almost a whole day since first contact with the alien creatures in the subterranean facility his white battle plate still had the dark red of Fed blood spattered on it at the shoulder and knee. He stared at the table as if under a spell, his hands rested before him on the table, tightly gripping one another.

"We should destroy this planet. No kinetics, no re-settlement, just get a Punisher in orbit, destroy the entire planet."

Gerin'Gov gave an amused huff, throwing his arms up slightly in defeat at such an outrageous proposal. The other officials and officers seemed to hold similar opinions to such a claim, some seemingly outright tickled by the proposition as they emitted squealing chuckles.

"A Punisher Giga-craft? Of course, why didn't I think of that? Are you seriously comparing the danger of fighting a single alien ship with the spread of the unliving virus across an entire planet? You're saying that this situation is as bad as what happened almost a hundred years ago?" Gerin'Gov spat.

"No, I'm saying it's worse you stupid, old fuck! There couldn't have been more than fifty of them, and they chewed the insertion force to pieces! You've all read the mission report, you've seen how many waves of reinforcements I had to call in just to get our military assets out of there!" The Benefactor shrieked hysterically.

"On that subject, Commander Reem'Gov is less than impressed in how your little field trip spent six whole drop-ship's worth of troops. He was under the impression he'd have the rest of that evening free to focus on digi-work." Megna'Gilith said with a stern expression.

"He can go and get fucked! I needed to get out of there! You all wanted the immortals and their hardware to come back intact!" Yuni'Gov continued spitting in hysterics.

"Indeed we did, but that's because we thought you where going to arrest a group of rebel morons, not engage an alien military detachment." Gerin'Gov snorted, Yuni'Gov shooting him a profanity in the form of a hand gesture in response.

"Doctor, what did the bio-teams find through examining the corpses of our troops?" The Attendant asked Unal'Gov.

"Their small arms fire is...well, it's hard to really call it small arms fire at all really. Massive kinetic value is shown to be used by each round fired, we calculate through observing battle-footage, via a small rocket thruster located behind each round. Once the rounds penetrate the armour of our Benefactors and enter their bodies, each round seems to 'wait' until it has reached the center of mass of its victim before violently detonating. As much as the bodies are riddled with dense shrapnel, really, the initial detonation is what destroys the target, leaving them in...well, leaving them in quite a messy state."

"What countermeasures do we have for this?" Gerin'Gov asked.

"Here? None. The only way we could out match their ground troops is if we had twice as many Immortals as they have infantrymen." The scientist said with a huff, seemingly amazed by his own statement.

"That's ridiculous. You can't expect the Federation to commit to deploying a whole division of the Immortals corps just t-" The Gilith official began before being cut off.

"You don't see it, do you?! Have you even watched the battle footage from the encounter?!" The young scientist blurted before typing on his wrist-tablet, a holographic image being projected to the center of the table for all to see.

The footage that was revealed was a first-person perspective view from a Benefactor who was in the middle of a firefight in some dark, seemingly crystalline environment. Red Magna-rounds zipped and sizzled through the air, snapping off wall and floor, but also off of the armour of large, bulky figures that stood ahead of the Benefactor. More fire came from beyond the sight of the camera, presumably coming from the rest of the squad the Benefactor they observed belonged to. Again, more rounds hit home, striking at the aliens before them in the chest, legs and shoulders, but to seemingly no lethal effect as the aliens continued standing and delivered their own fire at the Feds that attacked them, each shot soon followed by a sickening, meaty pop, some even followed by agonized screams of the wounded and dying.

"Look at this! Their firing positions, their resolve, their commitment. Everything we threw at them did little more than scratch at the surface of their armour, suppressive fire has little to no effect in pinning them behind cover and this is them in a tactically deficient condition, caught unawares and terribly ill informed. Now they've regrouped, they have a mobile stronghold that we can't find and their very nature seems to indicate their not ones to shy away from the proposition of a fight, a fight this trigger-happy Supreme had no trouble inviting them into." Unal'Gov growled as he gestured to Yuni'Gov.

"I could shoot you for your disrespect!" The Benefactor barked as he stood from his chair.

"Make as many threats as you want, it won't change the fact that you could have just started a war. Why is all reason has no one asked the biggest question yet? Where do they come from? What if there's more of them, lots more, what if there's more of them than there are of us? If we've started a war with a space-faring faction of aliens that outnumber, outgun and so utterly outmatch us on every level in conflict, we could be facing the extinction of our entire species!"

None present uttered a word, every officer and official keeping their mouths firmly sealed tight and sheepishly looking down at their hands.

"But no, we don't want to think about that, do we? We don't want to think about how almost everyone in this room could be held responsible for the single greatest threat to our species in all of history. Not that it'd matter much, since we'd all be dead shortly after our trials either way."

"Alright, that's enough. We can think on the implications of this situation for weeks and still get nowhere. The question remains; What do we do now?" Asked Gerin'Gov after a short sigh.

"Let's say the rolls are reversed, for a second, and we come under attack by an alien faction. Say a single ship of ours is lost in uncharted space, then what? Would the Federation simple shrug off the disappearance? If these aliens are even a fraction as smart as they appear, they are not going to ignore one of their ships simply going missing." Said Unal'Gov.

"If you'd checked the research report on the underground facility you'd know the residue of the cell the ship was held in was over a thousand years old. I'm willing to bet whatever 'empire' they belonged to stopped looking for them a long time ago. Assuming their empire even still exists." The facility Attendant snorted.

"And if you'd read my report you'd know that what we could analyse from their ship suggests their communications have been offline that entire time, and came back online soon after their craft came back online, meaning they can start calling for help. And I'm willing to bet any civilization able to build anything like that ship builds to last, for a long, long time. There's evidence to suggest that their ship itself was actually centuries old. And judging by the crafts performance, I don't think their technology really has a sell-by date." The scientist remarked.

"So what's your point?" Yuni'Gov hissed.

"The evidence that stands confirms that we cannot achieve a long-term win scenario. Even if we somehow managed to destroy their ship, there's a high probability that reinforcements will arrive here, perhaps tomorrow, perhaps in a years time. We have to initiate a diplomatic arrangement that allows for them to be given safe passage off-world in exchange for the Equestrians."

"You want to try and arrange a compromise with those...things?!" The Benefactor spat.

"What makes to think they'll cooperate?" Megna'Gilith growled impatiently.

"I don't. I think they're going to stay in this system and cook us alive in our own spacecraft. Then I think their buddies are gonna come to see what's happening as join in. I think they're gonna squeeze us until we sing the name of our home world and every bastion from here to there. I think they'll finish a feud we started, and I think the rest of the galaxy'll just keep spinning on, having long since forgotten us many years after the last of us have died. But I also think that if there's any chance of saving us from such a future, it lies not in firing every gun all our ships have at a planet we, quite frankly, need and cheering as we destroy another few billion innocent families, but instead dropping to our knees, putting on our best pouty faces on and pleading for cooperation." Unal'Gov said plainly.

"The Federation does not negotiate with terrorists." Megna'Gilith said with a heavy sense of pride.

"What little dream world do you occupy? These aren't terrorists, they are a vastly superior alien military organisation, one we have really, really pissed off. One that seems to have taken a shining to the native population of this planet, the very people that still mostly hate our guts. If there ever was a time to grovel and negotiate, it would be right now!" The scientist blurted hysterically.

Again, the room was silent for a half a minute, all present left with their own thoughts. Gerin'Gov himself hated everything the immature little turd of a scientist had said, but the thing he hated most was that everything he had said was based on solid evidence that none of them could ignore any longer. As much as he was sure every Fed on this planet would have taken not a second to vote to blow these aliens and this whole planet to the darkest corner of the universe, he knew in doing so he could well doom all the Federation to the same fate that revealed itself in the holo-screen that floated before his eyes. Since the scientist had first spoken, the feed had displayed the footage from the battle from the previous day, and had ended a few seconds ago, the Benefactor the camera had belonged to having since been shot dead, the camera now lying on the crystal floor at an angle, half of the lens spattered with the owners dark red blood.

"Alright, I'm going to convene with the other military chiefs to instill a cease-fire. I'm to assume your department will be responsible for instigating and sustaining negotiable terms with the aliens?" The commander asked the Officiate nearby.

"Commander, are you sure this-?"

"Yes. You've been presented the evidence just like the rest of us have. It's not the evidence any of us wanted, but it's just what we have to deal with. Now I'll ask again; Can we rely on your department to fulfill it's functional requirement?" Asked Gerin'Gov in a slow, stern tone.

"Of course." Megna'Gilith replied after a short pause.

"You can't seriously be considering this?!" The gore-stained Benefactor yelled to the entire room, arms flailing.

"Yuni'Gov, I advise you spend the rest of the campaign in a less interactive position. You've already been through too much to be assessed as entirely combat effective, and we will need everyone on the ground at 100%, even if things don't turn out for the worst." The commander said in as bland as tone as he could manage, trying to cover his feelings of magnificent amusement for how much this would get under Yuni'Gov's skin.

"You can't do that! That's not fair!" The Benefactor practically shrieked.

"I can. I vastly outrank you."

"Under Federal military law I am not obliged to follow any order you give me that I see as misguided or unreasonable." Yuni'Gov growled through gritted teeth.

"Of course, but any order you don't follow that then causes combat inefficiency will be considered a crime you have directly committed. If any loss of life occurs under your command you will be held for each death as though it were a murder." Gerin'Gov shrugged.

The two locked eyes, the Benefactor Supreme staring in an enraged state into the Commander's own, of which remained far more relaxed. With a grunt of frustration, slamming his fists on the table in juvenile protest, the Benefactor marched out the meeting room's automated doors, leaving the rest of the occupants silently sitting in an awkward silence. Besides the Commander, who seemed very pleased with himself.

"How, exactly, do we contact the alien ship to discuss negotiations?" Megna'Gilith groaned impatiently.

"We call the whole planet. Have every ship relay and project a single message through every manner of communication we can send it by. I trust you'll be as warm and inviting as is required for such a delicate situation?" The commander said as he leaned back in his chair, savoring the distaste and frustration coming from those he had grown to deeply dislike the whole time he'd been in this joke of a solar system.

"And you had...no way of knowing this condition was afflicting your sister?" Nitheleon asked, his tone a slight distrustful.

"No! No, of course not! I...I mean, we never had any reason whatsoever to believe that...she would return." Celestia said, just as panicked as she had been since being released from Varadoch's vice-like grip.

Errithius shifted in his marble chair, turning to the other ponies, each having taken a seat themselves.

"And what of the rest of you? Did any of you talk to Luna recently? Have you noticed anything odd about her behaviour?" The marine asked in a quiet voice, his mind a jumble of issues in need of sorting.

"Well, it was pretty obvious that Aunty Luna has been very unwell recently. She has been growing weaker by the day for the past couple of years, but we thought it was something to do with what the Federation was doing." Princess Cadence added.

"I have to admit, it is a little odd how weak she was getting compared to how the rest of us have fared. I mean, I don't feel I bear the same amount of magic I once had access too, but I feel far from being half-comatose. Do you think Nightmare Moon might have been, somehow, tromenting Princess Luna?" Twilight asked, concerned at the thought.

"I...I don't think so. At least not directly. What can we say we know about what's happened to Luna for sure?" Celestia asked to all the ponies in general.

"Well, for one, it's highly likely that whether consciously or unconsciously harboring Nightmare Moon, it took a lot out of her physically. Like a sickness." Twilight added first.

"I noticed, maybe a couple of times, it seemed like she was flinching. Like she was in actual pain, or startled by something like somepony talking to her. Maybe she was aware that Nightmare Moon was still within her somehow." Cadence said next.

"I couldn't help but notice that her mane was lacking its usual starlight glow and elegant weightlessness. I don't know if that has anything to do with how her magic was being affected." Said Rarity.

"We haven't spoken in months...not really. Just organizing resistance movements, sneaking from town to town to keep out of the Federation's sight. It's been so long since I actually asked her how she was, how she was feeling...anything. This is my fault." Celestia's heels were on the very precipice of tears, Errithius could smell the blood rushing to her head as her features tightened.

"Alright, I can believe you all had no way of knowing what was happening to the princess. But I do need to know what you know about this 'Nightmare Moon' character." Errithius continued, changing the subject as to keep the snow-white princess talking, he could ill afford any in this hall falling into an non-interactive state.

"She...well, it's a little complicated. In our world, out of all the dangerous wild creatures and powerful adversaries we have faced in the past, no enemy has been so expansive or had as many faces as Dark Magic. Dark Magic is an energy much like regular Equestrian magic, only it's nature is far more...unpredictable, far more volatile." Celestia begun, Errithius looking to Tyreth as what Celestia was talking about sounded frighteningly familiar, the Chaplain seeming to have nothing to say on the matter for now.

"Dark Magic has developed since the founding of Equestria, going from a form of otherworldly energy, to some form of intelligence, although quite a simple one. It tends to act like a predator, sniffing out emotions and magical spells that it can infect and feed from, such emotions being despair, anger, greed and jealousy. Luna...a long time ago her role in Equestria was so much less celebrated than it is today, and such isolation from the lives she felt she affected so much, along with their overall disregard for her led her to grow steadily more bitter over time. Just over a thousand years ago these feelings she harboured drew the attention of Equestria's Dark Magic, it burrowed deep into her mind, developing an identity of its own based off of Luna's own sorrow and her desire to be admired. This artificial personality eventually grew so powerful from my sisters growing instabilities that when she decided to confront me, when she decreed she would never lower the moon from in front of the sun for all time, the darkness festering within her took over her mind, followed immediately by her very physical form until all that was left was the wicked mare of darkness; Nightmare Moon. Nightmare Moon then made it well known from then on that her only goals in her mind were to dethrone me and bring about nighttime eternal."

"After learning what my sister had become, I found I was greatly outmatched by the raw power of her magic, and that my only option of saving Equestria was to use the Elements of Harmony. However, in doing so I could not wield them as effectively as I could with my sister, as we had done before, and the very nature of them being used against...against my dearest friend somehow threw off the very nature of the spell I was casting. I meant to cleanse my sister of the Dark Magic she was infected with, and even though I knew it would be quite painful for her to experience, I knew that afterwards I'd have my beloved sister back to the way she was once again. However instead of this, the Elements almost decided to instead imprison her within the moon for a thousand years. After all that time passed, she did indeed return as I had interpreted from the Elements, still bent on dominating all of Equestria. However in that time the Elements had chosen new, far more suitable bearers, and in doing so were far better suited for cleansing the darkness from within my sister, finally returning her to me. But...well this is where I just don't understand what's happening. The Elements should have easily been able to completely strip away the essence of Nightmare Moon from my sister, the only thing I could possibly think of right now as to how she still exists is that for some reason, one completely beyond my understanding, the Elements did not destroy her for an actual reason. Perhaps they saw some use for Nightmare Moon in Equestria's future."

"Like today?" Nitheleon asked in a soft, inquisitive tone.

All heads turned to the Sanguinary Priest, yet none spoke, instead everyone present simply waited a few seconds for him to explain himself.

"Nightmare Moon said, we all heard it, she said she wanted to save Equestria. That she actually had a way of evicting the Federation from 'her' country. I think perhaps, if she is so sure, she might just be able to do so. You just said yourself, Celestia, she's far more powerful than even you. Maybe she'll end up doing our job for us." The priest said.

"Yeah, but at the cost of eternal darkness! If she does manage to get rid of the Federation, as soon as she does she'll declare herself the new princess of all Equestria and will never raise the sun ever again. And without the Elements, the Tree, the Heart, there's no way we could stop her." Rainbow Dash blurted in frantic reminder.

"Just to get things into a clearer perspective, if Nightmare does, indeed, hold dominion over all Equestria she will bring about an unending night. And, what else exactly? I assume she'll be seeking to execute all of you?" Errithius inquired.

The ponies looked they were on the very edge of confirming the captain's assumptions before all of them stopping, mouths hung open for a second as they were just about to speak before slowly closing them, their expression seeming to display how they were trying to remember some time that held a reference for their confirmation. However after a few seemingly endless seconds none of them seemed to dig up anything to help their case.

"Y'know what, I don't actually remember a time when Nightmare Moon was actually tryin' tah...y'know...kill us. I mean, there was that thing with dangling us over a cliff." The farm hand added.

"That's true, but it seems a little odd considering the rest of the trails she put us through in our search for the Elements seemed more geared towards just scaring us off." Twilight seemed to think aloud.

"Yeah, and I guess when compared to those squid-heads I'd rather take on Nightmare Moon any day." Dash weighed in.

"I always thought Nightmare Moon was kinda cool." Pinkie said in her seemingly consistent cheery tone.

"Uhm, excuse me?" Twilight blurted, seeming to be almost directly insulted.

"Well, I mean sure, she was a big meanie. A queen meanie if you ask me. But the only thing I remember about her is how much she made me laugh with those silly tree faces." The pink girl continued, finishing the sentence with a not-so-graceful chuckle.

"I suppose when I look back on that whole evening I mostly just remember it as the best bonding experience I've ever shared with anypony. And if that's the one thing I remember best, I find it hard to truly call Nightmare Moon all that evil." Agreed Rarity.

"Girls, please, try to remember she does want to shroud the land in eternal night. No matter how tame her plights against you might have seemed, her ultimate goal does indeed mean the end of all life in Equestria and beyond." Cadence reminded with concern.

"I don't understand. Her motives seem to be centered around harvesting adoration and veneration. Seems entirely counter-productive to destroy those you wish to worship you." Nitheleon said, perplexed.

"Wouldn't be the first time a daemon's motives are invalidated by it's methods." Riveth growled in a low tone.

"That is yet to be concluded. I for one doubt she is a form of daemon entirely, based on how our flesh was not set ablaze as soon as she looked upon us." Errithius huffed.

"You say she was trapped...'within' your moon for a thousand years. What was your understanding of the effects of eternal night back then? What did you know of it's consequences?" Tyreth asked Celestia.

"Well I suppose back then...we wouldn't have known of it's scientific ramifications. I merely stopped her due to knowing how miserable ponies would be in eternal darkness. I suppose I...we never would have known how it would also eventually bring a deathly winter, or kill all plant life. Do you suppose-?" Celestia said, leaving the statement open.

"Of course! She's not trying to bring about eternal night to actually hurt anypony, she doesn't know it's going to destroy Equestria! She must just think that ponies will eventually get used to, and then eventually admire, her nighttime." Twilight finished, eyes wide in revelation.

"Wait! Your telling me that Nightmare Moon is quote-on-quote 'evil' due to a lack of modern education?!" Rainbow Dash blurted.

"Makes sense Ah s'pose. No ponies would dare talk to her after she returned, an' I guess we were all just too caught up in stopping her that nopony ever really thought to explain to her what she was actually doing." Applejack said, giving the room a slightly ashamed shrug.

"I suppose what we can gather from this is that your Nightmare Moon holds no hostile intentions for Equestria, at least not directly, so that leaves us with only one other concern." Errithius said, his brow furrowed.

"My sister." Celestia said in a low tone, looking as her own interlinking hands.

"It's well within reason to assume she's still within the subconscious of Nightmare Moon's mind, considering her past experiences with her, however her fate is from this point directly tied with Nightmares actions. If Nightmare does something to endanger herself, she does so to Luna as well." The captain explained.

"Captain, why are we even discussing this? The fate of a single native, no matter how tragic or significant surely holds no priority over the fate of millions of others." Biemark added in a careful tone.

"First, she's my sister," Celestia began fiercely, "But beyond that, Luna's very essence of being is tied to that of the moon. Without her, although I can't be certain, I do believe that the moon itself will fall beyond perhaps anypony's ability to control, Equestrian and alien alike."

"Celestia, with all due respect, I fail to see the legitimacy of resting all the basis of our missions to come on a hunch." Biemark said again carefully, his hands held up to signify no ill will on his part.

"I...Look, I understand that this situation has gone recently from bad to worse. I understand that you hold no obligation to intervene in a problem that is, ultimately, our own to deal with. But please...I just can't lose Luna." As she finished, Celestia sounded utterly defeated, as though her very reason for existing was being taken away.

Errithius rubbed his temple for a moment, thinking on what all this could mean for the future of both this planet and even his own chapter. Dealing with this in an exemplary way would lead to a neat, tidy portion of the chapters history being written in the tomes. However to falter and stumble in such a delicate situation could lead to the scribes forever condemning the very name 'Errithius' for providing them such a complicated period of time to record and write down. Errithius sometimes greatly envied over chapters of space marines, specifically those who found no difficulty in saving themselves from the worries of compassion and charity, and one such time was right now. Many other chapters would have, most likely, escorted the Equestrians out from the alien facility before dropping them off outside the nearest native town and headed off to report the situation on the planet to the chapter at large. But instead the Hospilaters had a terrible condition, a genetic mutation that entirely replaced the Blood Angels more commonly recognized deformity known as the Black Rage. It was known amongst the chapter as having 'a conscious', something no space marine should have to bear the weight of. It was this dreaded mind-plague that made Errithius say this.

"We will find your sister, Celestia. However I have limited forces to choose from, so I can dedicate no more than a single gunship, maybe a second when I can, to survey the lands for traces of her." Errithius practically sighed.

"Thank you, Captain. All of Equestria is in your debt." Celestia said with a sigh of relief.

"And what of the data swipe? Where do we go from here?" Asked Nitheleon.

"Our plan remains unchanged. Miss Rainbow Dash will be deployed today and retrieve us the information we require. However, the sooner you return, the better." Errithius said, addressing the blue pegasus.

"No problem, Captain." Dash assured.

"Celestia, do you have any idea where Nightmare Moon might be? Do you think she is headed straight for your capital?"

"I think so, yes, it certainly sounds like her kind of approach. However I feel like she is, for some reason, taking her time getting there. I noticed she could have simply teleported closer if not straight to Canterlot, but instead she simply took flight. I think she might be approaching this slightly more cautiously than she normally would, attempting to perhaps assess her plan of attack as she approaches the city. She also might be trying to conserve her magic for the fight she's expecting." The princess said, deeply thinking over the possibilities that presented themselves.

"So you think we have time as our ally, for now?" Asked Errithius.

"Yes, I do, Captain."

"Captain. Situational update from the bridge." Unycrios' voice blurted through the halls speakers in such an assaulting, sharp manner Errithius could have sworn nearly every marine present was startled slightly.

"Yes, brother, go ahead." The captain said with a sigh.

"I am receiving several free-flowing, universal access transmission signals." The techmarine chattered.

"Alright. And this means what exactly?"

"I have significant reason to believe they are of Federation origin. I believe they are attempting to hail us."

13 - Queen to E-4, Pawn to G-7

The wind in the outer regions of this far foreign mountain cluster was far less turbulent than it was nearer the center of the region as Nightmare Moon had soon found after taking flight after her exchange with her sister and the alien interlopers. She couldn't have been more thankful that they had almost immediately lost sight of her through the nearby clouds and bright light of the sunset, for not five seconds after having taken wing she found herself wildly tumbling through the air in a clumsy mess of flapping wings and flailing arms. The dark mare gave a soft snort and shrugged at the loneliness that surrounded her on this mountainside, turning from staring into the night air to retreat closer to a small grove she had located planted upon a more level portion of the mountain she had chosen to rest upon. It was a green area full of trees and grass no larger than the average garden, but provided plenty of shade, cover and protection from the night winds, but more importantly it provided her with a comfortable atmosphere that reminded her of the nights Luna had spent resting in Canterlot gardens, and although Nightmare Moon could only watch on through the eyes of a body beyond her control, she did enjoy the soothing calm such a thing would bring her.

She reached the edge of the grove, stepping in through the clusters of trees, savoring the soft grass beneath her hooves and the smell of forest air around her. Reaching the center of the tiny forest the large alicorn managed to make up for her earlier aerial ordeal by gracefully, almost weightlessly swimming to the grassy floor of the grove, her legs spirally about one another to slowly drop her down onto her rump. Her legs slid out to her side as she re-positioned herself to lie down, tail still swirling about with ethereal energies to mesh its mass with the grass, making it appear as if the night sky itself was washing over the ground in liquid form. Her expression was calm, eyes half closed as she let out a deep sigh, clawed hands and bulky arms brushing gently through the forest floor as she stared lazily up at her dazzling night sky through the veil of forest leaves swaying gently overhead. The mare of darkness, cruel monster from the shadows, one of the greatest enemies of all Equestria allowed herself to relax for the first time that day.

Huh! What do they know. She thought to herself, her brow tensing slightly.

The dark princess shifted onto her side, one of her bat-like wings springing out from under her back, giving itself a slight stretch before covering itself over her like a gigantic, half leather, half feather blanket. She rested her head upon a one of her incredibly oversized forearms, her cheek pressing deep into her relaxed extensor muscles, which proved slightly more pillowy than most would have assumed it would have been. Her expression tightened as she seemed to be unable to find any comfort from her reestablished position, growing more and more frustrated until her eyes shot open in sudden realization before rolling in exasperation.

"Go right ahead, keep us up aaaaaall night~. See how much good it does us." Nightmare Moon said dryly.

I can't let you do this. I can't let you just run amok, doing what you want to whoever you want! Taking the throne and destroying Equestria! Luna protested, being heard by Nightmare as if she was speaking from the back of her own head.

"I remember when you used to be fun, Luna." Nightmare Moon said through a long sigh.

This isn't a joke! I'll keep you up all night, I'll keep you up every night from here onwards if it means my friends and sister have a better chance at stopping you! You may have control now, but as soon as I've regained strength like you did, and once you're weaker like I was, I shall take over my body, and then I'll make it my life's mission to find a way to be rid of you forever.

"Ugh! Yawn. Keep talking like that, it'll send me straight to sleep in no time." Nightmare said with a smirk.

Hah, who looks crazy talking to themselves now?! Spat back Luna.

"Not nearly as crazy as somepony trying to get themselves killed." Said Nightmare blandly.

K-killed? What in Equestria are you talking about?

"It'll take you weeks, maybe months to gain the magical strength needed to reassert yourself. I'm going to reach Canterlot in under three days. Now, you can go ahead and keep me awake until then, get me nice and worn out, but that will only mean I'll be unfit for the fight that's coming."

You can't fight the entire Federation, Nightmare, I've already told you this! You'll just get both of us killed, maybe even the rest of Equestria soon after if the Feds are feeling 'threatened' enough. Luna barked.

"And I've already told you I, in fact, mostly certainly can. It's all about the manner of disassembly one takes to assure the defeat of a foe. Even the mightiest armies can be rendered to nothing but ash if you know exactly how to hurt them in what ways at the right time. First we strike at their heart, take them unawares and tear out the heart of their organisation. From there I allow the alien scum to see the second phase of my plan succeed. And I assure you, I hold the magical capability to easily destroy even the Federation's most mighty soldiers." Replied Nightmare with a hearty, yet sinister chuckle as she rolled over onto her back once more.

You couldn't kill Celestia, what makes you think you could kill a Federation Immortal, or even a dozen Benefactors? And Canterlot is swarming with thousands of them! Said Luna with a huff of disapprovement.

"I-! I...could have...killed Celestia if I had wanted to." Nightmare said, starting furious, teeth bared and muscles tight before developing some deep sense of insecurity.

Why would you not want to destroy the only mare with power and influence enough to stop you? The mare who has already stopped you, twice for that matter? Inquired Luna fiercely.

"I...I wanted her to suffer the imprisonment she made me suffer. For her to pay for the thousand years of cold isolation I was put through for simply taking what is mine by right!" Growled Nightmare, her temper flaring, her hair growing increasingly more turbulent in its writhing.

That...no, before she imprisoned us. You struck her with magic in your first fight with her, and it simply stunned her. You didn't even leave a scratch on her. Why didn't you kill her if you claim you easily could have?

"She didn't have to die. I didn't want-...I simply didn't need to waste the extra energy it would have taken to kill her. I've always been more than powerful enough to ensure my dominance over her, I can ensure her submission for as long as I wish, easily long enough for even her to see the benevolence of the nighttime eternal. I can dominate all of Equestria, I can deliver them the unending beauty of the night, and I can do it without harming so much as a hair on anypony's head." Nightmare boasted, seemingly flattered by her own self acclaimed capabilities.

Oh my...Oh my goodness! You still care for her? You still care for Celestia?! But...but you're both mortal enemies! The two of you couldn't be any less ali-Aaargh! Luna yelped as some form of psychic shock zapped at her very consciousness.

Typical you'd know nothing about me either! The two of you, so sure of yourselves, so comfortable in your cradle of power and righteousness! Too busy to take the time to hear of anypony else's ambitions, their hopes! Yes, me and Celestia are very different, but not in the ways you have so arrogantly fabricated! I want for Equestria exactly what she wants, only I know what it needs to make it far greater than it has ever been! And no, I do not 'care' for that hubris little tart of a princess! But I do not see the point of building an empire built upon the bones of ponies...even those as unbearable as Celestia's.

No reply came from Luna, who Nightmare could feel retreat sheepishly into the recesses of her own mind like a wounded dog limping back to it's kennel. Nightmare's bristling form, wild hair and fierce expression slowly and steadily dimmed, her mane and tail growing calmer as her face softened and grew ready to get some much needed rest.

I will save Equestria. I will bring the glory of the night, forever. And Celestia will be alive to watch me do it. Nightmare thought to herself before closing her eyes, firmly satisfied she would go undisturbed.

Such an assumption was rudely interrupted, almost on purpose as a frightening roar came from beyond the mountainside she rested on, coming from the direction she had just come from. The roar grew in volume to near deafening levels, speeding closer to her position at a remarkable rate, so much so that Nightmare begun to feel slightly threatened by the sound. The mare, eyes open in shock and anger, allowed her physical form to melt away, her whole body taking the form of a gently writhing cloud of purple smoke that glittered with starlight, much like her mane and tail did. Eyeless, she watched the skies through the cover of the trees, finally spotting a dark, avian-like silhouette dart above her at speeds she'd never thought any creature could ever reach. Her formless sight shifted to follow the flying thing, soon spotting two brightly glowing blots of light coming from two point towards its rear, easily visible as it soared into the distance. It occurred to Nightmare that this was no creature, but instead some blasted alien flying machine, the two lights presumably being the engines of the metal creation. The rear silhouette of the craft, the glow of its engines, its downwards angled wings and bulky body grew smaller by the heartbeat until Nightmare could no longer tell the crafts engine lights from the bright stars that filled the night before it. Her mind raced with frustration and concern, fearing the further intervention of alien fiends and the incredible speed in which she had just observed them travel at. After a quick mental assessment, the cloud of ethereal smoke that was her rose from the ground and swiftly reformed into her physical body once again, only this time she felt some extra hardware would be require for the tasks she had at hand.

Her bulky form was for the most part exposed, her titanic biceps, firm abdominals and waist along with her thick thighs remained revealed for the large slabs of muscle awash with black fur that they were, however now instead of torn and strained alien medical garments, the mare of darkness was adorned in her battle plate. Her head was encompassed in a sleek helmet of shimmering cobalt, the metal almost appearing like a wave frozen in time and taken from the ocean itself, it's elegant design sweeping comfortably around her ears and horn as well as its edges breaking into a crater to allow her a full field of vision while leaving her mouth and cheeks entirely exposed. Her right shoulder bore a deeply curved slab of the same metal as the rest of her armour, looking much like a petal plucked from a flower of the night, the curve of the plate mirroring the curve of Nightmare's deltoid before peeling away at the edges in an elaborate display. Each forearm was clasped with a pristine vambrace that also extended a plate of armour over Nightmare's backhand, open the face of each forearm plate sitting an engraved image of a half-moon. Around her neck sat a thick armoured collar that washed down over her collarbones and down to just above her breasts, while similar smaller plates sat firmly over her hips, one extending to a large plate of armour covering the outside of her left thigh that seemed much like an exaggerated version of the one on her shoulder only appearing more shield-like in nature. Finally, each shin was protected by an elaborate greave, just below an armoured shoe cradling each of her hooves. Beneath her armour she wore a form fitting if somewhat revealing series of garments wrapping around her bust much like a tank-top, her arms much like arm-length gloves and providing her with panties that appeared much like the lower portion of a swimming bikini, providing her with the much needed mobility she would need in the fighting to come. All the clothing she wore was a deep, dark blue and seemed to hold some strange ability by never creasing or folding, no matter how her body moved beneath it. The final detail to her appearence was the deep purple eye-shadow she magically applied like she did the rest of her apparel, using her immense magical power and degree of finesse to break down matter from the immediate area and re-knit it into whatever spell pre-designed spell she caste remade it as. As the last of the violet makeup washed over her upper eyelid the alicorn opened her eyes, her brow creasing at the middle as she strode forward out from the edge of the grove and towards the edge of the small cliff she stood atop. She slowly spread her gigantic wings, firmly stretching them out as she stood upon the very edge of the mountain.

Looks like sleep will have to wait after all. The dark mare thought to herself before giving her large wings a single beat with her powerful back muscles, shooting her high into the air before soaring her forth like a thunderbolt after the aliens that had stolen her much needed nights sleep away from her.

Rainbow Dash had never clenched her jaw so tight in all her life, especially not for so long. Her eyes were almost just as tightly sealed shut, the blood pressure in her whole head throbbing so fiercely she feared her whole head would simply explode in a matter of seconds. The noise of the alien crafts engines was utterly titanical, it sounded almost as if she had a dozen manticore's roaring right into her ears non-stop. However she knew she could persevere through this sensory torture, she had done so for the passed two hours, and so could easily last another one or two if she absolutely had to. Yet she could no longer simply sit and attempt to concentrate on the mission at hand, now all she could do was tightly clasp her hands over her ears in an utterly vain effort at blocking out some of the deafening sound surrounding her. She risked opening eyes eyes by a few millimeters just to make sure she hadn't died from the bombardment of sound and gone to tartarus, looking around in a ahlf-panic to see a similar sight to what she'd seen a few minutes ago. Three large motor vehicles, each bearing a single wheel at their front and rear, sat just before Dash. Each was easily as large as some of Equestria's latest civilian automobiles, but each one was a machine of power and death and it's design did nothing whatsoever to hide this function. Each one's engine was truly gigantic, sitting just below and in front of where the pilot's seat, thick exhaust tubes leading out from the engine's sides. To the rear sprouted a long, flexible antennae of some kind that wobbled almost jovially as the ship they all flew in shook slightly, the antennae rising up from just besides a wrapped up set of what Dash assumed was military field gear. At the front sat the control handles that seemed to be directly connected to the frontal wheel of the vehicle in order to steer the vehicle, between the two horizontal handles was mounted a large projectile weapon of some kind next to what seemed to be it's ammunition drum. The pilot of each vehicle tended to their war machine, checking mechanical systems and weapon conditions, securing gear and weapons to themselves as well as to their vehicles.

Each of these aliens was significantly less well armoured as the ones Dash had more commonly seen, each having bone-white armour covering no more than their chest, back, shoulders, forearms, stomach, groin, knees and shins, the rest of their bodies mostly covered by battle fatigues that were a soft beige colour. It was hard for Dash to tell each of the aliens she had seen apart, something she had admittedly mentally scorned herself for, considering such a notion a little racist. But she couldn't lie to herself by saying it was entirely easy to tell each one apart, it might have been far easier than telling each Fed apart, but Feds all looked almost exactly like one another, and she felt as though she owed these guys at least the decency of recognizing who they were. In pony society it was so easy to tell each pony apart, each bearing vastly different colour schemes to their hair, tail, manes and eyes, at least for the most part, and each furthermore had certain genetic lineage features that made it not only easy to immediately identity each pony, but also understand something about where they were from, even what family they were a part of. But these aliens all looked so similar: Blonde hair, pale skin, golden eyes, strong features and stronger builds, and it sure didn't help that each one was so damn tall that Dash found herself almost constantly staring up their nostrils. She looked at the three she traveled with now, trying to find distinct differences that she could identify each one by. One was a little easier, having a side of his head shaved, the rest covered in medium length, flowing golden locks, within the shaved portion of his head sitting what looked like a pair of circular plugs surgically implanted into his very skull, a feature that made Dash feel a little unwell to look at. The other two were far more difficult, both having shaven heads and similar features, however a couple of features separated the two, the first being one of them having a large, long scar running along the side of his head, like somepony had fiercely swung a sword into the side of his skull but failed to actually kill him, the other alien missing said scar. The same applied in reverse for the messy series of scars that appeared like a webwork of lightning bolts struck through the face of the other alien, the deep cracks in his skin scarring their way through his lower cheek, lip and chin. However such efforts to recognize each alien fell hollow as Dash had long since forgotten their names since being introduced to them before takeoff, helped in no way by the terrible noise of the aircraft's engines rattling her brain.

The relief Dash felt as the noise of the engines began to die down was so immense she couldn't help but let out a clumsy groan as her body freed itself of the tense state it had been in, and although still very loud the noise had certainly become far more bearable as the craft presumably slowed, leading Dash to believe that they were drawing closer to their destination. One of the aliens swiftly brought a hand to his ear, seeming to concentrate on listening to something hearable only to him before striding around his vehicle and towards Dash. Once just a few feet ahead of her he began to speek, but the ringing in Dashes ears coupled with the still significant background noise meant she only heard the odd, unintelligible syllable.

