Bullets, magical portals and strange creatures

The providence colony. This place was once home to thousands upon thousands of people. It was designed to combat the ever increasing population count and to give the Earth resources that had run dry. America had it bad, but Russia had it worse. The people of the country were starving, barely able to even keep themselves alive. The death count rose to ridiculous amounts. And because of this, a terrorist organisation known as the Russian star, decided to take over Russia's military. They now had an army of robots at their disposal and what did they decide to do with their new fond power? Take control of the providence colony, essentially killing anyone who didn't manage to get to the escape pods in time. They used robots, energy weapons, anything that they could use to cause destruction. One of their head guys, Victor Zaitsev, used the providence's energy based generator as a makeshift WMD. They used it on San Fransisco and the results were horrifying. Thousands of people lost their lives that day and Zaitsev threatened the president of the United States and the rest of the country that if they didn't surrender, he would use it on New York. To combat this, the president sent the marines to recapture the colony. DARPA had also sent one of their researchers, Sam Gideon, to test out the new battle suit known as the ARS (Augmented Reality suit) and to rescue his superior, Professor Francois Candide as he had been captured when he attempted to stop Zaitsev utilising the makeshift energy WMD once again on New York. . They had also sent his colleague, known as Elena Ivanova, to help him out via reconnaissance by using the spaceship that she was piloting what would orbit just outside of the colony. The marines, along with Sam, had arrived at the colony via a platoon of marine spaceships. They had gotten past the main defenses of the R.I's (robotic infantry).

Now, it was time for Sam to go to work.

Providence colony, 1800 hours

"Sam, watch out!"

A barrage of bullets barely missed Sam as he used the thrusters in his suit, effectively dodging the bullets by a mere second.

"Fuck! I can't get close to the gate. Elena, hack it!"

She sighed and shook her head, even though she knew that Sam couldn't see the expression. "I can't, Sam. It doesn't support remote operation. You need to use the control panel in the building to the right of the gate."

Sam grunted in annoyance. "You'd think that she'd be able to remote hack anything, considering the technology on that ship of hers."

He came out of his thoughts and hesitantly replied. "Okay, I'll see what I can do."

Burns, a LT colonel in the marines, was also there with him and was now hiding behind cover an inch away from him. He was the leader of bravo team, the ones who Sam was supposed to be assisting. They had come to a bit of a...'disagreement' at the beginning due to Sam not being aloud to smoke on Burns's ship. He came out of his thoughts for a second to see Burns transform his bionic arm into a plasma cannon and shoot one of the R.I's operating a turret up the hill. Sam recalled the events of their disagreement and chuckled to himself slightly. "Thank god that I had this suit on, otherwise his arm could have ripped me in two. Crazy bastard."

Burns transformed his arm back into its normal form and turned his head to Sam, a determined look on his face. "We've gotta push up this hill. Can you use that augmented reaction speed of yours and some cover to get past that turret so we can move up?"

Sam slowly peeked his head out of cover to see what Burns meant. There we two pieces of rubble just in front of the turret. Because of the height of the turret, it wouldn't be able to hit him if he was behind the rubble. He swiftly put his head back into cover as a few bullets missed him by a few centimeters. He looked over to Burns and nodded. "Alright. You got it."

Burns nodded in response and Sam waited for an opening. Albeit, before he could even think of using his thrusters to get behind the rubble, he heard a loud bang in front of him. He looked forwards and saw what looked to be like some sort of portal. He raised an eyebrow behind his helmet and nudged Burns. Burns looked at him in annoyance. "What? Why aren't you rushing that turret yet?"

Sam pointed in the direction of the portal. "That's why."

Burns looked to where he was pointing and saw what he meant. He looked in confusion at the strange thing. "What the hell is that thing?"

Sam shrugged. "Beats me. Looks like some sort of portal. It can't be good though." He then noticed something that sent a shiver down his spine.

It was getting bigger.

He felt himself suddenly being pulled towards it and before he could react, he got snatched from his piece of cover and was getting dragged into the portal at a fast speed. He tried to grab onto something but he couldn't get a grip of anything.

Burns tried to grab him, but he couldn't get to him in time. "Sam!"

Sam braced himself for the impact and went straight through the portal, it closing after it sucked him in.

He had vanished into thin air, along with the portal.

