Five Hours Later…

While I still don’t know why we were over the Badlands, I took notice once I heard the engines start to spool down and felt the picket shudder as it slowly descended to the earth below. For most of the trip I had secluded myself in the Captain’s cabin, using the time to organize my thoughts. A short walk out onto the bridge and I saw that we were landing just outside of some sort of farm. “Where are we?” I asked.

“A few miles south of what used to be Las Pegasus.” Comet replied as he got up from the Captain’s chair. “Remember that Cosmo used to be a member of the Desert Rangers?”

I nodded. “Ya, he left when he was young and headed north with Sky.”

As a wry grin developed on Comet’s face, he nodded for no apparent reason. “Well as it happens Strike and I just so happen to be friends with them.”

I followed Comet down the hall to the cargo bay, where a ramp had dropped on either side leading to solid ground below us. “So these Desert Rangers, they’re the ones who owe you the favor?”

Comet nodded. “To be honest Dusk, Strike and I didn’t spend a full two years in Enclave captivity. We managed to escape after about a week and took shelter with these Rangers.”

Strike joined us once Comet and I reached solid ground. “Then how were you two aboard that Raptor?” I asked.

“Did you think the two of us wouldn’t jump at the chance to try and get back home?” Comet asked. “When we caught wind of the Enclave’s operation… Look, long story short Strike and I boarded the ship and allowed ourselves to be captured. You found us about a day later.”

As I mulled over Comet’s words, two ponies stepped out of the farmhouse ahead of us. Both wore gear that was identical to both Comet and Strike. As we got closer I noticed that the pair were definitely older, looking to be middle-aged. “Is that you Comet?” The stallion called out.

Even off to the side I could tell that Comet’s expression had turned to one of pure glee. Every time I’ve been around him since I came back he still wore that same neutral expression…

“Damn right it is Rune!” Comet replied as he walked up and wrapped the stallion, clearly a pegasus, in a bear hug. “We did it Rune, we actually got home.”

Even Strike looked happy, reaching out and shaking the mare’s hand. “A pleasure as always Miss Sunny.”

The older mare smiled in return. “Still as charming as ever Strike…” The mare stopped when she saw me and nudged the stallion next to her. “Rune, is that who I think it is?”

‘Rune’ finally noticed me, but retained that same grin as he let go of Comet and stepped forward. “You must be Dusk.”

I nodded. “I am… And you two are friends of Comet and Strike?”

“What Ranger wouldn’t call them friends?” Rune asked. “These two helped solve our food supply problem. Without them we all would’ve starved!"

Comet tapped Rune on the shoulder, his smile slowly fading back to his regular expression. “Exactly… Which is why I’m here.”

Rune and Sunny must’ve realized what Comet meant as both their smiles turned to something far more serious. “So then you managed to keep up your end of the bargain?” Rune asked.

Comet nodded and fished a photograph out of his jacket, handing it to the other stallion. “I thought she was dead for a while, but lucky for me your daughter doesn’t know how to be discrete.”

Daughter? What daughter? That question swirled through my mind as we walked inside and took a seat at a dilapidated kitchen table. Sunny was the last to join us, having gone to a radio on the counter and sent out a message to all corners of the desert. “So where is Sky now?” Sunny asked as she sat down.

I finally put the pieces together. We originally recruited two former Rangers, Cosmo and Sky. But Sky was buried outside of Vanhoover… At least so I thought. “Sky’s alive?” I asked.

Comet looked confused for a moment before he realized that I really didn’t know what he was talking about. “Yes, she is.” He replied. “King Sombra found her bouncing around from club to club about four years ago. I only figured out who she really was after I ran into her during the attack on Baltimare about two years ago.”

“King Sombra?” Rune asked. “You mean the same one from the history books?”

Comet nodded. “Yes, the same king. I guess he was under some sort of influence that Princess Celestia managed to help break.”

“Can we back up for a minute?” I asked.

