Equus the desert planet: The rule of Tirek
It’s the afternoon on the planet of Equus, Applejack and Rainbow Dash were sent out to the Crash Site in order to find supplies and food for the rest of the survivors.
“Oh I cannot wait until Twilight’s research turns up something to fix this situation.” Rainbow said grumpily.
“I hear ya.” Applejack agreed. “This long journey back to this crashed ship for supplies is takin’ its toll on my legs.”
“Applejack? Can we rest for a bit before heading back to base?” asked Rainbow.
“I guess so, it’s mighty hot today.” replied Applejack.
They stayed at the crashed ship for around 20 minutes to regain their strength, when suddenly something large and round crashed from outer space around a mile away from the ship. The explosion from the crash caused Rainbow and Applejack to jump in fear.
“What was that?!” Rainbow yelled.
“Whatever it is, it’s probably bad news!” replied Applejack.
Rainbow and Applejack looked out the window of the ship, from how high up they were in the ship they could see the object that fell from the heavens.
“Oh!” said Applejack as she rummaged around in her bag for a telescope.
“What is it?” Rainbow asked.
“It’s some kinda round metallic sphere with a big red window on the front.” said Applejack.
“Could it be another ship?” asked Rainbow.
As Applejack opened her mouth to speak, the round metallic sphere opened up and a person limped out of it.
“AH!” yelled Applejack.
“A person just walked out of it!”
“WHAT?!” shouted Rainbow.
“We gotta go help them! Get your stuff Rainbow!”
“Got it!” replied Rainbow.
Rainbow and Applejack picked up their rifles and got out of the ship as fast as they could.
It took the two of them around 10 minutes to get out of the ship; they had been looking around for supplies for a while and were on the 17th floor of the ship when the mysterious sphere crashed from the heavens.
Once they made it out of the ship they made a dash for the person who emerged from the sphere.
“HEY!” Applejack shouted.
The person who emerged from the sphere was limping, so they didn’t make it very far. Applejack’s shout caught their attention.
The person stopped and looked over in Applejack’s direction.
“… Well would you look at that… I might just live.” the person whispered.
As Applejack and Rainbow drew closer, they began to make out more details about this mystery person; the person was male, had an engorged dragon-like right hand and 4-toed left foot, had a dragon’s tail, and heterochromatic eyes, the left being blue with an elliptical pupil and the right being red with a round pupil. He was limping and holding his right arm which had blood running down it and dripping onto the sand. He was in a strange armor-like getup with long blue sleeves on the arms and pant legs, and an odd chest piece for the armor. He looked extremely worn out.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa!” Applejack said as she and Rainbow pointed their rifles at the mystery man.
“What’s with the way you look?!” inquired Applejack.
“… I mean you no harm… Could you two please help me?” replied the mystery man.
“How do we know you won’t harm us?!” shouted Rainbow Dash.
At that point, the mystery man fainted from the scorching heat and fell face-first into the sand. Rainbow Dash and Applejack didn’t think this person could be of any harm to them due to his condition, they decided to take him back to the base and help him out, but they were going to tie him down and run an interrogation just to be safe.
----The story will now almost permanently swap over to the perspective of the new character.----
The mystery man woke up lying in a hospital bed. When he tried to get up he found he was tied down.
“What the hell? … No… it can’t be… not this place again!”
He started frantically looking around for some way to break out of the binds that held him down when he suddenly realized that somehow his right hand and left leg had returned to normal.
“How…? I’m back to normal…”
After realizing that, he calmed down and took a look around. He realized he wasn’t in that placed that he spoke of before, and thought he should have known it wasn’t that place based on the dark, murky atmosphere of an old facility that the room had. The room also had several kids’ toys strewn about the floor which made him certain it wasn’t the place he spoke of.
He decided to calm down and see if he could take a nap until someone came.
It turned out that sleep would have to wait however as Twilight walked in at that moment and sat down in a chair next to this mystery man.
“My name is Twilight Sparkle and I’m a scientist researching a way to return our world to what it was before. Who and what are you and why did you come to our planet?”
It seemed like an odd question for the mystery man.
“My name is Xen, and I came to this planet completely unintentionally.” answered Xen.
“You didn’t completely answer my question. I specifically asked ‘Who and what are you?’ ”
Xen was perplexed by the question again, but decided to answer it this time.
“Isn’t it obvious? I’m a Saiyan. Then again I-”
“YOU’RE A SAIYAN?!” Twilight shouted out of fear.
“…? Oh, right. I forgot Saiyans aren’t exactly the most popular people around the cosmos are they?” Xen replied.
“TELL ME WHY YOU’VE COME! HAVE YOU COME TO DESTROY OUR PLANET?! KILL US ALL THEN SELL IT?!” inquired Twilight.
“Ms. Twilight… I can’t even break out of these restraints you have on me, what harm could I possibly pose to your planet or your people?”
Twilight was shocked by how calmly and easily this Saiyan explained himself to be safe.
