Meanwhile, Sentinels flew through the air, patrolling the area.

Inside her dome-home, Rey laid on her bed inside her dome home, staring up towards the ceiling as her mind flashed back to long ago…

A long time ago, a loud explosion suddenly interrupted the calm tranquility of a snow-covered planet.

From inside a dome-shaped structure, a pre-teen mare and a bearded middle-aged stallion sporting a thick beard and mane abruptly hurried outside. The stallion raised a pair of binoculars to his eyes and looked out into the distance.

“What do you see, father?” the mare called out to her father, standing by the door as she looked towards him, though, he didn’t respond.

Looking through the binoculars, her father watched as a large ball of fire came hurtling down from the sky towards the surface. The bright light cast by the ball illuminated the evening sky, making it easy to see.

It then disappeared behind several mountains, only to be followed by a loud BOOM and a tremor that shook the mountains, shaking the snow off a few of the mountains – nearest to where the ball of fire had landed. Soon, a large cloud of black smoke rose up from behind the tips of the mountains.

Macreedy lowered the binoculars and looked out towards the mountains, focusing his attention on the smoke as it climbed into the sky. He grimaced as he debated internally with himself about making a drastic and bold decision until he eventually turned back around towards the teen mare…

“Rey, get your things,” he instructed as he hurriedly trotted back up towards the door, “We are going out there,” he said as he entered their home, closing the door behind him.

Without delay, Rey got her fur jacket and quarterstaff. She then meets with her father in the garage where they kept their speeder. He already wore his own fur jacket and had his modified pulse-rifle – that had a flamethrower attached on the side – draped around his shoulder. They both sat down on it and after pressing a couple buttons on the control panel the bike lifted up off the ground, hovering in the air. Macreedy then grabbed the control sticks with his hooves.

Rey unlocked the garage door – which slid upwards into the ceiling – before she and Macreedy sped forward, flying out of the garage – and the cliffside cave that concealed their home – and into the air. The cold wind blew over them, but after living so long on the accursed snowball neither one of them minded.

Speeding through the air, they flew straight for the crash site.

After flying past several mountains, they finally passed over a peak and spotted the crashed ship. They noticed that it had crashed a little further away than they originally thought. Still, despite having to fly a little further than normal, they continued onwards to the downed ship…

While flying, they passed over a part of the planet that was dead and decaying.

Where the blightlands were especially concentrated, vast amounts of sickly pale bio-mass emerged from various cavernous pits.

Inside the largest of the pits, there sat a large, bulging mass. The mass throbbed and pulsated, while large tentacles supported the towering behemoth.

From several tunnels, hordes of Infection Forms poured on and scurried across the blightlands…

Eventually, as they finally reached the ship, Rey and Macreedy noticed that the ship had not crashed down into their snowy regions – as they originally assumed – but rather the grassy and lively fields at the edge of the “Green Lands”.

Despite this, Macreedy piloted the speeder down close to the crashed ship before he parked it, then he and Rey disembarked the bike and looked up towards the giant wreckage as it towered over them, casting its shadow on them.

What laid before them was a most peculiar starship; it sported eight – four on the bottom and top – wings that curved inwards along with a ball in the center of thee ship. Along the center side of the sphere were countless small orbs, that looked to be connected into slots.

A few of the wings were cracked, broken, while there were some rather large holes in the side of the sphere, a rectangular, glass, viewport had been shattered, a few of the wings had been ripped off, and several of the orbs – running along the side of the sphere – were missing, leaving many of the slots empty.

Rey and Macreedy cautiously approached the ship, remaining alert in case they encountered the “creatures” or the ship’s occupants.

Not detecting any hostility, they entered the ship through a hole in its hull…

Inside the ship, Rey and her father navigated through the ship, following the corridors which had been tilted on their side as a result of the crash. Sparks erupted from the damaged walls and ceilings of the rooms that they visited.

For a time, they didn’t encounter anyone or anything until Rey spotted a body in a corridor and rushed over towards it. She got down on her knees and rolled the equine over, only to see that he possessed quite the small stature. Macreedy trotted up to her and knelt down beside Rey.

“Who or what is it?” Rey asked while her father examined the stranger’s body.

“It’s a Sontaran,” her father replied, looking up from the Sontaran towards his daughter’s face, shooting her a serious glance, “They are a warrior race dedicated to discipline and warfare, believing it to be the greatest honor to engage one’s enemy on the battlefield,” he explained. Rey furrowed her brows in confusion and looked back down at the Sontaran.

“Is it dead?” Rey asked, looking up at her father, who stared at the small, blue-armored equine.