"W-...What?!" Dash spat clumsily.

The alien took to long steps forward until he was right besides dash, bending down slightly to bring her mouth right next to Dash's face. His breath was hot in her ear, and Dash tensed with fear as the only thing she could relate such a feeling to was having a hungry lion breathing into the side of her face.

"We are due to arrive in twenty five seconds. Once we touch down, twist this latch-," The alien quickly, but not fiercely grabbed Dashes comparitively small hand and brought it to the center of the harness Dash was strapped into to keep her in the flight seat she occupied, "-to the right and head straight out the frontal assault ramp. You have your mission dossier?"

"Yeah, I know what I gotta do!" Dash yelled back over the noise.

"Then you don't stop after stepping off the ramp, you head straight to your first objective. You have forty eight hours to complete this assignment, but Captain Errithius has informed me to remind you that if you can complete your mission any sooner, you should try and take the chance to. If you are not back after forty eight hours we will have to leave without you. If within forty eight hours our position is compromised and we need to reposition, we will upload our new location to your data unit. If you find you cannot reach any new location we have taken position at, activate the universal distress beacon in your data unit. Enemy units will be alerted to your position, but we should reach you first." The alien said, listing off each rehearsed subject.

"Should?!" Dash said wide eyed.

"Good luck, Miss Dash." the alien said with a sense of finality to his tone, patting Dash on the shoulder as the feeling of decent filled her gut.

The alien then quickly strode over to his vehicle and mounted it, the others following his lead and mounting up soon after, more mechanical roars bellowing from the land vehicles as their powerful engines started up, guttural growls emanating from deep within their mechanical hearts. Dash fumbled for a second, double and triple checking her travelling pack was firmly fastened to her shoulders before placing her hand around the switch the the center of her flight harness. The weight in her stomach caused by the aircraft swiftly descending eased out as the craft slowed it's approach, the engines dying down to a soft whine for a few seconds before a dull thud sounded from the floor of the ship, the hull shaking harshly for a fraction of a second before settling. Not a moment after landing the boarding ramp located at the craft's front, appearing much like the gigantic mouth of the aircraft, whined into life as it steadily dropped open. Dash, on her second attempt, flipped the release switch on her harness, letting the metal contraption pneumatically rise over her head before darting out the front of the vehicle, hands clasped tight around the straps of her rucksack as she ran.

Before she knew it she was a good thirty feet from the craft she'd been dropped off by, causing her to turn back for a moment to look at the large transport vehicle, it's bulky, blocky hull flanked by two massive turbine-like engines covered by two downwards angled wings. It's white and red hull was bristling with weaponry, two protruding from the crafts nose, two more mounted on a turret upon it's roof and two clusters of six smaller guns adorning the ships sides, as well as under-the-wing mounted missiles. Green and pink light softly bloomed from both the pilot and turret cockpit, as well as from out the deployed frontal ramp, of which now three motor-powered bike aliens rolled out from, each turning their vehicles and heading out to the left of the craft. The ship, as soon as the bikes had traveled a presumably 'safe' distance, turned it's systems off, engines dying out and light blinking off to leave the ship sitting in the grassy area surrounding it, covered by the darkness of night.

Dash turned from the lack of the sight of the ship and looked around at her surroundings. As it had been for years now, a thin mist hung in the damp air, spreading the cold of night faster than it would in the days before the occupation. Wrapping her arms around her waist and slowly walking onwards, she kept peering about, seeing only the vaguest of shapes through the fog and darkness and desperately trying to determine where she was. She'd been told she was going to be dropped off to the south east of Ponyville, meaning she was probably near Dodge City...or whatever was left of it. She spun around once more, and confirmed her assumptions, but was thankful that they lay further away than she had first thought. Off in the distance was a dark cluster of shapes that at one point had been buildings, and years ago would have been accompanied by the soft glow of street lamps and house lights. But now all that remained were burned out skeletons of both houses and ponies, all sunken in a swamp of ash and dust. Dash cringed at the painful reminder, shrugging her shoulders uncomfortably before turning her back to the dead city, confident that she must now be facing Rambling Rock Ridge. All she had to do was take a sort flight until she got through the rock formations, then take to the ground for a short walk through some woodland and hop over the river that would then lead straight to the edge of Ponyville. From there she had three locations to visit, and a few ponies to talk to, plus one filly that probably missed her a heck of a lot right now. After that it would be straight to Appleloosa to finish up gathering whatever info she could, but more importantly reporting the current situation to the Equestrian Resistance.

The young pegasus rustled about in her travelling pack for a few seconds before finding the blocky, grey handheld computer console the aliens had given her. The neon green display lit up with symbols and numbers as she hit the primary activation switch on the consoles side, the imagery then fluttering for a second to reveal a series of options to be selected with the control wheel, also on the consoles side. Each option was represented by a green bullet point next to a green image of some sort ranging from a screwdriver and spanner to what looked like a power plug, all on a black background. Dash flipped through the pages using button below the consoles screen until she came to one with the image of a compass, the pegasus then turning the control wheel with a series of clicks until the bullet point with the appropriate image was highlighted. Hitting the primary activation switch, she was now presented with a pixilated compass held in her hand, the glowing green needle pointing at a green 'N' she was fairly sure meant north. Repositioning herself to face the correct direction, Dash then clipped the computer to her waistline, stretched out her wings as darted forwards, soon drifting upwards on the thick air to speed towards Rambling Rock Ridge, and from there, Ponyville.

"A trade?" Errithius snorted.

"Absolutely. I believe this arrangement is well within reasonable conditions for the both of us. You hand over the criminals you are harbouring and you will be granted exit from this system entirely free of any hassle from our forces." The thin, sickly looking alien said through the bridge's primary holo-screen.

"Something that has been a slight bother to me of late is how none, absolutely none of your people have cared to enlighten me or any of my marines to what these individuals are charged with. What have they done exactly to brand them as criminals?" The captain asked in slight bewilderment.

"Captain, I am sorry to say it is not entirely your business what they are charged with. They are fugitives under Federation law, and it is therefore the Federation's concern to address their crimes, crimes committed against us." The alien replied eagerly.

"Yet right now they are aboard my ship. My ship, my concern. I have no further business with you if you will only go so far as to simply assume I'll roll over and cooperate. Don't mistaken me for one of the natives you seem to hold a worrying degree of power over." Errithius said back, his voice hissing with a small degree of ferocity.

"...Very well. Each and every one of those criminals is charged with conspiring to commit treachery against the Federation. They are also charged with destruction, damage and stealing of Federation property, direct disobedience of Benefactor and Officiate demands, the unauthorized and unregistered teaching of illogical information and of course a handful are guilty of unlawfully imposing their authority on native populations as well as Federation personnel."

"The princesses have imposed authority over your people?" Errithius said back in utter disbelief.

"Absolutely! Demanding we bow before her rule, enacting laws upon our soldiers without Federal verification of which have been in direct obstruction of justice as well as demanding we exchange in unlawful exchange of products and resources." The alien said, his tone sounding genuinely emotionally hurt at the thought of the injustices done to his people.

Errithius thought for a couple of seconds. He knew how this conversation was going to end, he could read this alien like a picture book. These creatures may not be inherently evil, but he could smell the raw fabrication of this alien's words, he could imagine the long discussion's their leaders must have had in determining how they could make what illegal for their own benefit, what reasons they could dream up to detain anyone or anything they wished in order to exploit it as a resource. The captain knew that even now, these aliens did not see he and his ship as so much as a threat as they saw them as a mathematical imbalance, a threat only to their numbers not adding up at the end of the day. The captain couldn't help but feel insulted from being seen as a simple collection of estimates, and his conscious only hungered for further destabilizing their precious assumptions. But he also knew he had to approach this situation with at least a sliver of tact and planning, he had to play into and then against the assumptions and arrogance of these alien creatures. They wanted the natives, more specifically the princesses, they wanted them so bad they'd cooked up hundreds of laws for them to specifically break, they were conditioning the entire planet so that it could not survive without them, and through all this they were turning the fear of the native people to their advantage and villainous those they'd once been led by.

He knew what he needed to do.

This foreign military, along with the society it was part of, was utterly dependent on complete, unquestionable order, but such strong foundations were built frighteningly brittle, lacking any form of chaos or attentiveness to allow the system to be conditioned to rapid changes or adapt to unfamiliar situations. They planned, they solidified their plan, and then they simply waited for their plan to bring them victory. With this in mind, Errithius knew he need only deliver a single, cataclysmic blow to their forces, to break the back of their command structure and watch all the pieces fall and scatter away. Yet such a plan was a volatile one, it left one variable, and that was the fleet in orbit. Complete devastation of their ground forces would undoubtedly mean the spacecraft above the skies finding no reason not to pepper the planet below with relentless orbital fire. And so destroying their leadership was out of the question, this enemy needed it's brain still firmly sat in its skull, but for what purpose, wondered the captain. He recalled the alien mannerisms, the way they talked, the way they reacted to his marines firing upon them. He remembered the sole priority that most of them immediately took.

Preservation.

These aliens weren't wasteful, they harvested resources wherever they went, they took whatever they saw of any interest and re-adapted it to serve their endeavors best. And they saw something in this planet of great interest, something they had yet to truly understand, something that had them feverish with frustration in trying to decode with their beloved reason and logic. They wanted magic, they wanted Equestrian magic and they wanted all of it under their direct control. And so Errithius could see clearly his single hope for a sustainable victory, for if he could not kill this beast outright, he could cut open its belly and let it squeal and panic as it fumbled to keep its guts from dribbling out. His target was clear: The research facility to the east. He would need to ruin much of what they'd worked to created and master, but leave enough left for them to scramble desperately for the weeks to follow in an attempt to salvage their efforts. Errithius bobbed his head slightly in approval of his own design, mentally drawing up force deployment a moment before re-addressing the alien emissary.

"A few things shall be made clear at this moment. First, I am not blind to your true motives. I understand perfectly that you wish not to detain the princesses for any legal breaches you claim they have committed, but instead you wish to exploit and entrap the abilities they wield. Second, I also understand how the authoritarian regime you have deployed upon this world is a security measure, to ensure public submission while you go about pillaging whatever resources you wish to harvest from this world."

"Wrong! We are not some retarded band of space-pira-!" The alien blurted with a humored snort.

"And finally! You will come to understand that I have no intention and doubt I ever shall have any intention to hand over a planet's native royalty just so you can commence whatever procedures you have planned for them. I, in fact, intend in making it exceedingly difficult for you and your forces to find them, and even if you do locate us, I plan on making your forces pay for every inch they step closer to us with an ocean of blood. Upon locating the nearest astronomicon beacon I plan to then leave this planet with the Equestrian royalty to act as witnesses to your crimes here before an Imperial court, of whom will then doubtlessly send a liberation fleet to sack your forces from every corner of this planet." Errithius growled his eyes locked onto the pale eyes of the alien that stared back with ever tightening features.

"You will never make it passed our ships in orbit. Even if you did, we'd just destroy this world and pull back to our own territory. Our public has no knowledge of this world, and without any evidence to support you, you'll be seen as an aggressive invading force by the entire Federation if you choose to retaliate." The alien huffed.

"I happen to know a fair many chapters, along with just as many Army branches who would be far less bothered by such a notion than we, admittedly, would. Destroy this planet, and I assure you I know those who would happily return the favour tenfold."

The two simply locked eyes for a moment, gold staring unblinking straight into dull grey.

"This is your last chance. Hand over the criminals, or we will take them from you." The frail, grey creature said with a trembling voice.

"Come and get them." Errithius snapped with a tense sneer before hammering a finger down on the signal link switch, killing the connection between the two.

The holoscreen went blank, and Errithius was left in silence for what felt like hours as he slowly ran an armoured hand through his short, blonde hair as he lent on the communication console before him.

"This tactical approach is ill-advised." A deep, mechanically distorted voice gurgled from next to Errithius.

"That's why it's not the one I'm taking." Replied Errithius.

"You have fed the aliens false information?" Unycrios growled.

"In a manner of speaking. The princesses, natives, myself and our forces will not be leaving this planet, but I will need you to."

"Captain?" The techmarine gurgled.

"I will need you to take Remergence to the edge of this system, perhaps even beyond, but not via warp transit. I need you to get the Federation's attention while we deploy in every gunship we have. As their fleet is giving you chase, we will carry out our offensive. But once our objective is complete, our campaign will then depend on my trust in the Federation wishing to save their resources over trying to destroy this ship. They will scurry back to their facilities, they will be busy rebuilding what we would have torn down for weeks, perhaps longer. That will grant the princesses the breathing room they require to reestablish at least a portion of control over their country, and it will grant us time to locate the nearest beacon. Benefits for both our parties." Errithius said in a low, calm tone.

"My estimates determine an 89.996799% chance the Federation will seek to recover their facility, but not if their fleet is too deeply concerned with our ship. I will need to feign systematic failures...I will take take Remergence into the gravitational well of the moon, allow myself to be scuttled, reposition, replenish shielding, repeat. I will also remain attentive to disabling carrier craft, to better aid your efforts on the ground." Unycrios crackled and hissed through his vox speaker of a mouth.

"You'll be outnumbered, dozens to one, Unycrios." Errithius said, his features creasing with concern.

"It is the only way to ensure their fleet stays within an appropriate distance to the planet and keep them within range of being recalled to deploy forces to their damaged facilities. Otherwise your plan will fail to be brought to full effect, enemy forces may have time and integrity enough to amass a counter offensive."

"I know," Errithius said somberly before turning to take the stairs down from the command platform, "Look after our ship, Unycrios. I am to believe we will be departing as soon as our informant returns."

"Understood, Captain."

His mind felt cold in his own skull. For a split second his whole body felt as though it did not belong, as if he were trapped within an unnatural shell of a body. This moment passed, his mind growing calm a breath after having woken, his synthetic lungs drawing in a long, rasping breath as his photoreceptors blinking with the pale yellow light they always did as they sparked to life. His primary lens, firmly locked into his right eye socket, activated first soon followed by the two smaller lenses situated in the left half of his metal face. His brain thrummed with energy for a second as the sense of his physical self fed into his cerebrum, neural feeds filling with information of what limbs were rested where, their current status, each and every minuscule movement they made. The electro-conductive fluid vials mounted upon the top of the tech-priest's armour carapace bubbled as the fluids began circulating through his semi-synthetic body, filling biomechanical organs with immediately accessible and entirely controllable levels of energy, allowing his breathing to be quickened or slowed at will alongside his own mechanical heart. The metallic disks wrapped around thick wires and tubes that composed his spinal column gave a sudden twitch before stretching out a few inches to prepare for further movement. The priest's four arms flexed slightly, his mechanical hands straining for a second before calmly clattering each digit rhythmically against the arms of the iron throne he had been rested on for over four decades, as his internal computing systems informed him. His spider-like clusters of insectile, mechanical legs scratched on the metal floor beneath him as the stretched out slightly, soon revealing what the rest of his body had steadily assessed; There was a significant weight atop of him.

Lifting his upper two arms, the two bearing actual hands, he slowly swiveled his head from left to right, seeing most of his body had a waterfall of various power cables draped over it, plugged into various ports all across his body. He shifted a moment, his hideously hunched frame lurching forward slightly, the glassy, yellow orbs scanned ahead of his location, peering across the large hall ahead of him, most of it engulfed in a thick darkness not even his variable-register visual adapter could cut through. What he could see, however, was three red-robed figures knelt about a dozen feet before him. Again, the tech-priest drew a long, hissing breath in, the thick air around him filtering trough the numerous tubes and filter chambers sprouting from his lower face, the sensor node built onto the left side of his head opening it's lens socket to reveal yet another photoreceptor that gave a more thorough analysis of the individuals ahead of him. All three were three of the many serfs he had, all augmented with various mechanical equipment and bionics.

"What is it?" Tech-priest Ritivek said in his usual monotone, gurgling, digital voice.

"My Lord Ritivek, I am to report to you we have picked up an unusual transmission from a nearby source. The data is distorted, but I believe it to be holding information you might find interesting." The serf replied in a similar mechanical voice, only having a slightly higher pitched tone.

The tech-priest rattled his digits in the arm of his throne once more in a disturbingly precise rhythm before leaning forward towards his servants.

"Indulge me." Growled the scion of the Machine God.

14 - Initiate

47:57:12 The digital counter blinked, the numbers blinking as they steadily changed to reflect the time passed since the stormraven had touched down.

"She's going to be late." Tyroch said dryly as he twiddled with a combat blade atop his bike, spinning the tip upon the vehicles armour plating.

"Probably." Micheangel shrugged, his eyes fixed to the dark horizon ahead, just like Gilifreid's had been.

Both Micheangel and Gilifreid were knelt before the stormraven gunship, about thirty feet from the open assault ramp at the ship's bow, of which Tyroch sat within atop his bike. Both the Astarte scouts knealt out in the open wielded their combat shotguns in hand, bolt pistols firmly holstered alongside their grenades and combat blades. Gilifreid, even with his recently developed senses and abilities, found it frustratingly difficult to see, smell or hear anything through the thick fog that washed before him upon a steady breeze. The smell of damp grass and thick air had assaulted his senses for the past six hours as the insertion team had waited with unshakable patience and resolve. However that patience was due to run out, and run out very soon. The team had their orders to take off as soon as the mission timer hit forty eight hours, and were not to wait around a second longer. Gilifreid knew that this was, of course, not going to happen, he knew he would be waiting a fair while after their forty eight hours were spent just to make sure that the team didn't miss an important opportunity to retrieve the mission data the space marines needed for the campaign ahead of them.

47:58:01

Two minutes remained until Gilifreid would be breaching mission parameters which would undoubtedly earn him and his squad a firm scolding from Chaplain Tyreth. Far from a death sentence, but irritating enough for the idea to stir a measurably degree of discomfort at the bottom of his mind. The scout sergeant sniffed at the air once again, taking in a vast range of scents, but one which still nagged at his curiosity. It had been in the air since he and his squad had sped into the cover of the nearby forest and stuck in the back of his throat the entire time. It was the familiar smell of ash, several different kinds of ash in fact. Wood, paper, clothe and flesh to name a few, and the source was near enough for each different smell to be distinct, however Gilifreid suspected the scents were aided in their travels by the damp native air. However what the last sniff of air was most notable for was that the smell of shes was infringed upon by a different smell, though not as potent, one certainly noticeable. It was an animal, to be sure, and held similar pheromones to many species female breeds. It held a soft, sweet, almost citrus tang to it and was mixed in with the more subtle scent of thick clothing and plastics. Right after noticing the odd, yet strangely familiar scent, the sergeant could begin to hear the soft rhythmic pat of footsteps approaching, pounding on soft, moist grass beneath.

"Eyes front." Gilifreid murmured over the squad comm channel through his throat mic.

Gilifreid's acute senses quickly homed in on the direction the footsteps were coming from, detecting the culprit was coming straight at them from the right ahead, and very, very quickly. The footsteps sounded as though they were at full sprint, overworked, even panicked in nature, almost leading the scouts to believe something was on the way to assault them. Ahead a small silhouette revealed itself through the fog and mist, its thin shape bobbing erratically as Gilifreid assumed it was the individual running at them.

"Take off!" Barked a husky young female voice.

The scouts found themselves somewhat at a loss for words or actions, utterly puzzled by what exactly was occurring. Gilifreid looked to his left at Micheangel who looked back at him with a sneer of perplexity. They looked ahead again, the figure gaining distance to be now no more than a hundred feet away, and revealing itself to be almost surely the native girl the insertion team had dropped off at this very location just two days ago. Her eyes were the first thing Gilifreid noticed, magenta orbs staring straight at the scouts with lids peeled all the way back to reveal a terrified expression. Her jaw was clenched tight, ears folded back and flat against her head, damp mane and tail flying about ungracefully as she sprinted forwards at the greatest speed her lean legs could carry her. He arms ceased their wicked swinging back and forth as she ran to wildly flail about in a bizarre attempt to signal those she sprinted towards.

"TAKE-OFF!" She practically screamed, still sprinting.

With that a flurry of bright red line hissed and sizzled through the air passed and around the girl, shooting into the dirt around the scouts. Gilifreid's head bobbed downwards sharply as a flinch a moment before the scout raised his shotgun as the misty air that hovered around the fleeing native. With the quick flick of his finger above his head, the sergeant flipped down a retractable eye lens to provide his vision with a HUD and multi-spectrum vision. Through a now greyscale version of his own vision, a number of light grey shapes revealed themselves in the form of infrared signatures, the lumpy blobs shifting and growing in the same manner any signature given off by approaching infantry would. The red lines that were the alien projectiles shot from their chemical acceleration firearms were being spat from the grey blobs from ahead of Gilifreid, giving him enough reason to level his weapon's iron sights at the strange shape and fire a heartbeat later. The weapon made a single thunderclap, dispersing the massive eight gauge payload out from it's stocky barrel and towards the target ahead. The shape expanded for a split second, no doubt due to the alien's inside rapidly becoming outsides before the whole blob fell to the ground suddenly. Gilifreid's fellow squad members soon followed by example and let loose their weapons, Tyroch arching grenade fire into the fog ahead from his bike's front-mounted weapon while Micheangel volleyed shotgun fire in rhythmic, thumping patterns of fire.

"Pilot, those engines had best be warm enough to fly soon." Gilifreid said through his throat mic as he kept up the suppressive fire, the alien troops up ahead beginning to take cover and go to ground, trading their advance for personal safety.

"Already primed for take off. Get everyone aboard and we can leave immediately." The Astarte pilot replied as the gunship's turbine began to spin up to a vicious screech.

Gilifreid was about to wave the blue-coated girl into the gunship, but found she had passed him with such speed she may well have had time to wave each scout in if she hadn't then busied herself with frantically locking her flight harness over her shoulders. The sergeant shrugged to himself for a second before quickly turning and taking to a low sprint towards the storm raven, Tyroch and bikes having already been loaded aboard, Micheangel in close tow. The alien fire seemed to narrow down towards the gunship, the ping and zip of chemical projectiles pitter-pattering off the reinforced ceramite armour plating of the ships hull. One fortunate, award-winning shot managed to herald a sickening liquid popping sound as it struck the soft-clothe of Micheangels battle fatigues, the round burning clean through the material and cutting through the flesh beneath. Gilifreid darted his head around to find his brother knelt half-way up the gunship's assault ramp, his face contorted in pain, a clean hole cut through the side of his throat, blood viciously gushing down all over the armour and clothing beneath the wound. Gilifreid rushed over and scooped his brother up by the arm, hauling him to his feet, the wounded Astarte coughing a mouthful of blood onto the deck as he stumbled forward.

"What happened?" Tyroch barked as he locked his bike to the deck of the gunship, mag-plates humming to life.

"What do you think? He's wounded." The sergeant replied, slightly irate.

He checked over Micheangel as he sat him into a flight seat, finding them thankfully the wound was a clean shot through the right side of his neck, no shrapnel damage, no round tumble, it was surgical in nature. Thus the wound was already beginning to heal, neatly as well, the Astartes accelerated physiology knitting the damaged tissue together and staunching the flow of blood to make the wound far less lethal than it would have been on any other infantry unit in all the galaxy. Gilifreid looked Micheangel in the eye and gave a thumbs up, shakily returned by the wounded scout. Gilifreid turned now to the native, who was clutching at the arms of her flight harness as the gunship tremored to life, ramp folding in to close as the vehicle began to take off.

"I trust you got what you needed?" The sergeant asked plainly, if a little loudly to raise his voice over the roar of the engines as the gunship sped from the landing zone.

"Yeah." The girl said, her voice hollow and strained with fear.

Gilifreid looked the girl over for a moment, having not had the chance to truly get a good look at her since she was running passed him like a bolt of lightning. Her face was dirty, hair twisted and matted with what looked like dirt and dust while her left cheek had some minor scratches grazed across it. Her hands were in a similar state, also slightly bloodied, her left outer bicep had a large, neat cut struck across it that was still gently leaking a bright purple blood, the wound seeming to be caused by one of the rounds fired from the alien weapons. A few similar wouds were dotted through the feathers of her wings, the area around each hole blasted through the feathers was singed, the keratin turned a nasty burnt black, the same as the fur around the wound on her arm. The girl looked up at the scout sergeant, her head turning slowly and unsteadily to bring her magenta eyes staring wide into his brass ones before speaking.

"I got everything."

"Please, Miss, you should remain still so we can more effectively tend to your wounds." The creepy little hunched over alien robo-servant droned through it's mechanical grill that made up it's lower face.

"Uh, buddy, I gotta look at the princesses when I talk to them. This isn't exactly a spa appointment." Rainbow Dash huffed as she rolled over slightly to face Princess Celestia, Cadance and Twilight Sparkle, the alien nurse's mechanical arms flinching back from tending to her arm as she moved.

"It's fine, Rainbow Dash, let them do their work, they're just trying to help clean you up." Princess Cadence reassured.

"That crazy-paste they threw on is itching like crazy." The rainbow-maned mare groaned, fidgeting uncomfortably.

"Thuk root solution can cause mild dermal irritation, however it will ensure your wounds remain clean and accelerate the natural healing process of soft tissue." The nurse informed, the cyborg wheeling about to see to a computer display upon it's tank tread lower half.

"Coulda' just bandaged me up." Dash grumbled.

"Miss Dash, if you would please, we need to know what you found." Celestia said, more concerned than irritated.

"Right, yeah. Everything I found on every console I hacked is on the 'Digi-majigy', but I got a good look at almost everything I was downloading. Turns out the eastern research facility might not be the best first stop for you guys, turns out that place has some pretty serious defenses plugged in to almost every room and corridor inside the place. Kinetic barricades, laser grids, auto-turrets, triple-layered blast doors and a small army defending it, almost as many ground units that are deployed in all Equestria are guarding that base. However, the facility has a massive power demand, I imagine they're working on some pretty freaky stuff in there judging by how much energy the whole place is soaking up. So to power up the facility, they need a constant supply from the Rainbow Falls generators." Dash informed as the alien nurse now began applying oil-soaked rags to wounds on her abdomen.

"Rainbow Falls? I thought those generators were powering the Federation's facilities in Manehattan and Filly Delphia?" Celestia asked.

"Generators?" Inquired Errithius, who had been standing near the medical room's door, just now striding over to the ponies.

"Uh, yes, they were one of the first facilities to be built by the Federation in Equestria. It uses whatever energies given off by the Rainbow Falls waterfalls to directly power whatever installations they have in the immediate vicinity, but it would seem that was just another lie." Cadence added.

"I found out that those 'geographic surveillance' operations the Feds were taking a couple years back were actually to install one giant-as-hay power cable assembly. I'd say we just need to dig a big hole and get ready a pair of rubber-handled scissors, but that cable is about ten foot thick and is buried about a hundred feet underground. But it runs to just one location; the eastern research facility, and the facilities backup generators are only just powerful enough to run the base's lights, doors and elevators. That means you guys just have to worry about the small army of soldiers inside the facility once you get inside." Dash said, turning to Errithius as she finished.

"Let's take this one step at a time for now. Are we sure the generators are the only source of power keeping the research facility functional?" Inquired the captain.

"Pretty sure, unless they have something else fueling them power that wasn't in the data-banks, but the way I see it is that Feds tend to obsess over documenting everything they find, build or own, meaning they usually document all their hardware. And not just what they have here, but on every planet they inhabit." Rainbow replied.

"Again, let's just focus on what lays before us. What will happen once the facility looses power?"

"Oh, uhm, well we have no idea how that specific base actually operates, but I have acquired information on the basic functionalities of Federation structures and buildings." Rarity interjected as she rustled through her sling-bag for the documents she'd acquired.

"Show me." The captain said as he took a few steps to come standing besides her.

The pearly white coated lady spent a few seconds flicking through what appeared to be a sizable collection of paperwork, some digitally printed, others hand written, before stopping to pluck out what looked like a blueprint of an angular building, its image adorned with alien text. The girl the marine loomed over through her head back with a small shake to bounce her mane out from her eye and back into a more comfortable location before clearing her throat to read from the paper she now held.

"All federation automated structures are reliant on a source of power to operate their vastly mechanical based nature. I don't think any door within any building I've seen isn't mechanically operated to open and close. However once power is cut to the structure it draws auxiliary power from a local generator, meaning operational efficiency is reduced to a little over ten percent. This means each door you would come across would need to be keyed in with a personnel multi-pass before being given eight seconds to cycle, only then will a door open. All facility lights are dimmed to provide minimum illumination and power fluctuations are to be expected as power is rerouted to priority systems. I think you can expect the lights to flicker on and off at times."

"Spooooooky~!" Pinkie blurted from in between Errithius and Rarity, seemingly having appeared out of nowhere judging by how the captain had not registered her presence until her announcement.

"This won't be a concern, but locked doors could prove problematic, I'd prefer to move as freely as possibly in such confined quarters." Errithius stated as he raised a brow.

"Well I'm afraid there's little else to do in that regard. Cutting the power will make traversing the facility sluggish to say the least, but the power deduction allows for all personnel to access almost all areas of the facility for the sake of evacuation efficiency. All you would have to do is acquire an access key from any Fed official or soldier." Rarity said with an upbeat tone that tried to capture the best of the situation at hand.

"Almost all areas?" The captain inquired.

"I'm not one hundred percent sure, but there was mention in a requisition order I found from a couple of years ago for level five security systems. These systems haven't been observably implemented into any facility's we're more familiar with, meaning they have most likely been installed into the research facility. If I were to rely on my keen intuition I would safely assume that these systems are keeping the Feds most controversial research locked up, research most likely linked to Equestrias magic."

Errithius thought for a few seconds, considering the implications of all he had just heard. The generators were an immediate priority for absolute certainty. Although dismantling the research facility one section at a time with such dire movement restraints was hardly ideal, cutting the power to communication networks, alarms, locks and defensive measures was far more important in assuring the success of the mission. But something about the aforementioned security requisition perked the astartes interest. If such containment measure proved to hold the federation's most valued research, then perhaps a thorough cleansing of the entire facility was not needed. Destroying, or at least disabling whatever devices lay within would mean the federation would be preoccupied with regathering their research and beginning their efforts anew. This could lessen the possibility of planetary annihilation by a fair fraction, leaving the Federation crippled in it's motives, but not entirely devastated enough to see them cut all ties to Equestria.

"Miss Rarity, see if can find out anything more about those security systems. Where they were installed and for what purpose."

"Gladly, darling." The unicorn replied spiritedly.

"We have our heading then. My brothers and I shall deploy with a small strike team to the facility generators, once power has been severed, however, I will require a distraction." Errithius said, turning to look at Celestia.

"I...I understand, Captain. What do you need from my guard?" The alicorn replied grimly at the thought of more of her kind perishing.

"Just a preoccupational revolt, and not from just your personal guard, from all the country. We need all who have gone into hiding to take up arms and harass the Federation's forces and all citizens to turn on their local benefactor units. Sabotage vehicles, destroy ammunition and fuel stocks, start riots, make the environment more turbulent for the Federation to traverse."

"I cannot ask my people to risk their lives in such a way, hundreds could be killed, maybe more." Celestia said in a voice shaky with worry.

"If they do not then Federation forces will be readily available to deploy against us. The Feds are efficient, but are not very adaptable, meaning any hails for reinforcements their forces receive will mostly go unanswered as they focus on the preoccupations at hand. And civilian casualties can be kept to a minimum, perhaps outright avoided if the revolt is staggered in the correct order. First issue and order for country-wide protests to start immediately, and all who take part are to escalate their protests to riots after three hours. Then order your guard and any native with arms available to strike at whatever Federation forces and hardware seems most vulnerable thirty minutes after the riots have begun. Once these guerrilla strikes are initiated have all rioters retreat to more secure locations, be it safe houses, local forests or mountain areas. The Feds should be too preoccupied with fighting your guard to notice the rioters retreat, and when they do, I advise all civilians who have remained inactive to the events prior to this to follow them. Once all civilians are away, have your forces fall back to their deployment positions and hold out, leaving population centers emptied. By this time my efforts to destroy the facility would, with any luck, be complete. The end result is the Federation scattered, confused and robbed of their most precious prize. With no one to arrest, question or blame it could result in them arguing amongst themselves for a time, if their previous behaviour is anything to accurately judge by."

Celestia listened intently to the captain's plans, pondering a moment after he had finished, he expression tense and contemplative.

"Princess?" Errithius inquired.

"This...This could work." The alicorn muttered to herself.

"A lot of ponies could get hurt in all the chaos. Families could be separated, torn apart even." Cadence said in a soft, concerned tone as her hand gently touched upon her lower stomach.

"Worse will happen if we do nothing, and utilizing only military forces will leave the population of Equestria to suffer for our provocation." Celestia said with absolute surety, pausing a moment to think before speaking again.

"I always knew it would come to this. One way another we would always have to have committed our efforts to an exodus. A mass exodus of all Equestria to flee into the wild, to save themselves from the thrashing of a wounded Federation."

All present knew it as well, had known it for a very long time now, and such a fact wounded some more than others. Rainbow Dash stirred for a second before sitting up, the medical serfs seemingly finished with patching her up.

"Well then let's get to it everypony, we have some stuff to break. I'd better come with you to Rainbow Falls, Captain, the Feds conscripted me to work at the generators for a while a few months back, and I've got a rough idea were to best hurt them." The pegasus said as she hopped off the operating table and to her feet, standing strong, but her discomfort due to her injuries seeing her stand in a slightly crooked state.

"I admire your conviction, Miss Dash, but I hardly think you are ready to travel in your condition." Errithius said with a bassy chuckle he could not help to contain.

"Couldn't stop me even if you tried, Cap', I don't need to fly there and I can still walk and run, so I won't slow you down. Plus I didn't plan on going alone, if anypony wanted to keep me company on our little expedition?" Dash inquired, looking almost specifically at the larger orange pony standing across from her.

"Oh, uh, ah gotta git tah Appleloosa as soon as this all kicks off. They'll want tah hear this plan straight from me." Applejack replied as she adjusted her hat.

"And I'd better get everypony in Ponyville in the loop for Operation 'Feds-take-a-whappin'." Pinkie announced.

"Uh...'whappin'?" Princess Twilight asked with a failed attempt at a concealed smirk.

"Ain't a baddie we've met yet that hasn't been beaten with a good whappin'" Pinkie shrugged with a sense of satisfaction.

"I'd better go alert Shining and his guard, Twilight, could you do the same with the Crystal Empire? There should be a crystal mill to the south-west of the city that will have a contact who'll get the word out to everypony?" Asked Cadence.

"Absolutely." Confirmed the purple princess.

"And I know ponies in Manehattan who can spread the word. But I'd would appreciate it if I could have a ride back here when I'm finished, Captain. Fluttershy is still pretty shaken by everything that's happened and she's only recently started talking again. I wouldn't want her resolve to slip due to a lengthy absence on my part." Added Rarity.

"Understood. Celestia?" The marine inquired, turning to the princess.

"I'll be accompanying Rainbow Dash, I'll make sure you are kept safe and it couldn't hurt to have somepony who can use magic lay a part in this operation." The princess said calmly, coming to stand next to the blue pegasus.

Errithius took a moment and ran the details of the plan several times through his mind, his eyes gliding across all who stood before him. With one final, deep breath the astartes lifted his gaze to address the group as a whole.

"My marines shall stand besides your guard throughout the operation, and shall keep us informed on the situation throughout Equestria as it develops. I will assign you all gunships to report to, ready what equipment you have, say your farewells, and get set for deployment."

"So, that leaves us with only one logical option." Gerin'Gov growled as he turned to Megna'Gilith.

"You're proposing we exterminate this planet? I thought we went over this you degenerate?" The pale female replied with a fierce expression.

"Just shut up and listen for once! We don't have to destroy this world or our facilities on it if they all truly mean so much to you all, but we can deliver a singular killing blow to these creatures. All we require is there location, and from there my ships can carry out the rest." The commander said with solid absolution.

"So we're just going to blast them out of the sky? Is that really your plan?" Unal'Gov interjected.

"Yes, that's exactly what I'm going to do." Gerin'Gov replied in a condescending tone.

"That alien ship's defences are of entirely unknown capacity to us, we could hit them with everything we have and not scratch a percent from their shield power systems!" The scientist blurted.

"You and I both know our sensors detected minor power fluctuations occurring within certain systems within their ship when their shields were being struck, that means they have limited power capacity, and although they withstood an assault from a single cruiser I could easily deploy thirty ships as soon as they are detected. Their combined firepower will surely bring their shields down, and soon afterwards breach their hull."

"This is all based on information that is utterly inconclusive, what if your estimations are wrong?" Unal'Gov groaned with his head held in his hands.

"And even if you're correct what will the cost be for our ships and troops?" Megna'Gilith droned in a monotone.

"For the greater good of the federation it will cost as many as I see fit." The commander replied with a huff.

"Not from my perspective. I already have to order and process dozens of replacement troops after Yuni'Gov's little underground stunt, not to mention repairs for a space cruiser. I can't afford for you to pile me up with extra requisitions." The Officiator sneered.