“Alright, but why did you land on this planet in particular?” asked Twilight.
“Like I said, I didn’t come here intentionally. If you can believe it, the Saiyan home world Planet Vegeta has been destroyed along with the majority of the Saiyans on the planet. I had to escape, I saw the thing that was about to destroy Planet Vegeta heading straight towards us. I got in the nearest Saiyan pod and set the co-ordinates to either what they were set to before or just random ones, I just got in and started mashing buttons. On my way away from the planet I saw the one who destroyed it. It was Lord Frieza. My guess is he was growing scared that the Saiyans might turn against him if they got strong enough, or maybe he was just sick of King Vegeta’s BS.”
That last comment intrigued Twilight.
“Why would he badmouth his own previous ruler?” Twilight thought.
Then she realized one scary thing about what Xen had just said related to the Saiyan pods.
“About the Saiyan pods, do they sometimes lay around pre-programmed with co-ordinates on where to go?” asked Twilight.
“I understand your concern, if indeed the co-ordinates were programmed in when I got into the pod, then that would mean that your planet was on the hit-list for the Saiyans to sell.” replied Xen.
Twilight’s heart sank at those words. “What if Xen didn’t get into that pod? What if Planet Vegeta wasn’t destroyed? Would we have just been goners?”
“On the other hand… I think I understand why your planet hadn’t been invaded by the Saiyans yet.” Xen said.
“Why is that?” Twilight asked.
“Well, no offense, but Saiyans only target profitable planets, my guess from what I’ve seen of your planet from on the surface and from space, and what you said about trying to return it to the way it was before, that this planet used to hold some kind of value on the market, but now that the planet is a desert, it has since become pretty much worthless.” Xen explained.
“Well, if having a planet that’s ‘worthless’ means the Saiyans wont invade, I’ll take it.” Twilight replied jokingly.
“But that’s only assuming that the pod was pre-programmed to begin with. We’d need to check the pod itself to confirm whether or not it was.” Xen said.
“I have three final question to ask you Xen, and this is going off of what several of my subordinates told me about your appearance.” Twilight said.
Xen waited patiently with a serious look on his face.
“Why did you have what they described to be an arm, leg and tail of a dragon? Why do you have heterochromia? And why don’t you have any of the features I mentioned besides the heterochomia at this moment?” Twilight asked.
Xen took a moment before he answered.
“I don’t understand the heterochromia myself, nor do I understand why those other features aren’t with me at this moment, but as for why I had them in the first place, the matter is private… VERY private. Though I can guarantee you that it only has something to do with me, and it affects no one else here.”
“That’s odd… Why was he up-front with the fact that he’s a Saiyan, but not this issue? This may be something to look into later, but if what he says it true about it affecting no one else then it shouldn’t worry me.” Twilight thought.
“Alright, I’ll send a search party to where your pod crashed so we can check if the co-ordinates were set beforehand or what you put in. I don’t have to tell you that the others are going to feel quite nervous having you around, and they won’t like the idea that the pod was pre-programmed to go to our planet either.” Twilight said to Xen.
“That’s understandable, but I know how to prove my innocence.” Xen replied.
Twilight was intrigued. “How would you go about doing that?” she asked.
“Well, the pod uses the Saiyans’ language for the text, so only I can read it; if indeed I put the co-ordinates in to come to your planet or if the pod was pre-programmed, I’ll look suspicious either way, a guilty party would try to cover up anything that incriminates them, but besides the issue of my appearance from before, I have nothing to hide.” Xen answered.
Twilight could see his point. “If he were sent to this planet then whether or not the pod was pre-programmed is irrelevant, he would look like he was sent here either way.”
Then Twilight had a thought and decided to ask. “Xen, why did you so nonchalantly reveal that you were a Saiyan before?”
“Well, you look like a Saiyan, you can’t deny the species resemblance. I just assumed you were a Saiyan as well since you’re the only other species I’ve seen that looks similar to Saiyans.” Xen replied.
“I see, but does that mean if you knew I wasn’t a Saiyan you’d keep it private?” Twilight asked.
“Considering how well-known Saiyans are in the universe, it probably wouldn’t have taken long for you or the others to figure it out anyway, so if I chose to hide it, I’d only make myself look more suspicious, so no, I wouldn’t have kept it private.”
Twilight had enough information now; she didn’t distrust Xen like she did before, to her, it seemed he was just another one of the survivors. But Twilight thought hard about it and came to the conclusion that maybe Xen might have more use, particularly when it comes to saving their planet.
“I’ll speak with you later, for now, just get some rest.” Twilight said as she left the room.
“Alright.” Xen said before trying to get to sleep.
Trying to nap was a bit hard for Xen due to his bindings, he couldn’t get into the position he prefers to sleep in, but eventually Xen fell asleep.
When Xen woke up he saw the mane six sitting in chairs around his bed.
