Chapters It was just like any other day in Ponyville, sunny but far too hot for Starlight. She had asked Spike to lead her to the library (she still doesn't remember where to go), and when he happily agreed the duo walked to the tree house situated in the middle of the cosy town; a permanent residence for Twilight Sparkle.
They opened the door and were greeted rather enthusiastically by none other than Twilight.
“Hey, Starlight, what brings you here?" Twilight chirped, returning the book she had just finished reading to its shelf.
“Oh, nothing much, just want to read some books, you know?" Starlight replied, smiling over at the purple mare.
"Oh thats great!" Twilight smiled back, the tone in her voice growing more cheery. "What kind of book do you want?”
“I don't really have a preference, anything is good,” she replied. Her eyes wandered from bookshelf to bookshelf, taking in her surroundings bit by bit. “This place library is pretty big just for a treehouse,” Starlight commented.
“Yeah," Twilight agreed, “but it’s great for a large book collection.”
They both stood in silence as Spike walked past them, looking for the fridge.
“Well, let me know if you need anything!" Twilight called, laughs bubbling. “Other than that, you’re free to do anything!” She laughed again and Starlight couldn't help but giggled, happy that her friend was being as cheerful as always.
Starlight trotted around the library for fifteen minutes, checking all the categories from Pony biology to spell-books, but nothing was worthy of her attention.
Being advanced in magic-using for her age, she had already mastered most of the spells she had come across—whether it be teleportation or high-level telekinesis.
Her mind picks up the books patterns—spell-books, fiction, non-fiction, in that precise order—as she ventures deeper inside the library. It was huge, colossal compared to others Starlight had visited.
As the books kept flooding in, the light around her began to dissipate, growing dark, too dark. She lit up her horn, wanting something to calm her, something to light up the path.
With the aid of the dim light, she managed to locate a book she had never seen before—in any library, at that.
"Huh, what are you doing all alone?" she lifted the book and gently blew the dust covering it’s worn cover. The title read Forerunners.
"The Forerunners and the Cleansing of the Galaxy, by anonymous,” she smiled to herself, happy something seemingly worth-while had come up, and put the book inside her saddlebag. She trotted back to the counter to pay the book.
"Hey Starlight, got what you were looking for?” Twilight asked, sipping at the coffee Spike had just made for her.
“Yep, here you go,” she placed the book on top of the counter.
"Something about this something Forerunners,” Starlight chipped in.
"Huh, I never remembered that book being here,” Twilight commented, but the book didn't seem out of place; she shrugged and giggled for a bit instead. "But who cares, if my pupil wants to learn something new I'm not stopping ya."
Starlight chuckled along and sighed. "Yeah, anyways how much do I have to pay?”
"That'll be five bits,” Twilight replied, smiling warmly. She had done all too much smiling, recently.
Starlight handed over the bits and proceeded to exit the library. "See you in the castle Twilight!" she called.
Starlight trotted back to the castle just outside of the town and opened the huge entrance. She sighed softly and walked over to Twilight's study room, which happened to also be Starlight's study room.
She lay the book on the table and brewed a cup of tea.
"It's going to be a long night Starlight, Twilight will be gone until midnight,” she said to herself, lifting the cup of tea. “Now let’s see what this book’s worth.”
[Ten Hour's Later, 22:00PM]
Twilight walked inside the castle along with Spike, a bag of hay fries among her possessions.
She told Spike to “Go put the fries in the kitchen”, and he did so obediently, humming softly as he padded over to the kitchen countertops.
Twilight walked into her study room only to be greeted with drawings littered everywhere.
She picked up one of the pieces of paper that she found lying on the table. She looked around and read it, ceasing to have any worry.
IS THIS WHERE MAGIC CAME FROM, ARE THESE THE WILL OF THE GODS?! read the title, glossy, black ink screaming at her.
Twilight looked down at the paper in disbelief, hearing what could only be laughter at the dark corners of the room. Scared, she walked over to the corner cautiously, warily, and saw Starlight with her untidied mane.
“Starlight?" she asked, a sigh escaping her lips.
"Do you hear that? The screaming, all the despair from everypony." Starlight whispered cryptically.