“Yes, it’s dead.” Macreedy nodded back, “It was most likely killed when the ship crashed,” he said.

Rey’s father then rose up on his hooves, standing over the Sontaran as he looked down at it.

“I don’t know why I didn’t see it before. Maybe the angle threw me off, and the damage made it harder to identify,” he said in a faintly nervous tone, looking down at Rey and shooting Rey a slightly concerned look.

“We should return to the speeder and get back home. We’ll come back tomorrow,” he instructed.

“Father, what is it?” Rey asked, concerned about her father’s sudden urge to leave the ship. He turned towards her, shooting her a frightened look.

“If I had known that this was a Sontaran ship, I would have taken you back home immediately!” he said in a raised voice.

“As you would have been wise to do,” a dignified voice suddenly said from out of the darkness behind them.

Rey and her father quickly turned around to face the – faceless – speaker, but they suddenly froze as they heard the sudden hum of blasters charging up. A group of Sontarans then stepped forward and pointed their elongated, black blaster rifles at them. Macreedy quickly grabbed Rey and held her back, preventing her from attacking the Sontarans.

“No, don’t attack them,” he instructed, to which Rey jerked her head back, and stared confusedly at him.

“But father-“ Rey protest, but her father glared sternly at her.

“I won’t let you sacrifice yourself in vain against a group of trained Sontarans!” he shouted back, shooting her argument down.

Father and daughter then locked eyes, staring at each other until they finally turned back towards the Sontarans and raised their hooves.

“We surrender,” Macreedy said.

After the two equines had surrendered, the Sontarans lowered their rifles and stepped aside, allowing their commander – who wore a cane-like device on his belt – to come forth and see their prisoners, silently staring at Rey and her father.

“Restrain them,” the commander ordered, waving several soldiers over towards Rey and her father.

However, as the Sontarans approached Rey and her father, everyone abruptly heard an odd chittering noise echoing throughout the ship, followed by metallic clanging as something moved about the ship.

Alarmed by the shaking, the Sontarans immediately looked around their ruined ship as they heard the strange noises. Meanwhile Macreedy’s eyes widened, and jaw hung slack as a horrific revelation dawned on him.

“No! No, it cannot be,” he softly said aloud to himself, drawing Rey’s attention as she turned her head and looked towards him.

“Father, what is it?” she asked, concerned.

Swiftly jerking his head towards her, Macreedy looked into his daughter’s eyes.

“What trickery is this, equine?!” the Sontaran commander angrily shouted at Macreedy. Several soldiers pointed their blasters at Macreedy and Rey in response to their leader’s aggression.

Macreedy opened his mouth to respond…but before he could get a word out, a shape screeched as it leapt out at the Sontaran commander!

The shape landed on the Sontaran’s chest, knocking him to the floor. As soon as the commander fell, both Rey and her father quickly grabbed their weapons, turned around and hurried back the way they had come, leaving the Sontarans to deal with the Infection Form – specifically the commander, who tried wrestling it off him, but its tentacles were too numerous and quick.

As it attempted to rip off the commander’s armor, the soldiers immediately fired upon it, blasting it away with a continuous volley of laser fire. The Infection Form screeched as they fired away at it, blasting it until it was dead. Its lifeless body flew backwards and slammed against a wall.

The commander quickly rose to his hooves, looking down at the Infection Form as the holes in its body smoldered.

Turning around, he looked back at his soldiers, panting from the struggle he had endured with this…thing.

“Search the ship,” he ordered, “We must find out if there are more of these things or if that was the only--“

However, before he or his soldiers could react, hundreds of Infection Forms leapt on then from numerous holes in the ruined corridors!

Screaming aloud in fear, they tried to shoot the many Infection Forms…but none hit their mark before they were overwhelmed!

Their frightened screams changed into painful ones, before becoming feral growls.

Rising again as Combat Forms, who snarled as the Infection Forms scuttled off to locate the two that had escaped, just before the Combat Forms accompanied them…

Rey and her father ran throughout the entire ship until they leapt out of the hole in the side of the ship – that they used to enter it – planting their hooves on an organic flood once more.

Panting, they quickly looked up at each other.

“Quickly, get to the-- DUCK!” Macreedy shouted as he raised his modified blaster, pointing it directly at Rey.

Rey ducked, and he fired upon the leaping Infection Form. It screeched as he hit it before its corpse fell to the ground.

Getting back up, Rey rushed back over towards their speeder, slamming her electro-quarterstaff into several advancing Infection Forms, and hearing them screech as the electricity scorched their bodies.