"I don't care! They just spat in our faces after we offered them the logical way out of their retarded little dilemma and have severed all communications. We couldn't even hold a long enough conversation with them to get a fix on their location! The longer we wait the longer they run amok with the criminal rejects they harbour and the more time and effort we all waist on this sorry excuse for a science experiment! Speaking of which, how the fuck are you and your scientist freaks getting along with your dumb little tests and theories?" The commander spat and sneered, his temper boiling over to send him into a full blown tantrum.

"Progress has been...ugh...slow. But we're close. We're so close to unlocking a crucial element in harnessing Z-density. It's like I can feel it, like I can feel it in the back of my head...talking." The scientist said, starting off irate before drifting into an almost half-hypnotized state, snaring the attention of all present.

"And just what the fuck is wrong with you?" The commander hissed in disgust at the scientists antics.

"I'm ju-...I'm sorry, I haven't slept in a while. I think I should...I should sleep...yeah, just...just maybe after today's research." Unal'Gov droned, acting almost as if having been taken a serious blow to the head and earning the immediate disdain of the other two Feds present.

"Great, so now the research is invalidated on behalf of our head scientist growing delusional." The Officiator huffed as she looked doown at the scientist who now muttered to himself in disgust.

"Is everyone around me just slowly going mad?! Why won't anyone just let me blast this fucking country to dust?!" The commander barked and shrieked as his fist slammed into the table sat before him.

"Commander Gerin'Gov, we have located a foreign entitiy moving into orbit from the planet's surface, and moving fast! I don't think it's one of ours, sir!" A federation officer yelled through the rooms local speaker system to address the Commander.

"Of course it's not ours you idiot! It's them! The aliens! They're trying to escape and return to wherever they came from with the princesses! Order all ships to pursue them and destroy their vessel with maximum efficiency!" Yelled the commander through the communication channel.

"Orders confirmed! Moving to attack the alien vessel!" The officer replied before the communication channel blinked to a close.

"Finally! We destroy them, utterly vaporise any trace of them and it will be as though they were never here in the first place. And the princesses would have had to be dealt with sooner or later, personally I can happily say good riddance to those freaks." Gerin'Gov said, starting to finally calm down.

"Sir! This is Canterlot Facility! Gate three has been breached, we are under attack! Oh reason, she's tearing right through us! Oh-gurk! Gaaaah! NyuuuUUUAAAARK!" The Benefactor's voice who spoke through this fresh communication link was half drowned out by a chorus of gunfire, explosions and screaming before being finished off by shredding the feed with the grim sound of flesh tearing apart along with bone being sharply broken and gore spattering the floor beneath the presumably dead soldier, leaving the room in a pause of silence soon after the connection had been cut.

"WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON!" Was the last thing Gerin'Gov screamed before flipping the table in front of him.

15 - What's yours is mine

The Stormraven gunship sang it's song of war with pride and rage, the screams of it's engines piercing even it's own thick, armoured hull. The floor upon which Veteran Sergeant Adventios stood upon continuously gave a slight yet consistent tremor as the ship's engines grumbled and the atmosphere of the world around them washed over it's metal skin with great discomfort at the tremendous speed they had been travelling. A small shudder broke the rhythm of the humming vibrations coming from the hull as another pocket of air broke over the craft, and again, causing the only two non-astarte passengers to tense up, if but a little. The space marine took heart in how resolute the duo had been, especially considering the circumstances. Plucked from their lives, thrown into danger head first only to be entrapped within an alien ship by those who they had no idea whether to trust or not, then only to hurtle themselves into the fray once more. Adventios could only pray the rest of the population was as composed and purposeful, for no less would be required for the immense task at hand.

"Scans conclusive. Alien facility signatures detected within destination perimeter. Sixty seconds from arrival." The pilot announced through the on-board comm-channel.

A series of flexing arms and twisting wrists clunked, clacked and rattled around Adventios, adding to the noises of armour contact he himself made as he made final weapon and system checks. His heads-up display ammo counter blinked thrice as its systems triple checked their validity to find themselves sufficient before a translucent blueprint image of his armour's multiple segments flashed through a tall box to the top left of his vision. Several marines waved off a pair of serfs that had accompanied them on their trip as the ancient and slightly malfunctioning biomechanical creatures hobbled down the center of their two-by-two ranks. Again, Adventios washed his vision briefly over the Princess and her rainbow-haired accomplice, seeing them holding themselves together but failing to hide their extreme levels of discomfort and distress as they both clutched their flight harnesses with a death grip, eyes wide and brows tense. The sergeant drew his gaze back to look ahead into Brother Denethios' power pack, his armoured fingers gripping tightly to the grip points of his storm bolter, Shade snatcher.

"Thirty seconds out." The pilot said as the engines began to wind down steadily to approach their destination at a safer and more manageable speed.

Another temor rang through the ships hull, but this time it was far from the bounce delivered by a gentle pocket of air. Another, paired with a bassy thunderclap coming from outside the hull, shook Adventios and a couple other to readjust their footing slightly.

"Incoming fire, brace." The pilot sounded, his composure unshaken.

"In darkness!" Brother Chaplain Tyreth bellowed from the front of the Stormraven soon after he had unlocked the equestrian passengers from their harnesses and waved signaled for them to relocate behind the marine, at the passenger bay's rear.

"In darkness I shall be light!" Adventios called back along with all the other ten marines stood within the gunships deck.

"In doubt!" The chaplain barked again to all present.

"In times of doubt I shall keep faith!" All present, besides the natives, replied.

"In rage!" Tyreth called as he stood before his column of marines, his crozius giving a high pitched, electronic squeal as its ornate striking end burst into life with a bright pink power field shimmering around it.

"In throws of rage I shall hone my craft!" The squads replied as Adventios spied the princess and pegasus hurry past him.

"In vengeance!"

"In vengeance I shall have no mercy!" Marines replied as the front rank of both Tyreth and Sergeant Dathes braced their stance to prepare to initiate their assault.

"In battle!" The chaplain sung out the explosions thundered all around the gunship as it slowed, the crafts own weapons sounding with the shriek of missiles and hiss of laser beams.

"In the midst of battle I shall have no fear!"

"Ten seconds! Distance to enemy lines will be four meters!" The pilot barked over the vox channel.

"In death!" The chaplain roared, his amplified voice causing the natives behind Adventios to audibly slam their hands against their heads to shield their ears.

"In the face of death I shall have no remorse!" The marines hollered in response, bolters ready, Adventios letting his storm bolter fall to his side in his left hand as he unlocked his chainsword from his belt's mag-plate, brandishing the blade in his right.

The gunship grumbled and whined to a stop that filled the deck with a heavy thunk as the landing gear struck the ground beneath it. All went quiet for a second, the only sounds being the muffled plinking noise of small arms fire skittering across the ships armour, the hum of power armour reactor packs, the sizzle of Tyreths crozius, the low growl of Dathes and Adventios' primed chainsword motors and the steady breathing of twelve marines alongside the rasping, stuttering breaths of two terrified equestrians. The assault ramp's hydraulics squealed as their quickly lowered the forward mounted door, letting in a scarlet shower of incoming enemy fire, yet letting out something far more deadly.

"CHARGE!" Roared the chaplain, his boots pounding him forward at incredible speed alongside his battle brothers who all barked and yelled their own battlecries.

A little over fourteen feet lay between the end of the gunship's ramp and the frontlines of the alien enemies the marines faced, the doors to the generator facility another thirty or so feet behind them. The initial fourteen feet was covered in barely a couple of seconds as marines rocketed forward, the strength of their power armour adding to their own to propel them forward like living missiles. Alien fire whizzed by the marines or bit insulting little shards from their armour plate, a couple managing to find more vulnerable portions of armour, cutting through lightly armoured joints and shredding flesh beneath, but all non-lethal thus far and all doing nothing measurable to slow the marine advance.

Adventios threw himself into a sharp left turn as he exited the gunship, grass and dirt thrown into the air as his heavy and violent steps chewed up the earth beneath him. He broke into a sprint that sent him out into the widest line in the attack's formation, heading towards the outer reaches of the enemy line. Swarms of dozens of federation footsoldiers frantically scurried about, most rallying to the epicenter of the marines shock assault were the astartes had first made contact in the form of Chaplain Tyreth throwing himself into the air mid-sprint, his obsidian form falling into the alien ranks like a meteor, sending aliens scattering about, some tumbling to the ground in one piece, others proving less fortunate. Crackling booms sounded out as the chaplain's crozius discharged, sending handfuls of alien flying through the air in shredded, bloody forms. Metallic shrieks heralded agonized screams as chainsword mangled flesh and shattered bone, arcs of gore being thrown over the armour of both astarte and fed alike. All the while bolter fire hammered out in single shots or short bursts, enemies caught in the weapon's sights soon blasting apart from within in a messy spectacle.

Adventios threw his chainsword out and them forward, signalling both marines who followed him to commence offensive measures as they reached the optimal angle of attack. Herathor slowed to a halt a second before readying his heavy bolter and raining down terrible degrees of fire down on the aliens, each burst of rapid fire shearing apart cluster of tightly packed infantry, filling the air with thick red mist. Denethios, who had just thrown his head back around from visually checking on the natives raised his bolter and took to a sprint besides the veteran sergeant, fire blasting from his weapon's muzzle to cut down those infantry that had left themselves out in the open near their target area. Adventios quickly close in on the angular slabs of metal armour that the aliens had deployed as cover barricades, seven of the federation's soldiers line up behind, kneeling down to bring their weapons rested atop the barricade's edge. They peppered the marine's with semi-automatic fire, besides one which wielded a squat firearm akin to a carbine or submachinegun which emptied dozens of rounds a second, practically drenching the marine in fire. Yet this weapon lacked the kick the more common rifle variant had, each round merely scratching at the paint of the marines armour, even the single round that clipped Adventios in the abdomen failed to penetrate the plasteel segments, delivering only a mildly painful blow that the marine's mind easily ignored.

Both Adventios and Denethios vaulted the four foot high barrier together, each delivering punishing fire onto the nearest enemy they passed by at point blank range, each alien's body falling to the floor in a shredded heap. As the sergeant turned to ready himself to attack one more he threw out a burst of undiciplined fire to keep the soldier's heads down, the storm bolters fire scything an arm of one and sending top top of another skull showering behind him along with broken shards of helmet. most of the troops hit the dirt in an attempt to find shelter, two throwing their guns away and their hands skywards as their trembled on their knees. Adventios swept his bolter over them, his finger wrapped around the trigger, but held his fire against the seemingly surrendering infantry. However a small shower of bolts did soon disintegrate another trooper who had plucked up a rifle of a fallen comrade and duel wielded the rifles, screaming as he blasted the marines with fire from both barrels, each round delivered from each unbalanced, madly swaying rifle flying wide of the astartes, missing with embarrassingly poor accuracy. As the admittedly gutsy alien's broken body pieces slumped to the floor in a pile Adventios felt something blunt strike him in the hip. The marine's head snapped around to see the soldier with the squat gun, likely some kind of junior officer of sorts, had used the stock of his geometrically designed firearm to strike a melee blow to the sergeant, yet the alien's strength doing little else but send a harmless tremor through the marine's belt. The sergeant threw his chainsword arm wide, catching the alien's gun with the back of his fist and sending the creature reeling back minus one gun which tumbled to the dirt several feet away. The alien quickly drew a combat blade of diminutive size when considering those used by imperial troops, the blade itself no longer than six inches or so.

"Come on!" The alien barked through the mechanical components of his helmet, red lenses staring up into pink ones for a moment.

"I pray you choose to die as bravely as you boast." Adventios said through his own helmet's amplifier as he locked his storm bolter to the back of his belt.

"I don't need fucking prayer to kill you, degenerate!" The alien blurted as his hand snapped around behind him and returned to reveal a drawn and loaded pistol which took immediate fire into the marine's face.

Each round was much like that from his earlier weapon, chipping white paint from ceramite but little else as Adventios took a single large step forward, clutching the officer's shoulder in his vice of a grip and knocking away the pistol with a sharp blow with his elbow. The creature squealed as the sergeant felt what her assumed to be two collar bones and the upper part of an alien humerus break under his grasp. With a swift swing that carried the momentum of a speeding vehicle Adventios drove a roaring chainsword blade into the diaphragm of the alien soldier, gore, guts and shards of bone spattering from the wound as the whirling teeth of the weapon quickly chewed clean through the soldier's torso, leaving behind a limp and gutless corpse impaled upon his weapon. The astarte lowered his blade and raised a boot to kick off the alien remains, the body falling apart into two mangled halves onto the ground.

"It seems you were wrong." Adventios growled as he spared a moment to look down on the body of his victim before turning about and taking to a jog towards the facility.

A little over a minute had passed since the first astarte bot hit the ground to the final bolt being fire, and those aliens that had not surrendered were most certainly dead. Crimson was spattered in all directions, over grass, corpse, weapon, dirt and barrier as if the blood had fallen from the skies. Alien soldiers shook in their boots, hands on the back of heads, all staring at the ground directly beneath them as they knelt, many falling into some form of panic attack as their breathing became harsh and laboured. Celestia and Dash had both been kept close to battle brother Revitheon who now was headed to join the rest of the marines near the facility gates, both natives in tow and trying their best not to observe the macabre carnage that was littered all around them, and failing in doing so.

"You will order them to stand down!" Barked Tyreth through his skull shaped death mask at a federation officer who knelt before him.

"Yeah, I don't think so." The officer replied, seemingly humored by the notion.

"They will all die as these troops have died just now! Order them to submit and none others shall be harmed" The astartes voice bellowed with the help of his helmet's amplifier systems.

"Then they'll die in service to the Federation." The alien shrugged.

Tyreth booted the officer over backward to have the alien flop over clumsily to his side, a blow meant to dismiss rather than maim or kill, though perhaps delivered with a touch extra frustration judging by the chaplain's currently heated condition.

"Gethov, see if there's a simple way through these doors. Tachiar, return to the gunship and ready a melta charge in case he proves unsucessful." Tyreth ordered with seamless fluidity, seeing both marine nod a salute and head out to their respective tasks.

"More are, ugh, more will be on their way soon." Celestia added, cringing as her hoof slipped in a small pile of spilt alien entrails.

"It will be fine, Princess. Having the Federation preoccupied away from the research facility is part of the plan after all, and this location cannot be exempt from such a ploy." The chaplain replied as he turned to look to the alicorn.

"This image right here is giving me mixed feelings at best." Rainbow Dash expressed, looking incredibly tense as she rubbed her arms as if physically cold.

"The enemy seemed rather convicted to the defense of this location. Ultimately their loss was orchestrated by them not expecting our arrival, I had guessed the fight would be a bloody, yet sorely short lived one." Tyreth expressed, his tone almost hinting at a shred of sorrow beneath the metallic growl of his amplifier.

"It's strange...the place we found you, now here...for all they've done to us I still feel sorry for these creatures dying like this. It's kind of...a shame." Celestia said softly, her ears folding back as she spoke.

"It is. I doubt many of them were absent of family and a home, but it would seem their cause made this choice for them. A shame, indeed, but necessary." The astarte replied, his voice burdened with the weight of wisdom and purpose, the princess seemingly affected by the infectious nature of a chaplain's council as she appeared to regain a shred of heart for herself.

A buzzing crackle shot into the air, the digital noise coming from below the astartes. Almost all marines in the immediate area turned to look down on the fallen alien officer who writhed on the ground in an attempt to right himself upwards once again. An icon in the officers wrist mounted data pad flickered as it seemed some form of transmission was being sent to him, and it may have been some deception of the senses or mind, or a trick of the sound of the wind blowing by, but Adventios could have sworn he had heard screaming amidst the static.

"And what might that be?" Tyreth growled at the alien as he loomed over his comparatively tiny form.

"Yeah, I get it, you freaks are attacking Canterlot too. Fuck you, you barbarian." The officer spat back.

A pause rang through air, cut only by the continued chatter from the alien's radio and the breeze of the wind for a few heartbeats as marines looked at each other, perplexed.

"Sir, no forces were deployed to Canterlot." Sergeant Dathes said, breaking the silence.

"No, there weren't." The chaplain replied, his head slowly turning to bring his skull helm to stare at Princess Celestia who looked back in a worried, slightly frightened manner before her expression grew slack-jawed and wide-eyed.

"Luna." She practically whispered, her head snapping to the side to look straight at Rainbow Dash.

"Go, I'll be fine." Dash said, nodding rapidly.

"Wai-!" Tyreth started as he began to reach a hand out before Celestia vast wingspan exploded outward and sent her airbourne in less than a heartbeat, leaving the marines and Dash staring up to the skies, all eyes having completely lost sight of the princess in the dense clouds above.

"Very well." Sighed the chaplain.

The Federation Immortal augmented soldier fell to the marble floor with a metallic thunk that was accompanied by a wet slapping sound as it's mangled and bloodied portion of it's body hit the stone beneath it. It's stomach, one of the portions of it's body that was far less well armoured as the rest of it's body, had been entirely eviscerated, entrails draped over the floor nearby it's corpse and gore drenching it's once pristine white and bright blue and yellow armour plate. To ad insult to injury, the alien had also lost it's right arm in daring to defy the Princess of the Night, the limb, even though being reinforced and empowered by electrofiber bundles and reacta-gel layers the limb had been torn almost clean off by the immense strength of the rampaging alicorn, who now sought out her next victim with eyes aglow with the joy of battle.

Another round fired from an alien magna-rifle struck a previously invisible barrier of sorts that surrounded Nightmare Moon, the air around the small cataclysm resonating with a glassy echoing sound and sending out neon blue ripples of energy before dissipating once again. The princess returned the hostile gesture by raising a blood-soaked, clawed hand towards the benefactor and releasing a small portion of her magical potential. Pale blue lightning erupted from all around her hand and forearm, wrapping around her dark fur light veins of pure energy and going on to soar forth from her palm and straight to her adversary in bright, flashing archs. The magical lightning struck the target and delivered a seemingly non-measurable kinetic blow to send the soldier slamming backwards into a marble illar that made up a portion of one of the two entrances into Canterlot Palace. The soldier was not so fortunate to simply suffer a shattered spinal column however, as the magical discharge he had received had caused hundreds of biological micro-detonations, shredding the grey battle uniform, twisting and torturing the alien's armour as if it were paper, shattering bones, blasting flesh clean off of the creature's body and tearing alien body tissue apart in a terrible spectacle of immense trauma. The ravaged corpse simply slapped against the pale marble like a plastic bag full of jello and syrup, splitting apart and spattering the area with a foul mess.

More rounds were fire from the entrance of the palace as the troops hastily slammed the tall doors to the castle's interior shut and activating some form of heavy duty locking mechanism built into the original architecture as a resounding clunking sound would lead the princess to believe. But this did little to concern the obsidian demigod as she casually strolled over to the doors, her royal battle garb now stained half red with alien blood. The alicorn's horn glowed as she raised a hand and lazily swiped her clawed fingers off to the side as if dismissing an unwanted visitor, the doors before her disintegrating into a shower of splintered wood and twisted metal that blasted back five alien that had barely seconds to retreat away from the doorway they had seemingly sealed. Red lances of magna fire danced through the air before Nightmare Moon, a couple striking her magical defenses, but most flying wide as the shock of her entry disorganized their fire. As she strode in she spied eight more troops besides the five she'd just disoriented or killed, the latter confirmed as she passed one trooper who had two shards of wood from the devastated door impaled into it's chest. With a slight fiercening of her already venomous expression and the clench of her fists the alicorn emitted a psychic shockwave that blasted outwards from her very body with a dull boom, taking all the aliens within the palace off their feet, slamming them into marble walls, pillars and mechanical equipment they had installed into the building.

Alien's cried out in pain and panic, some fleeing for their lives, some taking cover and others squirming in pain on the floor after receiving some form of grievous injury. Although many of the technicians and officers who inhabited the interior of the palace fled either out the nearest door or window available to them, some remained at their posts, warily stood behind computer consoles and holographic tables, all eyes fixed on the giant of a mare who had just broken through into their usurped domain. Nightmare Moon marched down the long hallway of Canterlot Palace, those aliens that dared obstructed or fire upon her being mangled by an invisible force or blasted apart by ethereal lightning. The princess soon came to a junction and turned a corner to come to face the doorway into the castle's throne room, and as far as she was concerned, her room. She reached out her magic to test the large set of doors to, predictably, find them tightly locked.

Are these things dead set on seeing that I destroy half my own castle if I am to retake it from them?! The alicorn thought as her mind boiled with frustration.

As she marched forward the alicorn used her own defenses to smash through the doors to the throne room. As she struck the obstacle her shields intensified to the point that she almost effortlessly pushing the material of the doors outwards around her in a circular shape, stone shattering and metal bending outwards sharply. Within the princess was shocked to find the throne room had been transformed into some form of alien command center, machinery and strange electrical equipment scattered all over the place like a dark grey, angular fungus that emitted various forms of red light. Nightmare's rage built to a magnificent climax, and although she did not growl or roar, her very aura bristled with a terrible energy. The dark alicorn pressed forward, sweeping her magic outwards and flooding the room with it like a tidal wave, consoles crumpling as they were torn from their foundations, holo-tables shattered and flipped end-over-end, alien technicians and operatives tossed through the air by the invisible force, some even being crushed and mangled into gory blobs of shattered skeleton and bubbling gore. Soon the whole room had been thoroughly 'cleansed', all alien presence broken apart and destroyed, save for one.

"You are in my chair." Nightmare Moon growled through clenched, predatory jaws at the robed alien that sat nonchalantly in the royal throne of Equestria.

"I don't care." The alien replied, his tone flat as he raised a hairless eyebrow.

A small pause left the room silent, the collosal alicorn staring down at the frail alien with fire in her teal eyes.

"Do you know who I am?" Nightmare Moon said in a steady tone.

"Do you know who I am?" The alien replied in a condescending manner.

"Actually, I do. I really, really do." The alicorn said with a chuckled, her sharp set of brilliantly white teeth bared in a wry grin as she learned forward, placing an immensely powerful arm against the back of the throne to brace herself as she brought her face level with the fed.

"Attendant Supreme Gak'Gov. Overseer of Canterlot and relay to all activity in Equestria. I remember you very well." Nightmare Moon said in a sickly sweet tone.

"Huh, I don't ever remember meeting you." The alien sneered, his head veering away to the side, the attendant evidently uncomfortable with being this close to such a large and intimidating creature.

"Well, I remember you. I remember the day you arrived to this castle to conduct a little 'foreign investigation'." The alicorn said, pressing her face forward, eyes half closed and nose mere inches from Gak'Gov.

"I remember when your commanders designated Canterlot a hub of unlawful activities and social injustices." The alicorn's brows tensed slightly as she spoke, her grip on the edge of the throne tightening.

"I remember when your commanders deemed me and...my sister to be unfit to rule over Equestria." The mare spoke again, her eyes closing, features tensing and jaw clenching as she recalled memories that seemed to draw up particularly turbulent emotions.

Meanwhile, the attendant began to feel immensely uncomfortable, and not just emotionally, but physically also. His neck felt sore, tense, as if his muscles were all cramping up at once. He flexed and twisted his head about in an attempt to relieve himself of the increasing pressure his throat felt.

"I...I remember when you...you issued the order for my assassination by the hands of that damnable traitor guardspony! And I remember the look in his eyes as I drove a blade through his chest!"

In a throw of rage Nightmare moon slammed her fist into the back of the throne, cracking the fine stonework of the framework. Below her, the alien began trying to cry out, but only squealed out smothered and choked murmurs and moans of pain as his mouth was locked shut until a sharp snap filled the air, the alien letting out a muffled scream of agony as his jaw had broken as if the weight of his own head had imploded his mandible inwards in a bizarre display.

"I remember being evicted from my own home under threat of death! I remember being framed for murdering an uncooperative subject in cold blood! I remember being hounded for weeks on end and having nowhere to run to!" Nightmare Moon now roared, her eyes flaring open, her expression twisted in a visage of pure hatred, mane writhing madly with turbulent energy and thick layers of muscle tightening in anger.

More snaps and cracks could be heard as the attendant's face broke apart, his neck and spine collapsing into itself in a series of sickening pops, shattered teeth and blood spattering from his mangled lips as his throat rumbled with a series of dying gurgling sounds, his arms flailing about madly, hands clawing at the throne's arms and the alicorn's face, neck and shoulders.

"My name is Nightmare Moon! And I remember...EVERYTHING!"

With that the alicorn grabbed the crippled alien by the ruined neck and shoulder before whirling around, arms tightening before throwing themselves wide open, tearing the shattered head of the alien clean off in a terrifying display, sending an arc of gore flying across the room. As she tore apart her victim the mare let out a deafening roar that was far more feral than that of a pony, sounding much like that of a fully grown dragon. Her hands clenched with titanic strength, the alien remains she held falling to the floor as the tissue she held popped apart into gory pulp. Her massive wings flared out as she continued her single, long roar of rage and victory, while magical lightning danced about the room, emanating from her dark form to display her as a truly mythological spectacle. Nightmare Moon finished with a rumbling growl, glowing eyes dimming down, features more pained than she would have ever admitted to anypony as she simply stared up at the ceiling for a moment, her breathing heavy and still holding a growling quality to it before she closed her eyes to recompose herself.

A smile slowly and steadily broke across Nightmare's face, her eyes lazily opening as her arms dropped to her side. Her wings folded in as her body relaxed, the mare taking a single deep breath before breaking into a casual walk back out the throne room and towards Canterlot's residential area.

The dark alicorn strode down the long, wide set of marble stairs that connected Canterlot palace to it's urban domain through a massive archway. The arch had been draped with federation banners for over a year now, yet Nightmare had seen that reign had come o an end on her way into the palace, having set the banners alight with her flurries of lightning as she passed under them. At the bottom of the large stairway lay a fallen federation Dominator battle suit, the giant mech vehicle having suffered a devastating penetration wound through it's thorax which served as a cockpit for the robot's pilot, a six inch wide hole scarring both the vehicles armoured front and the engines at it's rear as the princess had cut it down with a magical beam of energy, both disabling the machine and killing the pilot instantaneously soon after having deflected a single round from the machines primary magna-cannon, having done so with considerable effort and concentration. Upon reaching the fallen mech, Nightmare strode atop it's face, coming to stop upon the highest point the machine corpse offered.

Canterlot's population now warily wandered outside their homes in response to the sudden absence of the commotion that had no doubt disturbed them moments ago. Many were simply talking amongst themselves in small groups, expressing worry and small degrees of panic at the situation before them, some marveled in fright and disgust upon seeing their streets littered with dead federation security, benefactors, defenders and immortals alongside trashed and ruined alien weapons and equipment. It would seem a select few hurried about, presumably belonging to some kind of resistance group, but all scurrying to collect as much functioning alien hardware as possible. The ponies nearest the fallen dominator, many observing the alien wreckage looked up in fright to see the mare of their nightmares, the fallen princess of Equestria and harbinger of darkness looming over them in a truly history book worthy envisionment. Her mane and tail flickered wildly with ethereal energies, the luminous hair almost like a liquid that swam in the air, bearing the dark of night and the shimmer of starlight in it's mass. Her obsidian fur made her appear as a living shadow that banished all light before her, save for the cyan glow of her draconic eyes. With her titanic frame, shining, blood stained armour and predatory visage, the princess appeared as a goddess of battle and nightmare both, seeing more and more ponies have their attention drawn to her and soon seeing them tremble before her presence. Nightmare Moon scanned her eyes across the hundreds that had gathered in the street and now cautiously backed away from their new matriarch, the alicorn grinning in amusement at the sight.

"Citizens of Equestria! Look upon your fallen alien oppressors and rejoice at their downfall! For I, Nightmare Moon, have seen to their demise, for the sake of the future of all Equestria! Now you shall rally behind me as my loyal subjects, and together we shall drive this menace from our lands and reclaim the Equestria they have robbed from us! For I am your new, one and only princess, and by my rule, and the glory of the night eternal, Equestria shall be rebuilt, far greater than it has ever been!" Nightmare hollered, her voice full of purpose and zeal, and although still deeply frightened by the alicorn's presence, the ponies below her couldn't help but be captured by her words.

"All I ask, is that you kneel before me and my rule." Nightmare said in a silky tone.

The ponies before her were evidently deeply conflicted. Many still held firm allegiance to the royal sisters, others having conformed at least partly to the federation's demands, and the rest too shocked by what had befallen to make any rational decision. Although the stall the crowd offered began to irritate the princess, she knew that this was a difficult time for them, and all they needed was a degree of encouragement.

"I said...KNEEL!" Nightmare Moon roared, neck muscles tense with rage, biceps plumping as her fists clenched, her voice delivering a deep echoing quality through an ancient and supernatural method of speech lost to time.

Ponies reeled back in shock, eyes wide, couples and families holding tightly to one another as fear swept over them like a tidal wave. Not a second passed and the first ponies dropped to their knees, more and more following by the second until all before her bowed to her might. The giant of a mare allowed herself to relax once more, a soft smile spreading across her face, her eyes growing as gentle as they could be considered.

"I understand these are troubling times for all of us, but there is no need to fear. Where your former princesses abandoned you to the torment of these miserable creatures, I swear to stand by your side always." Nightmare Moon announced in a surprisingly kind and gentle tone, but most surprisingly, a seemingly sincere one, raising a fair few brows amongst the crowd of kneeling equestrians.

"May I have a word?" An all too familiar voice said from behind Nightmare, the bearer of the voice seemingly emanating a bright white light that washed over the back of the dark alicorn and over the crowd of ponies before her, the princess slowly turning her head about to bear witness to the new arrival, their identity causing Nightmare to bear a predatory grin.

16 - Standoff

Armoured boots thundered against equestrian dirt and grass as the marines scurried to either side and away from the main doorway into the generator facility.

"Fire in the hole!" A battle brother barked as the marines braced.

A dull thump followed by a dry shreik sounded as a terribly intense shockwave passed through all present outside the facility as the melta charge detonated, washing the immediate area in a bright violet light as it's intense thermal energies disintergrated most of the facility's door and the frame surrounding it. Although the air around the door breach was so hot as to shred the skin clean off of anyone who would be foolish enough to pass through it, such a threat put little worry into the hearts of the Hospitalers. The space marines piled in, close combat weapons holstered in favour of ranged weapons optimized for close quarters engagement, meltaguns primed on a broad discharge setting and bolters set to semi-automatic or two-round burst. The marine found that hose aliens within had little to no fight left in them, many having been positioned far too close to the door when the charge had blown, their cover aglow with an angry orange heat, their clothes mostly seared clean off their bodies and their armour melted into their very flesh in a grotesque fashion. The half-cooked feds screamed through lipless mouths, eyes that hadn't popped in their sockets staring out in agony, thoroughly lidless, before collapsing in still smoking heaps on the floor. Those that were left were still recovering either from the horrific sight of their mutilated comrades or from the blast of intense heat that would have singed of their eyebrows if the creatures had had any to begin with. Bolt round blasted out, roaring thuds hammering out and echoing through the metallic interior of the structure, aliens falling amidst bloody mist and spattered giblets as the marines kept their advance pressing on. Soon what appeared to be a reception hall was cleared of all contacts, and the heat left behind by the melta bomb had begun to die out.

"Breach sector clear. Miss Dash, you're clear to proceed." Adventios said through his vox mic built into his helmet, the message transmitting to another marine waited outside, emitted through the marine's amplifier grill to function as a speaker system.

The blue coated pegasus cautiously stepped through the breach, hooves careful not to graze the still very hot molten metal. Once inside she advance towards the center of the room and proceeded to get her bearings, taking a little longer than the sergeant would have liked as he and his marines covered the doorways leading into the room they occupied.

"What's the problem?" Adevntios asked in a low tone.

"Eh, this is all a bit new to me. This place has gotten bigger since the last time I was here, normally the entrance just lead straight to a maintenance hallway that took you straight to one of the reactors." Dash replied as she spun on the spot slowly, trying her best to read the alien signs and labels to try and lead herself to somewhere familiar.

"Where did you get that?" Brother Revitheon asked as he spotted the Magna-rifle held in Dash's grasp, the weapon neatly shouldered.

"The last guy didn't seem to need it very much." The girl replied casual, causing a couple of marines present to emit a single huff of amusement.

"Alright, that's enough. Can you still get us to our destination?" Tyreth growled, his patience tested slightly.

"Yeah, I think so. I'm no ace when it comes to reading Tafish like Twilight is, but I think this'll lead us to the maintenance network." She said as she approached one of the door to the left of the large, mostly pristine waiting room.

"And that weapon?" The chaplain inquired with a wary tone.

"I've used one before, I'll be fine." Dash replied in solid surety.

The marines moved up in solid formation, all doorways still covered by at least one astarte as Denethios keyed in a decoding transmission through the auspex multi-tool he had fastened to his belt. The device chimed as it successfully broke through the doors security systems with relative ease, the mechanical systems in the building sliding the door away in three geometric shaped that receded into the frame. Almost immediately after the way was clear a flurry of crimson fire came hissing through the corridor ahead. Denethios gave Dash a small but sharp shove, throwing her wide from the entryway and stumbling back a few steps to the safety the door-frame offered, the other marines taking shelter in a similar manner.

"For all our sakes, I pray you are right." Denethios called out to he pegasus through the hail of alien fire.

Errithius marched forward out the front ramp of the stormraven gunship, following the lead of Princess Cadence who seemed outrageously eager to find those she sought after. The pink, purple and blonde female hoped forward with a short stepped jog, her head swinging about, scanning the trees and boulders that were heavily scattered all around the landing zone.

"Shining?!" The princess called out, her voice mostly drowned out by the dying whine of the gunship's engines.

The captain, his command squad and combat squad Viskur strode onwards down the ramp and stopped just before the princess, many also scanning the area for signs of activity, yet all held their bolters just to be on the extra safe side.

"Shining!" Cadence yelled again, louder this time and far more audible as the craft behind her quieted down.

After a short pause the marines started to notice an array of movement in the treeline, groups of shapes moving between the debris of an ancient rock-slide, though in the dying light of day, and considering the distance between them and the creatures they observed, none could identify those they had spotted.

"Cadence?!" A husky, unmistakably male voice called back from behind the trees ahead.

"Shining?!" The princess called back, the plush bodied princess breaking into her scurrying jog once again to close on the treeline.

"Cadence!" The voice called again as a figure rapidly closed in towards the alicorn, soon breaking into a full sprint.

The figure soon revealed itself to be a male native equestrian, his fur a pure, pearly white, his mane and tail composed of streaks of both a darker and lighter blue. Judging by the single horn sprouting from the center of his forehead Errithius could easily observe he belonged o the unicorn sub-breed of equestrian. He was dressed in grey military fatigues of practical design, his combat trousers boasting an array of pockets. He wore a vest of fairly well crafted chainmail, most of it covered by armour plate that was shaped to provide protection to the chest, the left shoulder in the form of a seemingly petal shaped pauldron and three plates of armour linked to his belt, one offering his rear a degree of protection much like a space marine's, while two more were strapped to his legs to cover the front of his thighs. His battle plate was a deep, royal purple in colour bearing a golden trim, reminiscent of the battle plate worn by the Emperor's Children space marines. The two equines ran into each others arms, the two sharing a long, deep embrace before then sharing a questionably appropriate kiss that had Errithius' expression crease in perplexity at the activity he was utterly unfamiliar with. Once the two dureecoupled after a time they pressed their foreheads together, horns criss-crossed as they both quietly spoke of how they had missed each other. The captain could allow the sentiment to continue no further for the sake of the ever ticking clock he knew to be against them, the astarte stepping forward with his brethren in tow to come up behind the couple. The male soon came to notice the group of towering alien creatures, and although quickly seemed to recognise they were not the same breed as the federation, he cautiously tightened his grip on his mate slightly, backing away a step with wide eyes.

"It's okay, Shining, it's okay. They're here to help." Cadence said in an infectiously relaxing tone as she held her lover by the sides of his face.

"Oh, uhm, yeah. Sure." The equestrian replied in a slightly higher pitched tone her had previously had, looking thoroughly shaken by the sight before him.

Another shot hammered the alien weapon into Dash's shoulder, the muzzle flying high as the recoil took it's toll. The round she'd just fired struck a security unit right in the base of the throat, the velocity of the round passing through the alien's flesh and bone, snapping it's neck in the process and leaving it to collapse to the floor in a lazy heap. The space marine's weapons let out their own thunder, their weapons recoil seeming to affect them as much as a mild breeze would, each shot placed with admirable accuracy to scythe down alien soldier after alien soldier.

"How's that door coming, Denethios?!" Adventios called out as he fired another burst from his double-barreled weapon down the hallway.

"I'm encountering delays, I believe the enemy have deployed digital countermeasures to slow us down!" The marine replied from behind the defenders.

"And this influx of fresh troops leads me to believe they have begun deploying infantry as well. We're going to have a damnable time getting out of here, Chaplain!" Herathor barked over the thunder of his heavy bolter discharging.

