The Lightning Seven: Equestrian Wanderers

Derpy looked scared at the group, not knowing what was going to happen. The alligator was the first to look down and scare the pony with his heavy breaths, "Uh...hi." He said before the grey mare ran off in fear leaving the seven figures in the dust.

"So much for keeping everything secret." The armored fish said annoyed.

"Well be that as it may, we need to stay calm and not panic, we were going to be exposed sooner or later." The mole said adjusting his back pack.

Back in Ponyville

Derpy was flying like there was no tomorrow as she was hoping those things were not chasing her. She saw a winged purple pony talking to five other ponies and thought of this as her safe zone, "Princess Twilight!" She shouted before crashing into the group.

"Derpy, what's up?" The rainbow haired pony asked, "I thought you were off today."

The crossed eyed pony looked up, "I am, but that isn't important now, I saw something scary!"

"The cost of muffins at Sugar Cube Corner?!" The pink pony asked, "I tried to make the prices reasonable, but there wasn't anything I could do!"

Derpy's eyes widened, "No...but that only makes this worse. I saw seven strange creatures on the border of town!"

"What kind of creatures?" Twilight asked she summoned a book, "Maybe I can identify it."

"Well one of them was a giant fish in a suit of armor, and another one was a giant alligator on two legs, and an owl with some weird looking metal tubes on its back." Derpy continued describing each figure making the group look at each other with both uncertainty and worry.

Twilight sighed as she teleported the book away, "Well it seems like this is something beyond my comprehension...I'll have to alert the Princesses about this." With that Twilight began to write out a letter, "Dear Princess Celestia. I hope this letter finds you and your sister in good health, and that she is feeling better after that terrible nightmare you mentioned in your last letter to me. Everything is going just fine down here in Ponyville, but I have a very important request to make. Recently, there was an alerting report of seven strange creatures on the borders of the town. According to the report, these creatures are not even native to our world! There was talk of fish surviving on land in a suit of armor and animals talking and walking on their hind legs. They seem to and be far beyond my comprehension, and I was wondering if you and your sister could us in this situation. Signed, your loyal student, Twilight Sparkle." She then sent it off in a puff of smoke knowing it would reach Canterlot in no time.

Canterlot

Celestia looked over her books of monster lore, trying to find anything similar to the figure that Luna had described in her dream. Luna herself was busy with an abacus, doing various calculations in her head as she looked over some figures on a chart. Merely moving the abacus beads around seemed to have a calming effect on Luna, Celestia noticed. She smiled softly, glad that her sister seemed to be feeling better, her terrible nightmare nothing more than a bad memory...

"Nightmares..." she said softly, looking out over the villages and towns below her. Specifically, towards Ponyville, where her prized student Twilight Sparkle resided. She felt a shiver of fear for her go through her, and decided to focus on her studies. She was surprised a moment later, however, when a scroll appeared before her in a flame of green flame that she recognized. "Oh!" Celestia said, startled.

Luna turned to her, frowning. "Sister, what is it?"

"A letter from my student," she said, "A little early for one, though..." She thought about it for a moment and shrugged, her horn glowing as she opened the scroll and read it. She frowned, a worried expression coming to her face.

Luna stood up, concerned. "Please sister? What is it?"

"The lightning bolt that fell from the sky..." Celestia said, her voice one of wonderment. She turned to Luna, a thought occurring to her, "Luna, get ready. We're going to Ponyville."

Luna blinked. "Why?"

"Something major has happened," Celestia said, "I need us both to be there, just in case it's too powerful to handle for Twilight alone."

Back at Ponyville

"She's coming, thank goodness..." Twilight said as she had just received a response letter.

Eventually the seven ponies gathered at Twilight Sparkle's castle, just as a royal carriage had arrived, Twilight and her friends quickly bowing as Luna and Celestia disembarked.

"Princess Celestia," Twilight said, "It's so good to see you again."

"As it is good to see you once again, Twilight Sparkle, but I am sure you are wanting to solve this mystery as fast as possible I assume?" Celestia asked looking at the ponies.