She leapt back onto it and frantically started it up, flicking several switches. It activated and hovered above the ground.

“Father, come o-!” she called out to him before freezing in place as she saw the Sontaran ship. Her eyes widened, and jaw dropped, hanging slack as several massive tentacles – had risen out of the earth and – gripped the wreaked ship, cutting off escape for the few survivors onboard.

Rey and her father had engaged Flood forms before, but she had never seen large tentacles like this before.

She snapped out of her stupor as she heard her father call out to her and looked down towards him, only for her eyes to widen as she saw a large, hulking, Combat Form charge towards him…

Hearing an unnatural snarling in front of him, Macreedy looked down in front of him. His eyes widened as he spotted a tall, humanoid – with an Infection Form rooted in the former-creature’s jaw, forcing its mouth open into a perpetual scream – run straight towards him.

The Combat Form leapt into the air towards him, causing time to abruptly slow down for him. His eyes widened in fear as the Combat Form swung its whip-claw down towards him, ready to pierce his skin and end his life… However, an electrified quarterstaff suddenly shot through the air and struck the Combat Form in its chest, causing the creature to roar and screech in pain.

It continued to fall towards the ground, but Macreedy quickly grabbed the staff and pushed back against the Combat Form, knocking it off to the side before getting back up on his hooves. He turned and ran towards the speeder.

Infection Forms leapt towards him, but he either dodged them or swung the electro-quarterstaff out towards them, hitting multiple Infection Forms at once.

“Father, come on!” Rey shouted, waving her hoof for him to hurry.

With a mighty leap into the air, Macreedy landed on the back of the bike.

“GO, NOW!” he frantically shouted.

Rey immediately grabbed and squeezed a button on one of the control-sticks, causing the speeder to sped forwards. She pulled the stick back and bike arched its tip as it flew up into the sky.

Sitting up-right on the bike, Macreedy put his arms around his daughter’s waist before looking back over his shoulder at the wreaked Sontaran ship.

Down behind them on the ground, the large tentacles released their grip on the ship as several new Combat Forms emerged from the ship. One of them was the Sontaran commander, who snarled as he looked up into the sky towards Rey and her father as they fled.

Speeding through the air, Rey didn’t stop until she and her father returned to their dome home.

After a lengthy drive home, they flew inside the cliff mountain, straight towards their home. The garage door opened for them, and they flew inside.

Macreedy switched the bike off and they disembarked it, carrying their gear with them out of the garage dome into the central dome.

“Wow, I think that’s plenty excitement for one evening,” Macreedy exhaled heavily as he stepped into the living area, raising a hoof and rubbing the back of his neck.

Rey followed inside after him, nodding in agreement.

“Yeah, me too, ‘da. Goodnight,” she said, scratching the back of her head as she trotted up towards her room’s door.

“Goodnight, Rey,” Macreedy replied, yawning as he entered a corridor, following it to his room at the other end. The door automatically opened for him, and he stepped inside.

Several hours later, Rey suddenly jolted awake, immediately sitting up-right on the bed as she heard a voice scream aloud.

Her eyes shot wide-open, and she sat there on the bed breathing heavily.

The voice continued screaming, at which point it dawned on the pre-teen mare that it was her father!

Quickly pulling the covers off her body, she ran straight towards the door. It automatically opened for her and ran out into the living area, then turned left and entered the corridor that lead to her father’s room.

However, as the door automatically swooped open for her, she gasped as she froze in her tracks as she saw her father standing in the center of the room.

An Infection had wrapped its tendrils around his body, and had already burrowed well into his chest, causing his head to hang down over his right hoof. His skin changed color to a sickly pale, and his left hoof had already begun grotesquely morphing into a whip-like claw. Macreedy loudly groaned in pain as he tried fighting off the transformation into a Combat Form when he looked up at Rey – having heard her enter the room – and stared back at her with a pained expression, gritting his teeth.

“No…! No…! NO!”

Rey shook her head, eyes watering and voice breaking before she screamed aloud at the sight transpiring before her.

In an attempt to slow the Infection Form, Macreedy drooped himself onto the floor, pinning himself against the floor.

“Do it!” he shouted, pointing a shaky claw at his modified-blaster – which had been knocked over, and laid on the floor beside the bed.

Rey looked towards it, quickly running up towards it and picking it up. She pointed it at her father, but hesitated, watching his body continue to mutate and turn more of a sickly pale color.

His bones cracked and skin ripped open, all for the goal of making him into a weapon to serve the Flood.

As his eyes watered, his closed them and sobbed, experiencing the purest, most brutal pain in his entire life as the Infection Form continued gaining full control over him.