"Hold firm and fear not death, brothers! We have made it this far, His will guides us!" Tyreth yelled as he blasted the head clean off another benefactor before an immortal fired a flurry of magna rounds into his right pauldron, sending him reeling back round the corner, another marine replacing his efforts with bolter fire.

Dash kept up her fire as best as she could, but finding her efforts greatly eclipsed by that of the space marines. It did not bother her that she had reaped a far smaller tally of kills than the marines, but she was starting to feel that her presence there was becoming practically worthless at this point. She desperately tried to place her shots to better stem the enemy's efforts, or at least keep their heads down, but since the amplifier suit wearing immortals had entered the fray, the federation's grasp on defensive positions had become slightly more resistant, and their advanced uncomfortably more effective with each passing minute. Dash tried her best to think about what advantages her position held, what she could make use of. The first was easy to remember, and that was this corridor was the only one leading into the western maintenance network, then leading onto the western reactor array that converted the energies produced by the rainbow falls into energies the feds used to power the eastern research facility. This was the choke-point that not only needed to be surpassed by the marines and herself, but at least temporarily seal off to prevent their pursuers from flanking and surrounding them within the maze of maintenance tunnels. Unfortunately the interior of he corridor was built much like any other federation structure and was extremely resilient to structural compromise or collapse. A single segment of the tunnel that stretched ahead could be blasted open, the paneling being destroyed by little more than sustained small arms fire due to the induced pressured kept behind the walls of most federation facilities, mostly those housing sensitive equipment. Dash's eyes widened with revelation before she spun around to address the nearest marine.

"I need a grenade coked off between us and the feds.! I need to expose the conductor conduits behind the internal paneling!" Dash called out over the sound of gunfire to the marine pressed against the wall besides her, who gave a sharp nod in response and readied a grenade, dislodging the pin, calling out a warning, then tossing the cylindrical device down the hallway.

The grenade bounced a fair distance, surprisingly coming to a halt almost exactly half way between the marines and the benefactors, pausing a moment before detonating with a sharp blast that rang the ears of the pegasus. Once quickly recovered from her disorientation she turned again to look at the astarte sergeant, Dathes.

"Cover me!" Dash said before darting off down the corridor, rifle in hand.

"Wait! Rainbow, wait!" Dathes called out, the marine shifting his stance to steadily proceed down the corridor after her whilst providing covering fire.

Dash could barely see what was happening around her with her bloodstream composed of what she assumed was mostly adrenaline at this point. Red flashes surrounded her vision as she sprinted down the corridor, hindered slightly by her half-healed injuries sustained the day previous, but making good progress so far. The yellow flashes of returning space marine fire filled portions of her vision also as she assumed at least a couple of the alien's had begun to follow her advance. Soon dash came to a skidding halt, dropping to one knee just before the breach in the wall the marine's grenade had caused. The torn and charred metal of the interior plating had been spectacularly blasted away, destroying many components hidden beneath the wall, but not the primary electro-static feed conduit as Dash had hoped. The pipe was at least as thick as a pony, it's length divided into segments separated by neon red spaces that thrummed with the energy the conduits contained. Half her mind marveling at how she had made it this far, the pegasus raised her rifle and brought her aim square with one of the glowing separations before firing a heartbeat later. Not a millisecond after she had fire a shot an enemy round blasted clean through he barrel of the rifle she held, the weapon letting out a harsh whine that built in volume before the whole device sharply detonated in her very hands. Dash cried out in pain as the right side of her face felt as though it were on fire, the inside of her right forearm and right shoulder feeling much the same sharp, searing pain. Although extremely uncomfortable, it was not enough to be unbearable, leaving the pegasus tense with pain on her side, her eyes opening to reveal a blurry sight that slowly grew clearer with time.

A degree of relief washed over Dash as she saw how her efforts had not been in vain, a section of the corridor immediately ahead of her filled with white-hot arcs of lightning that was conducted through a quickly dissipating gas that leaked from a breach in the power conduit she had sabotaged. Through it, not only could neither side firmly make out the position of the other, but none could cross through the miniature lightning storm. A deep thud sounded from behind Dash a moment before she felt a large hand gently grip her left shoulder, slowly turning her over onto her back as she cringed and gasped in fits of mild pain.

"Have any of your friends cared to mention how perhaps your bravery is twinned with your foolishness?" Dathes said in a soft tone as the pink lenses of his helmet scanned over the pegasus he knelt over.

"Guh...Yeah, I think...I've heard something...Nnng...like that...before." Dash weakly replied as the marine drew a medical pistol from the rear of his belt, cycling the devices mechanisms to activate some form of spray unit that doused Dash's wounded areas with a cooling mist that numbed her maladies to a degree.

"I don't know, Cadence. These guys just happen to show up in the last place Princess Celestia happens to look out of desperation? They just happen to be a space travelling military cult and they just happen to feel the need to help us? This is starting to sound like a poor excuse for some kid's comic book. I mean do we really, really know where they come from? Have they shared anything about themselves besides the bare basics?" Shining Armour said, pacing before his wife who sat before him upon an ammunition crate within the captain's command tent.

"Of course not, Shining. They have no more reason to trust us than we do to trust them. But they haven't demanded to hear any more than we have been willing to tell them, and they're actions couldn't prove their convictions more." The alicorn said in a genuine tone, trying her best to ease her husbands fears.

"I just don't understand the motivation behind it. Everything the federation has done for us has always had a price to it, and we've given up so much already. What's to say these...uh...whatever they are, won't do the exact same, or worse?" Stressed the unicorn.

"Because they're not the federation. Because they seem to have a genuine moral compass. They could easily whether whatever the federation would try and throw at them and eventually find a way back to wherever they came from, but the thought of abandoning us to die away here...I feel like they know a part of their honour would die with us as well if they simply left us."

"You're good at reading ponies, Cadence. What have you seen in these aliens?" Shining inquired in a low tone, coming rest upon a stack of water barrels.

Cadence hesitated for a moment, knowing what she had to say wasn't particularly nice, but it was the truth, nonetheless.

"Pain. Hate. The...product of what feels like ten lifetimes of ceaseless conflict. In a way, they're far worse than any federation soldier when considering who fearsome they are in battle. Their fear, it's...it's receded, mishapen...like an amputated limb. Their whole psyche feels...unbalanced...almost, broken. Like somepony cut out everything that would hinder them as soldiers, shaping them into the perfect warrior breed. If the space marines wanted, this haphazard band of castaways could lay waste to our entire domain in days."

"You always know just what to say to put my mind at ease, sweetie." Shining replied, his voice strained with fear and eyes wide as an ironic grin was plastered across his face, the sight causing Cadence to giggle slightly before standing up and placing her hands upon her husbands shoulders in a reassuring display.

"But they wouldn't. I don't think they could even if they wanted to. Like I said, pieces of them are missing inside, even pieces that allow for a pony to succumbed to misplaced actions. It's strange, they're almost...programmed to follow a strict set of moral codes that's been fed into their minds their whole lives. It's...sad, really. Being around them...it's like being around a group of angry little colts who've never known their parents, never felt the love of a mare, never even imagined themselves a future that wasn't dying horribly on some terrible war far from home while the rest of the world just forgets you and moves on!" Cadence grew more distressed as she spoke, recalling all she had felt through the psychic residue the marines exuded around her, all that they were and all that they would never be.

"It's okay, it's okay sweetie. I understand, it's fine." Shining said, calming his wife down as he placed a hand against her cheek to console her, the mare letting out a long sigh as she savoured his touch for a moment.

"But they're brave, they're true to their word, honest and chivalrous. In fact they're a lot like a certain captain of the royal guard I've heard about." Cadence said, looking into her husbands eyes with charming intent.

"Oh yeah, I've heard of him. Sounds like a real shiny-shoed prissy prince from what I've heard." Shining said with a chuckle.

"Oh, but he's sooooo handsome~!" Cadence replied in fake hysterics as she fell into Shining's arms, the two sharing a short giggle before sharing a long, deep kiss, Cadence eventually pulling away.

"I know this is all a bit chaotic at the moment, and I know it's difficult with your guard already so overwhelmed, but if we don't do this we-...then all of Equestria as we knew it will be gone forever." Cadence said with sincerity, quickly amending a misstep that had almost come in her vocabulary.

"Cadence, something's wrong. You've been getting more and more tense recently when you mention these sort of things. What's bothering you?" The captain said, cradling his wife's face as he looked into her eyes.

"It's fine. Really, I'm fine. You know how these things can get to me and...after all this time I guess it's just started to take it's toll." Cadence lied convincingly, inside screaming at herself.

"Okay, but I'm worried about you. Whatever happens over the next few days, I want you to stay out of it, okay? Stay in the camp, a safe house or...if you're absolutely sure it's safe, then at the space machine's spaceship thing." Shining armour said, the last of his words bearing a groan of insecurity.

"Marines. It's Space Marines. And they seem to be quite proud creatures, so you might want to make a point to at least remember the name of their species." Cadence giggled as she straightened some stray strands of Shining's mane.

"Yeah, whatever. It's a stupid name either way." Shining groaned as he rolled his eyes.

"Come on, time to behave." The princess said with a amused grin as she lead her husband outside the command tent and through the military camp the remaining royal guard had built for themselves in the north of White Tail woods.

The camp was still surprisingly vast, composed of over a dozen multi-pony tents for soldiers to sleep in and house their weapons and equipment, housing over three hundred equestrian royal guard from all three division's of their military detachment. Day, Night and Crystal guard all roamed and jogged about the hap-hazard campsite, dodging barrels, crates and each other as they busied themselves with whatever task lay ahead of them. Some waited around in groups, fitted for combat, rifles slung over shoulders and worn and chipped armour affixed. Cadence couldn't help but notice how many wounded there were, how many looked as though they were being deployed to combat regardless of their injuries, and how many makeshift sun and moon tombstones littered an area outside the edges of the camp a hundred or so feet away. Cadence had been through a lot, all of Equestria had, in fact, but the military had by far received the worst of the federation's wrath for a handful of reasons.

First, the Federation functioned primarily upon fear, both their own and that of their 'enemies'. They used fear and intimidation to subvert and indoctrinate all who would oppose them, shaving off any unwanted social or emotional excess they deemed unnecessary to one's functional efficiency and moulding them into the perfect worker or soldier unit they desired. And as much as a relatively small percentage of equestrians had bent to he will of the aliens, the guard had remained absolutely and totally steadfast when faced with the threats the federation made. For an equestrian royal guardspony was more than just a conscript of the army or operative of the equestrian navy, they were the finest foot soldiers Equestria had to offer. Although still only mortal ponies of flesh and blood, and many had families and free time to themselves, in deployment the royal guard were a truly magnificent force to deal with. The Minotaur Cataclysm, the Western Griffin Raids, all faced the ranks of Equestria's finest and fell before their titanic defense. Only two occurrences had ever seen the guard brought low, the Changeling Insertion that occurred a few years ago and the war they were fighting now.

For the Federation was enraged beyond all measure when informed that the royal guard had utterly refused to disband and turn in their wargear, finding the equestrian soldiers stubbornly set in defending their land and their princesses from the threat at hand. After threat after threat had been made, budging the guard not an inch, the federation ordered all royal guardsponies be hunted down, stripped of their rank and be processed for 'reeducation'. Not a single guard had met their pursuers quietly, and benefactors had orders to kill any of those that resisted their capture with lethal force, and although none can truly confirm anything in those terrible days where many equestrian streets suffered night-long firefights, it is said that not a single guard was captured alive. Now less than a thousand remained from their original number of over five times such a number, but still the soldiers of Equestria fulfilled their duty in any way they could. Thise was hardly easy work, however, as even the most clumsy and stim-induced benefactor was more than a match for a guardspony, the aliens bearing far superior weaponry and armour, along with vast numbers of vehicular units and considerable air support. Where the feds had magna-rifles, the guard had mere slug rifles, where they had dominator suits the guard had barely twelve operational recon jeeps and every airship the guard had previously had at disposal was now either under decommission or under strict federal investigation.

However the guard had proved themselves far from useless, being almost constantly active in guerrilla strikes and sabotage operations for almost two years now. Many donned simple civilian clothes when on such a mission, clogging reactor exhausts with elastic explosive, re-wiring defense systems and catching small, vulnerable federation patrols in ambushes or well placed traps. Having a considerable number of friendly organisation aiding in their efforts helped a great deal also, those zebra tribesponies able to slip through their containment zone delivering potent poisons and magical concoctions to cripple and slow enemy soldiers, a handful of ponies working the assembly lines located behind Smokey mountain had been leaving out certain components when assembling federation military hardware and, to everypony's surprise, a tiny group of changelings of the pale, pink maned Sltoloxa breed had offered their aid without condition, proving reliable spies, sentries and saboteurs. With all this combined with the raw, uncompromising effort and stubborn nature of the guard meant the Federation had had a thorn in it's side for quite some time now. The camp, however, did reflect how desperate things were getting with guard missing segments of armour lost in battle, not to be replaced, weapons in poor condition, ammo boxes barely a quarter full at best and even their tents and canopies bearing clusters of bullet holes and burn marks, testament to how the guard had to pack up camp quickly when their camp was stumbled across.

Cadence washed her thoughts of what the guard and her husband had been through, and instead focused on how best to save them and everypony else in Equestria. Shining Armour trailed behind Cadence a little as they approach the squads of astartes, like a child being dragged to the dentist's, his discomfort painfully evident around the giant aliens. Upon reaching the astarte captain Cadence brought her husband to her side, looking up at Errithius with a promising expression followed by a short pause as Shining found it difficult to talk to the alien, the unicorn scratching the back of his head awkwardly before receiving a sudden nudge of encouragement from his wife.

"Okay, uh...Look, I can offer you half of what force I have available. I can get them ready in a few days but they won't be able to bring what little sup-" The royal guard captain started before the astarte captain cut him off.

"I understand you care for your men's well-being, Captain, and these are truly trying times for all of you, but I require your entire force committed to this offensive. I have come to understand you have made a habit of snapping at the Federation's ankles for quite a time now, but this is the time to take the initiative in all entirety. Your soldiers will provide the Federation just one of the many engagements we are to initiate all across the region, and so overwhelmed will they be after sitting so comfortable in their cradle of power that their resolve will faulter, their morale crumble and their mobility be crippled. In this instance, my strike team shall cut at the heart of this enemy, leaving them bloodied and finding any sense of vengeance drowned by their grief and panic. We achieve all of this only with your full support, only with all your troops deployed across the country alongside my space marines, and only this one time." Errithius said, his words steady and carefully announced so there would be no misunderstanding.

Shining looked, expectadly, extremely conflicted, evidently torn between maintaining the integrity, if not the actual existence of his guard, and the possibility of finally delivering a truly effective blow to the aliens that had burnt and butchered his ponies.

"Shining, I know this is a big gamble. It could mean we really lose everything. But it could also mean we finally get a chance to rebuild, to take back our homes. We might just get Equestria back." Cadence pleaded, her eyes locked into Shining's.

The unicorn held a pause for a moment, shifting eyes revealing his mind in a state of deep, intense thought before he turned once again to look up at Errithius. This time however, Shining appeared to collect a noticeable degree of resolve and addressed the astarte far more directly.

"Alright, but I have some conditions." Shining said firmly.

"Of course." The alien replied.

"First, you deploy to every city we do, and I know exactly where that'll be. Manehattan, Canterlot, Ponyville and the settlement bellow Las Pegasus. Deal?"

"Agreed, though I shall have no forces to spare beyond those deployed. Once on the ground, what marines you encounter shall be all you can receive." Errithius replied informatively.

"Fine. Second, each field officer that leads my guard in each engagement has complete and total command over them. You can request their cooperation, but they are not yours to command, even if they choose to retreat." Shining said, jabbing an open hand towards the marine to drive home the condition.

"Understood, but have your men know our experience in battle is, in absolution, worth taking heed of. What information we relay to your commanders is not to be taken lightly."

"Alright. And lastly...take Cadence back to your ship and keep her safely there until this is all finished."

"Shining, ponies will need t-" Cadence begun.

"I'm sorry sweetie, but I can't let you do this. This world is going to go through the wood-chipper over the next couple days and I can't risk you getting caught up in all this. And this is a condition to my cooperation with all this, if you want the guard to play a part in this then I need to know you're going to be safe." Shining said staring into Cadences eyes with a steely intensity, his mind already utterly made up, the alicorn sighing before closing her eyes in defeat.

"Alright, I'll go back to the ship. But please, be careful, I need you to still be here when I come back." The princess said solemnly.

"I will, I promise." Shining said back as he brought Cadence into his arms.

"You'll find company with your friends who are already aboard. I imagine more of your companions will join you as they fulfill their rolls in informing the population of our plans." Errithius added, Cadence nodding in reply.

"Okay, when should I tell my guard to be ready by?" Shining asked as he turned back to the space marine.

"Now."

Celestia could almost savour the sense of tumbling weightlessness, the way it seemed all natural law was exempt around her as she hurtled through darkness. This came to a titanic and abrupt stop as her wings first, then her back slammed right into and followed to break through a solid stone wall composed of finely crafted marble bricks. Dense rock shattered all around her, brick and rubble tumbling through the air as she did, the cluster of motion they all made up gliding through the air in a blur of rapid movement. Both less than a second and all of eternity went by before the second impact of snow-white stone on equally white wing occurred, only this time the princess had been slowed down enough to cause only a cluster of crack in the wall she struck, her body bouncing of the surface to almost lifelessly tumble to the palace floor some forty feet below. With a mighty crash, Celestia plummeted to the hard floor of the throne room, the blow she suffered only cushioned by the thin plush of the pink carpet that led down the rooms length and straight to Equestria's throne itself. The princess of the sun, with a grunt of effort and pain shifted herself to her front, slowly pushing her torso upwards to try and ready herself to stand once again. Her efforts ceased when a dull thud sounded from behind her, toward the end of the room where the throne sat. Looking around, the beaten and sore princess looked upon a shadow sat in the middle of the space before her, rising to reveal a tall, massive figure that had just landed behind her and now slowly advanced forwards. The creature's bat-like wings spread out, making it appear absolutely gigantic and throwing a blanket of shadow out over Celestia who felt the pit of fear in her heart grow a little deeper.

"Of course you'd be the one to show up as soon as all the hard work was done for you! You've always only been any good at two things sister; washing away the beauty of the night with the unwanted day, and treating other ponies like your personal chess pieces!" The shadowy figure growled.

Between a pair of teal, draconic eyes the shadow had an equally teal glow emanated before a magical beam was sent forward and into the center of Celestia's back. The blast was mostly kinetic, blasting Celestia forward onto her front once again and skidding her forward on her face several feet, but the essence of the spell lingered where it had struck for a moment that felt like the crackle of static.

"Just listen to that little heart of yours go! You know why you're afraid of me, sister?" The sharp voice said, a voice that sounded much like that of Celestia's own sister s much that hearing it come from her adversary made her skin crawl.

Celestia suddenly felt a pair of large hands grab the back of the shirt she wore, throwing her up a few feet and spinning her about a little way to catch her shirt again by the front before yanking her forwards into the face of Nightmare Moon.

"Because I'm not just another one of your puppets!" The black alicorn roared, her hot breath washing over Celestia's face, the princess unable to face such intimate ferocity head on as she threw her head to one side in panic before being tossed across the room.

Celestia had been thrown by Nightmare as if she'd weighed no more than a bed pillow, the alicorn soaring through the air to come crashing down on the floor once more, smashing through a broken and ruined federation console and sliding up the the foot of the throne platform just in front of one of the two flower dishes that flanked the ramp up to the throne. She groaned as she felt waves of pain wash over the side of her that had slammed into the floor, her limbs cringing inwards as her head fell weakly to the floor. She soon her the rhythmic thumps of heavy, hoof-shoe'd steps that grew closer to her at a casual pace. Celestia open her eyes to see on the floor before her a shadow wash over its surface, revealing the dark alicorn was stood right behind her. Celestia weakly rolled over onto her back, wings limply sliding outwards, lacking any muscular tension whatsoever, her eyes clearing to see Nightmare standing over her, her sharp features tense with a fiery anger, eyes staring at her with painful tension.

"Please, I...I just want my...sister back. That's all I care about. I swear, I just want...my Luna back." Celestia said weakly, but in such solid desperation that no hint of a lie sullied her words.

Nightmare rolled her eyes, baring her carnivorous teeth as her muscles tensed in anger and a deep, feral growl rumbled from within her throat. The massive alicorn, who was easily twice Celestia's size when concerning musculature, snatched the fallen alicorn up by the collar of her shirt once again, the clothing tearing apart in a few spots as she was lifted up over Nightmare's head by her immensely powerful arm.

"Oh, it is just always about precious little Luna, isn't it?!" Nightmare yelled, her voice devolving to something bearing an animalistic growl to it as she spoke.

Nightmare threw Celestia down and outwards a few feet to see her smash into the nearest fountain ponds built into the throne platform behind the flower dishes. A section at the edge of the pond broke clean off as Celestia's shoulder slammed into it, shattering the ceramic material as her body sent most of the water within the pond splashing out in all directions. The now thoroughly soaked princess simply lay there in the scenic pond, wings and limbs splayed out motionless, eyes closed, clothing drenched and torn and hair heavy and still with water. For a moment Nightmare Moon simply looked out over to her victim, giving an almost unsatisfied huff before turning and ascending the ramp too once again bring herself looming over Celestia.

"I'm willing to bet you've not spent a single second thinking about me! Besides when you were thinking about how to defeat me, how to undo my 'villainous schemes'! First you act like I don't even exist, then you turn Luna against me, then all of Equestria! I've only ever wanted what is best for this country, to give them a competent, strong princess for once, to bring them a sky that never fades in its beauty. But you just had to ruin it all, like you ruin everything for me! You made me out to be some monster!" Nightmare barked and growled, her mane flowing with ever greater turbulence as she spoke.

"You...you are a monster, Nightmare Moon. You've only ever brought other ponies misery." Celestia said weakly, though her voice tried to reflect the anger her heart felt, her weakened lungs would not provide her more than a husky murmur.

Nightmare threw her arms down to pick up Celestia again, this time by the throat, and although she was not quite being choked, Nightmare Moon's immense grip made it even more difficult for Celestia to breath.

"I am not a monster! I'm a pony! I'm your sister!" Nightmare roared with such volume that Celestia feared she might go deaf.

"You are just a dark reflection of who Luna truly is. You're little more than an illusion of dark magic." Celestia grunt back, her features tightening in discomfort and anger.

"Why are you saying this?! Why do you hate me so much?! Why does everypony hate me?! WHY?!" With every desperate, hysterical question Nightmare Moon shook Celestia with frightening violence, causing the princess of the sun's vision to become a maddening blur before she was thrown into the pond below her once again, more of the fountain's edge shattering away into the pool below.

Celestia had lost all ability to move, to open her eyes, even simply breathing was becoming a trying chore for her. A trickle of warmth rolled down her nose, swerving as gravity dictated to come speeding down her muzzle and to her cheek. Celestia knew it to be a trickle of bright purple blood, something that had not stained her pristine white fur for hundreds of years. She coughed as her lungs struggled for the air they desperately required, throwing her head to one side to come splashing into the water she lay in. Opening her one un-submerged eye, with some effort, Celestia came to see something she had never even thought possible.

Limply, almost helplessly lent up against the foot of the throne was Nightmare Moon, her normally imposing face was awash with streams of tears still flowing from her mostly closed eye. Her expression was a defeated one, as if she'd just faced up to a hundred fully empowered Tirek's and found herself beaten, her muscle-clad form bathed in the pale light of the sunset filtering through the stained glass window behind her, her whole body slumped to the floor and trembling as she sobbed. Celestia tried to lift her head, and was thankful for the time granted her to make the same attempt three times, each one failed. After a moment she wearily succeeded, both her eyes able to make out clearly her enemy, previously applying her demi-god powers to great effect, now reduced to the same sight one would find a wounded child, sniveling and lacking any drive to function without aid.

"I remember the first thing you said about me. Me and Luna were playing...we were playing 'Castles and Kings' on the floor of our room. We were laughing...and then you showed up. You asked why Luna was making so much noise and she said she was playing with her friend, with me. And you said...you said, 'Imaginary friends are for babies'. Me and Luna cried for an hour after you left us there, we had to comfort each other and I had to convince her I wasn't just some made-up part of her imagination." Nightmare spoke, her voice quiet and trembling, her body still as a rock, mane utterly motionless.

"Over and over again you told Luna to stop playing by 'herself', then to stop talking to 'herself'. You told her that princesses couldn't have 'imaginary friends'. You made her ignore me for years! You took away the only friend I ever had!" Nightmare's anger flared, her large fist smashing into the stone beneath her, shattering the glossy surface.

"Only after everypony else in all of Equestria had stopped paying her any notice did she finally start talking to me again, and still we had to tip-hoof around you almost every day. She just wanted to have friends, just wanted to know what it was to be looked up to and appreciated for her effort. We both did! We both only ever wanted what you reveled in every day, right in front of our face while you completely ignored us!" The dark alicorn blurted out, her voice drenched in both anger and sadness.

"I...I was young, naive and arrogant. And Luna knows how awful I feel about how I acted all those years ago. But that was my crime against Luna, I never di-...you were never..." Celestia started only to trail off.

"I was there for ever scorn you threw at her, every ignored plea, every moment we both spent in the dark. And I was the one who saw you for who you truly were, a spoiled, rotten girl who only thought about herself! Luna loved you too unconditionally to ever do anything to hurt you, even after all you'd put her through, but I remembered everything you were capable off and knew just how important it was to throw you from Equestria's throne. Ponies deserve more than you, just as I did." The alicorn replied, her bulky arm pushing her slowly upwards as she regained her composure.

"You...you can't have-...I mean...I never knew." Celestia blurted clumsily as her mind tried it's best to wrap around what was being said to her.

"Don't play the idiot to me, sister! You know just as well as anyone that both yourself and Luna and I are shaped by the celestial bodies we control. You and your blinding illumination, your arrogant dismissal of any mystery, the way all is apparently revealed to you with such clarity, you couldn't be more like your precious sun if you tried." Nightmare mocked as she slowly rose to her hooves.

"Luna and I are the two halves of the whole, separate and the same. For so long you've tried so hard to destroy me, blinding yourself to the fact that I will always be a part of Luna, just as much as she is a part of me. Just because the dark side of the moon does not make itself evident to all does not mean it doesn't exist, and now all that changes. Now I get to have my chance to rise and rule, as is my right! And after your millenia of imprisonment comes to an end you will return to an Equestria that will never again have any need of you! Then we'll see how easy it is for you to pretend I'm just a figment of the imagination!" Nightmare spat, her eyes renewing their glow as her fury built.

"After a decade everypony will be long dead. If the night sustains for a thousand years, I'll only return to a dead world you created." Celestia said, her eyes now locked with Nightmare's own.

"You really have convinced yourself of your own lies haven't you, you ignorant foal."

"Nightmare, there are so many things we did not understand a thousand years ago, and I know you think what you're doing is right, but if you follow through with your plans, you will kill everypony." Celestia replied, her voice growing desperate.

"You don't know what you're talking about." Nightmare hissed.

"I don't, but the scientists and researchers who lived and died throughout the centuries you were gone for do, and we've come to understand that all Equestrian life is utterly reliant on the balance between exposure to both the day and the night. If the cycle is ceased one half of all Equis will freeze solid in the wake of eternal night while the other half burns under endless exposure to the sun!" The wounded alicorn said, her desperation escalating.

"You sound just like one of those alien freaks!" Nightmare barked back, her hands clenching into fists.

"I'm...I'm sorry I never-" Celestia began before being thrown from the fountain and onto the throne room floor.

"Shut up!" The dark alicorn cried as she tossed her sister to the ground.

Celestia tumbled over as she struck the floor again, coughing as her rib cage was violently compressed from the impact.

"Puh-...Please! If you are going to kill me...and if you'll never let Luna go, then at least let everypony live. If you're going to rule Equestria, then without the elements or my sister I cannot stop you. But please...Please don't kill everypony just o try and prove a point to me."

"I said stop it!" Nightmare yelled, her tone breaking slightly into a helpless whine as she closed her eyes, her horn glowing as her magic tossed Celestia aside a few feet, the sun princess rolling over limply, focusing all her effort on simply talking.

"I...I'm so sorry, I-...A part of me always knew but...You're right. You are right, Nightmare Moon. I'm not fit to rule Equestria, I never really have been without Luna," Celestia said weakly, Nightmare Moon's ears perking up and expression growing confused, "I just...wanted things to stay the way they were when we first became princesses. I wanted my perfect little world to stay the exact same way forever, just for my own sake. And I admit, a part of me has always wished for the same thing ever since."

Nightmare stood, her head tilted in disbelief as to what she was hearing as she stared at Celestia, her emotions swimming from one extreme to another. Celestia groaned as she rolled to face Nightmare again, her nose still running with purple blood.

"And yes, you are stronger than me. Probably in more than one way. My pride would have never seen me admit it, but after failing my country for so long I cannot deny that I do, honestly, believe you could probably rule Equestria. Perhaps better than I ever could. But you'll be ruling a kingdom of corpses and ice if you bring the eternal night to ponies. Times have changed over the centuries, and Equestria's population do not all shun the night as they once did, so please let them enjoy the night as it should be offered to them. Maybe in time they will forget me, and they could come to love you, but let them love you for keeping them safe and alive."

Nightmare Moon's eyes flitted about, staring at nothing in particular as her expressions rolled from hurt to angry to confused over and over for several heartbeat's. The alicorn dropped to her knees, the floor shaking as she struck the marble surface. For a moment it would seem that she was considering heeding Celestia's words, perhaps allowing her to live, yet her next action was to remain a mystery as a sharp explosion rang out next to both Celestia and Nightmare alongside a blinding flash of red light that filled their vision for a couple of second. The best Celestia could do was cringe away from the distressing effects of whatever had occurred to her before slowly opening her eyes to see Nightmare Moon, still on her knees, snarling with wild eyes locked towards the throne room's main entrance as a swarm of bright red targeting lasers shimmered shakily all over her body.

17 - Well, this is going great!

"Starboard battery ready. Starboard battery, fire."

A quick series of dull thundering booms rang through the Remergence's bridge, the holographic displays arranged before Unycrios displaying the craft's right-side macro cannon battery firing it's payload, the projectiles hammering into the bow of an enemy frigate that was daring to attempt to intercept him. Flashes and bolts of lightning blasted into view from the beyond the observation windows, revealing another layer of void shielding had depleted. Unycrios' data-feed blinked, the situation monitor flashing orange as the Remergence alerted him to it having only three remaining void shields.

"Engines: All ahead full. Bombardment turrets: Initiate fire protocol 'Blinding Halo'." The techmarine announced through the comm channels as he witnessed the astarte frigate speed up, the view of Equis' moon below speeding closer before dipping out of view as the frigate entered low-orbit.

The holographics revealed a total of thirteen enemy ships in direct pursuit and another nine waiting at ambush point around the moon itself. The ships tactical cogitators fed Unycrios a series of battle information, showing him a vast degree of variables and applicable combat tactics to utilize as he keyed in digital orders to a variety of ship systems. The bombardment cannons located upon the top of the frigate began hammering out massive magnetically accelerated rounds, washing waves of fire over the pursuing ships much like a shotgun would with such dense clusters of projectiles fired at once. The lance turrets took far more cautious aim when considering firing upon the enemy craft, the bright flash of the weapons laser discharge visible only once every minute or so, but each shot did severe damage to the Federation ships, the energy beam bypassing the kinetic shielding the crafts were fitted with. The feds had slacked the aggressive pursuit they had entered battle with, after loosing almost a dozen ships the rest felt it best to take a more cautious approach when attempting to disable or destroy the astarte frigate. And in all truth, such a strategy was beginning to work, the Federation's hit and run tactics beginning to chip away at the frigates shielding and shepherding Unycrios into position's he'd rather not be in, such as on the retreat.

For a moment Unycrios was alerted to a strange anomaly flickering within the hologram's projection, fearing the ships digital equipment was starting to fail or had been compromised by enemy fire. But the anomaly was not a glitch, but instead a system access rune, alerting Unycrios that someone, somewhere was access the frigates data files and communication network. The techmarine intercepted the hack and began assessing it, and found no resistance to the digital observation, to his surprise. And to further surprise found the insertion was being made by a faction he had far from expected to be in the ship's system.

The Adeptus Mechanicus.

Someone from the machine cult was accessing Remergences data logs, downloading almost every file the ship had cataloged, and streaming the download to a hardware source located nearby. Hitchhiking the download stream, Unycrios tethered a comm channel to link himself to whatever was accessing his systems, committing a hail as soon as the link was established. A data report allowed little information as to who he was about to talk to, but the feed did identity the recipient as indeed that of the Mechanicum judging by the identification icon being a semi organic, semi robotic skull surrounded by a cog wheel, and that he was contacting some form of ship. The hail held for a few second, Unycrios diverting his attention to adjust his course to avoid running into more Federation craft waiting beyond the moon's horizon before turning back to find an audio link had been established.

"Astarte vessel designated 'Remergence' of the Hospitalers space marine chapter, this is the 'Icon of Calculation'. We are an exploratory vessel of the Adeptus Mechnicus, burdened with the glorious purpose of reclaiming awaited glories for the almighty Omnissiah. Identify yourself and your intent." The digitally distorted voice barked through the vox channel, a voice Unycrios himself had in a many ways, one he had gorwn familiar to with his time spent in the depths of Mars' forges.

"-This is Brother Techmarine Unycrios of the Hospitalers space marine chapter, I am pilotting this vessel alone besides her designated serf crew and are under attack by alien vessels. I humbly request your support, and shall offer you all prizes of steel and data once the fight is done. I offer good faith and complete data exchange by the name of the great Machine God.-" To any average ear it would have sounded as though Unycrios had spoken through a malfunctioning vocal emitter as he blurted a series of static growls, chimes and digital gurgles, speaking in the holy binary tongue of Mars.

"-Hail, brother of the red robe and mighty cog! We have your location and accept your offerings with good faith and joy of your presence. We shall soon be upon your ascendant port-stern angle and ready to bring judgment upon the enemies of the Omnissiah and Mars. Praise the Mahine God!-" The communication serf replied shortly after, the vox link blinking off to leave Unycrios in silence once again.

"All hands and stations, alerts! Friendly Mechanicum contacts inbound at eighty four degrees port-to-stern, seventy nine degrees anscendant!" Unycrios barked as his display revealed a Mechanicum cruiser inbound towards his position, the ship's ranks of bombardment cannons showering fire upon the alien pursuers from above, seeing two vessels plowed into the moon's surface in a single volley as the magnificent craft swooped down to join Remergence's advance.

The gaps between the transmission valves and coolant pipes were surprisingly ideal in width to insert and conceal the melta charges the marines had brought with then, and allowed them to waste no time attempting to try and affix the bombs to the mechanisms in a less ideal way. It took only a handful of minutes for the marine to finish up and the door that required defending after the feds had committed to breaching the facility's outer structure was holding firm. The passage that Rainbow Dash had managed to obstruct with a wall of direct energy immersion was still impassable, meaning the aliens had to break through the facility's outer walls and funnel themselves down a single, narrow corridor that left them thoroughly at arms length. The odd bolter round kept any who dared peer around the corner ahead dry of any further curiosity, leaving the defending marine free of incoming fire.

"Sergeant, the last charge is primed and ready for detonation." A marine called out from across the generator room.

"Understood. All brethren, the charges are set, prepare for immediate evacuation. Nethileon?" Adventios called out to his brother who was jogging past him toward the defended doorway.

"Spare charge ready, should grant us an exit." The astarte replied as he passed by.

"Dathes, we have to go." Adventios said, looking down to his fellow sergeant.

"I know. Come, Miss Dash, on your feet." Dathes said in a calm tone as he helped the pegasus to stand.

"Heh, leaving already? We only just got here." Dash said weakly as she stood up, her legs slightly unsteady.

The blue furred girl had the right side of her face, her right shoulder, elbow and forearm wrapped in simple medical dressing soaked in medical gel and sacred oil. Although her scars were beginning to heal neatly, and the pain her wounds caused had been dulled, she still found herself having been done a shaking blow by the detonation of the alien weapon she had held near her own face while firing. Dathes held a large arm around Dash's back, cradling her under the ribcage to keep some of her weight off her weary feet as they steadily walked forward, the astarte having his bolt pistol drawn in his free hand.

"Sergeant, remain to the rear of our advance. Brothers, let us bid farewell to this blasphemous place and see our work complete! Forward, for the Imperium!" Chaplain Tyreth cried out as he broke into a jog, keeping close behind the two battle brothers that spearheaded the advance down the corridor they had just been defending.