Burns looked in shock and said what usually comes to his mind in these types of situations.

"Fuck."

Sam couldn't feel anything. He started to come to and open his eyes. As soon as he managed to do so, he was able to feel his body again.

Not in a good way, either.

He moaned and groaned in pain as he sat up, wiping his eyes in the process.

"Ugh.....I'm never going to drink that much agai.....wait....I remember. I was on the providence colony with Burns and then...."

Then it suddenly hit him.

The portal. He'd left Burns alone with the marines on the colony.

His eyes widened in shock as he near instantly got to his feet and looked around him. He noticed that he was in some type of large forest. Although, the trees didn't look like the trees back on Earth. They looked...darker. More sinister. How trees could even look sinister, he didn't know. All he knew is that he had to find Burns and the marines. And fast. He looked around for the BLADE weapons system and noticed that it was on the floor. He picked it up and transformed it into its shotgun mode.

"Don't want anything jumping me in this forest. It's too closed in."

He activated his visor and felt the chunk of metal form around his face. He started scouting the surrounding area, trying to look for any signs of the marines and Burns. "Burns? BURNS?! ANYONE?!" He shouted at the top of his lungs. Surely he can't have been teleported that far away? What was this place anyway? There was no residential area on the colony that was this big and this wide, he knew that for sure. He'd done his research on the colony and it's features before he went on his mission. He should be seeing buildings. But he didn't. All he saw was trees, trees and more trees.

He screamed in frustration. "Gah, where the fuck am I?! Hello?! Can anyone here me?!" Then, something happened that he didn't expect.

He heard a female like voice crying out for help.

He let the BLADE system merge into his armour as he started to sprint as fast as his the suit would let him. Each few steps that he took, the screams were getting closer and closer. It sounded like it was coming from right in front of him.

He kept running for what felt like hours until he came across a sight that made him question his sanity. On the floor quite a ways in front of him was some sort of strange, blue creature. It resembled some sort of reptile. It was stuck under quite a large tree branch. It was chucking stones at something to its right. He turned to his right and saw what looked like a lion crossed with a bat, a scorpion, and god knows what else. He retracted his visor, revealing his face as he rubbed his eyes once more. He closed his eyes for a second and chanted to himself. "This is not real. I must have been knocked out by an explosion or something and I'm just dreaming. I will wake up. I must wake up. The Professor and Burns need me." He slowly opened his eyes and he looked back. He looked in horror.

It hadn't changed back. He wasn't back on the colony. He was still in the forest, watching that blue, small reptile like thing try to break free from the massive branch that was still on top of it. The lion like creature was still backing off ever so slightly every time a rock hit its face.

He looked down and sighed.

"Either this is a very lucid dream that I'm having trouble waking up from or somehow, this is real."

He looked towards the reptile like creature and the lion creature once more. The trapped creature had now ran out of rocks to throw and twigs. It looked like it was trying to...breath out forcefully? A tiny flame came out and went away pretty quickly. The attacking creature looked like it gained a massive grin on its face as it started its slow march towards the other creature. Sam nodded to himself. "I need to help it. If it's a dream, it might jolt me up somehow." Even he had to admit, he was now grasping at straws, just still hoping that this was just a weird dream. It was a dumb idea that didn't make any sense. But he couldn't just sit here and do nothing, waiting to hopefully wake up. He sighed. "If it somehow turns out not to be a dream...I'll cross that bridge when I come to it." He activated his visor once more. He readied his weapon and ran.

"Stupid wing! Why do you hate me so much?!" Ember cursed at herself as she watched the Manticore slowly walk up to her, clearly eyeing her as its prey.

"This is embarrassing. A dragon killed by a Manticore? I hope my dad doesn't find out about this...or Spike..or Twilight...or anyone back home!"

She tried to get her wing out from under the giant tree branch, but it still wouldn't budge. She was starting to accept her fate, as pathetic as that was. She was literally stuck. She couldn't defend herself like this and her flames weren't big enough to harm the beast. She tried to grab her bloodstone scepter, but it was out of her reach. She saw that the Manticore was basically in her face now. She could feel its warm breath on her face. She closed her eyes and quietly wept.

"Goodbye dad...goodbye Dragon lands....goodbye Spike..."