“Please, Rey, k-kill me!” he winched, in this moment wanting nothing more than to die, both so he wouldn’t hurt Rey and due to the physical and mental agony he was in.

Looking down at her father, Rey’s hooves started shaking as she watched her father suffer. She grimaced as the pain of seeing him like this overwhelmed her, bringing her to tears.

“I’m sorry!” she sobbed as she activated the flamethrower, spewing fire onto Macreedy.

The flames engulfed his body, and both Macreedy and the Infection screamed/screech in pain. Both of them burned as the fire incinerated them. The Infection flailed its tendrils as it tried to escape, but since Macreedy had his body pressed against the floor it was unable to.

Even as it tried, Rey screamed as the flamethrower spewed more fire, burning the Infection Form but good to ensure it didn’t survive…

Back in the present, Rey’s screaming echoed in Rey’s head as she stood in front of the corridor – leading to her father’s room.

She sniffled as a lone tear ran down along her chin.

****

A little while later, an escape pod laid deep underground inside a vast cavern chamber.

From the hole above it, a beam of light shined down upon the pod.

That light was abruptly blocked as a form approached the pod, descending towards it through the hole in the ceiling.

It was Rey on her speeder.

She guided the speeder down towards the surface, and then she, the Doctor and Twilight quickly got off it.

Grabbing her quarterstaff, she held it out in front of her as she kept a close eye on the many tunnel passages.

While Rey was on the look-out for any Flood forms, the Doctor and Twilight hurried over towards the escape pod.

“Hello? Is anyone there?” the Doctor asked as they peeked inside the pod, only to find that it was devoid of life.

Closing his eyes, the Doctor sighed heavily as he backed away from the pod.

Hanging his head, he trotted back up towards Rey’s speeder.

Upon reaching the speeder, he looked up at Rey, staring at her before he shook his head from side-to-side.

At seeing his reaction, Rey sighed heavily and averted her gaze as she hung her head.

****

A little while later, the three equines rode the speeder up, out of the cave into the air beside the mountains.

“That is the third pod we’ve found that’s empty,” Rey said as they flew through the air.

“Are you sure it’s possible that Poe, Holdo and the others survived the crash?” Twilight asked.

“As long as they managed to escape these caves before the Flood got to them, then yes. There is a chance that they survived,” the Doctor replied, briefly looking back over his shoulder at Twilight before he turned back in front of him towards Rey.

“Rey, fly West, Rey,” the Doctor instructed.

Rey furrowed her brows confusedly and looked back over her shoulder at him.

“West? What’s there?” she asked…

*Flashback*

The Doctor stood by a window, staring outside at the unspecified number of Sentinels that swarmed out the cliffside cave’s maw.

Whether not seeing them as a threat or unaware of their existence, the drones zipped back and forth through the air.

BLEEP BLEEP BLEEP

At hearing the sudden bleeping noises, the Doctor’s eyes widened, and he abruptly turned around. He trotted up towards the couch, reached into his pocket, and pulled out the holoprojector.

Activating it, the TARDIS’ familiar holographic avatar appeared.

“Yes?” the Doctor responded to seeing her again.

“Doctor, I’ve intercepted a faint energy signature West of our position,” the TARDIS said.

“It’s very weak – almost like its being suppressed – but it’s unmistakably a telepathic call for help.”

The Doctor’s brows jumped, and his jaw hung slack as he stared at her with a look of shock.

“Are you sure?” he asked.

“Positive, Doc.” She nodded back.

In response, the Doctor hung his head in contemplation as he thought about what their response to this information should be.

Once his mind was made up, he looked back up towards the TARDIS’s hologram.

“Then we’ll go investigate it tomorrow after we’ve searched for Poe, Holdo, and possibly any other survivors,” said the Doctor, which the TARDIS nodded back at him.

“Very good,” said the TARDIS.

“Good night, Doc. Happy hunting tomorrow,” the TARDIS said, smiling back at him before her hologram vanished back into the holoprojector.

The Doctor lowered his hoof but turned his head and looked right out the window behind him. He stared out of it until his head abruptly jerked towards the door of Rey’s room, and he watched her trot out of her room.

She stepped up towards and stopped in front of a corridor before staring down at the other end, sniffling as a tear ran down along her cheek…

*Present*

Hanging her jaw slightly open, Twilight furrowed her brows.

“But, Doctor, what about Poe, Holdo, the others?” Twilight asked, concerned for their friends’ safety.

The Doctor sighed, hanging his head before looking back over his shoulder at Twilight.