Comet nodded. “Sure, what’s wrong?”

“You said that Sky has been tagging along with Sombra for four years… What has she been doing?”

“Body guard duty if the intelligence reports are anything to go off of.” Comet said. “But up until Baltimare, every known sighting of her with Sombra indicated that she was in full gear. Hell, the intel wing thought that it was Cosmo running around with him at first.”

I sat back and nodded. “Then what made them realize that it was someone different that they were dealing with?”

“Because one of the analysts realized that Cosmo had been in a completely different part of the country when one of the reports came in.” Comet explained. “After that the ponies tailing Sombra kept trying to identify his ‘ranger’ with little success.”

“You said that you found out it was Sky in Baltimare…” I muttered. “How’d you figure it out?”

“One of the Enclave raiders got the jump on her. I picked up on the distress beacon that she triggered and showed up in time to see her helmet get knocked off her head. Long story short Strike and I tag-teamed the raider, then Sombra showed up to save Sky’s ass. She did ask about Cosmo, but all I could tell her is that he was still out there… I guess she had been trying to find him in her spare time, but Cosmo just was too good at covering his tracks.”

Rune got up and grabbed a silver flask off the shelf from behind him. “That’s all I needed to know.” He said as he sat back down and uncapped the flask. He took a quick swig and passed it to Comet. “You kept up your end of the deal, so we’ll keep up ours. Even if the others hang back, Sunny and I will help you deal with the Enclave.”

“Thank you Rune.” Comet said before taking a swig from the flask. “So while I was gone were any of you able to dig up more on the Pathfinder project, or did that info get handed off to Applejack's Rangers as you intended?”

“Last I checked our power-armored friends were investigating, but we haven’t had time to go north and see what sort of progress they’ve made.” Rune replied. “We’ve been otherwise occupied with another project.”

“You mean that Raptor?” Strike asked. “What are you doing, stripping it for parts?”

“On the contrary, the others just finished repairing the drive systems yesterday.” Sunny added. “It was a pain in the flank scrounging some of those wrecks for parts, but we did it.”

Suddenly my radio chirped to life. “Porter to Dusk, we’ve got a contact coming in from the southeast. It’s a raptor!”

“Tell your pilot that he can calm down.” Rune ordered. “That would be our associates coming to join us.”

I flicked the radio and sighed. “Take it easy Porter. I’m being told that they’re friendly.” As a shadow cast outside and the hum of turbines finally made themselves known, followed by the sounds of metal groaning under immense weight I couldn’t help but sigh. “I really hope this’ll be worth it…” I muttered.

***

Where E-201 was clean and tidy after Porter’s crew had worked their magic, this old raptor was easily the polar opposite. It was dirty, light fixtures were broken and the walls were marred with patches of rust. As Rune explained, the Desert Rangers had discovered group of crashed Raptors some time after his daughter and Cosmo journeyed north. Only after Comet and Strike had allowed their recapture had the loose group of ponies decided to get the lead Raptor back in working condition, as it was still relatively intact. Salvaging parts from the hulks of the two others from the long-abandoned squadron, the Desert Rangers have in three years taken an abandoned relic of the past and managed to turn it into a working airship, although one could readily admit that the old craft had certainly seen better days.

Yet as we stood on the bridge with Porter, Rune and the rest of the Desert Rangers I got the impression that most of the ponies gathered didn’t care about that final detail. They actually seemed jubilant, having conquered time and decay itself and managing to restore the cloud cell that allowed the Raptor to fly. Both feats were certainly admirable, and were rendered as even more impressive when the limited technical expertise of these ponies was considered as a factor.

But of all the Raptors that I had been aboard, this one was different. Being a squadron leader, this one ship had an advanced holographic mapping system. While I couldn’t tell how it worked, it definitely worked as it was designed. “Strike, are you almost ready?” Comet asked.

