Population Control

Chapters

Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5

Chapter 1

Version: 2

Imelda Noble was a snow white unicorn with a long messy black mane. She was tall and muscled, her body crisscrossed with several bald scars. As she reclined on her back, legs sprawled about randomly, she certainly looked like a wild pony. Her blood red eyes were half closed as she stared at the television. It was muted and subtitles were rolling across the screen, but she was only barely paying attention to even that. Strewn about the floor was a diverse field of garbage that included food wrappers and disposable microwave meal trays. Beneath the layer of trash was her ship's metal flooring, stained from years of messes.

A low beeping caused one of her ears to twitch. The mare lazily lifted her head to gaze across the room. A blue light was blinking slowly in the dark corner. She had mail.

Imelda sighed in frustration. She didn't want to get up. She groaned with the effort of rolling over and dropped off the couch. She stretched her back even as the beeping continued to notify her of the message. The unicorn yawned as she waddled across the room, not even noticing the random things she kicked to and fro as she headed straight for the console. The television continued to play whatever boring thing she had left it on as she plopped down in her seat and tapped on the keyboard. The terminal screen lit up, blinding her for a moment. Imelda growled and rubbed her eyes. She blinked away tears as she glared at the once dark surface in front of her. This had better be important.

"Contract Request"

Imelda scratched her butt with one hoof as she leaned forward to make sure she was reading it correctly. That was unusual. She rubbed her eyes and read it again. The subject line of the message had not changed. It still read "Request".

The mare eased back into her chair, taking a split second to stretch her spine and neck again. She worked her tongue around her teeth. She lifted her hooves over her head and crudely brushed her mane down a bit. Imelda was wasting time to think. Was it worth reading? She hummed, rolled her eyes, and shrugged. She didn't have any other contracts to fulfill at the moment. She used her hoof to poke the glowing screen in front of her and opened the message. It was very long and included several data file attachments.

This was too much info for Imelda to process at the moment. The unicorn huffed, scratching her head in agitation. The mare seriously considered just closing this and going back to...

Imelda glanced at the couch bathed in the glow of mundane entertainment. That craving for action always burned in her veins and merely watching someone else jump around never did it for her. She rubbed her left shoulder where a nasty burn had marked her with a permanent bald patch. She glanced at the message which was a literal wall of text. She needed to wake up more before she dealt with this.

Imelda Noble quickly finished off a meal of instant mush and downed a cup of liquid energy. Her mind was now alert and she was ready to digest whatever this contract had to offer. The mare dropped into her seat and began diligently reading what had been specifically sent to her.

The more she read the more confused Imelda became. The mare hesitantly opened one of the attachments and stared at the image. An alien race she had never seen before. Then she gaped at the scale beside the diagram. That was impossible. The unicorn lifted a hoof and stared at it. These... "humans"... were less than two meters tall? Imelda was nearly 20 if she just measured from the shoulder. Even without counting her head and neck she would have towered over these little creatures. Such small things couldn't possibly be sentient like the message suggested.

Then she opened the attachment that included various images of the human homeworld so uncreatively named "Earth". Huge sprawling cities complete with towers and bridges and infrastructure like any she'd seen on developed worlds. The parade of evidence went on and on.

The mare's jaw hung lower and lower the further she dove into the request until she had to stop and massage her temples. Surely this was madness. Some idiot with nothing better to do must have thrown this collection of nonsense together then sent it to countless suckers across the universe. Such a thing was not unheard of. They were usually part of a scam or a cover to infect computers with viruses. Luckily, Imelda was no stranger to those tactics and her terminal had some high grade protections. The fact no alarm had been tripped eliminated the possibility this was an attempt to spread a computer virus. So she wasn't sure what to make of it.

It was insanity at a level that made even a mercenary like her uncomfortable. Imelda felt her guts twisting at the very thought of the request. This contract was something else entirely. Imelda had never seen anything like it. It disturbed her. It enticed her. It claimed things that were nearly beyond belief. It was the most complex situation she had ever been thrown into. She had to talk to the sender.

The connection opened and a box with a single line running through the middle appeared on her screen. It flickered up and down as the other person spoke.

"Greetings. I take it you got my request."

Imelda worked her jaw for a moment, not sure what the best way to start was. Was this negotiating? "I did. Is this... real?"

"Indeed." The voice on the other end sounded a bit robotic. No doubt he was using a voice scrambler to obscure his identity, but that also made it harder to tell what tone he was speaking with.

"Humans are not a registered species with any nation or company," Imelda stated a bit harshly. "I have a hard time believing a random caller could have exclusive knowledge of an entirely new alien race."

"Have you checked the coordinates included in the details? I think that will explain a lot."