“Twilight, I’m sorry, but we must accept the possibility that they have been captured and assimilated by the Flood,” said the Doctor in a sad tone, “There is no way they could have escaped those caves, not without a navigator to help lead them to the surface,” he said, shaking his head dejectedly.

“You don’t know that!” Twilight yelled at him, raising her voice.

His eyes widened, and he shot her a shocked glare.

“Yes, I do. More than you can imagine,” he sternly said.

Twilight opened her mouth to respond, only to leave it hanging slack as she remembered that he was right.

He had fought the Flood before, so if there was anyone knowledgeable about the parasite it was the Doctor.

Afterall, had he not lost everything to them?

Frowning sadly, she hung her head – averting her gaze from the Doctor – and nodded back in response.

“I’m sorry, you’re right,” she said.

“I…I just hoped that they might have survived.”

The Doctor’s strict expression faltered, changing into sad frown at the sight of the –subtle, but still noticeable – distraught look on her face.

As Rey turned her speeder around and flew Westward, the Doctor hung his head as he looked back in front of him.

His sadness returning as he thought about how it must feel to Twilight for questioning him like that, like she hadn’t cared about all that he had suffered at the hands of the Flood.

He knows that she does.

She just wants to help save as many lives as possible, he can understand that.

Afterall, he had tried to do the same. A long time ago…

****

Deep within the Master Builder’s stronghold, Poe and Holdo sat alone inside a cell – large enough for the two of them. A barrier prevented them from leaving but allowed them to look out into the large room where their cell was located within.

Ever since their capture by the Master Builder, he had not seen the two other soldiers that had come here with them.

Meanwhile in another part of the Master Builder’s facility, a chamber was filled with the agonized screams of one of the taken soldiers.

The soldier laid – nude – on a table while a device above him projected a beam down upon him. The beam brought immense pain, making him feel like every part of his body was being ripped apart and then re-assembled.

Standing beside the table, the Master Builder held his arms behind his back as he watched his machine extract the Equestrian’s gaiyash. The terrible visage of the equine being tormented reflected in his visor. Behind his helmet, however, the Master Builder grinned sickeningly to himself, deriving pure joy from watching the Equestrian suffer.

Floating beside his master was Penitent Tangent, who silently observed the experiment alongside his master.

Soon, the Master Builder deactivated the machine, ending the soldier’s torment.

The soldier’s body fell limp against the table, his chest sharply heaven and fell as he inhaled staggered breaths.

“Pity. Looks like we lost another one,” he remarked sarcastically, smirking underneath his helmet at the pretense that the equine had not survived the extraction – when in reality he had.

“Tangent, have the bodies brought to the Preserve,” the Master Builder instructed to Penitent before he turned around and walked away from the table.

“I’m finished time,” he said, heading straight as he headed straight towards a wall, however, before hitting it, he immediately vanished in a bright, golden light.

“As you command, Master Builder,” replied Tangent before he looked back down at the table, at the soldier.

Then, he and the soldier vanished in a similar golden light, leaving the torture chamber behind.

A second later, the soldier re-appeared in a completely different place.

The cold metal table was replaced by soft grass.

He furrowed his brows confusedly as he felt the grass with his hoof.

“What the-?” he asked.

Sitting up on the grass, he turned his head and looked towards his surroundings.

All around him, he saw tall trees, beams of sunlight shot down through the tops of trees, casting their warm glow on his body.

He had ended up in a jungle of sorts…a jungle that ran for miles no matter the direction taken.

Elsewhere, the Master Builder re-appeared within another chamber and walked up towards a chair. He grabbed and held the armrests as he sat down in the chair, looking out in front of him towards several rectangular, blue, holographic screens as they floated in front of him.

Two displayed the two soldiers inside the Preserve…and the third was a place whose walls were covered in an odd, black surface with odd shapes and formations along the walls.

In the center of this chamber there sat a tall humanoid figure atop an odd growth that reached out from its crotch to behind it.

The humanoid had a bio-mechanical appearance, with an additional pair of arms on its chest, a bladed tail, no eyes, sharp teeth, and a large head-crest.

The Master Builder chuckled to himself as he sat back in chair, intertwining his fingers as he held his hands together in front of him.

“Let the hunt begin,” he said to himself.

“H-hello!? Is anyone there?” the other soldier shouted – in the spot that he had woken up.

He dared not to move from this spot, least of all because he didn’t know what awaited him out there in the jungle.

Sweat started running down his temple as his fear grew, mounting everything passing second.

The soldier immediately turned around, looking behind him as he heard something rustle in the bushes…only for his attention to snap up towards the trees as a branch snapped.