The slam of armoured boots of metal floor heralded the marine's advance towards the entrenched feds, the first alien peering around the corner with weapons raised towards the astartes as they pushed forth. Yet the alien's aim was not drawn fast enough as a bolt round was fired into it's throat at near point blank range, the broken corpse hitting the cold floor with a wet slapping sound. Turning a corner the marines found another ten aliens stacked up against the wall of the corridor, all reeling back at the shock of the astarte's rapid advance. Switching their bolters to their fully-automatic setting the leading pair of Hospitalers hammered a flurry of rounds out in a series of flaring muzzles and bursting bodies. Tyreth added his own fire, blasting apart a pair of aliens before the corridor was clear of the living, painted a sickeningly dark, glossy red by the alien gore. The marines slowed not, pushing onwards until a split in the path ahead was spotted.

"Chaplain?" One of the leading marines asked in reference to the dilemma.

"Right! T-take a right!" Dash called out, her unsteady legs travelling as fast as they could while aided by Dathes' embrace.

The marine scanned the path to their right as they reached the junction, a pair of alien's ahead scurrying away to take cover around the next corner. A pair of bolt rounds were fired in quick succession by each marine at the front, most rounds missing bar one that blasted an alien's foot off half way up the calve, the trooper squealing in agony as he flopped to the floor, dragging himself foreword to hide himself from view. The marines continued the advance, coming to turn the corner the benefactors had just retreated around to find a long, straight smear of blood leading from were the alien soldier had been dismembered to were he was still currently crawling forward. Upon hearing the massive footfalls of the approaching attackers the alien rolled over onto his back, his already drawn pistol aimed at the marines who in turn aimed back at him with their bolters. The wounded benefactor managed to fire the first shot, the round striking one of the marines directly in the eye lens by the decree of chance. The battle brother was sent reeling back, letting out a roar of pain as blood shot out from the demolished lens, his brother next to him peppering the alien with a burst of fire from his weapon, the benefactor being ravaged to little more than bloody pulp in the blink of an eye.

"Dicho!" The marine called as he turned to lift his now kneeling brother to his feet, the marine cupping his hand to the breach in his helmet, the glass of his visor utterly destroyed and ceramite surrounding it chipped and scratched, dripping with the bright red blood of a space marine.

"I'm alright! I'll be alright!" Brother Dicho called back, his voice shaken by the trauma he received.

"Hectus, let Dicho through to the rear. Sergeant, replace him." Tyreth ordered, the squads of marines reducing their advance to a crawl as they rearranged themselves for better tactical efficiency.

Again the marine set off, heading down another pair of corridors and turning equally as many corners before coming to an exit leading out of the maintenance network on into the facility's primary structure, the hallways bearing much more light and a lighter grey panelling than that of the dim interior of the maintenance environment.

"Dash?" Adventios called out as marines flooded out of he access door and into the main hallways that lead off in two directions, the sergeant sweeping his storm bolter down each direction in anticipation to an enemy advance.

"Left, we go left!" The pegasus called back as Dathes helped her through the doorway, the segments of door sliding back together behind them before the sergeant delivered a tremendous kick into the center of the formation, bending the door inwards and sealing it's mechanics to become locked together.

Adventios and four other including Tyreth led the way, bolters sweeping about their nearest sides, the light grey, geometric architecture making it admittedly difficult to spot any upcoming junctions or corners before coming right up to them. This was made painfully evident as the wall to the sergeant's left shifted in form as he ran closer, revealing a corner leading to another corridor had been coming up to him all along. Before he could stop and warn others the marine had passed the threshold, his heart skipping a beat as he spotted at least two dozen Federation benefactors lined up a ways down the hallway, stacked in perfect formation to provide two ranks of fire lined up before them. As the lead marines ran into their line of sight they all unleashed a shower of magna fire, red lances of fire snapping down the corridor and into the marine's. Adventios, being the nearest to them caught several rounds into his left side, his auto-reactive pauldron swerving upwards to protect his throat and face from the incoming barrage, yet the left side of his waist and behind his left knee became peppered by the high velocity rounds, the thinner armour proving ineffective at resisting so many shots. Three round cut through his waist, another two into the side of his left knee, bringing him skidding to the floor as his brother came to hasty stop just after he had fallen. The two fellow marines threw themselves back, one slamming into the wall around the corner behind them to take cover while the other ducked into a neat combat roll back down the hallway. Tyreth, however, came to a kneel before throwing a hand out to snatch up his fallen brother, bring both of them back down the corridor as scores of alien projectiles danced off the chaplain's rosarius energy shield in a flashing spectacle of bright, golden light before they were both safely behind cover.

"Yeah, just try that again you stupid, primitive degenerates!" A benefactor from the firing squad called out, others throwing in their own heckles in a chorus of spat insults and arrogant claims to supremacy.

"Brother?" Tyreth asked, his voice ever so slightly shaken by concern as he knelt at Adventios' side.

"I'm alright. Although...I wouldn't mind cutting this little expedition short." Adventios admitted as he turned to brace his back against the wall behind him, his legs sprawled out before him as he sat in his wounded state, a relatively small amount of blood having run out from the wounds in himself and his armour before his augmented bloodstream had stemmed the bleeding with rapidly developing scar tissue while his armour filled the breaches with a half-foam half-gelatin coagulant solution that took an oily yellow colour.

"Nethileon, we need an exit!" Tyreth called out.

"If I detonate this charge that leads to just another part of the structure we'll have a damnable time getting out!" The marine called back in a sharp tone.

"Wait, that wall it...it leads to the visitor garden, it's just behind the reception area! It's only about the size of a house in width and such though." Dash called out again, leaning into Dathes arm, the pain of her injuries beginning to return to her.

"Gertavius, what is your position?" Tyreth called over his helmet's radio.

"Circling the facility, Brother Chaplain. More hostile troop ships have arrived and are deploying ground forces and scanners are picking up a squadron of alien fighters closing in on my location, fast." The stormraven pilot replied, his transmission askew slightly with a drizzle of static.

"Do you see an open area within the facility boundaries?" The chaplain asked.

"Yes, Chaplain. It's a small natural reserve of some kind, I'm not sure if I can fit the gunship in to land, sire."

"You'll have to find a way, Brother. We are out of alternate routes to exit the facility and our only viable exit leads us into that garden. Can I rely on you to be there once you've spotted our breach detonation?"

"You can rely on me to try, Chaplain. I shall await your signal." The pilot finished before the comm link blinked off.

"Nethileon, breach that wall!" Tyreth ordered, signalling the other marines o fall back to the furthest wall.

"Aye, Brother Chaplain!" The marine replied as he jogged over to the metal surface, the melta bomb he carried being locked onto the inside of the wall magnetically before being primed, timed and triggered.

"Charge set! Clear!" Nethileon cried out before hastily darting to join his brethren, mere seconds passing before a sharp blast rang through the metallic corridor alongside a fierce heat that wash over the marines armour, forcing Dash to look away in discomfort until the meat had dissipated.

Not a second had passed and already Adventios could hear the pitter-patter of alien boots scurrying towards their position. The sergeant looked up to see Tyreth offering him an armoured, open hand in which he greatfully accepted in a firm grasp, the chaplain heaving his brother to his feet with a groan from the wounded sergeant. Adventios' stimulants had long since deployed into his blood stream since being wounded, allowing him to function better without having to deal with the fierce pain of being riddled with several still burning projectiles. Yet his muscles found themselves unresponsive in certain wounded locations, meaning he could travel no faster than a hasty limp, making him fortunate that Tyreth was stood besides him, his bolt pistol trained on the corner behind them as marines piled through the breached wall ahead. Bolt rounds hammered out of Tyreth's pistol as Adventios assumed the first benefactors had dared to reveal themselves, a handful more being let loose before the two reached the exit, Adventios carefully stepped through the molten hole, soon followed by the chaplain.

Outside, the weather had taken a turn for the worse as the sun had come to set, yet still a dull hue of orange was washed over the thick cloud leading off to the horizon that was out of view thanks to the buildings wrapped around the small garden that marines had stepped into. This caused a small degree of worry for Adventios, the sergeant having been informed about the strange way the sun and moon of this world cycled by the will of the alicorn sisters of Equestria. And yet the sunset was still not finished, even though the marine's heads up display revealed the local time to be well into the early evening. However this worry lifted as he could just about tell how the light was still dimming, meaning the daily cycle was not broken, but simply delayed. And once again, a worry washed over the sergeant's mind. The clouds above were laid thick, completely engulfing the sky and battering the world beneath with a near blinding torrent of rain, so fiercely that most of it was dissipated back into the air by the fierce collision with the earth, creating a thick smog of steam and mist hanging in the air that made anyone not aided by their autosenses blind to anything further than about five feet away. Adventios looked about, the neon outlines of his fellow marines highlighted by his HUD and his motion tracker reading their signatures alongside several hostiles closing in behind at a slow, steady pace.

Looking to the sky the marine spotted a faded light swim within the clouds, it's luminescence growing in strength as whatever bore it seemed to grow closer. Soon the high-pitched whine of gunship engines could be heard and Adventios' sensors outlined and identified the stormraven they had arrived in swiftly descend down to their position, engines blasting the wind about them and scattering the downpour in wild directions. The craft's wings barely cleared the width of the reserve the marines were spread out in, each astartes relocating to the nearest gunship door as it came to a booming halt as it's landing gear struck the ground. Both front and rear ramps dropped open while both the side doors fell open to allow marines to board. Adventios quickened his limping advance, soon reaching the metal of the gunship beneath his step, but not before scarlet blasts of alien weapon fire snapped and zipped by, clattering off his armoured plate and he hull of the gunship. Turning around as he braced himself against the inside of the stormraven the sergeant lifted his storm bolter in his right hand, spitting rapid fire at what aliens his autosenses detected. One benefactor that was one step out the astarte's breach was sent flying back inside in a bloody and mangled state as bolts smashed into his chest and face. Tyreth also put down fire along with a few marines that were already aboard the gunship, his bolt pistol running dry just after taking the side off of an alien's skull, forcing the chaplain to turn and make haste for the ship. Another alien silhouette could be seen filling the breach a moment before Tyreth's mighty form blocked Adventios' view of the alien. Not a second later a thunderclap sounded directly behind the chaplain, throwing the marine forward and fiercely slamming him face-first into the descended assault ramp, stunning the chaplain to such a degree that he could only sluggishly attempt to rise again as it he were made of stone.

Looking up Adventios could clearly see a cloudy smoke trail lead to a benefactor wielding a form of rocket launcher, who now quickly dropped the weapon from it's shoulder and was beginning to reload it. The sergeant dropped too his knees with a groan of pain, his hand slapping down on Tyreth's pauldron to grasp the edge of the ceramite armour slab and begin to hoist him upright. Arcane lightning flitted and crackled around Tyreth's form, his rosarius having taken the brunt of the rocket's blow, but the energy shield provided by the sacred relic having been utterly depleted by the blast and needing time to replenish. A sharp snap rang through the air and Adventios found his front spattered with blood, and to his horror, not his own. Looking upwards to the source of the sound the sergeant looked up to the roof of one of the alien facility's segments, a figure knelt atop it. The creature was cloaked, bearing a cluster of four glowing red eyes that appeared mechanical in nature and held a long ranged rifle of angular design. A moment passed as the astarte locked 'eyes' with the alien marksman, no more than a heartbeat passing before looking down to find a gaping bullet wound blasted deep into Tyreth's lower back, the shot having blasted clean through the lowest portion of his power pack and through his thinly armoured waist. The wound was smoking, and a sickening scent of burning flesh filled the sergeant's senses as he looked down upon his now limp and seemingly lifeless brother. His other arm was thrown forth in a clumsy manner as he desperately braced to drag the chaplain into the gunship's deck, another marine speeding to his side to help. Another snapping blast rang out and Adventios' vision flared white for but a split second as a spray of white hot metal filled his vision. With a synchronised, singular tug, both marine threw the motionless Tyreth into the gunship alongside them, Dathes signalling the pilot to take off.

Looking to his right, Adventios could see how the flash of white had been caused by the second sniper round blasting through most of his right pauldron, the metal having a neat groove cut deep into it's plate, the thickness only just sending the projectile outwards to tear through and out the side of he armour, blasting away a portion of the large slab of metal. His vision fell to find a bright red ocean of Tyreth's blood slowly washing closer to his knees, the gore spreading all across the stormraven's deck as the craft turned and tumbled to evade enemy fire.

When I get out of here, I'm going to craft my throne from alien skulls!

If we get out of here

Nightmare Moon's eyes were in such an intense expression that one would think she could melt steel beam's with her hate-filled gaze. Her neck was locked within an almost overcompensatingly large alien containment device that resembled a collar the size of a fridge, while her arms were also locked within similar creations that were both linked to her throat collar and the floor of the containment tank she was being carted around the alien research facility in. Her muzzle was shut tight within another alien contraption that made any form of speech utterly impossibly and acted as a junction for a series of cables to run up to her nose, along the top of her snout and into another lock wrapped around her horn, the cylindrical metal contraption sending some sort of suppressive energies into the alicorn's cranial appendage to block her magic and nullifying it's use. Another over-sized harness was locked around the princess' waist, anchoring her to the floor of the tank and forcing her into a kneeling position, making her overall posture very uncomfortable, both physically and mentally. Each section of her entrapping harness was linked together by some form of extremely durable rubber tubing that seemed to be meshed with a dense alloy spring running the tubes length. Additionally each segment also had inbuilt kinetic tethers, the glowing nodes connected to similar nodes on the cage's floor, the two bound by a pale orange light. Considering all this mechanism offered, Nightmare had to admit she was in a bit of a pickle, but knew that her vengeance would be best applied when coldest.

The alicorn did not need her magic to know that Celestia was being held within an identical containment cell following behind her own, the two being scooted down the long hallways through the alien facility on the anti-gravity slabs that floated the containment tanks off the floor by a few inches. Celestia also most likely had her own squad of fully equipped Immortals following beside her cage as they advanced, the only difference between her and her sister most likely being that Nightmare wasn't wallowing in her own self-pity, instead opting for ceaselessly envisioning the bloody and drawn-out demise to her captors at her own claws. Again she tested the integrity of her retraints, her muscles bulging as she gave her arms a series of sudden, thumping tugs and her back a fierce convulsion, her locked-down-and-together wings not budging an inch within their slab-like harness.

"I said shut it, fucking tyrant!" The nearest Immortal spat through his sealed helmet as he rammed the butt of his repeater into the thick, transparent polymer shell that made up most of the cage's exterior.

Nightmare slowly turned her gaze to the side and upwards to the armoured alien, her gaze bearing a clear intent to cause the creature endless suffering.

When I am princess, I'll rack you first Nightmare thought within the raging blaze that was her current state of mind.

Do you think they have Celestia too? They took her alive as well, didn't they? Communed Luna through their mental coexistence.

As much as Nightmare was far from being as concerned as Luna was for her sister, she'd be lying if she had said she didn't care at all, especially considering the final words Celestia had said to her before the Federation once again decided to wedge their oar into situations it didn't belong in. She quite clearly remembered what had transpired soon after; The waves of troops armed exclusively with arc-rifles set to stun, being blasted by dozens of electric bolts over and over as she'd attempted her best to ward off her attackers, succeeding in disemboweling a single benefactor before an Immortal had tackled her from behind and locked the magic suppression device to her horn. She remembered the avalanche of punches and kicks she had suffered immediately afterwards, each one allowing her to mentally etch the number of alien's she would hang from gallows as soon as the throne was hers. Nightmare partially knew all these promises of revenge were half-baked concoctions of her own imagination, yet such things were the only sustenance that was provided to her state of mind to give her hope of any kind of future, otherwise she feared she'd succumb to the hopelessness of the situation she was in much like Celestia had done.

Of course they did, she's probably right behind us. They wouldn't give up the chance to snare a second 'specimen' after all

Nightmare was carted to the end of the seemingly never-ending corridor, it's walls a dull, metallic grey that seemed to absorb what little light the constricted overhead lamps offered, giving the interior of the research facility a cold, shady appearance. At the end of the hallways she was then turned to the left as her and her captors entered a large cargo holding area of some sorts, her cage brought to face a collection of what she assumed were alien scientists, all wearing bright white and light grey jumpsuits, complete with sealed medical masks and glossy gloves. Each one looked up for a second, turning from their computer tablets to peer at the approaching soldiers and the captive alicorns to simply return to their typing and tapping immediately after. Out of all of them present one stood apart from the rest, pacing at a frantic rate off towards a pile of crates. Nightmare's ears twitched slightly as she could have sworn she heard the apparently anxious scientist mumble something to himself, however her concentration on the anomaly was broken as her cart came to a sudden stop. Movement blurred into the field of her peripheral vision, just about reaching her line of sight to reveal another transparent cage identical to her roll up next to her, only this one having a far whiter, and far more wounded, alicorn princess locked within it's internal harness.

Sister!

Oh for crater's sake, no need to shout so loud! It's not like I can mishear you. And yes, I see her too Nightmare mentally growled in reply to Luna's sudden outburst.

"Doctor Unal'Gov! Your 'patients' are here. Mind taking this scum off our hands?" The forward immortal huffed in amusement to his own insult.

"No...No no no, no NO! No. They are...our bridge, commander, to the future."

Simply hearing this sentence come from the alien scientist sent a shiver down Nightmare Moon's spine, making her muscles tense slightly for the first time in an eon they had tensed through fear. The scientist, this Unal'Gov, was a truly terrible sight. Not in the same way Nightmare might be considered as by some, not in any directly imposing or threatening way, but instead in a way that might also be considered when looking upon a pony burdened with a deathly illness. His face was evidently drained of life, as if he hadn't slept in weeks, as if something was feeding off of his very soul. His eye sockets and naturally gaunt cheeks were a terrible, almost rotten dark colour that made Nightmare fear his face would simply slide clean off his skull if a strong breeze washed over him. His eyes had an unnerving buggy quality to them and darted about feverishly, snapping to look at Celestia and then again to look at Nightmare with an almost unnatural quickness, shivering all the while as if overcharged with energy. His long, clammy fingers also seemed similarly afflicted by whatever condition he had contracted, his pale digits flicking and curling in truly disturbing ways as if the appendages had developed restless, animalistic minds of their own.

"T-t-take...them...take them to theater nineteen. Secure them in their respective harnesses. And...and!...They are not to have...another...scratch...on them. Do you, do you understand, commander? Do you?" The sickly looking alien said through a series of writhing emotions and distressed facial expressions.

"Uh, sure, doc. C'mon." The immortal replied uneasily before beckoning his team onward.

As the princesses were wheeled off again, Nightmare before Celestia once more, the alien scientists followed close behind carrying whatever equipment and tools they felt necessary to bring with them to handle whatever these creatures had planned for the two alicorns. Nightmare couldn't help but grow more and more uneasy spying what the aliens carried, ranging from cutting tools, probes and syringe guns, yet something far more troubling caught Nightmare's attention, her ears swiveling in response.

"Open the gate and they'll leave me alone. Open the gate and they'll leave me alone. Open the gate and they'll leave me alone. Open the gate and they'll leave me alone." Unal'Gov murmured to himself, unheard seemingly by all save for Nightmare Moon herself.

Nightmare closed her eyes and let out a shakey sigh, the alien's chattering still tumbling into her ears.

Okay, I'm ready to go back to the moon now

18 - Best laid plans

The screen broke into a flurry of static yet again, the transmission between Captain Errithius and Brother Nitheleon strained by their considerable distance between one another. Thousands of miles away the strike force deployed to sabotage the Federation power generators had returned to the space marine temporary command bunker, with severely mixed news. On one hand, the mission was a complete success, and evidently so. The generators were crippled and would take months to fully repair, Federation forces were shaken and their commanders panicked by the blow, pulling the majority of their ground forces back to locations of prime importance; Military outposts, storage depots, airfields and the like. Now was the time to commit to the offensive, to deal the stranglehold against the alien usurpers and tear away at their heart. However such accomplishments were of a tactical and statistical nature, and did little to comfort the captain from the grave news that ate at his heart. Chaplain Tyreth had been severely wounded in the offensive, suffering substantial damaged to his spinal column and several internal organs, seeing him immediately installed within a medical sacophagus and under constant supervision by the sanguinary priest.

"If Unycrios was here it would be our safest option to install Chaplain Tyreth into-" Nitheleon begun.

"You keep Tyreth alive and stable for as long as possible, we can revive him and restore him with the facilities within the Remergence." Errithius interrupted, his voice tense and dry of emotion.

"If he can return in time, I doubt we have more than a couple of days before the chaplains body fails him, Captain." Nitheleon stressed.

"Brother Tyreth is strong, his faith shall hold him for as long as we need him to. Stabilize him, Nitheleon, he can make it...he must."

"Aye, Captain."

The captain slammed him armoured finger down upon the rune key next to the digital display screen, his crippling anger at such dire news reflecting in his actions far more than he should have allowed. He flexed his hand open and closed a couple of times, recomposing himself if but a little before waving away the tech-servitor that bore the console he had just used, it's machinery extending out from the lobotomized once-man's thorax, extending into retractable arms that were bolted to the sides of the console screen, wired dripping from the servitors mouth and nose into rear mounted plugs and lens units fused to the creatures skull. Upon it's dual tank-treads it had instead of legs it spun around shakily and with a robotic senselessness went off to re-couple with the comms-dish array it had been birthed from. Near the array that had been deployed from Remergence alongside a drop pod filled with ammunition and basic field supplies and a single plasma generator to keep all systems well fed with energy. Nearby all this was the captains command squad, a single combat squad, five close combat terminator veterans and the available scout squad. Set apart from his comparatively gigantic kin stood dozens of native military guard, wearing white and blue battle dress adorned with golden armour plate that appeared to have seen better days than this. They clutched at their lengthy rifles and bulky support weapons, and although such tools of battle were vastly outmatched by the performance of the technologically superior Federation weapons, Errithius couldn't help but appreciate the nostalgic design to the firearms along with the humble gold decorations that gave the weapons a oddly imperial look.

Errithius found his pondering had actually reconciled his thoughts mildly, finding himself taking a deep breath before focusing on the mission at hand once more. The scouts would lead the offensive, setting detonation charges throughout federation supply clusters and within unused vehicles as well as setting a series of explosive traps through the streets of the town the gathering overlooked. The town was small, but had wide roads and many small building meaning mobility would be maximized, yet location stability compromisable. Thus had the scouts, marines and local guard been briefed to keep as mobile as possible. The marines would remain active as individual units for as long as they could manage, the scouts working themselves into the local buildings as best as they could while the guard provided covering support for the marines. Errithius had sent pegasi guard as forward scouts to deliver recon, but more importantly, warn Ponyville's population of the inevitable conflict inbound. Unfortunately, a sizable portion of the local population was already dedicated to some insurgency organisation, and had reported to have prepared arms in readiness of the battle to come. Errithius' mind was strangely silent on how he felt about local shopkeepers and tradesmen taking up arms against trained alien soldiers, for as much as the sentiment stirred a sense of admiration for the natives he couldn't help but know how this day might end for many of them.

"Squads Frivitor and Dathes, initiate your offences, hold ground and predetermined positions," The captain ordered over his vox link, "Guard, you move in when those charges are detonated. You know what opportunities to take when they present themselves."

The Royal Guard nodded, many evidently shaking with nerves, all at least a little wide-eyed with fear, but every last one of them grasping rifles like desperate men. It was desperate men like this, as Errithius knew, that won wars.

"You all have homes and families to reclaim when your duty is done, be sure you are alive to take back what is yours. Let my brothers lead the offensive, grant aid when you can." Errithius said before turning again to his command console.

He flicked activation switches and punched at keys as the small platoon of Royal Guard went on to their destination. He communed with the other squads spread far and wide throughout Equestria, ensuring they had their orders relayed to them with crystal clarity. Each confirmed what had been commanded and one by one set off to their own individual mission. Every last battle brother was deployed, all that Errithius had was about to do battle with a forces thousands of times larger than their own, all that remained was what brethren he had at his own personal command. Five assault terminators, each armed with a thunder hammer from ages past and storm shield handed down from their progenitor chapter. His own personal command squad, minus Tyreth and Nitheleon, stood at the ready also, in them he had trusted his council and life more than a hundred times and had never yet been disappointed or let down, the entire team a well balanced machine of the right skills, qualities and temperaments that made operations as swift and resolute as they could be.

We are all going to die this day The captains' thoughts wavered.

He would have shaken such thoughts clean from his mind on any other occasion. But this wasn't any other occasion, this was the truth plain to see. The marines winning card was orbiting the planets local moon, or had perhaps traveled even further out into the local system. His forces were stretched thin, and although casualties and injuries had been extremely minimal, such was the result from but a single insurgency operation. What would happen from here on out? Would fate favour his schemes? Or would the frigate never return, overwhelmed or outmaneuvered only to be scattered through space, leaving the astartes to their fate. The months would grind on, ammunition would run dry, and the rest was a simple matter of mathematics. A space marine could match almost a hundred times any other soldier from almost any other army in the galaxy, including the federation, but over ten thousand to one?

No! Errithius finalised, We prevail through this. We must. Even if we've awoken to a galaxy without aid coming from beyond, we fight on no matter. I trust my brothers. I trust myself

"Captain, the stormraven is ready." Theocre rumbled from within his terminator armour.

"I know brother." Errithius said plainly, almost sad at gazing upon the road that lay before him.

His group marched off to the aircraft that awaited them just as the last of his brothers and the native guard began their own journey, off to save the world or die trying their best. The aircraft was not designed to accommodate the bulky expanse of terminators, but no other option presented itself to Errithius beyond a day-long hike across mostly open terrain. The ships interior was cramped, and surely the pilot would encounter some uncomfortable feedback while flying, but all was necessary for the success of this mission. All present locked in their flight harnesses and mag-locked their boots to the ground, the crafts engines whining to a roar as the pilot brought the gunship off the ground. The ascent started off shakey, but thankfully smoothed out, everyone within the craft utterly silent and remaining so for the entire journey to the federations' main facility.

All save for one.

"Are you scared, Captain?" Asked Princess Cadence, her soft voice barely audible over the cacophonous roar of the engines.

Errithius did not reply, none of his brothers did. The journey was quiet.

Oh by the moon, that'd better not be for me Nightmare thought as the slender federal scientist adjusted a glassy, tubular instrument in his or her hands. From the tip of the tube extended and then retracted a series of tiny, almost microscopic needles, rising and falling next to each other like a wave. The device was set down, re-plugged into some equipment console, Nightmare letting herself sigh a little in relief.

"Doctor Unal'Gov is late. Again. Would someone put out a fucking call for that schizophrenic already?!" One of the scientists blurted out, stomping over to another computer terminal, tapping holograms furiously.

"Probably hold up in laboratory K-CC12. He's always there lately. I heard him and some others were working on something big to do with Equestrian magic." Another, but this time female, replied while decontaminating another form of surgical instrument.

"You idiot! There's no such thing as magic, or fairies or goblins! Another letter of illegal vocabulary and I'm reporting you to the reconditioning department!" The first spat back aggressively, the other letting out a contemptuous huff.

"I heard similar, I mean not about magic, but about the Z-density project." The third and final scientist added.

"It's all crap, the Z-density project was suspended after the thirty sixth complaint about Unal'Gov was filed. No wonder too, his behaviour has only gotten worse with time." The first huffed as he moved again to a seperate console, this time clicking some form of slab into place into a port on the computers' side.

"Well, that's the thing. We all know about Unal'Gov, everyone's seen him talking to himself and shouting at other operatives, but I heard a security worker muttering something about another scientist who was signed off as unfit to work just yesterday."

"What do you mean?"The female questioned.

"I heard that that guy from the energy conservation department was called down to K-CC12 to look at some 'specialist equipment', to try and help it run better."

"Yeah, so?! So what?!" The first growled.

"So, he never signed back in from his shift in K-CC12. And that's where the security guard comes in, I heard him say something about some guy who had his whole face cut off."

"That's so retarded!" The first scientist laughed as he typed on his console.

"You don't think...that maybe-?" The female started.

"Unal'Gov did it? I don't think so. Could have sworn I heard the guy say something about 'self inflicted'." The third scientist said, his words now strained with a sliver of fear.

"So let me get this straight, some idiot, glorified energy plumber gets called down to a lab decommissioned for two days. He goes in, tinkers around without supervision and probably hits a switch to a live terminal by accident. He has his face poking into a particle field exchanger and the thing rips his face off. And you wanna make a fucking ghost story out of this?"

"I mean...maybe that is how it went." The third said in a hushed tone.

"This is a place of science and reason, not some fucking simulator game development studio focused on cooking up the next fairy tale to enthrall the idiot masses. Now shut up and put a call out to that mumbling maniac!"

N-Nightmare? Luna started, her voice in Nightmare's head shakey and obviously afraid.

I heard, it's fine. I hate to say it, but that pompous busy-body is probably right. Just inconvenient circumstance. The dark mare replied, still squirming and tensing against her restraints.

Like the situation we're in right now? Luna said, her tone a little more even now.

Yeah, okay, I get it. Look, I can get us out, but I need Celestia to stop being so damned wrapped up in her emotions and do something useful, like provide a distraction! Nightmare thought with a heated tone, her glowing blue eyes burning into the helpless, defeated image of Celestia next to her.

A chirping, bleeping sound rang through the room, and presumably the rest of the facility as some form of warning light system activated within the room Nightmare was held in as well as the corridor outside, a harsh red light flickering on and off frantically all around her.

"What in all reality is that?!" The female scientist blurted in fear.

"Attention! The facility security level has been raised to...Scarlet! All occupants must evacuate immedia- Attention! The facility security level has been lowered to...Amber! Localized override verification cleared! Please remain at your stations and continue your work!" The automated announcer droned, her initial alert seemingly having been disturbed by something.

"Dropped to amber?! You've got to be fucking kidding!" The first scientist barked at no one in particular.

"Who could have authorized the override?!" The female said shrilly.

"If I had to guess..."

Before the scientist could finish, a column of soldiers thundered down the hallway next to them, headed towards the facility exterior. Nightmare peered at them as they jogged past, her vision interrupted by the reflective, glossy mask of the lead scientist in the room bending over to come face-to-face with her.

"You better be worth all this trouble you abomination!" He hissed at her through the mirror of his mask, Nightmare only seeing her scornful expression return back to her before her darted away again to continue his work as had been ordered.

Bolters thundered as the stormraven pulled away from the ground after having deployed her passengers, carrying away with her Princess Cadence to a safer location. Errithius was wasting no time, he needed a keycard now, not after this exchange was over, not as the reached the facilities doors, now. He sprinted forward, his bolter barking death into the chests and faces of a federation trooper at every second. Behind him strode the assault terminators, shields raised, soaking punishing degrees of enemy fire and turret emplacements rained crimson hell into the marines. Between the space of each shield marched one of his command team, their own weapon chattering and zipping deadly bolts of fire into the enemy before them.

"Captain!" Brother Riveth called out over the local vox channel as he fired his weapon.

"I'm fine, brother! Keep moving!" Errithius barked back, rolling to one side to avoid an incoming missile only to take to a sprint not a second later.

The captain raised his bolter, putting a trio of bolts into the center of the turret that had just targeted him, the machine spitting sparks for a moment before falling limp from its harness. Errithius blasted away another two aliens as he ran, finally squaring up with the giant main doors of the expansive facility, the smooth dark metal gate easily wide and taller enough to let a pair of knights march straight through without any worry at all. Yet they were not his prize, not quite yet, his prize stood between himself and the colossal entryway. A federation officer, his lengthy, blue and yellow coat flapping in the wind as he sprinted as fast as he could away from the charging space marine, had commanded what had looked like over a hundred soldiers which had stood between the marines and the facility. Now he commanded little more than two dozen who had survived the initial offensive, all making a hasty retreat in the face of such fury, clumsily tripping over piles of corpses, ruined weapon emplacements and churned up soil as they sprinted back to the facility walls. The officer had discarded his weapon not two seconds after having taken to sprinting back to the safety of the building behind him, his arms flailing as he ran in a desperate, lopping fashion.

He wasn't nearly fast enough, even on a one-man speeder he might not have made it, but on foot? The captain reached out with his powered glove, the large mechanical construct snatching the comparatively tiny alien from the ground, the officer squealing in fear as his feet thrashed above the ground. Errithius did not stop. The ground beneath him split and churned as he ran at full speed, the marines behind him forsaking their formation in favour of closing the distance between them and their commander. The captain was almost there, almost to the digital console located besides the massive doorway and slung his bolter. His free hand now grabbed at the officer in his vice of a gauntlet, bringing up his belt to see clearly. Attached to the belt swayed and flapped a small, translucent orange card made of some kind of polymer bordered by a metallic frame that seemed to emit a fiery glow across the glassy surface of the device.

A keycard.

Errithius collected his bolter from his hip again, aiming his full tilt sprint right at the oncoming console. A sudden sting of pain. a searing sensation bit into the back of his right knee as a round from an alien weapon caught his armour at a weak point. A small fountain of blood shot from the wound before it was closed, the armour sealing itself up as his body began to heal. The injury through him out of step for a second, but he quickly recovered, his expression tense with anger as he ran, now only second away from the door ahead.

"No! No-no-no! Stop! NO!" The officer screamed as the marine outstretched his power fist, holding the alien out ahead of him as he sped forwards.

With a sickening, cracking, popping sound, the officer was crushed against the doors' external console, Errithius' power fist sending him pounding into the solid metal ahead with the force of a macro-train. There was a whistling bleep as the console read the nearby keycard, the doors resounding with a series of clunks and rattles seconds before they began to grind open slowly. Corpse still in hand, Errithius darted to the left, speeding towards the widening entrance as his brethren gained on his position. Ahead, a squad of aliens filled the breach, blocky rifles readied as they peppered the commander with crimson fire. Slinging his bolter again, Errithius decoupled, primed and tossed a frag grenade from his belt in a single, swift motion, the cylindrical explosive landing in the midst of the aliens, a couple managing only to look down to their feet at the device before it violently detonated with a bass-tone thunderclap. Those closest to the grenade disintegrated almost instantly into clouds of red mist and slivers of organic tissue, those further away made a sad series of blurting and choking sounds as they were sent flying through the air, the shockwave of the grenade pulverizing their insides to liquid. Without missing a beat Errithius thundered forth, stamping through the gory slop of the aliens that hand stood before him to slide sideways through the gates' opening, looking out towards his approaching brothers.

"Come on, faster!" The captain roared as he drew his bolter once more, blasting bolt after bolt to either side of the approaching squads to gun down would-be interlopers.

A couple of seconds later the marines reached the large blast doors, the command squad slipping in first, followed shortly by the bulky terminators. Once the last was through he quickly slammed the officers corpse into the internal security console, the machine bleeping once again as the doors came to a halt and started closing again. Alien fire rattled and sparked off the edges of the doors, some round zipping inside the colossal chamber within to snap off of a nearby wall. Eventual the doors shut closed with a dull thunderous resonance, leaving the marines alone in a very large and very dark room within the facility.

"Captain," Riveth begun again with an exasperated tone.

"I know, I know brother. But we have no time." The captain grunted back as he checked his leg wound.

"We'll have even less time if we're dead." Varadoch chimed in with a low tone.

"Do you trust me, brothers?" Errithius asked as he turned to the two veteran marines, his tone strained.

"Of course, Captain. But this place," Varadoch said, turning towards the darkness that stretched before them all, "But this place I don't trust one bit."

"Attention! The facility securi-Attention! The facility security has been lowered to...Amber!" The automated voice droned for the fifth consecutive time in a row over a fifteen minute period.

"That's does it, I'm out of here!" The third scientist barked as he headed for the door.

"No, you idiot! You could be shot on sight if a Benefactor sees you abandon your station! You'll be labelled a traitor at best!" The first blurted aggressively.

"What is it? D-Do we even know what's happening?!" The female stuttered and cried as she backed into a corner of the room frantically.

The emergency lights continued blinking, the announcements kept on droning, and all the while Nightmare was a millimeter closer to escape as her powerful arms ceaselessly straight at the restraint around her arms, while her bulky thighs pushed her forwards and down, her neck throbbing with strength as the choker around her throat creaked and groaned as she pushed onward to breaking free from it, veins pulsing visibly through her fur as her efforts were pushed to the limit.

I-...I think I heard something behind us break! Luna said with a shard of hope in her still fright-filled voice.

Trying...to...concertrate Nightmare growled back through her own head, thought busy with the feeling of pressure and the pain of constriction.

"Hello...Hello everyone, this is an official announcement. This is Doctor Unal'Gov and I have something very important to tell all of you...They...They say I have to tell you all something very, very important." The fatigued, shakey voice of the alien scientist came the the facilities announcement channel, his tone almost delicate enough for him to actually be whispering.

"I've done...I've done something horri...Something horrible. I just...I just wish I could get the voices out of my h-head! The sounds...so many voices. And they need your voices too...they want all of us...they want...everything. So I had to let them in...I just want the voices to stop...I just want them to...leave me alone!" The doctor grew more desperate with every word, his voice cracking up as he ended in what sounded like floods of tears.

Nightmare had no time for this craziness, she was done with these damned aliens on her damned planet. Anger flooded her veins, frustration and rage pumped through her muscles, and a sickening sound of twisted and tortured metal sung through the lab as Nightmare wrenched free from her containment with a roar of triumph and anger, fists clenched and wings flared. The scientists backed away like skittering insects, the eight and a half foot tall alicorn making them look like children before her.