Twilight took a few, tiny steps back. There was worry written all over her face.
"The reclaimers fought for their own survival against a foe they knew they couldn't beat,” Starlight continued, shaking her head as she continued to tidy her mane.
"Starlight, what did that book do to you?!” Twilight shouted, taking a few larger steps back. She tried running to the door, but it shut itself.
“What? Sorry if i acted like that, just testing out a spell, you know?” Starlight laughed uncomfortably, trying to find an exit out of this awkward conversation. "So how was your day?" she asked awkwardly.
Twilight wasn't buying it, she picked up the book and read one of the chapters.
"Visions of the reclaimers, you shouldn't try out with unknown spells without the Canterlotian authorities!” she shouted at Starlight.
"So what? I've seen what happened, we're not alone!" Starlight hissed back.
“How do you know that? What if the book was a fake?!” Twilight screamed.
"B-Because it worked!" Starlight yelled incredulously at Twilight, making the purple mare shiver. Starlight sighed regretfully.
“Look, I'm sorry. I didn't—" Starlight began, but she was cut off from Twilight's hoof.
“It's alright. I-I’m sorry if I shouted at you..." Twilight replied, wiping away the tears in her eye. “Tell me about this… reclaimer thing,” Twilight asked softly.
Starlight then proceeded to burble about the Forerunners and how they wiped out all intelligent life in the galaxy.
"They what?" Twilight snapped in surprise. "Why would anyone do such a thing?”
"To ensure our survival, to create a future for all of us, not only for ponykind; for the gryphons, dragons, and many others. They saved all the aliens that lived in our galaxy,” Starlight replied, as undeterred as ever. She picked up a drawing of some sort of mutant. One fact for sure, Starlight was really good at drawing.
"But why? Why would they do such a thing?” She asked again. “I just… I don't understand how you would want to hurt someone like that.”
"You see this drawing?” Starlight asked, giving the sheet of paper over to Twilight.
“The Flood. What? Like they’re made of water or something?” Twilight joked, but Starlight only looked down.
"Don't you get it? they wiped out half of the alicorn population in a day..." she said in grief, voice strained.
“Oh. Oh.” Realising the mistake she just did, Twilight rushed to apologise, but instead settled for a "Where did they come from?”
"No one know's, not even the aliens; all they know is that that they feed off intelligent life and doing so became ever more intelligent themselves,” Starlight explained more about the parasite and how the Forerunners failed to protect all alien life, how they tried all methods and how all of them, all of them, failed.
“Haven’t they tried using magic?" Twilight asked, causing Starlight to chuckle.
"Twilight, not everypony uses magic,” Starlight whispered, something of a mocking tone in her voice.
Shock wrote itself all over Twilight’s face.
"T-Then how did they fire these Halos then? It must've have some sort of magical properties,” Twilight complained incredulously.
"I'm not sure, but they fired their weapon, returned all the species of the galaxy, and rebuilt all the damage they caused,” Starlight told the lavender mare.
They both stood there in an awkward silence, looking around while Starlight was drinking her (now cold) coffee.
Spike walked in to the room and nearly dropped the tray of food and drinks he was holding. A cup tumbled over, but Starlight caught it delicately with her magic.
“Oh, phew, thanks Starlight,” Spike says, putting the tray on the nearby table and joining Starlight and Twilight for a while. He grabbed one of the paper sheets that was lying on the floor and held it for a while.
“So... what's up?" he asked, inviting a giggle from Twilight.
“Nothing much. Hey, Spike, could you leave Starlight and me alone for a moment?” Twilight asked innocently.
"Oh, sorry if I was interrupting your mare gossip. I’ll be in my room, then.” He closed the door behind him, trying to be soft but failing miserably. A muttered sorry was heard by both mares.
"So earlier, you said something about ‘Vision of Reclaimers’. What do you mean by that?" she asked Starlight, out of plain curiosity, of course. She had no interests in befriending the said aliens.
"I'm not sure what it is but I think it gave us a view of these reclaimers called”—there was a silence as Twilight waited for the answer—“Humans.” Starlight finished, but something in her tone was sad, sullen.
"What's the matter? Did they did something wrong?” Twilight asked worriedly.