Up in the trees, something looked down towards the soldier.

Silently watching him from the treetops.

Predator and prey…

The soldier gasped and quickly turned left, looking behind him towards the thicket of jungle trees and bushes.

The leaves on one of the bushes bounced up and down, indicating that something had moved there.

His breathing intensified, now filled with fear and tension as his eyes darted back and forth; scanning his surroundings for signs of anything. Anything at all.

The soldier remained so fixated on what was in front of him…that he failed to notice a tall, dark silhouette encroaching on him.

“AAAHHHHHHHHHH…!”

The soldier screamed as a pair of hands suddenly reached out and grabbed him.

The unseen assailant then pulled him back across the clearing before disappearing into the dark trees.

Soon, a dead silence hung on the air of the clearing.

There was no sound, no movement.

Just…nothing.

Observing everything, the Master Builder and Penitent Tangent watched the creature drag the soldier off to an unknown fate.

His horrified screams echoing throughout the jungle until they finally died down as he vanished…

****

“Is that it there, Doctor?” Rey asked.

Peeking out from behind her back, the Doctor looked in front of them – as did Twilight – towards a series of large structures that they were coming up on.

Atop some mountains – but behind a large wall – arose a large, geometric and angular structure.

The center of the structure was a dome that sported four small spires, but flanking the dome were four, geometric spires that sloped in towards the center of the dome.

Briefly looking down at his Screwdriver, the Doctor returned his attention back up towards the structure in front of them.

“That’s our destination,” he replied.

“Alright, I’ll take us in then,” Rey said, flying the speeder through the air towards the structure.

As they passed over the wall, the Doctor and Twilight looked down towards it. They then looked up, facing each other before the Doctor shrugged his shoulders, and he looked back in front of him as Rey piloted the speeder down – once they were over the wall – towards a clearing where they could touch-down.

The speeder blew up snow as it landed on the surface.

Rey, Twilight and the Doctor disembarked the speeder, planting their hooves on the ground.

Twilight and the Doctor looked around at their surroundings, but none showed no more interest than Rey, who seemed entranced by the place.

“Doc, what is this place?” Rey asked.

“It’s a Forerunner facility,” said the Doctor, “Specifically, a Library; a pseudo repository of knowledge that can double as a research facility,” he explained before he looked back over his shoulder towards the two mares.

“The Forerunners may be gone, but their technological achievements should not be forgotten,” he said, which made Twilight furrow her brows.

“What do you mean “gone”?” she asked, raising a confused brow.

The Doctor looked at her and then said, “The Forerunners are extinct, Twilight.”

“They sacrificed themselves to destroy the Flood at the end of a worse war than the Last Great Time War,” he said, pulling out his sonic screwdriver and pointing it out in front of him. He watched the end blink and listened as it beeped.

“This way,” he said before he stepped forwards, traversing the snow as he headed straight towards a doorway – that leads into the mountain.

Twilight and Rey stepped forward, following him inside the mountain.

With the Doctor at the head of their little group, Twilight and Rey followed him down the corridor as he traced the signal.

Despite how determined they were to get to the bottom of who or what is creating the signal, Twilight and Rey cannot help but look in awe of this place’s architecture.

Enigmatic inscriptions covered the walls, the flashing – sometimes pulsating, throbbing lights – and most – if not all – the architecture was geometric and angular. A lot of it also used a lot of greys and gold.

Twilight did not know much about these Forerunners, but she could tell just from looking around at this architecture and these enigmatic shapes that they were dealing with a noble race.

While also interested in learning more about these mysterious Forerunners, Rey knew that her curiosity and intrigue to learn about this long-extinct race didn’t hold a candle to what she suspected Twilight would do if she were to ever meet a member of the species.

Rey would have asked a couple questions whereas Twilight would have bombarded them with questions, demanding an answer for each – question.

The Doctor hardly seemed to pay their surroundings much thought. His primary thought seemed to be on finding out the source of the signal.

However, while Twilight looked around – at the rear of the group – she missed a mural on the wall behind her.

The mural was a blue, holographic screen that displayed three humanoid figures raising and pointing their hands towards a humanoid that was double the size, worshipping it. This single, large humanoid held its arms out beside itself, shining beams of light down upon the three figures.

Two of the humanoids were males and the third was a female.

The being that the trio worshipped wore a long dress, from which tendrils reached out the bottom – of the dress – the underside of her arms was covered in leaves, her fingers were unnaturally long and also covered by the leaves.