“Good morning Xen.” Twilight said. “I brought my friends here to get you introduced and to discuss something with you.”
Twilight went around her friends introducing each one along the way.
“Now, with introductions out of the way, time for business.” Twilight said after sitting back in her seat.
“It’s time you learned what happened to our planet.”
“Our planet was once flourishing with green grass, flowers and peace. Though peace was seldom a long-lasting thing, we had a run in with problems involving an army of Changelings at one point. There was this God of Chaos named Discord who liked to cause lots of issues and even after being reformed he still likes to spite us. After a while, a being named Tirek resurfaced from a long time of hiding, and slowly but surely started to absorb more and more magic from-”
“Magic?” Xen interrupted.
“Yes, magic.” Twilight replied.
“I have a feeling I’m missing something here.” Xen said perplexed.
“Oh yes, we look like these beings known as Humans now, but everyone used to look like this:” Twilight said as she showed Xen a photo of Twilight and her friends along with a bunch of others who Xen hadn’t met yet, all of them were ponies.
“So… what’s with the Human look now?” Xen asked.
“I’ll get to that. Anyway, Tirek started to go around absorbing the magic capabilities of everyone on the planet, he began to absorb the pegasai’s strength to fly and the earth ponies’ strength in general. Discord had been helping him the whole way through, he betrayed us. At the end of it, the three other princesses gave-”
“ ’Other’ princesses? And who are these princesses anyway?” Xen interrupted.
Twilight rummaged around in her bag for another picture and showed Xen a few pictures of Cadence, Luna and Celestia. She explained Luna and Celestia’s duties for raising the sun and the moon, and what Cadence meant to her.
“And I’m the fourth princess. I was appointed to that position by princess Celestia.” Twilight explained.
“I see.” Xen said.
Then Twilight continued explaining what happened.
“The other three princesses gave their powers to me in order to hide them from Tirek, who didn’t know that there were four princesses. Tirek eventually found me and we fought for a while, at the end of it, he pulled a really dirty move. He trapped my friends and Discord in bubbles of magic, he threatened that if I didn’t give him the power, he’d kill my friends. I gave him the power and he let my friends and Discord go. Up until that point, we had been discovering keys to a secret box, these keys were objects we got from acting like our elements, Discord gave me a pendant which was the final key. We went to check the secret box to see if it could help us. Instead, we found a large weird looking earpiece inside it. I took it as a sign that I should work on technology and research in order to save us from Tirek’s fiendish rule. We gathered up everyone we could and set up a safe zone with the use of our technology, I managed to set up a force field around a huge radius that would keep Tirek at bay if he attacked. He hasn’t which I find suspicious. After about half a year I noticed we were having a lot of trouble without our magic and flight to help us, so I resorted to making a machine that would change us into human beings which I read about in a really old book. The earpiece we found actually helped a lot with my research on technology when I checked its tech, we couldn’t figure out how to use it but it still helped out. Around a year after we got our human bodies, Tirek turned the planet into a desert, I guess he wanted to kill us off slowly and was too lazy to do it himself, and it has definitely made it harder for us to live, the temperatures during the day are scorching hot, and sand doesn’t really make good terrain; since we had a lot of materials on hand I built what an old book called a ‘dune buggy’ but none of us could properly drive it and we ended up crashing a lot, so we decided to leave it alone. It’s been around 5 years since Tirek rose to power and it’s been hard enough to survive for this long. At one point a huge space ship came near our planet but Tirek took it as a sign of invasion, so he shot the ship down with his power. That was a big mistake on his part, through expeditions to the crash site we’ve found a lot of provisions to last us a while, it crashed around 6 months after the planet became a desert, we had saved up enough provisions to last it out during that time, but if the ship hadn’t crashed we’d all be dead. I feel sorry for those who were riding on the ship when it was shot down, but there’s no sense crying over something that can’t be changed. The ship also had a lot of research materials and schematics I could make sense of, and since it’s a huge space ship, I have plenty of metal to work with. The only problem is that it’s extremely far out from our base.”
Xen sat quietly listening to the whole story when he realized something.
“Where is this ‘earpiece’ you spoke of?” Xen asked.
“It’s heavily protected inside our vault low below ground.” Twilight answered. “Why do you ask?”
“I’d like to take a look at it, I wasn’t strong enough for anything on Planet Vegeta really, so I went into technology to try and become an inventor. I think I could help you out in your research, so I’d like to take a look at this earpiece you have, I won’t open it up or anything, just take a look at it and see if I can use it.” Xen replied.
Twilight and her friends look at each other then went and huddled in the corner of the room to discuss it.
Twilight left the room and the rest just went back to their chairs and told Xen that Twilight was going to get the earpiece.
Twilight returned with the earpiece after about 20 minutes.
She had the earpiece in a box. She had her friends release Xen’s restraints so he could look at the earpiece. Twilight handed the box to Xen and to his great surprise…
“IT’S A SCOUTER!” Xen shouted in surprise.