“What? Oh! No, no! Nothing like that!” Starlight tried to pick herself up after what just happened.
Twilight put her hoof on her pupil’s shoulder and Starlight looked straight into the purple mare’s eyes. “Tell. Me. What’s. Wrong." Twilight asked, a seriousness in her then that had never been there before.
"I-I think you should see it for yourself. It's sort of tragic." Starlight tried performing the spell once more, this time with Twilight beside her.
"Ready?" she asked Twilight. The alicorn grabbed Starlight's hoof and gave a small nod.
"All right, let's go.”
Not more than minutes after the spell was cast, their vision dimmed and dimmed, blackness nipping at the corners of whatever sight they had left.
Earth 2198, The Rainforest wars
The sound of gunfire roared the sky as both insurrection group's battled to the death toward's the newly formed "UNSC." Each time they would rush in with all their might, only to be pushed back to the depth's of the amazon forest. Several insurrectionist ship's had taken off and fled to the nearby asteroid belt. The UN had exhausted it's resource's on developing planet's such as Mar's and Jupiter's moons, so it had no military power to surpress the rebellion. With the formation of the UNSC, they've devised a plan, they would capture both of rebel leader's and force them to sign a peace treaty among each faction's. In just a few short month's the insurrection was finally over, and everyone can sleep in peace once more.
Twilight woke up in a dark room, she checked her surrounding's to see if anything's different. She looked down at her body to see herself as a human. Twilight gulped but soon relaxed as the humanized Starlight walked in to the room. Twilight tidied up her and turned on the TV, while sitting on the couch. Starlight raised an eyebrow at Twilight before shrugging it off, she sat right next to Twilight on her couch.
"Soo... Good morning purple hair?" Starlight asked nervously before looking toward's the TV. It was explaining about something very important that can benefit all of mankind.
"Ummm Starlight?" Twilight asked, Starlight turned her head to Twilight. "Yeah Twilight?" She replied.
"What year is it and what's with all the talk about mankind thing?" Twilight asked curiously, Starlight gasped softly before embracing Twilight, she blushed a little before shrugging it off.
"You don't know?" She asked sarcastically, almost like she's insulting Twilight. "The year is 2295 Dumbie, man and i thought you were the smart one" She mocked before watching the TV once more.
"O-okay?" She said nervously.
"Humanity had been imagining the wonder's of the cosmos ever since god created them, finally we can travel to the star's themselves and finally asking that one question, will we thrive? or shall we go extinct due to our fragile body's and spirits, I say that we have thrived for hundred's of year's and look where we are today, sending our first ship's to the Epsilon Eridinai system." The man continued his speech for another five minute's before the crowd shouted out in joy.
Twilight was gazed in awe struck as 3 massive ship's exited out of the ground and ascend to the sky, she felt some thing weird though, last time she was human, she felt a massive force of energy flowing in their world, but this time even though she's human, she felt no presence of magic whatsoever. She began to fade away and passed out on the couch.
Harvest October 31st UNSC calendar, 2525
Today was a monumental day for all of mankind, the local AI had detected unknown slipspace anomalies a few day's ago but didn't took that much attention until it got closer to the planet. It was discovered that the slipspace anomalies were caused by an Alien civilization, The local governor of the planet greeted them with open arm's and was kind enough to show them around the planet. It was only a few day's after first contact that the Alien's discovered that they were the son's of their god's. The prophet's knew that integrating the human's will most certainly caused a schism in the inside, so they declared war against humanity and glassed Harvest into hell.