Twilight turned to Derpy and signaled her, "Oh right!" The grey mare said, "I saw seven strange figure outside of town near the clock tower, but I ran off before anything actually happened."

"Do you know the exact location?" Luna asked.

"I told Princess Twilight." Derpy said, "I would like to come along, but I need to pick up my daughter from school." With that she took off in a hurry.

The group had eventually walked off to the field Derpy had described and to their surprise there was nothing there. "Why would she lie to us like that?" Twilight asked, "It isn't like Derpy to just make things up like that, especially when she was acting so paranoid."

Suddenly there a loud cough coming from the trees, "Well I guess whatever Derpy was talking about is smart." The rainbow maned pony said. The group looked around the bushes until pushing through them to see the fish creature Derpy had described.

The group screamed in utter shock of what was before them and to even greater surprise the creatures were screaming in shock too, "Please don't eat us!" The pink pony shouted, "Pony tastes bad!"

"Don't try to recycle me!" The fish shouted, "This armor is too awesome to be made into soda cans!" The screaming went down after they noticed that both sides were scared of each other.

Twilight Sparkle took a deep breath as she inched up towards the creatures, "H-Hello there..." She said nervously, "I am Twilight Sparkle..."

"Isn't that a type of deodorant!" A voice sounded behind the bushes before being sushed.

The fish rose out of the bushes and simply just towered over the ponies, he was almost as tall as the princesses if not a head shorter, "My name is Scalor." The fish replied.

"Well it is nice to get introductions out of the way." Celestia replied, "I am Princess Celestia, and this is my sister Luna." The blue pony nodded at the mentioning of her name.

"And these are my friends." Twilight said motioning her wing towards the five other ponies, "Applejack, Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie, Rarity, and Fluttershy." The five ponies nooded as their respective names were called out. Scalor motioned his fin towards the bush to reveal the other creatures Derpy had described.

"And I welcome you all to the rest of my team." Scalor said as each figure introduced themselves.

"I'm Slash, the teams Muscle." The gator said flexing his arms, "And the team's cook and personal wrecking ball."

"I'm Kooker." The chameleon said, "Slash's brother and the teams spiritualist."

"Razor's the name," The roadrunner said flatly, "Team speedster, scout, close range fighter..."

"And designated party pooper." Scalor added with a smug grin before Razor smacked the fish's face hard.

"Outlook reporting for duty!" The owl shouted almost the same way the princesses royal gaurds would, "Team demolition expert, recon flyer, and living shield." He said hitting his helmet.

The platypus knelt down to greet the group, "My name is Dice Shappukatto, but please just call me Dice. I am swift with my sword in hand, but like the early spring breeze I am gentle." The feeling of mystery gave the group a chill down their spines as the sash around his eyes made it unsure for them if he was truly looking at them or not.

"And I am Circuit Breaker," The mole said adjusting himself with all the equipment on his back, "I'm the team's technical expert, pleasure to meet you all."

The group looked upon the seven of them and gave off a smile, but it was an uneasy one. After a moment, Celestia asked, "Do you know how you got here?"

"'I am afraid not, your Majesty," Scalor said, shaking his head, "About five days ago, we were just minding our business and suddenly we got pulled into the sky. Next thing we know, we're crashing down from high up. And when we wake up in the middle of the woods!"

"The lightning bolt in the night sky..." Celestia said, mainly to herself.

"...Excuse me?" Circuit asked.

Celestia shook her head. "I may have witnessed your arrival in this world without knowing..." She hesitated a moment, and asked, "You've seemed to be eager to tell me your...'descriptions' of what you do, is there some particular reason to why exactly?"

Uh oh... Scalor thought. Do they suspect? Deciding to try and cover their job description up in rose colored glasses, he said, "Back on our home world, we are a private fighting team known as the Lightning Seven hired by anyone in high positions of power such as diplomats, politicians, and kings. We mainly follow the orders given to us by our employers, while also going against rival fighting forces through out our world."

"Do not lie to me," Luna said bluntly.

The other ponies save for Celestia, who had the same suspicions, seemed surprised . The BLU members just cringed, trading worried looks, realizing they had been caught.