....Nothing happened. Where was the final strike that would finish her and put her in a book honouring the lamest dragons of all time if anyone found out?

She carefully opened her eyes and saw something that made her wonder if she was dead already.

The lion like creature was about to deliver the finishing blow to the trapped creature as Sam darted at it at full speed.

"Here goes nothing!"

The lion creature then went flying into a nearby tree, producing sounds of various bones breaking. It wailed as it tried to get up, but ultimately failed. It looked up at its assailant and growled in anger.

"What the fuck are you?"

Sam looked down at the creature, waiting for his suit to cool down after the impact of his foot flying into its face. It was a strange mixture of animals as he saw before. It growled at him as he brought up his weapon and pointed it towards its face. "I hope that you're the bad guy, buddy." He pulled the trigger and filled the creature with several shotgun shells. Its head instantly dropped in a pool of blood. He looked down and sighed. "I hope that I did the right thing...if this is even real, that is. It's starting to feel too real to be a dream."

He heard a whine behind him. Sounded like...a woman crying? He turned around to see that the trapped lizard like creature was crying softly. It tried to back off, but still couldn't remove the tree from its form. He started to walk towards it.

Ember had never been so frightened in her life.

Just as she was expecting the Manticore to kill her, she saw something come in at lightning fast speed. It launched itself forward and propelled itself into the Manticore, delivering a strong kick to its face. The Manticore then went flying into a nearby tree, breaking several bones. Quite loudly, she might add, which added to her shock.

She then got a good luck at the thing that had just single-handedly broke a Manticore in half. It was a tall creature, taller than her by quite a bit. It had what appeared to be some sort of armour on. She couldn't tell if that was the case, though. It was bipedal, had appendages what strangely resembled her own albeit less sharp looking and had some sort of tool in its hand. Was that a weapon? Its head was also covered by the same type of material that was on the rest of its body, with a blue tinted glass looking thing in front of where its face should be. It went over to the Manticore and surprised her even more than it already had.

It spoke.

Not in some foreign garble. A language that she could fully understand perfectly.

"I hope that you're the bad guy, buddy"

It had a deep, gruff voice. Probably a male.

It then pointed the object in its hand towards the now bleeding Manticore's face and pulled one of its appendages down on something on the object. Ember shrieked in horror and turned away as the object emitted a loud bang. After her ears had calmed down, she turned back around to see the Manticore now dead on the floor, its face planted in a pool of blood. She heard the creature say something again.

"I hope that I did the right thing...if this is even real, that is. It's starting to feel too real to be a dream."

She looked at the Manticore in horror. This creature was extremely dangerous. More dangerous than most creatures that she'd come across in her life.

And it could do the same to her next.

She didn't know if she could defend herself against this unknown creature even if she wasn't stuck under the accursed branch that had her currently nailed to the floor.

She started to do something that she hated. She started sobbing. The realisation hit her even more than before. She wouldn't be able to see her friends or her family anymore. She didn't even want to know what this thing was going to do to her. She noticed that soon as she started sobbing, the creature's head moved slightly. It then turned around to look at her and stared at her. She tried to back off, but the branch was still crushing her wing. She couldn't get away from this thing. She looked in horror as it started to walk towards her, carrying the lethal object that it had used on the Manticore with it.

The only thought what crossed her mind was that it would hopefully at least make her death quick.

Sam walked towards the trapped creature. He sorta felt bad for it. It was obviously terrified of him. He couldn't blame it to be honest. A weird creature shows up and brutally murders the creature that was trying to rip its face off.

Yeah, he'd be shit scared too.

He finally reached the creature and let his weapon merge back into his armour. The creature looked in confusion as he did so. He deactivated his visor to reveal his face. The creature stared at him in shock and started to panic even more.

He mentally shrugged. "I should have expected that."

He got down to one knee and grabbed the tree. As he did so, the creature started swatting at him with its claws. He backed off slightly and raised his arms up slightly. "I wonder if this thing, by some miracle, can understand me. I fucking hope so."

"Hey, hey. Calm down. I'm not going to hurt you. I promise."

It looked up to him and stopped swatting at him. It puts its arms down and kept staring at him. It then did what he least expected.

It replied.

"...How do I know that you're not going to do to me what you just did to that Manticore?"