Twilight once again woke up inside of a building, though it didn't look like the last room she went. Outside she can hear loud bang's everywhere and light luminating before fading off to darkness. Growl's and screaming can be heard outside the room as well, she began to panic and exited out of the building, to find a bipedal creature stabbing a human with some kind of sword before throwing him off the ground. The alien looked toward's Twilight and began walking toward's her, she began to panicked and as the alien was about to hit her, it didn't, instead it just walked passed her and ran toward's another human shooting some sort of machine. She watched the alien destroy's the machine and ripped off the human's head and growl's loudly. The alien was followed by other alien's that are half their size and dragging the human body's to a nearby fire. The smell of corpses made Twilight's nose close itself for a while, there was a light above Twilight and by the sound of a huge horn playing from the ship, she knew that something's going to happen. The alien ship fired it's death ray and burned any living or non-organic thing's around her. She zoomed out of the planet to see 5 more of these ship's firing their ray to the scorching land below them. She began to teared a bit before breaking out and crying, why would anypony do such a thing? moment's later she passed out once again
Battle of Reach, July 15th 2552
it has been 27 year's since the battle of harvest, and all human colonies began to fall left and right. Already half of their population has been glassed to hell along with the planet and the alien group known as the Covenant see's no peace between them. To the eye's of the Covenant, the human's are heretics and should be cleansed from the galaxy in which they owned. After the battle of Sigma Octanus IV, a lone UNSC fleet entered slipspace and made it's way to Reach, not knowing that the Covenant implemented a tracker on board the ship's hull. Now with the covenant fleet of Particular Justice beginning it's assault on earth's footstep's, there was absolutely no way humanity will survive this war
Twilight gasped and layed her hooves on her horn, she had already seen death's by the tens and she wished that she had never seen it. Although just as she thought that she could finally have her peace, the same sound that she had previously heard ready's it's ray on a... very big human city, with building's reaching high up the sky, not even Canterlot's castle reached that high, and it's the tallest structure in all of Equestria. She saw each building fall beneath the cloud's and erupting huge earthquakes that rocked the foundation's of all the buildings. She descend below and see hundred's if not thousand's of human's running towards a ship in some sort of balcony. After seeing each one of them entered the ship, it began to ascend to the cloud's only to be shot with the beam Twilight had saw earlier. The ship crashed into another ship, this time 20 time's larger then it and exploded, causing the ship that it just crashed exploding as well. The bit's of wreckage fall down to the ground causing even more shockwaves. The alien's below engaged more human's in the street's and building's only to be repelled by large and muscular human's. Twilight knew that she will be here for a while.
It had been 46 day's since she last passed out and it only felt like the time she passed here on the planet felt only like an hour. She had saw more death's then Equestria seen dead ponies dying in the battlefield, although this wasn't exactly Equis, and she was far from home. Twilight looked up in the sky to see the last great city in the horizon, coming to ablaze and crumbling down to the ground, Alien's cutting down any human's they can see and decapitated their head's and growled with Joyce. There was only 1 human ship remaining on the planet, and even that to has exited the planet's atmosphere and entering some sort of portal, followed by a large alien ship, easily the size of the entire Canterlotian mountain, following behind. She could only pray to Tartarus that they all had escape the onslaught that was Reach, then her vision began to fade once more, but not without another bang coming from across the planet.
Pillar of Autumm, September 9 2552, Location Unknown
"Did we lose them Cortana?" Asked Captain Jacob Keyes.
"I'm not- what is that" The AI pointed to a large ring like structure, the captain irritated with her response again. "I don't care what it is did we lose them?" He asked once more, but before the AI can respond the covenant ship exited out of slipspace and stayed dormant in space,
"Well i think you just got your answer Captain, incoming Covenant dropship's inbound to the Autumm." She said, the Captain signalled the alert button and alerted all troop's to be ready.
A large human, claded in shining green armour walked into the bridge to meet the Captain, he said that this was the utmost of importance, the human already knew what the captain wanted and what to do, he grabbed his MA5 Assault rifle, fully armed and headed inside the bridge.
"Sir you called?" He asked, the Captain looked to his back and meeting him at his visor.
"Dear god Chief, you scared me a little for a moment" The captain joked, although not getting the respond he had intended. "Ah yes, the Covenant has boarded aboard the Autumm and report's of fatalities are recorded across all decks." he paused for a moment. "All deck's except here." He continued.
"I did encounter several pack's of elites and grunt's on the way, but what's the problem?" The chief asked, lowering his weapon behind his back.
"Cortana asked me to assign her to you, seeing that you are one of the only capable spartan onboard this ship" He took the AI chip out of his console and handed it to Chief. "Do not let those bastard's get her, if they do they'll learn everything; Military tech, weapon's design" He paused for a moment in fear. "Earth..." Said the captain, he snapped out of his gazing and sat on his chair once more.