Ignorant of the mural, Twilight continued after the Doctor and Rey, proceeding down the corridor with them.

Soon, they arrived back outside, where they found several peculiar lifts that they needed to cross the gap to reach the other.

Using his screwdriver, the Doctor activated the lift, using to ferry himself, Twilight, and Rey all the way across the gap towards the other side.

As they ventured deeper into the facility, the Doctor’s sonic screwdriver started beeping and blinking a lot louder and faster. An indicator that they were getting closer to the source of the signal…

At present, they have arrived at a large steel, but using his sonic screwdriver, the Doctor unlocked it. Once unlocked, the door moved upwards into the ceiling, revealing a vast chamber. From the other end of the room, the trio heard energy vibrantly humming coming a black sphere.

Large markings ran along the side of the sphere, projecting a fiery glow through the cracks.

After looking at each other, they stared back in front of them and strode forward inside it, crossing a thin but elongated walkway towards the center of the chamber.

At the end of the walkway, they were faced with two, odd-looking nods.

The Doctor furrowed his brows as he looked towards the nods, examining them until his eyes widened as it dawned on him what these were meant for.

Fishing out his sonic screwdriver, he pointed it at the two nods.

As the end glowed blue, the screwdriver made its loud, high-pitching buzzing noise as he scanned the two nods.

Eventually, he stopped scanning and put his screwdriver back in his waistcoat pocket.

Slowly turning his head, looked back over his shoulder at Twilight.

“I think it’s a locking/unlocking mechanism,” he said to her and Rey.

“A locking mechanism for what?” Rey asked, raising an intrigued brow at him.

“Let’s find out,” he said turning back towards the nodes.

He extended his hooves and touched them to the nodes, only to sharply hiss as he felt a sudden electric shock course through his body.

“Doctor!” Twilight called out.

“No, I’m fine!” he grunted, sharply looking back over his shoulder. In response, Rey and Twilight stopped in their tracks, “The system’s just connecting me to it, allowing me to control it,” the Doctor explained to them.

Looking back in front of him, the Doctor closed his eyes as he integrated with the systems. He accessed the control functions, focusing his attention on unlocking…whatever this thing was.

Finally, he managed to unlock it, triggering the release mechanism. He then removed his hooves from the nodes and backed away towards Twilight and Rey.

The sphere started humming which intensified as it lifted up into the air, rising higher and higher.

Then, the sphere suddenly released a powerful shockwave across the room, knocking them all to the floor!

Taken by surprise, the three equines quickly stood back up on their hooves, staring wide-eyed at each other.

“What the hell was that?!” Rey asked confusedly.

“I have no idea,” replied the Doctor.

Standing back up, Twilight immediately did a double-take as she noticed something happening to the sphere.

“Look,” she shouted, pointing her hoof at the bottom of the sphere.

Turning around, the Doctor and Rey stared to where Twilight was pointing and saw that the sphere was coming apart at the bottom. The black pieces – of what now looked to be a shell – pulled back as a small platform emerged from what looked like an inner layer comprised of magma.

Six clamps whirred as they moved downwards, revealing six meters tall, metal cylinder.

The trio stared at the cylinder until parts of it suddenly hissed as it released steam.

Like with the sphere, the cylinder separated into multiple pieces that floated off into the air…revealing an alien figure inside it – the capsule.

The figure held its arms in front of its face, but shortly, its arms twitched as life returned to the being. It lowered its arms from in front of its face, revealing a massive, flat, eurypterid-like head with wide-spaced, compound eyes. Its shoulders sloped and sported four arms. The upper arms were the biggest with a smaller pair underneath them. A barbed tentacle emerged at the back of the figure’s head.

While the majority of the figure’s body was humanoid, beneath the torso was just one, single large mass that sported many spiked legs underneath it – providing the creature balance.

Everyone of the trio’s eyes widened, and their jaws hung slack at the sight of the large alien being. However, none gawked more than the Doctor, who was in disbelief of what he was seeing.

“It’s a Precursor!” he said aloud, shocked and awed.

“A what?” Twilight and Rey asked in unison.

Before he could respond, the Precursor’s head jerked down, staring towards the three equines before it suddenly leapt into the air.

Despite its size, the Precursor was surprisingly fast, quickly landing behind the trio.

Standing up, the Precursor towered over the trio, silently staring down at them as neither of them moved an inch.

“Speak, Equestrians, where is the Master Builder?” the Precursor asked, speaking in a very deep, echoing voice, but one that the Doctor recognized as having a sense of nobility to it – and for good reason.

Natural tone aside, the voice, itself, was soft and high-pitched…like a female.