He looked in confusion. "Manticore? Isn't that some greek myth from hundreds of years ago?" He decided that he'd ask later. The current task was to calm this thing down the best that he could.

"I won't. I know that you're no doubt terrified. I mean, a weird creature appearing out of nowhere and beating the shit out of your assailant? Trust me, I'd be shit scared too if that was me. But all I can do is promise you that I won't hurt you as long as you don't try and hurt me. Alright?"

The creature looked at him in a skeptic manner. It then sighed and slowly nodded.

"I don't know what you are, where you came from and if I can trust you, but...thank you. If it wasn't for you, I'd be dead already."

He nodded and smiled at the creature. He pointed towards the giant branch. He saw now that it was crushing what he presumed to be a wing.

"Can I get back to helping get this off of you now?"

The creature slowly nodded and he knelt down once more. He picked up the branch and lobbed it to the left of him, freeing the creature. It put a hand to its wing and cried out in pain. He looked at its wing and noticed that it was badly crushed.

"Seems like your wing is in pretty bad shape."

It gave him a deadpan stare and snorted. It whispered something under its breath. "Well, yeah. It was crushed by a giant branch, you know."

He heard what it said. He chuckled to himself. "Least it has a sense of humour." He offered it his hand. It looked at him in confusion. He sighed.

"Here. Take my hand. I'll help you up."

The creature looked frightened and skeptic at first, but it eventually sighed and took his hand, letting him help it up to its feet. It instantly cried out in pain and held its wing with one of its...claws?

It started to cry softly again. "Stupid wing...I shouldn't be crying like this..."

He looked at it sympathetically and put a hand on its shoulder. It looked up to him and instantly recoiled back.

"What do you think you're doing?!"

Sam looked at the creature and sighed once more. "I was putting my hand on your shoulder as a sign of respect. It's what us humans do when we sympathise with someone."

The creature slowly calmed down and broke from its defensive stance. It looked at him in interest. "So, your appendages are known as hands and your species is referred to as humans? How come I've never heard of your species before?"

Sam smiled and chuckled. "You've never heard of my species because I'm obviously not in the same place as I was before I got sucked into a portal. I was on a space colony, trying to take it back from evil people. Terrorists. A war, basically."

The creature looked at him in confusion. "Wait, so you're saying that you're an alien?"

He nodded. "It seems so, yeah. And you're an alien to me."

The creature chuckled. It's laugh was softer than he'd expected. "That explains why you look so alien. I'd call you crazy if you didn't look as weird as you do." Sam looked at her and snorted. The creature panicked and waved its arms. "No no! Not in a bad way! You look sort of....cool."

He felt a bit of pride well up inside him from the creature's compliment. "Now now Sam, don't let your ego get boosted that much by an alien that doesn't even really know you yet." He chuckled. "Well, you look pretty cool yourself. What are you, anyway?."

He looked at its wing. Damn, it was in bad shape. If it wasn't mended by someone soon, it'd probably get infected. He could use his adrenaline syringe, but what if it had some adverse negative effects on it? It was an alien, after all. "Better not try and use it in that case. This thing does need to get help soon by the looks of it, though."

He snapped himself out of his thoughts and waited for its answer to his question.

"I'm a dragon. And...thanks."

He hummed in interest while looking her over to get all of her details once more. "Ah. Well, that explains why you have wings, reptilian like eyes and scales. Dragons used to be a myth hundreds of years ago on my planet."

It looked at him and chuckled. "Well, as you can see, we are very real. I am...admittedly a lot smaller than most other dragons."

He nodded. It made sense, considering how the dragons in myths hundreds of years ago were supposed to be large, fierce creatures. This dragon was small, skinny and strangely...adorable. He mentally slapped himself. "Did I just call an alien adorable?"

The dragon walked up to him, still holding its wing. He looked at the injured wing and looked at the creature in concern. "No, I should ask it if I can help in anyway. It's only fair."

"What can I do to help you? Do you need help with your wing?"

It looked at him and gave a soft smile, if only for a second, before returning to its stoic stare. "No, but....I appreciate your concern."

He looked at it in confusion. "What was that last part?"

It turned its face away from him. "I said I appreciate your concern."

He looked at it again with confusion. "Speak up a bit louder?"

