Equestria:ODST

In the year of 2552, pony kind has achieved the power to spread all over the galaxy and beyond, stablishing colonies on the formerly unchartered planets. The last option and strategy of The Princesses to save everypony was successful, but the war wasn't over. Just decades before of the great schism, where loyal ponies followed Equestria's rulers into the vast nothingness and abandoned their home planet, a hostile alien race self-styled as "The Covenant" declared that ponies were an offense to their pagan gods, and so, they began the war against Equestria.

The Equestrian Guard was badly outnumbered, and colossal armies rose from the formerly peaceful and cheerful Equestrian inhabitants. They fighted against the alien hordes, using old and new unicorn magic, earth pony engineering, and pegasi flight and climate control; and an arsenal of brand new weaponry, born from despair and need: guns. Earth ponies -again- brought the first small tongue fired pistols, chambered in cheap, basic almost homemade ammunition.

Enemies' magic shield -later investigated and renamed as "energy shields" in the post schism Equestrian Arcane Science argot- took too many hits from the poorly "crafted" guns to break. And so, ponies' first attempt at war ended in a bloodbath, defeat, and a great portion of Equestria lost to the enemy. It was untill the situation reached critical levels when Equestrian Government, The Princesses and a group of wisely selected ponies -the then called "Main 6" being part of it- created and conducted a great war council that would set the bases of the future United Equestrian Space Command, and with research, equip ponies with militar grade weaponry, armor, technology, magic and finally: Intergalactic Spaceship Colonies.

Earth ponies gave Equestria her guns, ground vehicles and explosives, Unicorn scientists and magic researchers gave Equestria her combat net, radar, data flux and manipulation, and the first rudimentary HUDs and soldiers intelligent combat systems. Pegasi couldn't do more in the short term than unleash nature's fury into the enemy troops, developing the first nuclear and massive destruction weapons along with earth and unicorn researchers. But, in the end, they were vital for the future of Equestria: The spaceship's design, science and building was their gift to Equestria. With earth ponies' materials, and unicorn assisting, they built the giant steel arks that would hold the future of the species.

And since then, they became UESC's spaceships captains and pilots, as the earth ponies became vital specialists at engineering, mechanics, maintenance and ambient keepers, while unicorns, with their telekinesis gift became elite soldiers with the very same spell matrices and software they had created. Once the Earth was lost and destroyed, and ponies scaped on their steel arks, they sought for a new planet to live on. The Covenant, arrogant by the victory and Earth's total annihilation, didn't pursue, leaving the "pathetic" survivors to their fate.

It is an UESC legend that one of the Main 6, Rainbow Dash herself, commanded and flew the first ship that made it out of the atmosphere, through the enemy lines, to the uncertain future. Her friends were scattered on the rest of the vast fleet. Twilight Sparkle became the lead investigator and combat magic science developer, Fluttershy became the leader and founder of the -still- main medicines and hospitals company, Applejack created and ran the artificial crops and food industries along with ship's maintenance. Rarity helped Applejack and eventually created the "Internal Fashion Industry", controlling clothing, furniture and all the things that made the colonies look like homes and military bases, and finally, Pinkie Pie suppresed crime and chaos by creating the "Princesses' Fun and Order Industry".

Their friendship survived. They visited each other or in groups periodicall, using the fleet's smaller civilian units to travel from one ship to another. The giant steel combat colony ships never parted ways while they lived... and the new home planet was found. The immortal Princesses kept leading their people, old and new ones, honoring those who had died decades and then centuries ago, found a new planet for ponies to grow and prosper.

It was again, a matter of time before ponies parted, this time peacefully, as the Princesses and most part of the fleet left Hope -the second home planet- towards the unknown. Seeking to give their kind protection against The Covenant by spreading across the galaxy and beyond. They kept growing and expanding the colonies, improving their former creations and producing new ones untill ponies became a true hegemonic, intergalactic power. The UESC in all its splendor.

It was untill then, years ago since the ships had stopped searching and traveled between colonies instead, when new spaceships, armory and weaponry were produced, when The Princesses were happy with their people's safety that The Covenant found pony kind once more. Once again, they attacked, like hundreds of years ago, searching for UESC's total destruction. But this time, ponies had become experts at combat, this time they had bases and colonies all over the galaxy, this time they had billions of soldiers to recruit; and this time, they had THE guns... They were ready.

The Covenant's first attack was small, underestimating their now powerful enemy, they launched a full attack on pony forces; being held back, and finally destroyed on space ship to ship combat. Their invasion to colonies and ship internal colonies failed, being butchered by pony soldiers with the last generation combat hi-tech uniforms and HUDs, better military grade guns, and a new trick: stolen and reverse engineered Covenant magical armor energy shields.

The Princesses themselves were the key to create the first pony Personal Magical Anti Damage Resistance Shield, or PMRS for short. Their benign magic gave it the final improvement unicorn researchers and scientists needed to create a magical rechargeable resistance shield integrated in the soldier's combat armor, or suit. That was when the phrase "May The Princesses protect you" became the literal and main thought of every soldier sent to battle. The second war continued ship to ship and with small invasion battles, untill The princesses, and ponies decided to take the offensive.

On a secret operation without precedent, a new armored suit was developed by each UESC researcher and engineer. Guns were improved and adapted to sneaky, urban combat; new weapons that finally took their place were invented, the armored suit was created and the first personal orbital drop pods were created. A special individual landing pod designed to land on every ambient and conditions, the armor suit was designed to maximize the operative's survival to injuries or dangerous ambient conditions.

On the first infantry mission ever since the war on the ponies homeplanet, the units against the Covenant flawlessly succeeded and then, they returned to home as heroes. That was when the ODST (Orbital Drop Shock Troopers), ponies', Equestria's and the UESC's new hope was born.

ODSTs were selected by many criteria since childhood. Uncommon speed, strenght, inteligence, magical hability, strategic thought, endurance, courage, willpower and many more were the virtues searched by the government along with the most important: Magic, Honesty, Loyalty, Kindness, Generosity, and Laughter. All the candidates were volunteers, wich meant that either they started with the programm since they were small colts and fillies, or they were veteran soldiers that chose to join the programm as volunteers. The gender or age didn't matter, only the mental and physical abilities.

As the second war ended, ODSTs number decreased to leave only the necessary number required for a basic number of reserve troops, wich helped with minor tasks and protection along with the soldiers from time to time. The main UESC's fleet, long ago divided, fragmented again on recon and exploration permanent groups. Forming complete colonies with a bunch of multi purposse ships.

The Princesses' ship, the flagship of the fleet, stayed as the center of the force. It remained as a recon ship, it was too risky to expose them to capture or harm tho, so it limited to wander the space, hidden, commanding the fleet at distance and occasionally, with a heavy but not suspicious escort, Equestria's rulers traveled to the rest of the Colonies, bringing hope and faith. A third war was upon the UESC, and ODSTs and soldiers were being prepared again.

It was in one of the ships of the Princesses' recon group and main ODST operations centers where our protagonist mare was born. Just another unicorn filly of the new generations. She never had a specially strong or pronounced virtue, and her presence on the ship was like any other filly: noted, but not relevant untill the Government laid its eye on her. As they continued to track her, she got her cutie mark on... peculiar circumstances, and they finally considered her to enter to the ODST programm.

She never expected what was coming...

Her magic, honesty, loyalty, kindness, laughter and generosity, along with the rest of the above mentioned virtues would be tested and her life would give a radical change as her life, and the ones of other fellow ponies would be put at risk on one of the most important ever missions for the war.