"F-Fuck this! I'm outta here!" The second scientist yelled before scurrying out the door into the main hallway, Nightmare raising an eyebrow and huffing in amusement as the tiny creature ran for its life.

A moment later she dashed forwards to snatch up the lead scientist in one clawed hand with all the effort a pony would lift up the morning newspaper. The alien hung there a moment squirming before throwing a single, untrained punch into the alicorns' cheek. It must have felt like punching a concrete wall as nightmare's face didn't budge an inch and just stared at the alien in her hand with half-lidded amusement before speaking.

"Now, you're going to release my sister and show us the way out of here." Nightmare demanded with an elegant tone wrapped in complete calm.

"F-fu-gh...yuh...mutahn...freck!" The scientist choked, Nightmare rolling her eyes before crushing the alien's neck in her large hand like a straw, the female screeching in panic as her colleagues body was dropped, hitting the floor like a sack of vegetables.

Nightmare took a couple steps forward towards the panicking alien woman, bending down to bring her snout just a few inches away from the aliens' trembling mask, snorting hot air at it in frustration.

"I really hate repeating my-"

Darkness.

Nothing.

Red.

The entire facility that Nightmare could see around her went as dark as could be dark before the red emergency lights hummed to life. Nothing else was online, no consoles, no lights, no announcer, just the soft red glow coming from above.

"What?" Nightmare murmured to herself before she suddenly heard a deep, frantic inhaling sound coming from the scientist before her.

The aliens' scream was like nothing, like it shouldn't even exist, nothing should ever have any reason to scream that loud. Nightmare recoiled, hands over ears as the creature before her twisted and shook in apparent agony. Then Nightmare saw it...she felt it...something was wrong.

Something had go so, so wrong.

A shockwave washed over her, over everything. It felt horrible, like hot oil being poured over her, like even single hair of her body was being tugged at. Her limbs ached, her eyes clenched and throat grunted as what could only be described as a complete magical violation took place all around Nightmare. But this wasn't magic, this wasn't even dark magic. The air around her was protesting, squealing in torture just as Nightmare cried out fro a reason she couldn't actually wrap her head around as she clutched at her own skull. The magic in the air steadied after what felt like days of being assaulted from every angle by every sense she had. The air stank...yet it didn't...but the stench was there, like burning flesh and bad water, but she couldn't smell it through her nostrils, more like she could feel it worm its' way into the very sense in her brain. She opened her eyes to see the same sight as earlier, the alien scientist still screaming, her voice now ragged, her throat undoubtedly shredded and bleeding. Nightmare let go of her head and took a second to collect herself as best as she could, until something happened that drew her into a deep shock.

The glossy, metallic mask of the aliens' decontamination suit had previously been a single, smooth area, but now was twisting and warping before her very eyes. It took on strange bubbly, uneven shapes like it was alive, stretching, warping and convulsing. Then it occurred to her, the answer revealed itself as an visceral, insulting display as two, four, then five holes appeared in the glossy surface of the mask, the substance wasn't alive, it was melting. The macabre image of the females' skull broke through the metallic liquid of the mask she wore, the plastic-like material hissing and smoking as it stretched and burnt into her features, flesh sloughing away as the mask boiled her alive. Her single long scream turned to a series of short, snapping, choking screams as her hands flew up, tearing away the molten mask and the remains of her face indiscriminately. Her screaming stopped in places, choked out by a snorting, gurgling sound before liquid viscera ejected itself from her skeletal, lipless mouth. Her half molten eyes swelled unevenly in their sockets, growing to the size of tennis balls before popping with an almost comedicaly loud sound. Her body weakened before finally toppling backwards, gore fountaining out the front of her mostly melted mask as she twitched on the floor, mangled insides still squirting from the holes in her skull.

Nightmare was frozen.

The world had fallen away.

This was beyond chaos, beyond madness. Nothing like this should exist, it just couldn't.

She didn't even have the capacity to turn or flinch as a hand snatched at her bicep, tugging her off to one side.

"We have to go, now!" Celestia spat, just as mortified as Nightmare but having just enough of her mind left to herself to take action.

Nightmare was beginning to collect herself, starting to remember what was happening, where she was, who she was. Celestia didn't nearly have the strength to actually budge Nightmare, but she allowed herself to be pulled away from the terrible sight before her. She caught a glimpse at Celestia restraining cage before they both ran out the laboratory doors. The construct wasn't damaged in any way, no broken cables or twisted metal, meaning the shockwave the had disabled the facilities power must have disabled Celestias' cage as well.

They were running now, but Nightmare didn't feel like she was running, like how one runs in the middle of a nightmare, as if she ran atop the slickest ice that made each stride slide her forward an inch at a time. She could now hear noises, a chorus of voices that screamed and screamed like a cacophony of raw agony and violence. Gunshots could be heard, frantic and finding little purchase, the screaming and snapping of magna rounds coming from everywhere, down every corridor. And over it wall something was speaking, another voice. No, an army of voices. They sung together, some clumsily out of time, all of them rasping and coughing like they came from a collection of woken corpses. She shouldn't have been hearing this, this was wrong, the voices were whispering and screaming at the same time, and she surely couldn't be hearing anything over the ever growing bombardment of screams that came from all around.

But she could hear it.

She could hear all of them singing together, over and over.

We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you! We're gonna get you!

20 - Go to hell...

Screams of the desperate, the debauched and the damned came from every corridor that was passed, they came from straight ahead in the dark metal hallway and they were constantly coming from behind. They came from the desperate; those desperate to rip and tear at the flesh of anything living, anything with even a shred of innocence in its' bones. They came from the debauched; the debauched and ruined minions of the dark gods of chaos, their mortal slaves that had been infected with their endless madness as well as their own daemonic offspring. They came from the damned, and the damned were everywhere. But no matter what direction the screaming erupted from, bolter fire was there to answer it's insufferable call.

"We're following the coordinates-!" Another shrieking, half-living thing leapt at Errithius, the space marines advances reflexes seeing the thing's body shattered mid-air by the thunder of his bolter, "No avail! Our location is so drenched in warp energies we'd might as well be in the depths of the eye of terror itself!"

Errithius and his command team fired seemingly non-stop, the twisted parodies of life that swarmed around them coming apart in showers of gore and steaming bones in pitiful instants. The responses from his fellow brethren were choppy and utterly unclear, garbled and static-riddled to the point where listening to them was almost pointless. Something about an 'outbreak' came through, then something about a 'retreat'. A number of other disturbing and troubling words and simple phrases made it through his vox-link as well as the background sounds of gunfire, explosions and the screams of the dying. One in particular seemed so loud it could well have come from the marine on the other end of the communication line, yet the cry was cut short by static once again. A moment passed before Errithius heard rasping, wet breathes scratching into his ear before a breath in was made to speak.

"We can all see"

The space marine cut the feed, his face a bitter scowl as he turned his full attention to fighting his way out of this madhouse he had barged his way into.
Errithius wondered as his bolter sang, blasting limb from body. He wondered what he could have possibly done differently to avoid such an occurrence? To delay the arrival of the dread legions of chaos? To have saved this world in the way he'd wished he'd seen was possible. But nothing came to him, the battle raging around him became a numb, muffled blur as he secretly turned into himself, desperately trying to drown his doubt and melancholy in some reason he could have made all that was before him right.

Yet no reason came.

That was the nature of chaos in the end.

It arrived wherever it wished, whenever it could.

And there was never any reason.

A blur of motion darted past the commander's right side, immediately snatching his attention fully to the world around him. He turned to spy one of the alicorn sisters tumbling through the air, locked in combat with a cackling daemon. The blightful thing wheezed as it shrieked it's spiteful laughter, hacking and spluttering vile mucus from its twisted maw as the alicorn crushed its throat with her powerful bicep. The female native appeared a wild thing, eyes wide and alight with burning violence, her own fanged jaws roared and missed like a Nocturne Fire Drake. The wicked talons on each of her wings slashed at the warp-creatures ribcage and belly, tearing messy wounds into it's already ruined form. The alicorn reared her head back with one final, bone-shaking roar as her bicep swelled, her other hand pulling one of the daemons horns counter-wise to her shoulder to bring the monster's head snapping clean off it's shoulders with a sickening crack.

A light burst from behind Errithius next, bringing his sights around to see two of his terminator brothers fending off at least a half dozen chaos daemons with their shimmering storm shields. The gangling nightmares scrambled and scratched at the power fields of the terminators shields madly before a burning bright lance of energy cut into the chest of the one that had made its way almost entirely atop of the embattled marines. Another attempted to slither beneath their defenses, a skeletal, clawed hand scratching at their boots a heartbeat before another bolt of energy blasted its assailing arm clean off, leaving the unnatural creature to scurry away, laughing like a demented madman as it chewed upon its own smoldering stump. Although he couldn't turn enough to see her, Errithius all but knew how Celestia was faring; Eyes wide with terror, teeth clenched, features strained, she probably looked the worst she'd ever done before.

"Biemark!" Errithius roared over the mayhem around him.

"Still nothing, my lord! But the structure, this place cannot stand such a barrage from a warp breach like this!" The marine said back, one had firing a plasma pistol into the chest of an onrushing possessed federal while the other shakily held an auspex scanner. Said arm had a torrent of blood running down it from a deep wound he had sustained at his shoulder.

"Keep moving! Back!" Errithius called out, the company of embittered survivors slowly working their way back out the large junction room they had stumbled into and into another corridor.

Marines and alicorns all criss-crossed formation to defend their perimeter as best as they could, but they were slowly being broken down, their strength failing. Varadoch was first to the door they had chosen to exit through, his armoured fingers tapping desperately on the surface of the doors control slate to bid it open.

"Come on! It's the same as the last one!" Riveth barked at his brother who was struggling to get the digital display to operate properly.

"I know! I know! It's not wor-"

Before he could finish a spray of blood spat into Varadoch's eye lenses, a dull sense throbbing through his busy fingers for a moment before a piercing agony. Crying out more in surprise than in pain, the marine stumbled back, his power pack colliding heavily with his captains. Errirthius was about to bark a censure at his seemingly clumsy brother until he turned and saw. Varadoch's fingers, the first three starting with his index on his left hand, had been cut away messily, right through his armoured digits. Both of them looked up to see the digital slate had shattered entirely, and something had come from within. The metal rim of the slate now twisted with shrieking, grinding sounds of tortured metal, and within was now an open space that appeared much like the inside of an over-sized mouth. And sure enough, from the edges gnashed and chattered rows of needle-sharp teeth, yellow and gnarled.

"Brother."

"I'll...be fine" Varadoch grunted, his mind wracked with what had occured, but not enough to stop him raising his boltgun, filling the obscene techno-anomaly with a trio of explosive bolts, the cavity exploding in a squall of dark blood.

"Gierto, break through this damned door!" Errithius called out to one of his terminators.

"Aye captain!" Replied his rumbling, bass-tone augmented voice.

The marine took a couple steps back before making a full-tilt sprint straight at the door ahead as though it has been his enemy his entire life. Clasping his thunder hammer high on its handle, the terminator lunged the heavy headed weapon top-first into the door's center. The thick, metal obstruction buckled and blasted apart like wet cardboard, beyond lay an area looking much like the one they currently occupied, only absent on the fiendish assailants they suffered from.

"Brethren, through the breach!"

Errithius hurried his company in through the open door ahead, terminators thundering past on heavy boots as his command squad followed close behind alongside the alicorns. Firearms blazed behind them, snatching the odd possessed off of its feet and stumbling a couple of scrambling daemons. Alien weapons clumsily and hysterically fired back from those few deranged mutants who had kept a hold of their firearms after their possession.

"Drakon! Hurry!" Gierto called out to his brother terminator who was the last behind, even further than the captain who held besides the doorway, boltgun chattering with fire in attempt at dissuading the hellish creatures that were bearing down on Drakon.

"Cap-...tain...can't..." Drakon choked as he stumbled forwards.

Errithius had been so caught up with the escape of his retinue that he had failed to see how Drakon had become injured so, but there he was, slowly stumbling forwards at a heavy, limping pace. Bright red blood ran like a waterfall down his right leg, staining the bone white armour a glossy crimson, the deep, long gash at the side of his waist where his armour presented a gap gushing with gore. Errithius took a couple of steps forward, bolter still barking as he tried to both cover his injured brother's advance as well as bridge the seemingly vast gap between them. Drakon buckled forward and was brought to his knees as a daemon lept atop his bulky armoured suit, it's gnarled claws tearing the marines complex armoured mask off messily in a pair of savage strikes.

"Did you dream of us?!" It's ragged, ear-shredding voice shrieked as it leaned forward to bear down on the fallen terminator, a gleeful grin on it's ruined face.

"We dreamt of you!" A second squealed as it stalked from a corner, loping towards its fellow to scratch its long nails over the armour of its prey.

Both the creatures, followed soon by the dozens of lumbering, twitching possessed that circled the astarte even as Errithius desperately blasted apart all he could, crookedly turned their heads and burning eyes up to look straight at the captain and his company, sickening, cracked smiles gleaming at them from the gathering dark.

"We missed you!" They all croaked in unison.

Drokan choked out a word, or maybe even a final, sorrowful noise in protest of his fate as his armoured gauntlet raised, reaching out to his brothers in futility. Errithius' world seemed to stop and go silent as Drakon disappeared before him, mutated, skinless and potrusion-ridden arms pulling the terminator limb-from-limb in a singular flurry of terrible savagery, even the powered machanical aid from his suit proving nothing when met with the painless efforts of a hundred grasping limbs. Errithius blurted short, panicked breaths as his inability to help a man he had known over fifty years bore into his mind, his feet slowly stumbling back as his eyes found themselves unable to look away from the horrifying spectacle present before him. Suddenly a movement was felt from behind him, a powerful grip pulled him back from behind and half-threw him through the ruined doorway.

Ritivek Gnolsor-01000101011011100110000101100010011011000110010101110010-C sat in his flight harness quite merrily. The servo-skull before him adjusted its levitation to perfect orientate itself to face its master at waist level despite the considerable turbulence the lander suffered when entering the target planets atmosphere. Within the grasp of its micro-manipulators it bore an ornate goblet filled with a dark red fluid. Trysnikior Death Knell wine with two percent digi-sanctic oil and four percent labourers blood, a common beverage by mechanicus standards, or at least between those tech-priests who still indulged in the odd sensory stimulation. Ritivek leaned his head forwards slightly, prompting the servo skull to once again swiftly float to his mechanical face. A wide syringe protruded from between his facial respirators, where his mouth should have been, like the proboscis of some parasitic insect. The long shaft curves down to dip into the fluid held before him, a metallic sucking noise resounding within the loading bay as his system absorbed the scarlet wine. With a satisfied whir of his internal mechanics the cyborg slowly leant back, the servo skull descending once more.

"Estimated time to arrival?" Ritivek asked in droning binary over the local comms network.

"One minute, fourteen seconds, two hundred and thirty four milliseconds, my lord." The lander's pilot droned back in the same buzzing language.

Ritivek let out a slight sigh, he found the concept of waiting outside of macro-sleep to be painfully dull and perplexingly pointless. Again he rattled in his harness, his spidery, mechanical legs scratching against the deck in a slight show of anxiety at the sudden lurch.

"Steady." He grumbled with a wave of his semi-organic hand.

"Of course, my lord."

On queue the starship began to slow a small degree, enough for the passengers to notice the turbulence drop a fraction. Ritivek grumbled to himself softly, his steely mind churning through a number of cynical presumptions and bewailments. He thought on how this whole endeavor could prove to be pointless, then onto how many units he could potentially lose to the pointless conflict that raged on the planets surface and how he could postpone his intervention even for but a few more seconds, then he thought on this new fledgling alien empire and how tiresome analyzing their uninspired and dreadfully dull technologies could be. The cyborg let out another huff, this one loud enough to turn a few of the scitarii ranger's heads that stood before him. His cold, piercing glance set them straight once more, their faces turning away sharply but a second later.

The rest of the journey ground on as uneventful and as tedious as expected before the crafts engines whirred low in tone and Ritivek's internal mechanics shifted and dropped slightly as the lander slowed as it approached the ground. A dull thump heralded their arrival, soon the harnesses of both the tech-priest and his scitarii bodyguard hissing apart to set them loos on the deck. Ritivek's insectile limbs chattered against the metal floor of the ship as he moved to come up behind the rangers he loomed over. The landers front door ramp lowered with a pained whine, the dull light from the living world beyond slowly seeping in. The biomechanic passengers disembarked in a hurried yet frighteningly precise manner, rangers coming to form two ranks around the landers ramp in a semi-circle formation as Rivitek steadily scuttled out, peering around for any sign of danger, or of intrigue.

"Forward. Follow coordinates." The tech-priest growled as he brought his arm-mounted eradication ray to bare before him as he moved onwards.

The sight ahead was a sorry one. So much to analyse, so many samples to have been taken unblemished and so much to record. The city they advanced through was quite the interesting sight, crystalline building structures, one being a truly magnificent tower at the city's center, caught the cyborgs scanner lens for many moments before duty calling him on still. Even the street lamps, those intact emitting a dull glow, seemed entirely formed from a crystal substance grown from the ground.

Most interesting Rivitek thought to himself as he recorded and categorised.

He was sure this place might well have been a true pleasure to thoroughly investigate once, but much had been devastated by the conflict that had recently flared all across the planet's surface. A pity indeed, yet further, more promising treasures still lay ahead further away from the rattle of gunfire and deep booms of explosives coming from the distance. Electric snaps could suddenly be heard a moment before the desperate cries of dying aliens, the tech priest not needing to halt his progress in knowing the commotion was his bodyguard already getting to work, making sure he wasn't to be bothered. The tech-priest turned a handful of corners until he came within a hundred yards of his objective, bringing a wave of assurance to his ancient mind. However as he turned the final backstreet corner a flash of light and deafening crack came from ahead.

Rivitek's refractor shield flared a ghastly orange, warning him the shields energy reserves had been cut in half alongside his inbuilt cerebral cogitator alerts. Rivitek snapped his head to the left slightly, to where the original cracking sound had come from. Nothing was to be seen ahead, the smog of the conflict that had been still obscuring his vision slightly. Within a half a second the cyborgs logic engine processed the sight ahead of him, cogitators rolling through various fields of vision, each spectrum of light, each thermal range scoured as the milliseconds ground on. And then he saw it, a strange blob presented itself in a low silhouette about twenty feet ahead of him. Spectral scrubbers shot designation beamers at the target, bouncing microwaves and infrared through the anomaly. The form cleared up steadily to reveal a single shrouded creature, an alien foot soldier draped in a hood and wearing light armour. Energy mappers revealed the alien was, much like the tech-priest, shrouded in an energy shield of some kind as well as using a form of active camouflage system.

A full two thirds of a second had passed, and the alien appeared to be readying its lengthy, rifle-like weapon it held to fire at Rivitek once again. However Rivitek had already readied his own primary weapon, his eradication ray leveling with the alien before a bright blue blast of energy shot out in a cone shape, engulfing the creature ahead. After the bright blast of light dissipated, the target he had fired upon had become suspended in the air and was drifting off wistfully as most of its body had been atomized, the ashen shell of its form now holding no more mass than a paper bag, the crusty, dark remains of the would-be assassin alight with atomic flares. As it drifted up it began to fall apart, limb from limb before eventually blowing apart into dust on the wind.

Rivitek peered at the space the alien had moments ago occupied as if it still knelt there, his head coking slowly as his mind sifted through what he had just seen, ignoring the scitarii who silently shuffled around and past him to secure the location. The cyborg analysed, deducted and categorised, a sense of satisfaction breathing through him as his first conclusive log was made.

Foreign species encountered:
Encounter duration - 1.823 seconds
Encounter development - Hostile
Encounter conclusion - Subject terminated
Subject capacities -
Used high-powered, chemical projection based projectile weapons (Hazardous)
Used cloaking technology, avoided thermal and base-spectrum analysis
Implemented kenetic based energy shielding (Bypassed by energy projection (Type - Atomic))
Conclusion -
Alien combatant prioritized Victorus level threat

Of course further data would be added to the report after this silly outing was over, but it was a delightfully thrilling start to his journey, a journey that was about to enter its second act.

"Advance." Rivitek croaked.

"My leg!" Yet another injured guardspony cried out at he was wheeled to the rear of the triage tent.

The large tent was one of several that had been hurriedly erected outside of Dodge junction after the country-wide conflict had arisen. Ponies filled every bed, those injured that could do without one simply sat propped up against the sandbags stacked around the inside of each giant tent. Guardsponies, local militias and even everyday civilians were amongst the many crying out in pain and panic, most bleeding and broken, a few lying still as they teetered on the precipice of death. Nurses, doctors and anypony else who could lend a much needed hand bustled about to tend to all that they could, each looking as exhausted as the next.

Gemini Glitter was one such pony, her brain feeling like it was going to split apart from the pressure within, the aching of constant worry for everypony she was trying her best to care for. The backs of her eyes hurt, her wrists and ankles ached and her hands wouldn't stop shaking. Despite all this she continued on, shaking her head from side to side a second to best shift a splatter of deep purple blood that had shot into her eye just as she'd started applying the tourniquet to the unconscious soldiers leg.

"Alright, that'll do, move aside!" A blue-coated male doctor gruffly ordered as she finished tying the bandage around her patient.

With deep breaths Gemini stood up and stumbled back as another fresh wave of exhaustion gripped her, her eyes fluttering shut a moment as she clumsily wiped what blood she could away from her face and eye. She'd been working in this triage camp for the past eleven hours, had been on the run from military action for five hours before that and had been awake a total of twenty two hours. This day had taken a toll on her indeed, like it had done most. Gemini turned awkwardly and made for the tent's door, flying through it with arms outstretched as if she was blinded by her own tiredness. The fresh air outside was a welcome change from the stuffy heat within the tent, and almost immediately she began to feel just a little better. Within this moment, with pleasant, cooling breeze and the relative quiet as she tuned out the dull chatter of gunfire in the distance, she allowed herself a moment to relax and gather her mind once more.

A small, yet heavy wet speck slapped Gemini out of her trance suddenly, the wad of liquid that fell from the sky slapping her right in the center of the forehead. She cringed away at the sensation before another drop of fluid slapped against her shoulder, then another on the same shoulder, then a handful over her chest and arms until a steady downpour of rain began to wash over her. A moment passed as she felt the warm torrent wash through her fur and down out her fingertips, the sensation making her smile as she opened her eyes.

What she saw killed her smile as dead as bones.

Crimson. The whole sky above her was a deep, dark, angry crimson, black clouds swirling and churning as bright flashes of purple lightning sent muffled booms through the air. The rain continued to pour over her, the downpour almost too much to bear comfortably as it soaked everything a dark red.

Blood. Not the blood of a pony, but blood all the same, much like that of a fed and some of the creatures that inhabited Equestria. The gore that came down was sickly warm and each drop heavy, coating everything in a thick layer of viscous fluid. Gemini looked down at herself, a breath choking in her throat as she saw how not an inch of her lilac coat remained, her white mane and tail stained a terrible red all the way through along with the clothes she wore. A shrill sound came calling on the wind, making Gemini snap her head north, her horrified gaze peering out towards Foal mountain, towards the federation's eastern research facility.

A pillar of dark flame arose from that alien place, the unnatural fire reaching up higher than any reason would have it reach normally. The dark flickering seemed to swallow the sight around it, the alien facility utterly shrouded from view and the mountain beyond barely visible. Again a nerve-shredding squealing sound rattled through the air despite the constant hammering of the rain, the terrible noise coming from the fires that now shifted and spread out into the air. Gemini's eyes rebelled against her, her focus flitting in and out as her mind fought to process the strange images the dark fire now presented as half-seen shapes swelled up from within its churning depths. She could have sworn she was seeing faces, she argued with herself in her mind as she stood paralyzed at the sight of the rising flames that seemed now to be entirely formed from shifting, soaring faces, each twisted with agony, hatred or sinister intent. Mocking, raging and screaming they spread, the landscape ahead drowning in darkness, the sight leaving the mare onlooking the scene to stand in the bloody rain, frozen in fear, absorbed in her own dread as the world began to end in front of her.

Another door was blasted apart from the inside, the terminator breaching it stumbling out and falling to his heavy knees a moment before shakily bringing himself upright again, charging ahead and, thankfully, out into the open air. Soon followed Captain Errithius, Brother Biemark, Brother Varadoch, Brother Riveth, three of the five terminators that had accompanied the command team as well as the two alicorn princesses. All present were injured in one way or another, Errithius ad earned a jagged slash breadth-ways across his face's left side as well as a couple of magna-shot wounds to his right shoulder, Varadoch was still suffering from his missing fingers, Both Biemark and Riveth had been shot and bitten at least once whilst Celestia clutched as a nasty gash that had been cut across her left arm and Nightmare had been bitten and scratched almost a dozen times all over her body.

"Thank...FUCK!" Nightmare blurted out as she fell to her knees, her face pained.

Her sister shot her an obviously unimpressed look in response to her vulgar outburst, Nightmare returning her disapproving gaze with her own exhausted one.

"Not a word you foal, it's hardly the time." The dark alicorn growled with a snarl.

"Brothers, status?!" Errithius called out between gasping breaths, his own expression strained.

"We need to extract! Biemark, get into contact with Remergence!" Varadoch called out over the rolling thunder that exploded from almost directly above.

"We're still too close to the warp breach! We need to get out of here and head towards-!"

Biemark's response was cut short at the ground beneath them churned and shook, dry dirt rolling and cracking as the alien base behind them groaned from within.

"Move!" Errithius barked before taking off, the rest of his comrades following at various paces as they jogged, limped and stumbled further away from the facility.

As he ran Errithius looked back to see the dark, geometric metal of the facility was breaking apart, twisting in as if a great pressures was forcing it to collapse inwards on itself. A terrible wind was kicking up, a powerful vacuum that pulled at his back as if the dreaded place he had just escaped didn't want to let him or anyone he had left with stay gone for long. Loose dirt danced and flew through and into his thick armoured plate, the torrent forcing him to slow his advance into a trudging march ahead. A terrible, burning glow lit the base from the inside as it's thick, metal exterior was torn apart in ugly, jagged patterns. A slope was up ahead not fifty feet from where the space marine marched, the promise of even the slightest cover proving enough to spur him and his company on to break into a hurried sprint despite the gale that assaulted them. Soon they reached the peak of the slopes edge, Errithius holding steady before it to half-throw each and every one of his fellow survivors over the hills crest and to safety before he himself threw his bulky form up and over.

"We're too late!" Varadoch cried out, eyes shut in protest to the madness emerging around them all, the alicorn sisters clutching the heads in agony as flickering sparks of unruly ethereal energy arched across their forehead protrusions.

Errithius' teeth clenched tight as the howling wind picked up power and pitch, its low howl rising to a feverish scream. He cracked a eye and peered over the rise to see the alien base ahead had almost entirely, painfully imploded, its vast form shredded and shuddering with unknowable energies that thrummed from within. As the screaming air hit its crescendo the front of the structure ahead seemed to split across its frontal length, the top pulling upwards like a gigantic jaw being messily torn open wider than it was ever meant to be opened. Half-molten metal split and shredded within and the outer walls of the base pulled open into jagged, gnarled edges to resemble a terribly carnivorous maw. From within came a breathless, long, aching shriek that shook the bones and rattled the ears, the epicenter of the madness a burning, bright light like a sun shrouded in a terrible darkness as if being swallowed by a black hole. Swirling collisions of contrasting spectrums slithered through the air, colour that was never meant to be percieved shattered the air just as fould energies turned the dirt beyond the ruined base harsh and hostile with jagged shards of twisted rock.

Ahead lie a gate into a nightmare, a screaming gateway into nowhere, and there did dark shapes gather, and they spoke as one terrible will.

WE MISSED YOU!

01 - A thousand years will leave such a crick in the neck...

His mind did not scurry. His mind did not question or quarrel. For despite the unending dark that lie before his every sense of self, Adventios, Honoured brethren veteran sergeant of the Hospitalers space marine chapter, seventh company, was enveloped within a complete sense of peace. He began to feel himself, as he would if he had just woken from a slumber, the rush of his blood, the essence of his Primarch and his Emperor sweeping through his physical form. He felt the activity of his own mind, the electric sense of things pouring into his very brain like a gentle dribble of fountain water. He felt his iron-hard bones, wrapped in thick muscle that was as tempered steel, laying rested, decompressed and feeling almost like simple extensions of fluid spanning from his core. A thunderclap rang through his ears, as if a war titan had just taken a step right beside him, a noise that shook the placid surface of peace that was his own mind. He immediately steadied himself, realizing it was the sound of his own heart, the first heartbeat he had heard in a very long time judging by how much the experience had jolted him. His mind sent out ripples of ever intensifying layers of consciousness, complexity of thought building up onto itself as he began to, for the first time in what seemed like an age, actually think.

Adventios, he who’s beloved brothers named him The Wrath of the Ridorian Bridge, would have frowned at this very moment, yet found he could not. His eyes would have shifted and rolled to observe his surroundings, yet no environment of any kind reached his sight, only an unending emptiness. He remembered what it was to breath, but as his tried desperately to draw in the air his body desired, nothing granted him welcome. He tried, with all his famed and feared might to struggle from the terrible sense that was overcoming him, the sense of having been unmade into dust and shade, nothing more. He tried to buck, toss and lash out at the hell that had surrounded him, but found his thoughts and feelings, now boiling with hate and frustration, to be trapped within a body that had may as well have been long dead. He would have screamed at this moment, roared like a thousand lions riding a thunderbolt. Such a thing was a hopeless dream.

A light lay ahead. It was a faded greyness of a light, but still a thing to be seen and savoured. Steeled from the terror of his paralysis, the space marine observed the expanding blur of illumination with an almost animal anticipation. A shape moved before the light, then again shortly after. Being raised within the marble and gold city of the Hospitalers, taught by their scholars to be an open hand to the people of the Imperium, rather than the closed fist most Astartes chapters identified themselves as, the Sergeant hoped by his blood that whatever life held presence before him knew of reason and good will, a life who could help him out from his sorry state, so he could honourably return the favour by giving his life in defence of its own, such as he had always done.

The light before him grew a clear illumination, building intensity, but narrowing into a defined shape and eminence. Some form of observation lantern was held before him, a small, single spotlight held suspended by a strange, sleek mechanical arm of sorts. The violet light drew a sense of wariness from Adventios as it sharply lifted back and away from his face, sliding gracefully to his left to seemingly attend to something else. The marine could feel the cool moisture of his eyes as they began to move, his eyelids washing over his sight frantically for a moment before he steadied their use. He began to draw breath, gently at first, then faster and more ravenous as he delighted in the sensation of clean air washing through his chest. Though icy and stale, it was nourishing all the same. A soft whine could be heard, and a more felt than heard voice whispered into his mind, a voice that told him it was once again one with him. Tensing his chest and shoulders, Adventios was delighted to feel the tension of a form fitting apparatus around him along with the sound of a gentle, near inaudible purr of micro-mechanical mechanisms flowing with activity.

His armour was famished and unsteady, the nuclear powered exoskeleton suit activated in a very hurried, uncomfortable and unsanctioned way. The armours machine spirit could be felt at the back of Adventios’ mind, its strange, almost alien sense of intelligence Adventios had come to know so well was almost whimpering in discomfort as its systems were awoken in a very undisciplined manner, out of sync with one another and taking more time to properly grow functional. The Astarte drew a sigh and closed his eyes as he directed his thoughts to calm himself, and by extension the instability of his wargear. The thrum of aggravation coming from the neuro-link to his armour steadied, slowed and died down into a calm heartbeat that synchronised with his own. Opening his eyes once more, the veteran looked out onto a sight much clearer than before. He looked out upon a large room, quite enormous actually, about the same size as a spaceport storage warehouse. It stretched out into the darkness that robbed Adventios of truly determining how far the room went on for, but its length could be seen by the two walls flanking his sight, standing apart the same distance as a Knight pattern War Titan was tall. The surface of the room was very much alien, highly tech-influenced, and designed for sleek, convenient applications, a space for ease of access and manoeuvrability. The surfaces were a dark grey with a strange gloss to them, almost like an oil spill frozen into stone. Sharp angles cut there way through the floor and walls, revealing strange, light blue illuminations beneath that appeared digital in nature, much like the storage core of a data slab. The ceiling could barely be seen, yet the calm glow of blue lights gave away a surface from which the lights must have been situated. The light washed over the room with a certain sloth, its energy falling upon the seemingly icy surfaces lacking any gleam or glare, just allowing their presence to be barely seen.

Adventios was about to note how the room held certain angles that seem obscure and almost chaotic in nature. However the angles, the cuts in his perception seem to move slightly as the Astarte grappled to a small degree of control over the movement of his head, able to gently shake it from side to side no more than a half an inch either way, yet the obscurities did not remain were he had first seen them, but instead moved in time with his erratic movements. Adventios cold now see around him, the slightest tinges of blue, some surface of a crystalline formation around him, yet the surfaces did not seem to be the face of a cage held around him, not wall keeping him from the world beyond, but almost as if he had become infused within the inner mass of a crystal itself. Adventios could move more now, breath easier, and peered down at himself. His armour, white as brightest day, shoulders trimmed red along with the left of his back mounted power pack, the decoratives he had earned through honour and determination forged of bright, gleaming gold, at the centre of his chest, his left lower left leg, right pauldron and pack sat a single item of crimson crystal, forged into his armour in the shape of a drop of blood to honour his chapters origins. About his power pack, left shoulder, belt and knees hung glass vials, each half filled with sacred blood, thrice blessed and imbued with the divinity of his Primarch, Sanguinius himself. His golden wreathed helmet was nowhere to be seen, nor his grenades, combat blade, chainsword or storm bolter. His ammunition and supply pouches appeared to have been emptied also.

His arm slipped back, as though released from the iron grip of a dreadnought. Adventios look down to find the very air around him seeming to flux and melt away, the blue tinge gaining a glossy edge that travelled away from his weakened body and out towards the edges that hung in the air. Adventios soon realised what had seemingly become of him, he had somehow, through the absence of his efforts, been entrapped within some alien stasis device that had frozen him in a crystal boulder. He looked up and around to find his ‘cell’ being held aloft, away from the wall behind him by four elegant mechanical pincers, each clasped tight around an edge of the crystal that contained him. More machinery could be seen in the form of consoles just below him, having been raised out from the very floor in hexagonal segments, as well as a few built-in consoles lining the lower half of the wall to his right.

The solid surface of the crystal around him receded further and further, reaching out towards the dark of the room before him. A sense of desperation wormed into the sergeants mind as his escape from his prison seemed to grow ever closer with each heartbeat, this sense forced his hand to flare gently to life at his right, then the arm it belonged to slowly raised up wards and out to the freedom that awaited. The crystal breached with a sound of twisting, groaning wood that writhed in pitch and tone as the breached before him melted outwards like ice against a raging fire, yet no fluid was relieved from the structure around him as it retreated. The hole before him grew to the size of a mortal being, a couple of feet shorter than himself, yet some artificial force began to grasp hold of the space marine and pulled him forwards, his armour making a plastic-like peeling sound as he was pulled from the skin-tight sealant that had formed at his back. The breach had grown into a full meltdown by the time Adventios had bee fully pulled free, roughly half the boulder having disintegrated, allowing the Astarte to float forward from his confines unobstructed several feet before being suddenly, and rudely, dropped to the floor below.

Adventios was dazed, confused and tired, but he could have sworn he had heard at least a couple of gasps coming from in front of him as his massive, armoured bulk hit the floor like a truck. For a second, Adventios just lay there, tired and feeling somewhat helpless as his limbs gave firm protest to being used, yet a reserve of determination came flooding into his mind, a solution that was half zeal, and half stubbornness. And so his armour ground against the strange metal of the floor that seemed more like a high density plastic. The micro-motors and powered fibre bundles of his joints gave a painful whine before beginning to gently hum and purr into more bearable life. He pushed himself up, fell sideways into a kneeling position in a somewhat clumsy manner, then arranged his arms upon his thigh and knee to brace his ascent to stand. His nostrils flared and gave a soft, yet deep grunt as his knees bent in to full length, his arms falling to his side with loosely clenched fists. His head held strong as it swivelled from side to side slowly, assessing his surrounding with a tactical sharpness any computing system would be lucky to bear. Shapes stood before him in the shade, yet his eyesight was built for the dark of war and could make them out in rough detail. Most stood no taller than the average Imperial trooper, a couple exceeding this height by a fraction only. Yet four stood tallest, two no more than seven feet, but only just, the second tallest was easily over seven feet tall, and well built, the tallest however was truly an impressive sight, standing seven and a half feet tall, bearing thick, powerful, yet strangely graceful limbs, and adorned with a pair of large wings at her back. Indeed it would seem all who stood before the Astarte were female, their bodies generously curved at the least, their legs long and heads bearing few, if any angles, and as much as it was clear these beings were alien in nature, Adventios could not deny their physical impression appeared outrageously feminine. None of them were armoured, nor did any hold weapons that could be seen. One shielded its form behind one of the larger ones, and a couple others were clearly trembling a little.