It turned to look at him with a blush on its face. "I said that I appreciate...your...concern. Just ignore what I said, alright?"

He chuckled to himself. Was it blushing? Damn. He never thought he'd see a dragon what was so bashful. Well, he never thought that he'd see a real live dragon anyway, but that was beyond the point. "Well, I appreciate that you appreciate me showing concern."

It chucked softly. "You're an idiot."

He grinned. "I try." His grin vanished as soon as he remembered the creature's injured wing. "Are you sure that I can't do anything to help you? I can't just leave you out here by yourself with what shape your wing is in."

The dragon sighed and then nodded. "Okay...okay. You can help if you really want to. Could you come with me to the nearest town to get some aid for this wing and so that I can get to my meeting?"

Sam looked in confusion. "Meeting?"

It nodded in response. "Yes. I was heading to a meeting with one of the pony rulers, Princess Twilight Sparkle. We were going to talk about our races relations to one another. While I was on the way there, my wing gave way mid flight and I fell onto a branch, knocked it off, fell to the ground and the branch pinned me down via my wing."

He face lit up in realisastion. "So that's how you got pinned down there."

It nodded. "Yeah. Then, the Manticore jumped out at me and I couldn't get free as you saw."

He nodded. Then, he realised what she had just said. He sighed. He put his hands up to his face and held it. "There's talking ponies too?"

It nodded back. "Yup. I presume with your reaction and the fact that you're an alien, that you don't have talking ponies either on your world?"

"No, we don't. We have horses and ponies, but they don't talk. They're just animals."

He noticed that it had a look of interest on its face.

"I see. How very strange. In anycase, we better get going. The sun is going to set soon and that means more Manticores."

He looked up to the sky and saw that it was indeed getting dark. He nodded once more.  "Yeah, I can see that it's getting dark and I can see why you don't want any more of those things popping out at you. I'll do my best to protect you....what's your name?

It looked at him with a small smile. "I'm Princess Ember, but just call me Ember. I'm the daughter of the ex dragon lord. That reminds me..."

Sam looked as it went to pick up a weird looking stick that he somehow didn't notice before. It had a red, glowing crystal at the top. He pointed towards it. "What's that thing?"

Ember looked at him and smiled. "This is a bloodstone scepter. It's what you have to acquire to win the Gauntlet of Fire competition, in which the winner gets crowned as the new dragon lord."

He looked at it in slight interest and nodded. "Interesting. I'll ask more about that competition later. As you correctly stated, we should be going. I'll tag alongside you as you know where to go."

She nodded and carried her scepter. However, before she could even start walking, she dropped the scepter due to the pain in her wing. Sam put his hand on her shoulder and looked at her in concern. "Hey Ember, you alright?"

She weakly nodded in response. "Yeah...yeah. It's just this damn wing. I'll be fine when we get to the nearest town, Ponyville."

She picked up the scepter once more and beckoned for him to follow. "This way. Oh, that reminds me, you got my name...but I didn't get yours?"

He smiled. "Sam."

She smiled softly in return. "Alright, Sam. Follow me."

He nodded, activated his visor and made his weapon appear in his hands from his suit. He walked alongside her and looked at her, noticing that she was staring at him. "What's up?"

She jumped out of her trance. "Oh! Sorry. It's just that I have a ton of questions. What is that on your skin? Armour?

"Well, ye...."

"What's that weapon in your hand?"

"It's th...."

"What's that what keeps going on and off of your face? It looks like its connected to your amour? Is it?"

He chuckled and held up his hand. "Hold your horses. Let me answer one question at a time, alright?"

She blushed and looked away. "Sorry...yeah. Take as much time as you need."

He smiled and remembered that he hadn't had a cigarette in a while. Luckily, he stored quite a few packs in his suit before he went on his mission. "Hope that they're still here..." He reached in one of the open spaces in his suit. He managed to find his lighter and all of his packs of cigarettes, all still in one piece. He sighed in relief. "Oh thank Christ. I certainly need these after today's events."

He pulled out a cigarette and used his lighter to spark it up, sighing in relief at the familiar smell of cigarette fumes.

Ember looked at him with confusion. He laughed softly.

"Another question to add to the list, eh?"

She chuckled slightly, holding her mouth with her palm. "Yep."

He smiled in return. "Alright. Here goes."