"Princess Luna," Scalor tried, "I assure that..."

"My power is based in darkness," Luna said, "It grants me the ability to see through any and all shrouds. Including shrouds upon the truth. I can accept that you may have been pulled here against your will. But I will not accept being lied to... and I will not allow any harm to come to this world because of a lie" Luna said softly, but with conviction. Celestia smiled warmly at the declaration before turning her gaze on the gathered Lightning Seven members.

Scalor frowned, and began idly playing with his thumbs, his expression going icy. Razor growled angrily. Slash's eyes narrowed, and Kooker sighed wearily, as if expecting this. Outlook began shifting nervously as if restraining himself from taking off, but knew he wouldn't forgive himself for abandoning his team; as Dice supposedly returned the cold icy stare that Luna was giving off. Circuit grumbled inwardly, going through countless calculations in his head, trying to figure a way out of this, trying to ignore the worried looks Twilight Sparkle and her friends were giving them.

Eventually Outlook sighed as he looke up at Scalor, "Just tell her everything, dude. There's no point in trying to come up with a dumb cover story."

Scalor frowned at him. "...If I must."

Outlook nodded. "No reason to lie when someone already suspects the truth, besides this is making me very uncomfortable."

Scalor sighed, his expression turning cold. "Very well..." His voice becoming monotone almost robotic, "The seven of us are a specialized team of mercenaries. Each one of us a killer, even Kooker," he said, the other ponies gasping. Scalor nodded. "Our world has many mercenary team in specific skill sets or special abilities such as being knights of an old order to simply using fire based weaponry; ours is mainly set in the thought of morality, but also electricity. It is...tough living on our world as most of the planet that isn't occupied with a city or settlement is filled with hostile creatures and hazardous environments that many weaker citizens would only dare to venture through."

The ponies looked at the Lightnings in shock at the information that the fish had just given them. Circuit sighed, "We don't have any beef with this world, and we don't want to cause any trouble. If you can help us get along home, we'll gladly be on our way."

Celestia and Luna traded looks. "I... I appreciate your honesty," Celestia said hesitantly, "And can respect your desire to leave without causing problems."

The seven of them looked up at her hopefully, their expressions almost pleading. Celestia felt her heart breaking as she spoke again.
"But... I don't know if I can help you at all," Celestia said. The faces on the Lightning Seven members fell. Celestia bit her lip and continues. "I truly wish I could help, but I don't know the first thing about transportation magic that has the capacity to transport all seven of you to a world that I don't even know about. And even if I did, even Luna and I working together wouldn't have enough power to open a gate. It requires more power than even the two of us and most likely all of the unicorns on Equestria together have."

"Man..." Outlook said softly, his head drooping. Dice kicked the ground, a look of intense frustration on his face despite the sash. Slash and Kooker just stared at her, their expressions a mix of disappointment and fear. Razor began growling, Circuit taking her aside and whispering to her harshly, trying to get her to calm down. Scalor sat down, a contemplative look on his face
"I am truly sorry," Celestia said, frowning. "I can look into other means of getting you home, but it will take some time for the research to be done..."

Circuit managed to smile weakly. "It's... fine. We..."

Pinkie Pie suddenly began shivering, bouncing up and down sporadically. The five ponies excluding the princesses about her suddenly became worried.

"What's wrong?" Kooker said, "Is something the matter?"

Twilight, even though accepting it long ago, could not believe she was about to say, "Pinkie Pie has... this ability to sense when things are coming. It often manifests itself as a twitching. A fully body twitching means that a real 'doozy' is coming..."

"A really big BAD doozy!" Pinkie said, shivering in fear. The Lightnings suddenly looked around, worried.

The Lightnings were not prepared to accept the presence of magic fully. Their world was more in the realm of technology and even if there was magic it was mainly based in cheap parlor tricks and phony 'magicians'. But out of all they have faced from world eating titans, beings of the underworld, and even gods themselves; this sounded just silly.

"You've got to be kidding me!" They all chorused.

And that's when the screaming started.