The flightless pegasus crawled out from under the map table and flashed a thumbs-up. “Whenever you’re ready Comet.”

The earth pony nodded and punched up the map of Chicacolt. “Fillies and Gentlecolts, you all know why I’ve returned.” He said. “The Enclave… In my world we managed to drive them back, but they’re still a threat. My friend Dusk here has been helping gather allies to combat them, which is why I stand before you all once more. As I speak an Enclave battlegroup is headed for the ruins of Chicacolt to launch a counterattack.” He punched a few keys and the map zoomed out, showing a group of seven red dots slowly moving towards the city from the west of the city. “As I speak a battlegroup centered around one of the last remaining Thunderheads is en-route to the city and will be there inside of a day.”

“So you know this for a fact?” I asked.

Comet nodded. “This old Raptor still has working access codes to the Enclave network. According to the dispatches they’ve assembled a group around the Victorious. If that ship reaches Vanhoover we won’t stand a chance.”

“So what are you thinking?” One of the Rangers asked.

“We eliminate Victorious from the equation.” Comet explained. “Using E-201 we’ll deploy a boarding party to the Victorious. We have two objectives, the primary one being to eliminate that ship. To do that we’ll blow the main reactor with demolition charges. But while we’re doing that, the second team will storm the auxiliary command center and take control of Victorious’ weapons array. Until that reactor is ready to go, the second team will turn the guns against the Raptors and do as much damage as they can. Once the reactor is ready to go we’ll extract via E-201 and break off the engagement.”

I’ll admit, it’s a simple plan that if properly executed will go a long ways to dealing with the Enclave threat. “But how are we going to survive getting close enough to that Thunderhead?” I asked.

That’s when Strike smirked. “We’ve got a present that’ll fix that.” He fished out two golden metal disks from his jacket pocket and placed them on the table. “I found these when I was going through the cargo containers that we pulled off of E-201.”

I looked at the disks and noticed a purple sigel of a shield carved into the center of both. “Strike… Would you care to share with the rest of the class?” I chided.

The pegasus nodded and handed one of the disks to Rune. “These are shield talismans. According to the Captain’s old logbook, they discovered these in a destroyed MAS lab outside of Manehattan. They just never had a use for them so they were never installed.”

“It could work…” Rune admitted. “How long will it take to get them installed on both ships?”

Strike shrugged. “At least four hours to get both installed and tied into the control consoles. It’ll take us the better part of a day to get back to Chicacolt, so we could probably install and test them while en route.”

Rune nodded. “Well I know where I stand…” He turned to face the rest of the Rangers and shrugged. “Who else is in?”

At first I thought that the other Rangers thought that this idea was too crazy to work… But one by one ponies stepped forward and found open bridge stations to go to work at. There was finally one younger stallion left who just shook his head. “Unless I’m mistaken there isn’t any more chairs.” He said.

“Does that mean that you’re out?” Rune asked.

“Hell no!” The stallion replied. “Just show me where to stand Rune, if everyone else is going I’m sure as hell not going to sit on my ass.”

As Rune walked towards the helm with the stallion I noticed an expression on Comet’s face. It wasn’t neutrality or anger… No, this was something I hadn’t seen since we were kids.

Comet didn’t look like that same reserved stallion that I had flown down here with. This was Comet, proud and ready to take on the world with a gusto I hadn’t seen in a long time. And you know what? That actually makes me feel a hell of a lot better.

Author's Note

Well that was simple and straight forward... And set up another side story for whenever I get around to it. I've put some thought into what Comet and Strike did before the events of Part I, and I think this could make a good segway for whenever I eventually write that story. Next time, Blaze Squad the Rangers take the Victorious!

In the meantime, anyone got questions? Like what you're seeing so far? Hell, maybe have some gripes? There's a comment section and the Mirrorverse Codex. Read and comment away, because I want to hear from you fellow denizens of this corner of the internet. Until next time gang!
-Striker