Fall of the Caribou: First Strike

Date: July 12, 2394
Time: 10:08 PM
Location: Equestria, Everfree
Forest.

We had walked along the path for a little while now, the sun had started to set below the trees behind us.

“So, Starlight, could you tell me about what has happened over the past five years?” I asked

“Yeah, Four years ago, the Caribou had Finished conquering most of this continent except for a small griffin colony to the Northeast, I was roaming about the East coast, attacking Caribou patrols. I did that for a couple months until I ran into a resistance group, I fought alongside them for 2 years until I had gotten caught after we walked into an ambush. I was enslaved in Ponyville until several hours ago when I escaped and ran into the Everfree, and well... you know the rest.” Starlight responded

“Do you know what happened to that group afterwards?”

“No I don’t, I think they might have been destroyed, I noticed a decrease in soldiers around Ponyville.”

Alright, that’s good to know.

“If we’re going to be fighting together, I think we should know more about each other. I was born in a small village named Calmare, I lived there with a friend named Sunburst. We were great friends, after he got his cutie mark, he moved to Canterlot to attend a magic school. After a while I went to pretty much the middle of nowhere at the time and made a town where the Ponies that lived there had no cutie mark. Twilight Sparkle and her friends came to the town, I stole their cutie marks. Soon after the Ponies there had enough and rose up against me. I fled into the nearby caves. I acquired a time travel spell and tried to stop Twilight from meeting her friends, she showed me the future, Equestria was a complete wasteland with no life whatsoever.”

“Interesting life story, I was born on the planet of New Eden, in the capital city of New Moscow. I really only had one friend, he joined the navy at age eighteen. My father was an early Bio-engineer and my mother was a secretary for some big corporation. After I graduated from college, I applied for a position for the Tokyo Biotech company, I got the job and soon after the company was acquired by the New Eden Defence force. We all got some basic survival and combat training. This pulse pistol they supplied us with is complete crap, the ammunition feed jams frequently, the weapon overheats way to quickly, and it requires a lot of maintenance to actually function. The only good thing about it is that it’s easy to disassemble for maintenance.”

We didn’t talk much after that, when we got to the castle, it was almost dark. The grey ruins of the castle was being overrun by vines and trees. The only way across was a small rickety wooden bridge. I looked back at Starlight before looking back at the bridge. I could see the bridge swing from side to side as we crossed it.

We entered the castle, most of the interior was still intact. We wandered around for a little bit before we found a room that was still intact. I pulled the MLCU off my back and set it on the floor. I never realized how tired I was until I was laying on the floor, sleep soon overcoming me and my world faded to black.

———————————

After I awoke the next day, I picked up the MLCU, and reholstered my Pulse Pistol. I walked down the hallways of the ruins, I eventually came to what appeared to be a throne room, several holes were in the ceiling and the back wall. Other than that, it was a pretty secure room. I again, set down the MLCU, this time however I activated it. A holographic keyboard was projected in front of me. I looked through several controls until I found the activation menu.

Huh, it appears that Skirmisher DNA is already inserted into this. They won’t be useful in melee combat, they should be great as a recon unit though.

I activated it fully and a timer popped up, showing how long until the first batch of Skirmishers will be ready. The timer read, 5 hours, 48 minuets, 32 seconds. I heard my stomach grumble, that’s when it hit me that we had no food supplies, we we’re either going to have to find it or steal it from the nearby village of Ponyville. As I turned around, Starlight has walked into the room, now with a full set of clothes, don’t know where she got it from but, I’m not going to question it at the moment, she walked over to where I was and asked me what I was doing.

“I’m just setting up the MLCU, it’s going to take about 6 hours for the first batch of Skirmishers to finish. I did notice however, that we have no food, I’m kinda doubting that there’s food nearby.” I told Starlight.

“Umm, I don’t think so, the only place close by with food would be Ponyville.” Starlight responded.

“Well, we could either try to hunt something in the forest around us, or we could try and sneak in during the night and steal some food from Ponyville.”

“The main problem i can see with heading to Ponyville is that your the only one with a weapon, and like you said, it’s not that great.”

“I’m thinking that we could try and make some crude weapons, or we find a way to head northeast towards the Gryphons and try to buy weapons from them.”

“Maybe going to Ponyville will be safer, Sweet Apple Acres has its fields extending to the edge of the Everfree, I think that would be easier that hunting a Manticore.”

“What’s a Manticore?”

“A Manticore is a big lion with bat wings and a scorpion tail, trust me you don’t want to run in to one of those.”

“That’s good to know. So, we’re heading to Sweet Apple Acres at nightfall.”

Starlight nodded and walked off, back down the corridor she came from. I pulled out my pistol and began to disassemble it to try and fix the jam.