I am not a monster

Being raised within the super-city, the citadel Metaphos, Adventios had lived a large portion of his life among the rabble of common folk that made up the Imperium. Unlike most brother chapters, the Hospitalers walked among their people as sires and lords, even going so far to form social bonds between themselves and the alien species that composed the citadels population. Thus, Adventios felt a terrible psychological pain to see mortal creature cower and tremble before him. They were not murderous heretics, not despicable traitors nor rampant xeno scourge, just an alien species he had not seen before, just scared people who had probably woken him through some accident or misunderstanding. This thought caught alight with an intense illumination all of a sudden, causing Adventios to sharply raise his eyebrows in revelation.

These people had set him free.

At least it was a very likely thing to assume. Adventios must have truly appeared quite imposing to the mortals that held a firm distance away from him, they might well be terrified by his alien appearance. Adventios took in a breath, savouring the taste of air in his lungs and composed his face. Any tightness in his expression was peeled away, his visage gaining a sense of calm as he breathed out again. Fixing his golden eyes on the group before him he swiftly, but not too quickly, took a step forward, followed by another, then once more again. As he strode forward, his thick, armoured boots thundering against the strange metal below him, the creatures he advanced towards took almost as many shaky steps back until the tallest seemed to swallow a sense of composure and stopped. She stepped forwards, when at the groups front raised her arms and held her hands back to signal them to remain behind her as she cautiously took half-steps towards the alien that approached her.

"My name is Princess Celestia. I-" The tall female had a coat of fur whiter than sunlit snow, her hair and that of her tail was long, had a chalky technicolour appearance and seemed to be removed from the effects of gravity, instead floating in the air slightly as if she were submerged under water. She spoke with a voice he could have sworn sounded familiar, a voice that held a motherly warmth, along with a motherly sense of authority. Adventios would have let her speak further, but felt certain understandings had to be met.

"Who woke me?" His voice was deep, but far from the guttural growl some space marines exhibited. His words were firm, but far from feirce and easy to understand. This was a curious thing since he had been sure such aliens would have never been able to understand low gothic, let alone speak it themselves. This made Adventios conclude that perhaps, if most likely, these people had once been a part of an Imperial civilisation, but had somehow become lost to time and records that he was aware of.

"I did!" The voice almost made Adventios flinch with its raw energy. It was chipper, almost childish in its tone, and had been spoken by the small female who now raised her hand in a manner of verification. The girl, her entire body uncovered by the brightly coloured, loose-fitting clothes, was hot pink in colour, her hair and tail a mess of curls that seemed to hold a sort of elastic bounce to it as she hopped up and down slightly while waving her hand in the air.

"Pinkie, please! I'm sorry s...s-siiiir~? Um, we're sorry we disturbed you, to be honest none of us are really sure what we expected when coming down here. The hologram thing said...something was being held in this room, so we thought we'd try our luck to see what we could find." This one was another of the taller ones, purple in colour, hair straight and neatly cut and kept.

"Your awakening is my fault, I brought everypony down here, so it is I who should appologize. But please, try to understand we are currently in quite a terrible situation, and we have searched for years for some means...any way to save our country." The tall white princess, this 'Celestia', took another step forwards, her posture enclosed if somewhat sheepish, but her hands held out in a gesture that spoke she meant no harm.

"Celestia, you said your name was? Princess?" Adventios asked, holding his ground firmly.

"Yes." The princess responded simply.

"I'm sure the reasons for your coming to this place will be revealed in good time, however my primary concerns at this time are those of what this place is, why I am here, and the whereabouts of my brethren. These answers I wish to seek out immediately, but not before I grant you my thanks. It would seem the kindness of fate saw it best to deliver you to engineer my release from a prison I was never aware I had been placed in." The Astarte allowed the slightest of smiles to grace his features, so slight he was unsure those before him even noticed the change in his expression.

"Oh...Oh, well, thank you. We were...unsure what we would find, and when finding you all we were very unsure how you'd react to your release. I'm relieved you're taking this all so well." Princess Celestia's surprise grew quickly into a relieved, yet no less beaming smile, a sight that found itself catching upon Adventios' heart as quite a beautiful one. But the largest feature of the Princess that caught his attention were her words.

"All of us?" The sergeant inquired, his eyes tightening slightly.

"Well...you were wondering were your compatriots were?" Celestia said while looking up above and behind the Astarte.

Adventios wasted no time on swiveling himself around swiftly, turning to look behind to were his containment crystal had been. There is was held, still, the half disintegrated crystal, appearing as a shining over-sized shard of blue-tinted diamond, but half molten as if made from plastic. It floating a couple of feet above the floor, suspending by a number of sleek, insect-like mechanical limbs that grasped its edges. However beyond this single cell, both besides and above it, sat a frightening sight.

Dozens. Dozens upon dozens of large crystal blocks. Each slightly unique in its composition, each one bearing different angles and overall shape as if cut by hand by a team of stone-smiths. each was sunk half way into the wall behind him that was fifty feet across and perhaps twice that tall. Obscured by the various sharp angles along with the translucent depth of the crystal, was the image of a single space marine. White and red armour and gold embellishments all, stood still, frozen within the strange substance that surrounded them. Adventios would, beyond this moment, not be too proud to admit his mind was awash with a sense of despair, in seeing his brothers cast in their own personal prisons, helpless to whatever mercies put them there in the first place. His expression dropped, his eyes fluttering for a second as turbulent waves of emotion battered the foundations of his mind. Turning and taking a couple of clumsy steps forward, Adventios peered up, attempting to gauge exactly how many of his brethren were being held in this place, concluding that it appeared to be the entire crew of the Remergence, the Astarte frigate he had remembered last being on, along with all those before him.

"Excuse me, sir."

Adventios turned with a great lack of speed or swiftness to Celestia's voice, to once again face her and her companions, only this time bearing a shock-striken face, his expression loose, eyes wide and skin cold. Celestia had stepped closer to him, no further than arms reach. She held her hands together anxiously and looked slightly up at him from being just fraction shorter, her eye tense and brows knitted together in an expression of deepest concern. Concern, however, Adventios felt was not for him.

"We need your help."

06 - What does this button do?

Fluttershy cringed at the thought of what they'd all just experienced. It was several steps better than the helpless weeping she'd originally began with, but even after over an hour since the traumatic investigation into the metallic tomb of the alien ship the pegasus felt like a part of it still clung to her. Perhaps it was the patches of dust that just simply refused to brush out of her sweater. Perhaps it was because it had been the first time she'd seen Princess Celestia in such a state. But at that moment her mind focused on the item Applejack was fiddling with.

"Oh, Applejack, I really think we should all just go back and return that thing! It's not right to take something like that from such an awful place! And it could be dangerous!" Fluttershy squeak in worry, her clenched hands pressing into the sides of her cheeks.

"Ah'm sorry, Fluttershy, but Ah can't kick up a whole fuss just'a take the hour's walk back to that place and throw this back in that dusty ol' rack. It's not lahk Ah took it from any of 'em. And even then, not lahk anypony was gonna use it besides me. Plus, dangerous is what ahm countin' on after we git outta this city-sized refrigerator." AJ replied, and although was not conflicted by Fluttershy's accusations, she did seem to show a level of understanding to where the yellow pegasus was coming from.

"Oh, fine," Huffed Fluttershy, "But please promise not to use it unless you have to." She pleaded.

"Alright, Fluttershy, Ah promise." Applejack reassured with a warm, honest smile.

Although Fluttershy admittedly felt a lot better, she felt very uneasy around the item the orange mare had enthusiastically picked up on the way out of the gigantic spaceship's interior. In one of the small side-doors that split off from the main corridor to the outside, AJ had found what appeared to be a weapons locker hidden away in the dark. With a swift, strong kick to the door that split the mechanical lock in half like it was made of cake icing, she pulled open the doors to find a small selection of weapons, all black, in three different variants that could be seen. AJ spotted the longest variant and carefully removed it from the age-old cobwebs and dust to find a familiar item. A shotgun. Applejack couldn't believe her luck and had enthusiastically shown everypony her find. It was longer than her Leverload, even without it's stock it would have been longer than the Equestrian firearm. It was not a lever-action reload weapon either, it had a thick grip build under the barrel that AJ had found slid back and then pumped forward to chamber a round. The rounds also were quite different, being wider, heavier, and from what AJ had said carried around eight large pellets as projectiles rather than the smaller variant the Equestrian's used that carried twelve. With luminous green iron sights, sitting comfy in a firing position and feeling like it was made of a substance stronger than chromed steel, AJ had been most pleased with what the ghost ship had granted her.

As much as Applejack loved her convenient discovery, Fluttershy did not. She'd never liked firearms of any kind, or weapons, or wars or killing as a whole. She'd never so much as grazed a finger over a gun before, and had no immediate plans to, in fact she was part of a protesting movement to reduce the number of firearms produced and used within Equestria. She'd been a part of several peaceful, pre-organised protests held in both Ponyville and Canterlot, and truly believed with all her heart that the less weapons Equestria had, the safer it would be. But that was not the only thing putting the pink-maned mare off the dark item strapped to Applejacks back, as something else was drawing her worries to the weapon. It looked, for a lack of a better term, 'meaner' than Equestrian weapons, it even looked 'meaner' than most Federation weapons. It lacked the cold precision of design the Feds designed their firearms to be, and instead of being blocky and angular, was bulky and weighty-looking. It was built with several holes running down the sides of its barrel cover, most likely to make the large weapon lighter to carry, and appeared to be built from several sections securely arranged and locked together rather than the Federation weapons of a more singular form. But beyond that, whenever Fluttershy risked a peep over at the thing, she could have sworn it bore a trace of innate energy to it, like some kind of unnatural life was forged into the machines very metal. And after a couple of seconds, she swore it was as if the thing was looking back at her.

"Alright, here it is." Twilight said suddenly, causing Fluttershy to jump a little.

The pegasus looked up to see a familiar sight, a gigantic wall much like the one they'd encountered on the way into the vessel cell, and before the group, across a short, wide walkways sat a large door. The group advanced, hooves clopping to the seemingly polymer floor with an almost 'horror movie' carefulness.

"Occupants, one among your group has possession over an unauthorized weapon. Please have her return to the observation rail for disarmament." The artificial alien said with a shred of authority to his voice that echoed through the very walls around the ponies.

"Ah could, or Ah could see what happens when you try an' take it from me." The orange farmhand said with an overt calmness, yet Fluttershy felt like she had a certain simmer beneath her tone.

"If you do not cooperate, I will be forced to activate the station's defense network in response to the threat your comrade presents." The computer replied.

"And what if we head through this door here? Would you activate the defenses then?" Twilight asked.

"I suppose I would, but that would be considering you had any chance of breaching the next cell. I would heavily advise you return now to the access hatch you entered from and return to the surface." The Divergence urged.

"You sound worried, if there's no way we can...get through this door then why so skittish?" Luna said, sounding a little more aggravated than normal, like somepony who had a bad headache.

"I assure you, you all lack the capacity to breach that door in any time that I can measure. But, I suppose it never pays to be...careful." Torsion seemed almost infected by Luna's temper, tension gripping his tone.

Twilight, seemingly driven by Torsion's attitude, stomped forward to the door with a solid sense of determination. Fluttershy wanted to call out to her, to tell her to stop, that it was too dangerous, but they had all come so far. Too far to be stopped by some door locked by an alien computer for a doorpony.

"Princess Celestia." Twilight said as she reached the door.

Celestia nodded, turning to her sister who she still had an arm around, Luna nodding tiredly with a weak smile before Celestia released her, leaving Luna to stand on her own to, slightly unsteady hooves. The princess quickly strode over next to Twilight and placed a hand on the door, the moment her fingers touched the smooth surface a neon blue series of partial circles surrounding the area of interest. The circles spun around each other for a short time before they seemed to gravitate into one another before locking in place, revealing several lines that made sharp turns into their own smaller circles not a foot away from the core glyph. Celestia hesitated a moment, eyes darting to each option available, each with its own small, simple glyph hovering above the circle. One line, along with it's circle and glyph, were an angry red, while the others a cool blue, and it seemed Celestia based her choice on entirely gut instinct alone. The princess slid her hand slong the line and into the circle, causing the door to 'hoot' in response.

Though the door stayed shut solid, the side of the walkway became possessed with activity as the stone seemed to silently shatter apart in an area no larger than Celestia herself, only for the pieces to rearrange and reassemble themselves into a sort of raised, slightly slopped table, like some sort of console. The ponies huddled together closer slightly, looking at he two princesses as they carefully stepped towards the newborn device as it finished pulling itself together. Twilight reached it first, touching it's surface, but to no avail as the slab sat still and silently before her. Celestia repeated what action she saw as best and brought her hand up to touch the consoles surface.

"I wouldn't." The alien voice called out from the air itself, turning all heads upwards as if they'd been called by a god from the skies.

"What will happen?" Celestia asked.

"I will activate the appropriate security systems."

"Which are?"

"I have a large number of alien lifeforms, the one's that refer to themselves as the Federation, waiting outside the same entrance you walked through yourselves. They have been demanding entry for over an hour now, and have made attempts to breach the door they have encountered, all without fruition. I have been happy to allow you to visit this stations facilities...undisturbed, but I am afraid I can not allow you to open this door. Please, exit this facility and return to the surface." The Divergence informed, as if rehearsed.

"You mean walk out that exit into the hands of the Feds?" Twilight asked with a humorous snort.

"Sounds like a lose - lose situation there, Twi'." Applejack said, having walked up behind the two princesses along with the rest of the group.

"I'm afraid so, darling. But I'd much rather give those pasty brutes a run for their money than just walk into handcuffs." Rarity added.

"Well, uhm, I can't run very fast, b-but I can't imagine what's through that door could be any scarier than those aliens." Fluttershy herself peeped.

"And I ain't going through another day of sleeping on the ground before at least trying to tear those freaks a new one! Anything that can't get through their thick squid-skulls that pegasi belong in the clouds needs to pack their suitcase." Dash said with bravado thick in her voice.

Twilight looked at her friends with a warm smile that helped them all feel a little better inside. She then turned to Celestia who herself gave a slight smile before turning to the console, tapping its face with her hand. Like the door, a number of glyphs appeared, though they were arranged in a horizontal fashion, in clusters of lines that scrolled off the side on different directions. Twilight tapped at her chin for a moment, carefully studying the rows of geometric shapes and patterns, trying to discern some sort of code or pattern that might be hidden within. Before Twilight had even spoken a word a certain pink mass bounced up between her and Celestia.

"Hey, look at that one!" Pinkie yelled gleefully, punching a glyph with her finger only for the console to burp in response, "Wow-wee! Someone's had one too many sodas." Pinkie said with a chuckle.

"Pinkie! This isn't a game! You could break something!" Twilight scolded, yet failing to entirely gain the attention of the peculiar earth pony.

"Twilight, please~. Of course it's a game! Look, there! Squiggles, squiggles, dot, dash, Batmare symbol!" Pinkie said, continuing to prod at the console.

"What're you talkin' 'bout, Pinkie?" AJ asked, hands on hips.

"It's easy! The shapes coming this way only match up to these ones up here just before these ones disappear. You hit the shapes while they're both still on the screen and you win! There'd better be prizes." Pinkie said studying the slab with childish intensity.

Twilight was about to roll her eyes and object before the monolithic figure beside her gently placed a hand on her shoulder to interrupt.

"Twilight, I think this might be one of those times to remember a certain friendship report you once sent me." Celestia said, smiling with her eyes and lips both.

Twilight looked up at her fellow princess with deep concern before closing her eyes and taking a long sigh.

"Okay, Pinkie, I trust you. What do you need Celestia to do?"

Pinkie skipped on the spot for a moment, beaming, before yelling out symbols and shapes, pointing to each one for Celestia to touch, each responding with a crystalline 'ping' and dragging the two symbols together and off to the side of the screen as if to form a combination for a locking mechanism. Again and again Pinkie darted her hand out to highlight a glyph, Celestia responding with supernatural quickness, shape after symbol being struck with increasing quickness as the scrolling code became more and more narrow.

"Twisty! Zig-zag! Zig-zag! Crab-claw! Spanner! Tennis racket! Tennis racket! Wheel! Tadpole with it's freaky little feet growing out of it!" Pinkie squeaked and barked frantically.

As soon as the final glyph was struck the console gave a painful screeching sound, causing all present to flinch away and cover their ears. The tablet broke apart as silently as before before folding inwards to become one with the walkways beneath it once more, however as it did the door next to the ponies groaned and slid apart.

"Stop! Nuh-nuh-nuh-nnnnnnn-! That isssssss a restricted area! Security countermeasures have been activated! Please leave the facility or be detained!" Torsion seemed to have had a screw knocked loose somewhere as his speech had become incoherent and his tone terribly desperate.

"Quick, everypony, through the door!" Dash was the first to shout as she darted for the entrance to the next cell.

Though some faster than others, the group made it through as quickly as they could, Fluttershy and Luna being the last two to cross through into the next hall a split second before the door they'd just hurried through slammed shut again, as if forced together in a hurry. The princesses made a quick check to ensure everypony was unharmed, and besides Fluttershy suffering from a slightly sire ankle, everyone seemed to still be okay. The group wasted no time in gathering once more to head forward into a somewhat familiar, but ultimately more frightening sight.

"Well, this one is...different?" Rarity said, her voice gripped by the cold of fear as she and the group looked up towards a titanic sight.

The vessel was twice the size of the last. It was bulkier, having a much larger nose and appearing to almost be made of a great number of different blocks and boxes, only crafted from a thick, seemingly ceramic metal. Its 'spine' arched upwards nearer the stern, forming what Fluttershy assumed was the bridge and observation decks, leading to a series of large towers that swooped back down to the engines behind the craft. Overall, the ship looked somewhat like a colossal, metal shark, only bearing a thinner 'neck' and ultimately blocky in design, as if constructed from large play-briks. What was truly worrying were the large tubes the nose was adorned with, each as wide as fighter plane, and each presumably a form of bow-mounted weapon, like a cannon array or torpedo tubes. Along these giant weapons were equally gigantic turrets fitted atop the ships spine and atop its flanks. Its sides also had a small array of holes built into them, reminding Fluttershy of the broadside cannons she'd seen ancient equestrian ships had in history books and pirate stories. The machine was impressive as it was terrifying, especially in such a grim atmosphere as it was being held in.

"Alright everypony, we need to get inside that ship. Rainbow, can you fly around the sides of that thing and find us a door we could use to get ourselves inside?" Twilight asked her friend.

"Sure thing, Twi'. But, this thing looks like it's at least two kilometers long, this could take a while, even for me." Dash admitted as she fluttered into the air.

"Hey, girls, look!" Pinkie squeaked as she pointed to further along the walkway they stood upon.

Before them was some form of disfigurement in the architecture, as if damage had been caused. The group made a quick but steady advance and came to find themselves before a strangely disturbing sight. The walkway appeared to have been partially blasted apart, not in any way that seemed to threaten its stability, but in a way that was certainly noticeable. There were two distinct types of damage that Fluttershy could see, the first being long, deep grooves that looked as if a powerful beam of energy had seared its way clean through the material before it, and then scattered about these wounds in the crystal were messy blast marks, as if something had been shot into the architecture before exploding inside it. What was more worrying was that a dark, brown smear was spattered across the surface among and around the damaged area. Considering how long ago this terrible event must have taken place, along with the nature of the damage, Fluttershy clutched onto Applejack's gigantic bicep for comfort as the reality of the scene sunk in. This was a firefight, looking hauntingly similar to some of the sights Fluttershy had seen at the now evicted Dodge Junction. Something had tried escaping or entering this place, possibly a thousand years ago, and had been caught and presumably killed. This meant the stains on the floor were most certainly age old blood. Applejack gave an affectionate nuzzle into Fluttershy's mane before turning back to the path ahead and shouldering her new-found weapon.

"Sumthin' wanted outta this place. Look." AJ said, twitching the barrel of her weapon upwards towards the path of damage that lead up ahead, up to and passed the looming nose of the spacecraft that lie suspended to their left.

The ponies continued on, though now with hearts pounding in chests as the darkness ahead seemed ever less and less inviting. After reaching the middle of the ships nose besides them, Fluttershy spotted the stitching of firearms damage stopped just a dozen feet ahead of the group. All advanced regardless to find the path of devastation leading off top the right, into the large wall besides them that held the vast variety of windows and decks. However the path did not lead into a solid wall, but a breach in the structure, a large hole easily large enough for both Celestia and Luna to walk through together. The breach was obviously created by some sort of explosion, one that had molten the edges of the large hole into a dribbling mess, but also one that had come from the inside of the structure.

"I won't tell you all to follow me in there." Celestia said with words that seemed to lack breath behind them.

"You don't have to." Luna said as she strode up besides her sister, appearing to have reached into some pocket of hidden inner strength.

Celestia gave her sister a loving smile before turning to head through the gaping hole in the massive crystal structure. Fluttershy noted how the foul, bitter smell in the air intensified as they passed through the breach, it beginning to feel like somepony was literally holding a dead squid under the yellow mares snout. In response she squinted her eyes in discomfort as she covered her nose with her sleeve, most of the group following her example. Applejack was the only one who seemed to withstand the stench, her shotgun raised, sweeping from left to right as her sight swept across the large room that lay before her. As the ponies walked on they found themselves in a tall room that stretched and weaved on for at least a couple hundred feet, most of the area filled with crystal cylinders stacked on their sides atop one another, varying in size and colour from dark purple ones the size of barrels to light pink the size of a rolled up magazine.

Onwards they crept, the air still as pungent as when they'd entered, but after a while the trail came to a stop after its sixth or seventh sweep. The room merged into another, only this one wasn't quite as large as the rest, and was about the size of a high school gymnasium hall. The wall they walked out of, along with each one to their sides, seemed perfectly smooth besides a handful of blocky consoles that sat inactive against and within the walls. But the farthest wall was a strange sight indeed, composed of what looked like a large number of irregularly shaped crystal boulders, stacked up in neat formation, buried halfway into the wall behind them. Fluttershy took a closer look as the group spread out, carefully wandering closer to the large crystals as the group behind her frantically searched for a a way out of the room they'd just entered that wasn't the path they'd just walked. Fluttershy at first was convinced these large structures were just some form of battery or harvested mineral the aliens must have kept, but a small glimmer of what looked like gold that came from within one of the rocks caught her attention, and seemed to call her forward. Closer she stepped, her arms held hugged around herself as she sheepishly peered up and at the crystal before her, then taking another step to peer at what might lay inside.

"Aaaaah!" Fluttershy screamed, stumbling backwards and almost falling over her own lengthy tail.

"Fluttershy! What is it?!" Dash said as she hurried over to help her friend.

"S-s-s-something ins-s-s-side!" Fluttershy said, shaking like a leaf as she pointed a heavily vibrating finger towards the crystal she'd just looked upon.

The group cautiously stepped closer to the crystal, bracing themselves as they drew nearer, before peering up into the formation with deep intensity.

"My creator!" Rarity blurted in a raspy voice.

Everypony must have just seen what Fluttershy had seen, something that had shot panic straight into her heart like a javelin. A face, or at least what she could assume was a face, lay rested within the crystal, eyes and mouth closed as if sleeping. It was hard to make out the thing within in any true detail as the crystal distorted the features of the being within. What Fluttershy had managed to make out before being hit by a fear-meteor were the creature inside had pale skin, though not sickly like that of a Fed, had two eyes, two nostrils under a triangular nose and a mouth much like a ponies, though one painted much closer to the things skull rather than at the end of a muzzle.

"My goodness! Is...Is it alive?" Twilight asked nopony in particular.

"He is. They all are. If released they-they-they will kill anything that moves." Torsion said in a remarkably unstable sounding voice, its pitch and tone twitching and burping sporadically.

"Heh, nice tah know Ah can tell when even a machine is lyin' through his speakers." Applejack chuckled.

"Celestia?" Luna said, looking to her sister with concern and confusion.

Celestia looked to her sister, then Applejack, then to the array of crystal blocks, then back at Applejack, obviously and greatly conflicted by the very few options that presented themselves to her. She thought a moment, eyes flitting about, before looking to Applejack again.

"Only one way outta here, Princess. An' Ah don't think we're gettin' out without some help." AJ said before looking up at the crystals.

Celestia frowned to herself, gave a quick sigh and strode quickly over to the nearest, largest console, grazing her hand over the surface to be greeted by an array of blue lines, circles and glyphs. She spent a couple of minutes quickly meeting each option, each glyph with her fingers, each time leading to some dead end or function that she couldn't operate or understand.

"Miss Pie, I could use my star player for some help." Celestia said smiling, keeping her eyes fixed on the computer.

Pinkie zipped over to the princess with speeds that would skin any normal pony alive. Once the less than five and a half foot Pinkie was stood skipping next to the over seven foot Celestia, she scanned her eyes over the screen, eyes lighting up not a couple of seconds later.

"Oh, I'm sure you already got this one, Princess. Tap this circle here, that's 'us' you see, and then over to this one down here, see how it points to the rock-ponies over there." Pinkie chuckled.

Celestia glided her fingers over to the glyph, the shape exploding apart and illuminating a set of meshed together hexagons that replaced the previous screen. Each shape held its own alien glyph within its confines, each as much gibberish than the next. Fluttershy, having recomposed herself, could barely tell the difference between the different symbols, each just a cluster of line, circles and dots that seemed to hold no informative material of any kind.

"Hmmm~. Ah! So thiiiis one here must be to bring up a bunch of numbers and junk, we don't want that. This one looks cool, I wonder what it does?!" Pinkie said with ecstatic energy in her voice, her finger furiously punching away at the symbol that coldly denied her.

Celestia moved her hand gently forward, Pinkie sheepishly smiling as she pulled her hyperactive appendage away. Celestia gave her a smile before planting her touch upon the shape, the screen honking before going completely black. A second passed, everypony's blood running ice cold before a sphere of holographic light, formed into a loose grid pattern engulfed the Princesses head. Celestia's eyes went wide for a moment as her vision must have been flooded by the blue shape, along with a number of circles, hexagons and glyphs that floated around before her very sight as she looked around in a mild panic.

"Oh cooooool~! Neat heads-up display, Princess! Take a look at one of our pals and see what happens." Pinkie said with an excited grin.

Fluttershy saw the Princess turn and look at the nearest crystal, only for the hologram to bring a purple, rotating triangle around the object of interest. Celestia must have been seeing something the others were not as her hand unsteadily rose up in-front of her, as if to grab at something. The alicorn gulped, eyes fluttering as she stood there still for a moment.

"What are we doing, Twilight? What am I doing?" Celestia said desperately.

"We're saving Equestria, Princess, together." Twilight said, putting a hand on Celestia lowered arm.

Almost as if possessed, Celestia reach forward slightly and pressed at something unseen. A soft murmur could be heard coming from the room itself before a sudden bleat called out. The nearest crystal at ground level hissed as it softly hovered out of its confines as a number of strange, mechanical pincers swung out from the surface of the wall behind the construct, grasping the edges of the large crystal. From above swung another appendage, this one was different, however, holding no holding tool on its end. Instead it looked as though it had a multi-lensed camera for a head, only one that looked much smoother than those used by Equestrian cameraponies, almost gelatinous in nature. When the camera-machine had reached the center of the crystal, facing towards it, the machine emitted a bright red flash of light much like the flesh on a camera. At first nothing happened, but then the surface of the crystal seemed to change, growing smoother and flatter, as if it were a lump of ice being melted. Yet nothing dripped or dribbled off of the rock, like its very material was being disintegrated and removed from reality. Fluttershy back up, placing herself at the rear of the group and cowering behind Applejack as she knew what was coming.

More aliens!

Inside, the figure became easier and easier to make out until the creature was almost entirely visible, the strange alien substance removing itself from around its torso, face and knees. The material melted from around the rear of its ankles, elbows and around some device held upon its back, leaving the alien within seemed to strangely float out and away from the half-molten crystal. Fluttershy, or at least a tiny molecule of her, was intrigued by the way the evidently large alien floated above the air, and after seeing no wings the creature bore and considering the thing looked half dead, the pegasus concluded the creature must have been pulled free by some form of alien mechanism that couldn't be seen. The whole group gasped and yelped as the alien was suddenly dropped to the floor, its mass so vast it sounded like a sky-chariot had just plummeted to the ground. The creature lay there a moment, unmoving, not even breathing from what Fluttershy could see, causing her to fear the being was, in fact, very much dead.

The metal suit the alien wore ground across the floor, the thick metal groaning across the plastic-like material beneath it as the alien stirred before attempting to rise. Clumsily the alien rose up, slumping to the side lazily, but catching itself in a kneeling position, its head lowered as it braced itself. The thing then rose to full height, the sight causing Fluttershy to turn away and fully conceal herself behind her friend, who had dropped her weapon out of pure shock. For a couple of seconds Fluttershy heard nothing, helping her feel a little more at ease in knowledge the creature was not tearing her friends limb from limb. She opened her eyes and risked a peek back, her eyes fixing upon the truly terrifying sight before her.

It must have been eight feet tall, easily, trumping even the gigantic frame of Celestia by a few inches. Yet its height only magified its overall size several times over, as it's frame was of an immensely wide build, its huge shoulders flanking a broad chest. Thick limbs fell below its body, massive legs like temple pillars bracing it against the floor. Fluttershy thought for a moment it might well not have been quite as big as it appeared, as the alien seemed to be almost completely encased in some form of armoured suit, one that appeared far to heavy for any pony to be able to wear without being flattened by its weight, let alone move within it. The armour was a bright, pure white with red trimming its large shoulder pauldrons. Half of its large backpack was also a blood red, painted next to the other snow white half. However what was truly strange was how beautifully ornate the suit was, most of its segments adorned with a gleaming golden sigil or decoration of some kind. Yet this observation brought further panic as she spotted one such decorative was what looked like a skull. A number of ropes were tied across its body, a handful of vials filled with a red fluid dangling off them as well as a couple of other locations upon its armour. Overall the thing was an armoured goliath, appearing somewhat like an overcharged version of the royal knights from the time before Nightmare Moon. Yet its armour was evidently very technological in nature, and must have been crafted with a great deal of care and expertise.

The monstrous being took a step forward, a thunderclap sounding as its immensely heavy bootstep hit the solid floor. Another followed, then another as it marched slowly forwards, its stride enormous compared to that of a pony. Fluttershy was surprised she was not more terrified than she was at that moment as she peered up at the approaching creatures bare head, resting eyes upon its features. Its flesh, as previously seen, was quite pale, but not the translucent flesh of the Feds, but making the creature appear to be almost crafted from a fine marble. It's eyes were a bright, metallic golden that seemed to have a certain liquid-metal quality about them, below each eye a scatter of soft freckles sat upon the creatures smooth cheeks, much like Applejack's own. It had no muzzle, looking unlike anything Equestria had ever seen, its nose a short, small triangle protruding from beneath the middle of the eyes, its mouth below the nose. To say it was likable to some form of monkey or ape would have been a truly insulting term that would fail to truly describe the aliens visage, as it held certain hominid qualities, it appeared far more 'evolved' in a sense, as if the winds of time itself had crafted the things genetics through patience and care. A set of small, rounded ears flanked its skull, brilliantly blond hair cascading down around them, as well as down the back of its head and over the forehead. The hair looked incredibly thick, bearing several tones of blonde that bordered on being golden, the locks messily combed over to one side to expose one side of its head had been shaven down to a thick stubble. What caught Fluttershy's attention the most however, was its incredibly calm, almost soft expression.

The group had, as Fluttershy only just realsied, actually take a few steps backwards as the alien advanced on them, until Celestia stopped and raised her arms to signal the group to hold still. Celestia made a small, unsteady advance as the creature approached another step closer, shuffling slightly closer while keeping her eyes fixed on the alien's own.

"My name is Princess Celestia. I-" Celstia began.

"Who woke me?"

The alien voice was just above a bass tone, the words seeming top actually vibrate within Fluttershy's own chest. Though quite loud, its voice was far from a bark or growl, more just a regular ponies speech only deeper and granted more volume. Fluttershy's gut wound into a knot as the alien cut the Princess off mid-sentence, something no pony would ever dare do without expecting a firm but fair verbal retaliation from the alicorn. A retaliation Fluttershy knew was not coming this time around.

"I did!" Fluttershy cringed as Pinkie's hyperactive voice rang through the air.

"Pinkie, please! I'm sorry s...s-siiiir~? Um, we're sorry we disturbed you, to be honest none of us are really sure what we expected when coming down here. The hologram thing said...something was being held in this room, so we thought we'd try our luck to see what we could find." Twilight assured as she took a step carefully closer.

"Your awakening is my fault, I brought everypony down here, so it is I who should appologize. But please, try to understand we are currently in quite a terrible situation, and we have searched for years for some means...any way to save our country." Celestia began again, stepping forward again, hands held out in a disarmed gesture.

"Celestia, you said your name was? Princess?" The giant alien spoke, his firm tone seeming to try and find some kind of appropriate footing.

"Yes." Celestia said back.

"I'm sure the reasons for your coming to this place will be revealed in good time, however my primary concerns at this time are those of what this place is, why I am here, and the whereabouts of my brethren. These answers I wish to seek out immediately, but not before I grant you my thanks. It would seem the kindness of fate saw it best to deliver you to engineer my release from a prison I was never aware I had been placed in." The aliens tone was still loud and deep, but had softened into something Fluttershy felt she could possibly have an actual conversation with somehow.

Fluttershy felt a slight warmth in her heart as the creature before them appeared to be honest and genuine in its statement, meaning that perhaps there was little reason to actually be afraid of this being. As much as it was obviously some kind of soldier, it was exposing itself in a very understandable way verbally, something Fluttershy thought no alien would have ever been capable of. This pulled on a string of guilt within the mare, making her regret her assumptions on what this creature could have been when she first laid eyes on it.

"All of us?" The alien inquired, his features pulling inward in apparent confusion.

"Well...you were wondering were your compatriots were?" Celestia said in a slightly shaky tone, not knowing how the alien would react to what was behind it.

The armoured creature swung about with heavy anticipation as to the whereabouts of it's brothers, taking a step around to look behind itself comfortably. Fluttershy's first thought was on the term it used, 'brothers', and then paired that with the dozens of crystal prison cells there were. Could anypony really have that many actual brothers? Was it even possible? The second was hoping that this being wouldn't decide to have a severe change of heart after seeing the state his fellows were currently stuck in. Celestia was the first to try and find the latter out for herself.

"Excuse me, sir."

The creature turned, unsteadily and slowly. Fluttershy felt her expression grow heartbroken as she gazed up at the aliens expression, which was one she'd seen on ponies on several occasions. It was an expression of bone-shocking grief, an exposure to a sudden, icy revelation that must have rattled his very core. His eyes seemed to not be able to focus on anything, simply floating in their sockets helplessly. His face seemed drained of the energy it once held, and whatever Celestia had to say next, Fluttershy feared would glide right through its head like a ghost.

"We need your help."

19 - WE'REHEREWEMADEITWE'LLRIPOUTYOURSOULWATCHOUTHEREWEARE

Revitheon.

Denethios.

Dathes.

Herathor.

Adventios.

The squad of marines had faced much, one could say, and they had most certainly faced worse than what they stood in the middle of at this current time. But so isolated, so absolutely cut off from reinforcements, resupply or evacuation? Herathor had already chewed through a single ammo box for his heavy bolter, and just over half of his current magazine was spent already, and was continuing to be spent more generously than Adventios would have liked. Revitheon was wounded, though not particularly badly, but the joints in his armour had collectively allowed over half a dozen magna rounds to pierce through. Though to the common eye he shrugged these wounds off without a second thought Adventios could see he was steadily beginning to slow. Herathor remained unharmed, but his entire right pauldron had been blasted off by some form of grenade launcher. Dathes and Denethios both were largely unharmed say for a few scrapes and scratches, and Adventios was much the same besides a magna round that had punched into his side that was still gnawing at him with a stinging pain.

Shade snatcher kicked in his hands in rattling bursts, another federation soldier bursting apart in a spray of gore and broken bones. Herathor's heavy bolter barked again and again, sending ruined chunks of corpses flying away a dozen feet from a wide crimson smear. The other three paced their fire as best they could, but everyone had cooked through at least half their ammunition supplies, and the ranks of white armoured aliens was failing to slacken. Another burning alien projectile snapped off of the contoured surface of the sergeants' left pauldron, biting yet another small fragment of armour away. His bolter swung about and up, bringing the dual barrels to bear straight at the soldier firing at him from a second floor window in a nearby, half-ruined building. A thunderous response from his weapon caused his assailant to die in a puff of red mist that squirted out the window frame, and with the prominent threat dealt with his attention focused once again on the seemingly ever-replenishing firing line that formed in the road ahead of the squad.