"What exactly do you want me to do now?" He asked, putting Cortana inside his helmet. "Simple i'll activate Cole protocol and you and the other crew of this ship get the hell out from my vessal" The captain responded, he continued commanding the officer's onboard of the ship to triple check any covenant activity, near within the bridge. Luckily, the last covenant activity near the bridge was when grunt's lifted an Elite major inside the boarding phantom's.
"What about you sir?" Asked the Chief. "Well every captain goes down with her ship, so it's easy to say that me and my hardy crew won't be leaving this ship as soon you get off my vessel" He joked once more, before coughing to break the awkwardness. Chief nodded and saluted to him.
"It's been an honour sir" He saluted to the wavering captain, before walking out from the bridge to regroup with the other marines. The captain saluted to the exiting chief. "It's been an honour working with you as well son." He grinned before sitting on his chair, continuing to give further order's to the bridge.
Battle of installation 04, somewhere deep in the Forerunner facility, September 11 2552
Twilight again woke up in some sort of room, this time a little bit more decorated and technological then the other previous rooms. She curled when she heard the sound's of plasma fire and gun fire clashing together. The battle seem's to be outside this door, she opened the door not to see the Covenant violently attacking the human's but working with them against some sort of disgusting parasite. Left and right, each human and elite get's infected by the parasite and turning them into a disgusting and deformed variant fighting against the remaining Covenant-human forces. It didn't took long before the last Elite get's infected and turning to one of those...savages.
Twilight crept backward's slowly before running into another group of human's alongside a pack of elite's, they engaged their fallen brother's with such haste and took them out in 10 shot's. However the flood spore's take on the counter-offensive and began to infect each of the alien's one by one. Some even tried to flee but was cut down by the parasite, as when all hope was lost, a tall figure in shining green armour engaged the spore's on the floor and killing the remaining parasites. In the outcome of this little raid, the human's were the one that suffered most casualties, although some of them did managed to survive in the end thanks to the Chief. The alien's though weren't so lucky, all of them were infected and there aggressive style of fighting led them to their own demise. She didn't are about the alien's nor the human's now, what she's interested now is in the tall green figure.
She followed him as he fought his way through hordes of enemy's, both from the Covenant and the flood though the flood has proven to be a far more challenging adversary then he had anticipated. He made his way to the index room where he would find the key and contain the parasite from rampaging the entire system. On his way there, his weapon's ammo ran out and he resorted to melee-styled fighting, using a sword made of pure energy to slice his way to the room. Eventually he reached the room and grabbed the index with relative ease, he walked back to the Cartographer with the occasional firefight's and grenade explosion's setting off. Twilight was surprise when an metallic orb came up behind him and hum in delight. As they both made their way to the console, Chief would stay silent and this "AI" will talk about his creator's and such, she didn't really care anyway, she just want's to see the end of this bloodshed. Just as Master Chief about to insert the key inside the console, a blue female human appeared out of nowhere from the console. Twilight was surprisingly shocked by this, but she stayed focus on the hologram.
"Not so fast chief" She pushed the key away from the console and downloaded it to her database.
"What do you think you're doing?" She asked angrily, the figure only stood there in silence with his weapon drawn on his hands.
"Activating the ring. Containing the Covenant and the flood." He responded, the AI only gave an disappointed sigh while she put her hand on her forehead.
"You don't know anything about this place don't you!?" She shouted loudly, almost like she was about to scream.
"This ring isn't only to contained the flood, i've did my researched on this ring and it doesn't sound good chief" She said sarcastically while trying to keep her voice very seriously.
"This ring was built to starve out the flood, and by starving it i mean killing all intelligent or sentient life in the 25,000 galactic radii" She crossed her hand's and a huge holographic ring appeared behind her.
Twilight was a bit skeptical at first, no species can do that without mastering all known and unknown spell's and other magical attributes. But seeing that none of these alien's or human's rely on magic, she came to a conclusion that this was made through technology. Though no species can wield that much power, power that can wipe out all life in the galaxy. She dozed off a bit, hearing the 2 AI ranting and arguing each other can be very boring but the sudden sounds of growls and screams of agony woke her up. The Chief managed to fight his way through hordes of flood once again and make a run for it, Twilight fell down to her hooves and fell to the ground, passing out.