“Master Builder?” the Doctor asked, furrowing his brows bewildered and confused.

Confused about why the Precursor was concerned with the Forerunners. And bewildered that there were Forerunners on this planet.

Other than the Sentinels, they had not seen any other form of life…aside from perhaps the Flood.

“Yes, the one who found and imprisoned me within my own stasis capsule,” said the Precursor.

“Why?” asked the Doctor, “Why would this Master Builder do that to you? You are a Precursor!”

The Doctor pointed his hoof up at the Precursor, taking several forward towards it. The Precursor tilted its head to the side.

“So, then you mean to tell me that you are not allied with the Master Builder?” asked the Precursor, moving slightly forwards towards the trio.

“No,” said the Doctor, shaking his head.

“Now that I know a Forerunner was keeping a Precursor hostage, I will help you any way I can,” he said, taking several more steps towards the behemoth.

The Doctor and Precursor stared at each other until their attention was directed towards Rey…

“Okay, can someone please tell me what the hell is going on? Who are the Precursors? For that matter, who are these Forerunners?” she asked, notably confused about all of this.

The Precursor looked back down at the Doctor, who smiled and nodded back.

“You can trust them, they’re with me,” he said, tapping his chest, to which the Precursor looked up from him towards Rey.

“We, Precursors, were the mass-seeders of all life in the galaxy; creating countless planets as well as the creatures that roamed them. And the original holders of the Mantle of Responsibility, which meant that we were the guardians of the galaxy...until the Forerunners betrayed us,” the Precursor explained.

“One of our greatest creations were the Forerunners and Equestrian species. Under our care, both races thrived and prospered, achieving great technological capabilities. However, once the Forerunners learned that they would not inherit the Mantle of Responsibility, they rebelled against us, hunting us all down until only a few remained,” she said, sounding progressively sadder while simultaneously putting her left hand on her chest.

“For all their achievements, they failed to see – or even understand – why we choose the Equestrians over them,” she added.

Rey, Twilight, and especially the Doctor frowned sadly as they looked back towards the Precursor.

“I…I’m sorry,” Twilight said, unable to fathom what it must feel like to be hunted down to near-extinction by ones’ own creations.

Despite the plethora of questions racing through her head, she wanted to appear sympathetic to the Precursor.

“Me too. As the last of my kind, I understand your pain,” the Doctor said, touching his hoof on his chest.

“You are the last of your kind?” the Precursor asked confusedly, “So, you mean to tell me that you are not an Equestrian?” asked the Precursor, pointing its finger at him.

“Mm-hmm.” The Doctor nodded back.

“My race, the Time Lords perished in the Last Great Time War,” the Doctor explained.

“Time War? Time Lords?” she asked confusedly, until something dawned on her.

“Oh yes, I remember now. Your people lived in the constellation of Kasterborous on the planet Gallifrey,” she said optimistically.

Smiling, the Doctor craned his head and looked up at the Precursor.

“That’s right,” he said back.

“Then, state your name, Time Lord,” she said.

“Gladly. I am the Doctor,” said the Doctor, smiling up at her.

“Doctor,” replied the Precursor, letting the name sink in, “You are a healer then since you bear the name of doctor?” she asked.

“A travelling one,” the Doctor said, shrugging his shoulders.

“Traveling? You do not reside on Gall- Oh!” she asked before she suddenly realized why the Doctor travelled.

He had no home to back to.

“You have my sympathies, Doctor,” she said, bowing her head in respect.

“Thank you. It means a lot to hear that from a Precursor,” he said, smiling warmly up at her.

“But, if I may be allowed to ask, who are you?” he asked back.

“Mortuus Viventem, the Primordial,” Mortuus said.

“Hello, Mortuus Viventem, Primordial of the Precursors.”

The Doctor bowed his head in respect.

Not wanting to appear disrespectful before the last surviving member of a long-extinct god race, Twilight and Rey also bowed their heads.

Once they stood up, the Doctor and Mortuus stared at each other again until Mortuus interrupted the silence.

“Now, let us be on our way before the Master Builder discovers that you have infiltrated his facility and freed me,” Mortuus said.

“Of course,” the Doctor said, bowing his head a second time – like one would do to royalty – and looked back over his shoulder at Twilight and Rey.

“Come on.”

He waved Twilight and Rey onwards as he trotted forwards. Without hesitation, they strode forward after him.

Following the equines with her eyes as they approached her, Mortuus eventually turned around and headed towards the doorway.

Together, the four aliens left the chamber together.

Author's Note

I don't own any of the pictures.

Feedback and comments are appreciated