A federation benefactors' head snapped back, a fountain of blood spurting from a neat hole in the side of his skull as an equestrian royal guard located somewhere out of sight, most likely hold up in a building around the corner besides the feds, put a low caliber round right through the aliens' brain. Another round flecked off of another nearby benefactors' angular shoulder mounted battle armour, and another a few second later tore the throat out from an alien that turned to fire at the guard. Another three, then four benefactors all turned and started hammering fire into whatever had fired on them, leaving Adventios to hope the guard had done the smart thing and swiftly relocated after that last kill. However not two seconds after the aliens had turned, a trio of winged natives, all in beaten and worn golden armour, swooped down from behind the firing line, their handheld sub-machine guns rattling as they made their dive. One alien was almost torn in two at the waist by the flurry of fire, another next to it having the incoming bullets patter against its' frontal chest plate as it turned, a lucky shot spinning him around on the spot as it clipped its' shoulder.

The aliens' returned fire, a pair with their own stocky automatic weapons peppering fire into the oncoming aggressors. Crimson round lanced through the sky like an angry tornado, the natives swerving and pulling up to avoid being caught in the hailstorm. One of the three wasn't fast enough however, his entire left side being ripped apart, his left wing being blasted to scattered feathers and mangled tissue. The dying pony entered a tumbling dive, hurtling towards a point near to the space marine squad. His body hit the ground with a loud thump and a sickening crack, his spine shattered in at least a dozen places upon impact.

Her spine, even.

Adventios couldn't help but stare on for only a couple seconds, soaking in the image that dug a deep pit of pity into his gut. Her features must have once been fair, her face full and neatly rounded. Her red mane of hair must have once been full and , presumably, well styled considering the hints of artificial product that still lay within it. Her fur was a sun-kissed orange, her eyes and brilliant and bright turquoise, her limbs graceful and slight. Her body must have once been a collection of comforting qualities, and now was dead. Ruined. Shattered. Half pulped and bloodied, her jaw loose and agape, her one good eye half-rolled into the back of her head, deep purple blood spattered and smeared over almost every inch of her. Her split stomach had leaked some of her innards while her limbs now twisted in unnatural, gruesome ways. Adventios felt a need to walk over. Her knew he couldn't save her. He knew he couldn't do anything he could be sure would mean anything to anyone. He would have just liked to tidy her up after a battle well fought. Closed her eye, rolled her body over, straightened her limbs out, perhaps even find her undoubtedly mangled firearm and lay it atop her. She deserved nothing less.

She deserved to be alive.

Hatred swelled in his heart, his face a scorn behind his mask as he turned again to march forward, storm bolter rattling with fire.

"We break their line! Herathor, destroy the supports next to them!" The sergeant ordered.

Herathor swerved his fire about, his bolts hammering into support pillars at the base of an overwatch tower located next to the firing line. A risky strategy, each pillar was as thin as half a man and no easy target whilst under fire, but Herathor had struck done far more difficult targets before, he couldn't afford to lapse in his skill now. True to his hopes one of the pillar blasted away, another soon followed and with a tortured groan the tower twisted and toppled. The aliens beneath were crushed in an instant, those not outright pulverized screamed and yelped pathetically as limbs were trapped and squashed.

"More targets closing from the north-north-east!" Revitheon grunted as he consulted his auspex scanner.

"Move, down the street! Close formation!" Adventios barked as the five of them took off.

"Wait...I'm getting sporadi-" Revitheon was about to finish before something collided into him from above, Adventios and the others looking up just in time to see two other large figures descend atop of them.

"Into the buildings!" The sergeant called out as he made a sharp dive to the side, barrelling through the front of what was once a shop of some kind, coming to a kneel and bringing up his weapon to scan for targets.

The rest of the squad followed his example, but the walls between the shops and homes they all dove into separated his brothers from the sergeants' line of sight, leaving him with only their identification runes to track their location on his HUD. The diamond-shaped icons bobbed and wavered as his brother dodged and ducked from enemy fire that reigned from above and in front. Three of their assailants stood before them, two that Adventios could see, one charging right towards him, gun ablaze. They were the augmented soldiers of the Federation, like those he had encountered upon first meeting the aliens in the underground catacombs. His storm bolter raged with fire, but only a handful of the rounds that he fired hit home, the aliens' reflexes being far faster than the average soldier, enough to dance through many of the rounds fired at him. Those that struck were rendered inaffective, a crimson energy shield detonating the rounds before they ever reached their target, the single round that breached the shield blasting away a fist-sized segment of the aliens' powered armour, but failing to stop or slow him.

With a grunt the fed drew a short combat blade from a hidden compartment within his armours' chest segment, swinging wide to strike as Adventios' midsection. The sergeant backed away, smashing through a desk with his mighty legs as he drew his chainsword from the back of his waist, engine roaring, teeth spinning. He made a wide slashing motion to assure some distance between him and his foe, the attack working as he'd hoped and seeing the nimble soldier backflip away from the swing. Adventios took the opening dashing straight forward, sword arm oustretched as he went for a strike against the aliens' stomach. The blow was batted aside, the soldier slamming into the side of the sword with his gauntlet, rushing forth himself to stab downwards towards the marines' neck. Adventios brought up his shoulder, his pauldron whining as it raised to intercept the blow. The aliens' swing was strong, strong enough to bite into the pauldron ceramite plate and send a jolt through the sergeants' shoulder.

He knew he needed distance as his ally once again, he couldn't afford to delay any longer.

Bringing his sword arm in, Adventios struck out into the aliens' helmeted face, knocking him up and over, sending him falling back into the far wall of the shops' interior. The soldiers' facial visor had been half shattered by the blow, leaving a single, pale eye staring at the space marine with cold hatred.

"When I'm done killing you nice and slow I'm gonna use your dumb little helmet as a trophy to pick up girls with." The alien soldier growled, finishing with a cocksure chuckle.

"For now, I'll be happy just to watch you die."

The alien looked as if he'd slackened to make a reply, only to stiffen too late as over a ton and a half of space marine ploughed into him. Adventios delivered a blow, then another and another, again and again. The aliens' recharging energy shield were once again sucked dry of their protective ability as each blow hit like a meteorite strike. The alien flung up its' hands to protect its face, Adventios responding with a hooked punch to the hip, the blow making something snap and the alien gag in pain. With both hands braced against his blade, the sergeant threw forwards his chainsword, the length of the cutting edge levelled with the aliens' throat. The soldier caught the blade in his grip, all his strength pushing against Adventios to keep the teeth away from his throat by but a couple inches. Little too late did he realise his mistake as he gasped less than a second before the chainswords' engine roared with mechanical fury. The razor sharp adamantium teeth spun far too fast for the mortal eye to see clearly, the sudden surge of quickening shredding the alien's finger clean off his hands. The alien had no time to scream before the blade pushed forwards, past his bloody, fingerless stumps and into the alien's unarmoured throat, chewing away rubber joint, gelatin layers, flesh and muscle in a single violent spray. Adventios backed away, his victim choking on the waterfall of blood that washed down his front as he swayed upright before the marine snatched him by the armoured collar, bending him over backwards across his knee. Adventios brought his sword arm up, and like a hammer of the gods brought the pommel of his blade down onto the helmet of his adversary, caving in his visor and the face beyond, snapping his head down to come dangling from his shoulders by a bundle of tendons no wider than half a hand.

Adventios raised himself up, tossing the body unceremoniously away from him before darting out the front of the store. the first sight her saw was another dead federation super soldier, the corpse almost cut in half at the waist by bolter fire. Next another tumbled out the front of a nearby building, decimating a brick wall on the way through from which Dathes strode, his bolter raised to hammer a trio of rounds into the face of the recuperating alien, its' head blasting apart to ruin. The sergeants' head snapped across the street to another sight, this time to Revitheon, who was in worse shape than before. One of the rounds from the super soldiers augmented firearms had struck Revitheon in the gut, the wound bubbling with blood that failed to clot due to the size of the wound. Herathor was at his side, keeping the aliens' that remained upon the rooftops pinned with his support weapon.

He was down to his final ammo box.

"We have to move, now!" Denethios called from behind the sergeant, running from the building he had found cover in and towards his brother.

Adventios could see what had Denethios so high strung on his HUDs' short range auspex, a blur of signals closing in down the road they now traveled and closing on them at a steady pace.

"Fall back! To rally point Delta!" Adventios called as he took to a sprint ahead of his brother, the rest of his squad doing the same ahead as best they could.

Revitheon had slowed to a limping jog, the sergeant could hear him wheezing in exhaustion.

The thunder of power armoured boots rang through the street, the marines gaining distance ahead of the oncoming assault. Adventios spotted another sight as he ran, one he'd hoped not to see. The guard from earlier, some of their bodies hung limp from the windows they'd been shot through, others had fallen clean through, their limp bodies crumpling onto the stone street below and some most assuredly still lay within the building they'd holed up in to fire upon the aliens the marines had fought against earlier. Thought of honouring the valiant dead burned through Adventios' mind as he ran, knowing nothing could be done, no matter how much it should have been.

Perhaps they were part of a larger squadron He thought, Perhaps-

A thunderclap from behind drew the sergeants' attention immediately, bringing him to a hault and spinning him around to see his brother behind him. Denethios' armour was shattered, cracked in half a dozen places, some segments having been blasted off entirely from behind to reveal the dark metal of the power armours' inner workings. His power pack was most notably ruined, sparking and sputtering blue flames and sparks atop him as he lay face down upon the street. Adventios started for a sprint to retrieve his brother, finding a moments' hope as he saw Denethios stir, his arms grasping forward to try and pull him down the street. Adventios' jaw clenched and his brow tensed as what looked like a parade of federation military was marching down the road towards his downed brother, those at the front already having their rifles drawn to take aim at the injured marine. Adventios quickened his pace a moment then coming to a skidding halt as a tall figure fell from the roof just across from Denethios' form and strode over to him. The alien super soldier pushed Denethios over onto his back with a boot from its' armoured foot, bringing its' heavy assault rifle up to take aim at the wounded marines' head.

Adventios couldn't just leave him there, he couldn't just watch on and do nothing as his beloved brother, who he had bled with in over a dozen campaigns over forty years, was executed like an aged mule. The sergeant went to take off into a sprint again, only to stop once more as the bloodied, burned hand of his brother raised up. Something was in Denethios' hand, something fist sized and made of dark steel, and Adventios could only watch as his brothers shakey, rasping voice come over the squad's vox channel.

"No...f-fear..."

The alien had turned in the split second it had realised what was happening, but not taken a single stride away before the krak grenade detonated. The explosive device made a violent, bone-shaking snap as it blew. Denethios was destroyed in an instant, most of him vaporized in a flash of light, leaving what remained as shards of scattered, twisted ruin. The alien was blasted into the nearby face of a house, being effectively liquidated within its' armour only to be splattered over the scorched stonework.

War was no time for grief. No time for regret or the pains of the soul.

Adventios looked on for but a heartbeat, then turned and took off to keep up with what was left of his squad.

"The factors are understood, Lord of Mars. However I once again reiterate my request for-" Unycrios begun, full well knowing what the twenty seventh response would be.

"Negative, aspired techmarine. You have your priorities, we have ours. And thanks to your most gracious banquet of data, we have determined our undertaking is priority code Zeta-Omicron, tier five." Lord Tech Priest Ritivek droned, his final words having a microscopic inflection of stimulus.

Unycrios would of sighed in exasperation had it not been a pointless response, instead he simply leaned forwards, adjusting his weight as he braced into the control console in front of him as he spoke to the static-laden hologram of the machine-man he conversed with.

"Very well. You final consensus?" The marine spoke in flawless binary.

"You know our destination already. Considering your recent surface activity, I would have thought it was obvious." The tech priest buzzed and clicked in his digital tongue.

"For the record. I require hard-copy categoricals of all imperial intents, no matter the party involved."

The tech priest froze a while, staring straight into Unycrios' eye lenses as though he were actually in the room with him, assessing his very being for signs of a hidden motive or twisted truth. After a few seconds the cyborg leaned forwards himself, slowly, like some ancient creature rising from the depths after being encrusted in coral for an eon.

"The alien artifact remains unattended within the planets' surface. It is mechanicus standard procedure to secure this most compelling find. My excavation and sanctification cohorts are gathered and time is a luxury is such circumstances."

"How long until you become available for future summons?" Unycrios replied not a millisecond after Ritivek had finished.

"You can expect my forces to be otherwise occupied for at least the next forty eight hours, twenty two minutes and four seconds; allowing for one point six second deviances...of course." Ritivek replied with an amused cough.

"And you summarise that leaving fellow imperial forces to a battle-" The techmarine started.

"With less than thirty percent likelihood of survival to go unanswered by segmentum command? By your parent chapter? Of course we can expect...friction, should your brethren fail in their task. Yet, I suspect this friction will be swiftly alleviated once the treasures of what lie beneath are appropriately seized and secured. Doesn't this entire situation sound familiar to you? The Countermeasure of Tellevor Nine? The Hell-Door Insurgency? Do not try to sell the notion that space marines are above being expended for a far greater gain, most aspired techmarine."

Unycrios felt what he had buried for so long, buried within the depths of the oldest part of his mind, risen like some reanimated corpse to shuffle hideously back into memory.

Anger.

"Your decision is comprehended. You will be contacted after your operations are further concluded."

Unycrios half-punched the rune switch to terminate the transmission between the two of them, the fraction of the second before the hologram died he could make out the tech priests' eyes twitch slightly, a purposeful giveaway that he was pleased he could be rid of the pestering that came from the astarte and go back to his business. Unycrios hung his head over the console, reciting the rites of logic as he slowed his own heart after a few seconds. One of the Remergences' bridge displays revealed the mechanicus vessel that had aided the astarte frigate as it was hounded by alien vessels, obliterating almost a third of their total number and leaving them to retreat to the farthest side of the planet they all orbited. The martian starship descended down to the planet below with an undoubted sense of purpose, speeding with absolute efficiency towards the province the natives had called the Crystal Empire.

North of Ponyville, the town hospital in sight, hundreds had gathered, shakily waiting outside a large set of thick, mechanical doors made from alien metal. Most present held no weapons, many were a part of a family that had collected amongst the crowd. Children coughed and cried softly in their parents arms, who in turn had their heads on a swivel, eyes darting around in anticipation for an unseen danger to suddenly present itself. Beyond the crowd spanned a long, large makeshift barricade crafted from all manner of items and obstacles, bicycles, carts, doors were all welded and nailed together to better protect the citizens of this war-torn town. Royal guard stood around the barricades' perimeter, rifles raised in hand to scan the ruins that surrounded their location.

"C'mon Star Chaser, what's taking so long?" Rainbow Dash said, turning her head back to the young, purple mare who was tinkering with the exposed circuitry of the buildings' identification console.

"I'm gettin' there! Just a few...more..."

"Movement! Ov-Over here!" A royal guard stallion called out in panic as he braced his shoulder into his rifle, readying himself to fire.

"Hol' up everypony! It's the space marines." Applejack replied from further down the barricade, imperial shotgun still in hand.

A chorus of loud, thunderous footfalls could be heard jogging closer to the barricade before four massive figures leaped clear over it, coming to a steady, yet booming landing behind the ramshackle defenses. Many of the ponies amongst the crowd gasped and cried out in shock and surprise, the creatures they lay eyes upon unlike any they had seen even considering their recent alien occupation. Children pointed and let their mouths hang wide as adults shuffled away warily of the armoured giants that now strode closer to them.

"What's the situation?" The leader Rainbow had come to know as Adventios asked in his bassy voice.

"We have way too many ponies here to hang out in the open for much longer. But we found this old transit tunnel that leads all the way to Canterlot underground. Squids built it to travel faster between towns and cities while they figured out how to adjust their aircraft to our air, or something." Rainbow replied, checking her looted alien carbine over once again.

"Should have the doors open any minute now, and once we're through I can cross-wire the terminal to lock up after we're through." Star Chaser said, her face still buried within the consoles access port.

"And just in case." Applejack added as she jogged over, throwing a rucksack to the ground filled with rectangular alien devices.

A main, blocky body, a priming mechanism, digital display, Rainbow trusted even a pony with socks for brains could figure this one out. And she bet the marines had a little more than socks knocking around inside their oddly fleshy heads.

"We collapse the tunnel." Adventios finished, looking down at the dozen or so explosive charges.

"Right, but we need-...Say, weren't there five of you before?" Applejack started, only to slowly and awkwardly add her inquiry.

The space marine did not answer right away, and Rainbow would never be sure if he would have ever have answered the orange and blonde farm pony as gunfire could be heard that was close enough to worry about. The sergeant turned to Rainbow Dash, his glowing, purple eye lenses burning into her.

"We need these doors open, now." Adventios replied with a growl before moving to the barricade, signalling his squad to spread out across the perimeter.

Rainbow looked up at her friend with a worried look, Applejack looking back at her as she sold the news to herself with a pained look pasted across her features.

Mortal after all Rainbow Dash thought to herself as she took off to join the other defenders at the barricade.

It was hard for her to truly accept. She was sad somepony who she'd fought alongside, who'd protected her had died, but she wasn't denying such a tragedy because of sentiment, it was just the math of the whole idea. She'd seen these warriors from space take enough fire to turn a manticore to ribbons and return enough to take down entire squads of feds in seconds. The idea of one of these post-mortal demi-gods being slain like a common battlefield casualty was just laughable, and killed by these usurper squid-heads? Rainbow's teeth gritted, the still-healing scars on her arm and face stinging as she scowled.
She had beef.
Beef she was gonna eat.
And then probably sick up, since she was really, definitely a herbivore.

Pony ears twitched and swiveled as the growling, throbbing sound of a federation vehicles gravity field could be heard getting closer through the fog-choked streets. Hands tense and flexed around weapons, eyes darted left and right, knees trembled and breathes stuttered. The space marines, however, were like statues. Utterly still besides a slow, steady sweeping motion they each made with their boxy firearms. Rainbow had always had a tough time giving credit to ponies she hadn't gotten to know a little first, she didn't like to sow herself into anyones' pocket too early and believed in having to prove yourself to gain praise. She'd known these alien for less than three days and already she was confident in calling them absolute hardcore super soldiers.

The dumb grin that had grown across Rainbows' face as she peered at the marines was quickly replaced by that stupid look you have just before you're about to get hit by traffic as a crimson magna round blasted into the barricade not two feet away from her. She and several others flinched awkwardly before recomposing themselves and firing into the ruins ahead, some blindly so. The marines had begun firing not a second after the round had struck, weapons letting out thunderous, roaring blasts as opposed to the ponies coughing snaps from their own weapons. Rainbow primed the alien carbine in her hands and let loose a volley ahead of her, scarlet bolts snapping through the air and chipping away at the brick and wood that was piled ahead.

The scream of a dying alien was heard, shortly followed by another and another as rounds hit home. A royal guard with dark grey fur and blue hair took a burning alien round to the stomach through a hole in the defenses, the stallion letting out a choking sound as his body fell backwards limply. Rainbow caught the briefest glimpse of motion near a darkened window to her right. Bringing her weapon about, her carbine rattled a burst of rounds into the opening, a wet, snapping sound resounding from within just before what sounded like a gasp from something dying. Rainbow expected to feel something good, like some sense of right, a feeling that something askew in the universe had been corrected, happiness in having destroyed something she knew was evil. But there was nothing, her mind went strangely quiet as the information of what had just happened resounded in her brain like a train horn.

Is this what it was like for the feds when they killed something, was it hard for them to kill ponies? Did they feel just as empty, just as confused as Rainbow did now?

Uhnbur Dur

Is this how they'd all become so twisted and numb to the misery they caused? What did killing mean to them anymore? And what about the space marines, they had all obviously seen battle dozens, maybe hundreds of times before, just exactly how many living, breathing things had they destroyed?

Rehnbur Dersh

What was all this killing doing to them inside? Did it make them feel anything anymore, after so long? Just what exactly was the difference between these two aliens that had come to her once beautiful and peaceful planet?

"Rainbow Dash! Come on little missy, now's not the tahm tah git all dreamy on me!"

Applejacks' powerful hand had already grabbed Rainbow by the shoulder of her shirt to yank her backwards violently. Dash snapped out of her shock to look about in confusion, seeing that most of everypony that had been around and behind her had started falling back. She turned quickly to see the tunnel doors had been unlocked, the opening mechanism apparently failing and seeing one of the space marine stood prying the two massive metal doors apart, his large armoured frame wedged between them to allow ponies to pass through between his legs and to either side of his waist. Dash snapped around again, tapped AJ on the shoulder to signal she was alright, going on to raise her weapon to rattle fire into incoming federation soldiers. They were just outside the barricade now, their white, blue and yellow forms shuffling and jogging about beyond the makeshift walls, barely visible. Alien projectiles whizzed and hissed through the air, snapping at dirt and clanging against metal constructs behind the blue pegasus. Some round hissed passed her far to close to comfort, and curiously didn't make a sound after passing by. Dash continued to shuffle back, the cries and screams of desperate ponies growing closer, louder, but thankfully less numerous doubtlessly thanks to the passage of escape being granted to them.

And to one other factor Dash discovered as she stumbled over something that lay behind her.

The mare was older than Dash, perhaps even as old as her own mother. She had a dark, grey-blue coat and a sky blue mane and tail that was kept neat and shoulder length. She wore a large overall coat that hid most of her body, making her look dreamily comfortable as she appeared to be sleeping. But the pool of dark purple blood beneath her crawled ever outwards in protest of such a notion being even remotely true. Rainbow looked on at the pony in front of her, her eyes running with rivulets as her emotions hung limply in her own mind, not wanting to feel what she knew she had to. Once more, a strong hand grabbed her from behind and dragged her frozen body across the ground towards the entrance of the alien tunnel. Dash lazily peered upwards to see even the marines had fallen back from the combat ahead, the only to remain being the one still prying the door open behind her, and the one ahead.

She could have sworn he'd been called something, she could have sworn she could remember his name. It was something like 'Hektor', or maybe 'Hothror', but Dash had simply remembered him as the guy with the huge gun. His bulky firearm swept left to right, pinpoint bursts of large caliber fire raking through the ranks of aliens that now lept and barged through the barricade ahead, their comparatively frail bodies bursting apart in great geysers of viscera as the rounds struck home. His helmet lay in front of him in the wet dirt, its lower right half ruined by enemy fire, the electronics within the high-tech piece of armour exposed and sparking. The marine's blonde hair was matted and messy with quickly coagulating blood that trickled from a wound on the side of his skull, and when he turned enough for Dash to see his face it too was covered in dark gore, as well as an expression of utter hatred of all the alien warrior looked upon. Rainbow heard a noise behind her, someone calling out, but she didn't have the capacity to understand what was being said, or even want to know for that matter. All she could tell was that it caught the marine's attention, turning his head around and back a moment before her swiveled to one side and took off at a jog, quickly covering the distance between himself and the tunnel entrance.

He was about halfway to the doors when a deafening, whining thunderclap shook the air, making even Dash flinch. Dash closed her eyes a second in response to the terrible cacophony, opening them once again to see the marine she had seen not a sec before stumbling forwards, his expression a mix of shock and his mind trying to process what must have been a death-inducing amount of pain. His right leg was ruined at the hip, the limb attached by a few centimeter wide strands of sinew and flesh, the armour around in obliterated. The marine took a step and fell like an old oak, the ruined limb falling away under him, the few remaining attachments shorn away by even the simplest motion. With a dull thud the alien fell forward onto his chest, his head falling limply forward for but a moment before rising again. He looked tired, drained of life and the fire of battle that had burned bright within him but a moment ago. He turned over, throwing his weight over to roll onto his backpack which was being riddled with dozens of alien bullets that chewed at it like a pack of piranhas. With one last bought of strength, one last testament of defiance and rage the space marine drew a bulky sidearm from his belt, swinging it up to blast a shot into the neck of an attacking fed. Snapping his aim across he took another one in the gut, the shot detonating within the alien to fling his upper half into a front-flip over his collapsing lower half. Round after round barked from his pistol as he roared what was left in his chest, roaring as the aliens he deemed worthy to die by his will did so,roaring as his lifeblood poured from his leg wound like a waterfall, roaring as one of the aliens blasted a wound into the side of his neck, and still as another caught him several times in the stomach. His eyes closed in agony, his pistol firing erratically, almost panicked as more and more round tore him apart, his roar slowly and steadily turned into a cry of despair as crimson bolts of fire tore into his shoulders, face and even his open wound. His cry drew out long and loud before ending abruptly, a second deafening blast turning his entire torso into ruin, shattered armour and great throws of gore showering around the battleground like a hellish rainstorm.

Dash slowly swept her eyes across to see the angular, shallow hull of a federation hover tank turning into the barricade, its' gravity cushion the vehicle hovered on crushing the household instruments and furniture to splinters as it barged through ponderously. It's wide, flat turret swerved around from it's previous, now deceased target to raise up and take aim at the Rainbow Dash as she was pulled through the giant blast doors. She was through in an instant as Applejack half-threw her inside, diving in after her. The marine holding the door slipped inside, letting the doors whine closed behind them, What little light from outside there was grew dimmer.

Dash looked out once more and saw her, amongst others she had failed to notice beyond the carnage of death. She new some of them, those that lay looking as though asleep, those who's faces she could still recognise. Others she could not recognize, no one would be able to ever identify such ruined, mangled remains. The doors left but a single sliver of the outside left to see now, and Dash wished they'd been closed a lifetime ago as she once again stared at the dead mare she had seen earlier, only now she saw something buried under her, the mare must have been holding something before her body fell atop of it after being struck down. A tiny pair of cyan, equine ears and a dinky, spiraling horn poked out from under the mass of her large coat. The doors rang with the snapping of gunfire bouncing off from it before a single, dull boom saw the doors closed and all went dark and silent.

Dash lay there for what felt like a thousand years.

Laying helpless in nothing.

Nothing.

Gonna getcha! Goooonna getcha!

Run! Run! Run away!

We see you~...Tasssssste yooooou~...

Nightmare's eyes darted left and right, up and down, her head snapped back and forth as she ran alongside her sister. The voices, so many voices, their scratching, rasping tones snapping and hissing at her as she ran tired, drowned in dim, crimson light.

Close our eyes! Please Nightmare, please close our eyes! Luna cried out from within Nightmare's mind.

Nightmare wanted to shut away what she was seeing, she wanted it to all just disappear as inexplicably as it had appeared in the first place. Heck, she wanted to disappear, so long as the parade of horror stopped, so long as everything that was all around her just stopped.

She half-gagged once again as she stumbled passed a federation security guard who was on his knees, his visage twisted beyond hope or reason. His face was a rictus grin, his face messily missing his pale lips, while his eyes had somehow been inflated with what looked like a wretch-inducing, puss-like fluid that swam with sickening brown strands mixed within. He was covered in thick layers of gore, and seemed to have draped a series of long, ropy lengths of flesh and innards over his shoulders making him appear like some macabre parody of a priest wearing a sanctified scarf. He clutched in his gaunt hands a viscera-wrapped bone that looked like it had come from the arm of the corpse he knelt over. He was gnawing into it with cracked and broken teeth before he saw Nightmare, when he violently crunched his treat in half, spitting fragments of bone and chunks of flesh from his ruined mouth as he peered up at the alicorn as she ran by.

"Come, see with me!" He said, his words a rasping gurgle more than actual speech.

"Sister!" Celestias' voice came from in front of Nightmare, turning her attention back again.

"Th-This is crazy! This isn't happening!" Nightmare said to herself, eyes wild with panic.

"Hurry, Nightmare!" Celestia half-screamed as she stood within the opening of another doorway.

Nightmare was horror-stricken, in severe shock and her breathing was ragged and stuttering, but she was an alicorn. The most powerful alicorn. Her massive, powerful legs ran her forward like a freight train, blasting her forwards past another dozen of the things the alien's she'd once fought had been made into, their grinning, chattering faces leering at her as she passed them in a heartbeat. She made it to the doorway, sliding inside before turning to look back through the dark, metal corridor, the terrifying, zombie-like faces of the post-aliens turning slowly in unison to stare at the two alicorns. Then, in unison, they spoke.

"We can see."

The mechanical doors hissed closed, Celestia using her own considerable strength to smash in the control pad to operate the door they'd entered. The two took a moment, leaning against whatever wall was behind them as they too shaky, panicked breaths.

"Te...Teleport!" Nightmare huffed, staring at the ground.

"I can't! Nothing's changed from earlier." Celestia replied, her eyes screwed up in despair, looking as if she desperately wanted to start crying but knew she couldn't afford to.

"We've got to...We've got to find a way out of here!" Nightmare said, moving over to her sister, straightening her up by the shoulders with a shake.

"I thought I did! I thought I knew the way they brought us in, but...b-but this is...I don't understand! It's like we've been running in circles for hours!" Celestia cried out, punching her fist into a nearby wall, crushing the metal surface inwards.

The low ringing of the strike thrummed through the air a while. Nightmare's spine went ice cold as she realized the sound of tortured metal somehow, beyond all reason was twisted with eerie fluidity into a low, rasping chuckle. The two sisters looked around as they backed into one another, moving away from the walls as they sung with bassy laughter. A long, cringing, creaking sound came from ahead of them, down the long, dark corridor they'd just stumbled into. The pair turned slowly to look into the abyssal darkness ahead, Nightmare swearing the pathway ahead was twisting, slowly and ever so subtle corkscrewing around to make her perspective go dizzy with confusion.

Celestia stepped out in front of Nightmare like a big sister standing up for their sibling in a playground, her horn glowing to cast some form of illumination spell. But her spell sputtered and sparked at her horn before failing utterly, her face creasing with pain as something denied her what she'd had at her fingertips her entire long life.

"I...I can't even..." Celestia said, her breath taken from her as she stumbled back into Nightmare who straightened her up once again.

"Okay...Okay we've just got to keep moving. If we keep moving we're bound to find a way out somewhere. Or at least somewhere with some weapons we could use." Nightmare said, recomposing herself to at least a recognizable degree as she marched forwards into her domain, the darkness.

"I don't know if I can-" Celestia began.

"Then leave all the heavy lifting to me. Nothing more than I expected if I'm being completely honest." Nightmare interrupted with a venomous tone, Celestia lowering her head and going silent in response as her hands fidgeted by her lap.

The darkness seemed to swallow the two of them, and consumed everything they'd once known, even the sense of being. Nightmare likened it to the feeling of being trapped within Luna's psyche, floating in nothingness with only your most intimate sense of being intact. She could feel her hooves hitting the floor beneath her, but it was as if she'd been dossed up of intense pain medication, leaving the feeling numb. She just about felt the delicate hand of Celestia grab hold of one of her large shoulders, her frightened grasp shaking with fear. Nightmare had excellent night vision, she could see a throne room's worth of space without even a sliver of starlight. But this, whatever this was robbed her of even that, along with inducing migraines while casting ruined spells this haunted place was taking away more and more things that made Nightmare strong.

Celestia screamed behind her like she had done as a filly, her hands clutching into Nightmare's massive arms. Her shivering was frantic and was even starting to make Nightmare nervous again.

"What?! What is it?!"

"Something...S-Something touched me! Something just t-touched me!" Celestia replied in a tone that Nightmare had never heard before, one that began to chill her to the core.

"Where?! Where from?!" She asked as she turned about, desperately trying to spy out something, anything.

Where is it?

The voice came as though hissed from a hot, lipless mouth not two inches from Nightmare's own ear, and with it came something that made Nightmare want to die there and then. The smallest, subtlest of scratches, like a ragged fingernail being dragged across the flesh beneath her fur with a slight pressure. This would be terrifying on it's own had the scratch not come from the inside of Nightmare's thigh, the touch sliding upwards towards an area Nightmare's mind wouldn't let her think about.

Nightmare screamed.

Luna screamed.

Celestia screamed.

It laughed.

The two sister fell from the shadows screaming, like children waking up from a nightmare. They fell to the floor, Celestia atop of Nightmare, the two of them quickly gathering themselves, pulling away flowing locks of magical hair to look up before them as they panted heavily.

A door.

Another alien door sat before them both, the alicorns scrambling to their feet, Celestia kneeling by the control pad, tapping and swiping at it with shaking fingers. Nightmare turned, peering into the darkness they'd just fallen from, the one that felt like a whole day had been used up just to travel through. Stared into it, wide chest heaving with heavy, panicked breaths as an ocean of nothingness stared back at her.

"Celestia, we need to hurry." Nightmare said in a low, frightened tone.

"There's something wrong, it won't let me-" Celestia replied through gritted teeth.

"Celestia...I think something's-" Nightmare said, turning her head away from the shadows to look over at Celestia before a slow, wet, rasping breathing sound came from where she had just been looking.

Five eyes. Five eyes like burning coals stared at her. Each one was fixed on Nightmare like a predator sizing up it's prey, but each eye twitched and rolled independently and erratically. Nightmares' confusion slid into heart-shaking terror as she could see something in the shadows, what little blood-red lighting there was catching the slick surface of something kneeling ahead of her in the middle of the corridor. In the middle of the shadows.

It was large, at least nine feet tall had it not been squatting down and hunched over, but it's build was very skinny, malnourished even, being little more than crooked bone and dried out sinew. Its arms were long and skeletal, its thin hands bearing long fingers tipped with a crooked claw. Its' rib cage looked like it'd been run over by an automobile, its' shape bending in and out at wrong angles, some bones piercing through its leathery flesh altogether like long, curved teeth. Its' spine was most certainly crooked, bent and twisted in several locations, the skeletal backbone spearing long, thick quills through the creatures' back, flesh torn around the protrusions, some lengths of skin still clinging to the spiny growths. A bony tail slivered on the ground, smearing dark gore into the metal beneath it, either side were feet much like those of a goat, except instead of hooves it hand hand-like claws gripping into the floor. It's head was a mane of twisting horns that swept up and back, some tangling painfully with others, some broken and gnarled. It's face made the eyes burn, skeletal, grinning with rows of needle-like teeth, gore running from noseless nostrils and lidless eye sockets.

A creaking, groaning sound came from the thing ahead of Nightmare, like old wood being bent and twisted. Nightmare could hear Luna screaming something in her own head, but couldn't make out what was being said, her mind a haze of fear and dread of something that seemed so beyond her, beyond her tiny, pitiful existence. It was like the thing had been sat there her whole life, watching and waiting, weighing up ever mistake, every poor decision and every wrong done. It was like each misstep Nightmare had made had flayed at the thing, and in blissful agony it had sat silent and still. And now, after millennia of pain, of hurt, hatred and general indecency, now it was ready to visit her. It would peel at her, scratch into her bones while she lived. It would force eyeless, tongueless stallions to be upon her, to put children inside her for it to feed on once newborn for all eternity. It would run its' toothed, serpentine tongue all around each eyeball as she wept, slurping up even tear as a fine delicacy. Nightmare felt her future as this things' plaything loom over her, choking her, rendering her entire life a pointless expenditure of meaningless tirades.

She was a cattle in a slaughterhouse.

A light came from behind her, fluttering and shifting as something moved from behind. She considered it might have been Celestia, her radiant, beautiful glow glaring out as she made a single and ultimately final effort to protect her sister. Nightmare felt a pit of sorrow for her, felt like perhaps things could have been different in a another life. Perhaps she could have somehow opened up Celestias' eyes to her existence sooner, shown her something real about herself while they were still children. Maybe the three of them could have actually grown up together, built actual memories together, happy ones that would help her sleep sound at night instead of the blistering resentment that had gnawed at her for so long. She felt sorry, sorry to Celestia for letting her anger cause so much fear of her for so long, sorry to Luna for violating who she was and how ponies saw her. She was sorry to herself for even becoming such a spiteful, useless thug of an alicorn.

A powerful, armoured hand shoved Nightmare to one side like she was no more than a nuisance, the large alicorn stumbling to one side to hit the wall next to her. The creature ahead of her leapt forwards first seemingly at her, then passed her as she fell away towards something behind her. The thing let out a scream that scratched at her very bones, a sound like a screaming child mixed with an old iron gate opening, its' long, grasping talons outstretched to rend at whatever it spied as prey. In a sudden, violent, deep explosion the creature was thrown backwards, a blast coming from besides Nightmare tossing it back.

The space marines' boltgun sounded out once again, and again, each round sending chunks of the gangly monster blasting away, but to seemingly little effect. The thing was tossed back, not a heartbeat passing before it was scrambling and leaping forwards again, trying desperately to scratch and claw at its attacker like a starving man reaching for fresh food. The bolter chattered and roared, more bolts blasting away at the thing that garbled and hacked as it was torn apart, a thin arm being blasted off before both its' legs were destroyed from beneath it. Even with just one arm in raked its' way forward, twisted teeth chattering and snapping as it closed in before another flurry of rounds saw it toss and flail before growing still. its' remains lay their a few seconds before its flesh began to slough away, bubbling and sliding to the floor followed with what muscles and innards it had. Soon a collection of dark bones lay cracked and smoldering in a puddle of bubbling ectoplasm that started melting into the metal floor beneath like a ferocious acid. Nightmare was snapped out of her transfixed staring as the armoured glove from earlier grabbed at the collar of her battle robe and hefted her upright, a pair of glowing purple eyes staring into her own.

"Move!"