She saw glimpses of the future, the past, the fire, the screaming, the pain. It had been all so real for her, Starlight never told her that it'll be an emotional trainwreck. Finally she woke up in her final destination... The Ark
Inside the citadel control hall, The Ark, December 11 2552
The high prophet crawled his way to the console, trying to stop any heretics who dared oppose the mighty covenant and their journey to salvation. It was then when the "Demon" and his former ally and friend, Thel' Vadamee walked towards him. He grabbed Truth's neck from behind and light's up his energy sword.
"You are all blind! can't you see the great journey is upon us-" He coughed a bit, as tumours began growing from the back of his head, he was turning into one of them
The demon walked up to the console and saw a green option on the bottom middle of the console. He tap's it gently and deactivate's the firing process. The prophet shouted in agony, the great journey was so close, it was within his grasp, but the heretic's prevented it from happening.
"Fools, you have not learn a single bit from our encounter" Said the prophet in a deep and disgusting tone, he coughed out more green smoke, supposedly tinier flood spore's.
"You all shall be cleansed, I am the high prophet of Truth, and I am the voice of the Covenant" He shouted, a tentacle began growing at the side of his neck, it was slimy and painful at the same time.
"If so your voice must be silenced" Threaten the arbiter, just before the prophet could say anything, he lifted the prophet by his neck and stabbed him right in his heart. The elite gave out a large growl as he decapitated the prophet's head and toss it aside the controls.
Twilight woke up once more, in a ship this time; How peculiar. She felt a course of adrenaline coursing through her blood as saw the an entire installation blowing up left and right around her. She trotted to the hangar and saw another halo ring alongside another form of installation that could five time's the size of Auries. She waited for a moment, spotting out the occasional flood passing by the ship without even noticing her, then a vehicle entered the hangar and crashed to a nearby vehicle. The Elite seem's like jumping on the crate's and avoiding the falling crates. The Master chief ran to a nearby port inside the hanger and inserted Cortana in.
"Hang on!" She shouted, the ship soon went to a very upward course, causing another vehicle to crash to chief and lifting his hand from the railing's. He slammed his fist inside the ship's hull and continued to do so until he reached the port. He went to the right side of the port and lay's his body there.
"hey John?" Surprise with the AI calling by his real name he instantly responded. "Yes?" he responded while keeping his regular mono-tone.
"It's been an honour" She replied, and soon enough they were inside the portal...
Twilight's vision was soon turned to white as the explosion had caught up with the ship, collapsing the portal and sending the ship drifting afloat space. When her vision cleared she saw the human inserted his companion to a nearby port and tucked himself inside a pod. Before that he had his rifle, and pistol right beside the pod, whenever the time was right to use it once more. The AI looked to herself once more and began to worry.
"I'll set up a beacon, it'll be a while before anyone get it anyway's, year's even..." She whispered. "I'll miss you" She said to the chief full of sorrow.
"Wake me. when you need me" The AI looked at his pod in surprise and watches the pod closes before her, she lay down and closed her eye's and started tearing a little. Twilight only wished that she could comfort her until her companion is set loose once more, but she can't, well not right now but one day. She saw her hooves disappearing as well as her body.
"It's been an honour" She thought to herself as she fades away from their existence for good.
Meanwhile on Earth, March 3rd 2553
Ten figures stood in front of the wing of a fallen pelican, with pictures, emblems and flowers decorating the space around it.
There stood the High Admiral of the UNSC home-fleet, decked with all of his medals and emblems. There were four other Sanghelli, their plasma riffles holstered on their backs. They crisply saluted to their former foes and bend down to kneel in honour.
Behind them Thel' Vadamee began walking towards the Admiral. He read the text that covered the wing.
In memory of those fallen in the defence of Earth and all of her colonies, March 3rd, 2553.
"For us the storm has passed.” He paused, gulping. "The war is over.” he continued, and something in his voice shook, trembled.
"But let us never forget those who journeyed the howling dark and did not return, the ones that sacrificed their lives for us, their families for us.” He paused once more, throat unimaginably dry. "For their decision required courage beyond measure, sacrifice and unshakable conviction.
"As we start to rebuild, this hillside will remain barren, a memorial for heroes fallen, they ennoble all of us, and they should not forgotten." He ended his speech, saluted to everyone.
Both Sanghelli and human pointed their weapons at the greying sky.
"Present haught!" ordered the sergeant, and both Elites and Humans fired three rounds towards the sky and saluted once more, but some of their actions were no longer so crisp, so clean.
After an hour, both humans and elites all went back to their respected post and left both the Admiral and the Arbiter alone for the moment.
The Elite walked towards the human and faced him in the eye. "I remember how this war started, what your kind did to mine,” he said grimly, but there was no anger, no hate. "I can't forgive you, but you have my thanks, for standing by him till the end.”
The admiral shakes the arbiter's hand. "Hard to believe he's dead." he paused for a moment, hints of sadness betraying in his voice.
The Elite glanced over, glanced towards his capital ship for a moment. "Were it so easy,” said the elite as he lowered his mandibles.
The scorching brightness of the room burned Twilight's eye, resulting her to hiss in a regular fashion. She began wiping her eyes from the tears she had when she was passed out. There five ponies looking at Twilight with worrisome faces; Starlight and Spike had just entered the room, bringing cups of tea and apple cider for the rest of the gang.
"Oh hey you're awake!" Starlight called cheerfully as she gave Twilight her cup of coffee. Twilight looks like she has a headache, a throbbing, painful one, and Starlight takes notice of it. "Are you alright Twilight?" she asked the lavender mare.
Twilight’s eyes had begun to tear up, resulting in drops of liquid falling from her muzzle, dripping onto the wooden floor. She then proceeded to having a breakdown, trashing and crying on the floor.
Starlight put a hoof on Twilight’s hair, gently coaxing her to come out of her cries, telling the others to leave the room for the moment.
“Alright, sugarcube. Take care of Twi, okay?” Applejack murmured, herding the others out.
"It must've been rough, huh?” Starlight asked, wiping away some of the tears from Twilight's cheek.
"I still don't get it, why would anypony hurt someone like that?" Twilight replied.
"I'm not quite sure myself, but let's set all of that behind and be optimistic for them,” Starlight attempted what she thought seemed like cheerful grin. "They won the war, and had begun rebuilding, just imagine where they’d be in four years, Twilight!" she laid a hoof on Twilight's back and brought Twilight's face to her cheek.
"Still, I just feel like we're not helping or playing a role in their conflict for survival. After all, the last time I heard somepony died in combat was several hundred years ago, and yet the humans fought on even though it was a loosing war for humanity.” She wiped some of the tear's once more from Twilight's now crystal-tracked cheeks.
"I know it's hard to help them, they live in some place far away. I wish we could help them as well but with our current technological status I doubt we’d be able to help sufficiently anytime soon.” Starlight murmured. She grabbed the tea and gently coaxed it inside Twilight's mouth.
"When i entered the vision, all I really saw were those aliens and human' fighting each other,” she said. "You were passed out far longer then I was so I'm guessing that you've seen more things then I have.” Starlight continued softly, levitating the book back to them.
“Oh, believe me, I've seen things far worst then what I anticipated." She proceeded to flip the pages of the book, casually skimming through them until she stopped at a very precise chapter.
"The flood?!" Starlight exclaimed, trying to muffle the sound of her voice.
"Yes, and believe me they're far worse then what this book describes.”
She proceeded to tell her friend on how she saw both humans and elites turning into deformed shapes and how they viscously started infecting their former comrades, how a human in shining green armour nearly wiped out all life in the galaxy, all in thanks to a fanatic lightbulb.
"Wow, that's quite a lot to take in, I mean you even mention a human snapping his own neck because of this parasite?"
"Yep" Twilight replied calmly, She looked at Starlight for a moment before flipping through several more pages.
They both sat there in awkward silence only gazing at each other for a few moment's before reading the pages once more. The door onfront of them creaked open and a small dragon walk towards them.
"Hey there Spike, what do ya need?" Starlight asked cheerfully.
"Well i just want to sit and stay here for the moment you know?" Spike replied. He see's that Twilight and Starlight are reading some sort of book and he gave them a curious look.
"Hey i've never seen this book in the library, may i read it?" Spike asked, Twilight nodded and pushed the book towards Spike. He flipped all the pages to go to the beginning of the book.
"Chapter 1, Halo?" He gave Starlight a very curious glance. "Is this some sort of Alien conspiracy thing here?" Spike joked, Starlight and Twilight both giggled to Spike's confusion.
Chapter 1: Halo
Eons ago, long before the reign's of our glorious leader's; Princess Celestia and Princess Luna, lived a race known as the Forerunner's. They have technology that are able to create entire world's, and armour that can enhance their lifespan for thousand's of years. They hold something called "The Mantle of Responsibility," they held the mantle with high regard's and protected the less inferior race's of this galaxy such as ourselves; Ponykind, dragon's, griffons, you named them, they protect them. One galactic day, an unknown force arrived in our galaxy, at first they didn't took action, only looking at the total damage that the new alien's can cause. But the alien force stopped targeting the inferior race's and targeted the Forerunner's instead. They infected every single sentient being in every planet they've encountered. Unlike most parasite's, this infection is very unique. Once it take's controls of it's host, they've gathered all the intelligence the creature has and distribute it throughout the gravemind. It was only in the last moment when they knew that the Forerunner's and the galaxy itself is in great peril. They did obscure actions such as studying and dissecting a infected body for further study, to destroying entire planet's until it's surface is but glass. The war lasted for many year's and they see no end to it, when all hope is lost one Forerunner devised a plan to stop the flood once and for all. They would create massive ring world's that are capable of wiping all life in the galaxy, but before they do that they must collect samples of every creature in the galaxy. Their end grows near when the most advance AI in the galaxy turned against his/her master's and controlled every flood spore in the galaxy. I think that our species; ponykind, and all the creatures in this planet were catalogued in their installations and finally when all hope is lost, the ring's were fired, everything dies. We were all returned in the end but it will never be the same again, the remaining alicorn's devolved and the Forerunner's leaves the Orion arm of the galaxy.
Spike read the page again and again, he only chuckled in disbelief. "Really? you're seriously believe this conspiracy theory?" He asked in disbelief once again.
Spike glanced at Twilight who seemed to be a little insulted about Spike's "Little comment." "What?" He asked in confusion, both mare's only glared at him, the mood in the air was really unsettling so he stood up. "Well...if you need me than i'll be at my room" he sighed. "Again..." His voice faded as he closes the door behind him.
Both mare's only rolled on the floor and started laughing. "Oh Celestia, we put an act!" Starlight wiped a tear from her eye's.
"Did you look at his face, he look's like a little filly who just discovered childhood-" Starlight's voice faded away and looked at Twilight, she was shaking her head in disagreement and Starlight groaned.
They both look at each other, then the book, then the (now cold) tea. The air breeze against their fur's and Starlight finally made the first move in what feels like an eternity. She laid both coffee and tea on the tray Spike had left behind and proceeded to walk out of the room. Twilight only looked at her friend exiting out from the room and closing the door behind her. Twilight sat there for several second's only looking at her surroundings. 'This room never stop's to amuse me.' Twilight sighed and looked at the book once again, though there was something off, not right, a small piece of paper was sticking out at the back of the book (technically the end of the book.) She looked at the paper in curiosity and flipped the page's of the book and stopped at where the paper was sticking out.
The return
One faithful day, a dark force will be awoken from it's slumber, it will creep from its hole and venture throughout the land, shower's of fire will drop from the sky and the land will be set on fire, none shall be spared from the coming fire and none can stop it's force from changing the fate of Auries forever
Twilight read the paragraph again, again, and again. She's going to go out a lot more often then she usually would.
5 Years later, The fleet of Renewed Justice
"I'm detecting storm activity!" An unknown creature shouted, it was dark, really dark only the light from the multiple consoles and holo-projectors were producing light that of a human "light bulb."
"Fire all weapon's, burn their mongrel hive's!" The leader of the ship ordered, and soon 60 ship exited out from slipspace and rushed toward's the enemy fleet.
Auries did not brought the war to it's very footsteps. The war brought it's conflict to them, and so the reclamation has begun.