Imelda blinked. She quickly entered the string of numbers into her navigator and was shocked where they pointed. "That's way out in the Dark Zone," she mumbled.

"Beyond the reach of any authority," the robot voice added.

Imelda swallowed. "You went that far to scan random planets?" She couldn't help probing him a bit. The Gray Zone was as far as prospectors tended to go. There were still lots of planets in that region that hadn't been claimed, yet were still close enough that new claims could realistically be mined or colonized. The Dark Zone was anything beyond that, completely unexplored and unrealistic for mining or colonizing. Shipping lanes would be stretched to their breaking point at distances that large. Defending them from pirates would be a futile endeavor.

"Will you do it or not?" The voice sounded impatient even with the scrambler.

Imelda grumbled to herself. He wasn't going to give her anything else. "What you are asking for is... insane."

"What's the problem? The local technology is so primitive you'll be invincible. Take whatever resources you want as payment and have fun."

She bit her lip. "Are they really that small?"

"Yes."

"It's... wrong..."

"Why? They are weaker than you, why not take whatever you want?"

"I am not a mindless killing machine!" Imelda barked. "I'm a merc, not a... a... planet destroyer!"

"I'm not asking you to exterminate them."

"Yeah, you just want me to reduce the planet to 1/10th its current population," she hissed.

"Yes. The humans suffer from countless complications caused by their excessive numbers. Culling them, like any herd animal, will stabilize the situation long enough for them to learn their mistake."

"This isn't war, this is genocide," Imelda stated.

"Genocide would be extermination. I want to help them."

"By killing them?"

"Is overpopulation never a problem?" the voice challenged.

"Then why don't you do it?" Imelda growled, choosing not to take his obvious bait. Everyone knew there were plenty of planets with too many people.

"I lack the technology or weapons. I assure you, if you gave me your ship and equipment, I would do it myself." There was a conviction in those words that made Imelda recoil.

"This is... insane," the mare mumbled as she rubbed her face.

"Take the planet's resources as payment. You have automated mining gear, yes? And recyclers? You can breakdown and reuse the materials mankind has built his civilization with."

"I'd have to buy a lot of equipment first," she admitted quietly. "I need to upgrade my drives just to make a jump that far."

"But once you get there you'd have an entire planet to mine and harvest for all your needs," the voice reasoned.

Imelda massaged her shoulder again. "Just getting there is going to put me in debt."

"Then bring plenty of storage space."

He was right. Finding so much material that wasn't.... claimed... could be incredibly lucrative, but she didn't have a way to transport it. Unless she spent her savings. It was risky, but she could always sell the transport when she was... done.

"Will you do it?" the voice asked again.

"Why do you want me to do this? Is this really to 'help' them or do you intend to invade after I've softened them up for you?" He did say something about not having the technology to do it, which was strange. She was just one mercenary, it wasn't like she had access to anything special.

"If you care then stick around and guard them while they recover."

Imelda blinked. That was an unexpected challenge. "If I care?" she echoed.

"Do you?" Did she?

"I... I... I need to think about this," she mumbled.

"Small species, primitive technology, valuable minerals, no higher authority to stop you. Make a decision quickly. Or I'll send my request to someone else."

The connection ended and Imelda Noble was alone in her ship.

To be a mercenary was to be a killer. Imelda had killed hundreds in her life. For credits or to protect herself. She'd worked for honest folk, she'd worked for scum. So why was this job so much more difficult? Why did it twist her guts? Why should she care?

Because the number of lives she'd be taking would be so much greater? Instead of hundreds it would be billions. She couldn't even fully grasp the scale of it. To attack an entire planet by herself? Ludicrous! Yet, if the info she had been sent was accurate, it was entirely possible. And the profit she could make while doing it was huge. Easily enough to cover any loan she might have to take just to get out there.

Why was she a mercenary? Because she had no honest cause to fight for.

Why shouldn't she do whatever enriched herself? Because no one else cared about her.

Slaughtering helpless little aliens was wrong? Only if there was a military or company authority to punish her for it. Right?

Imelda Noble's small cruiser turned toward the Olscaria sector. She had equipment and supplies to get.

Imelda fell into the captain's chair of her new ship. The sheer number of upgrades and new equipment she needed were too much to justify adding to her old ship. So she cleaned out her vessel and sold it, then she pulled all her savings and took out a loan on top of that to buy a next generation long-range cargo ship. It wasn't pretty, but it had drives strong enough to get her where she was going and some mid-grade protections that would easily repel anything humanity could try and throw at it. It was the most expensive thing she had ever owned. The biggest investment of her life. Even as she pulled out of the dock and punched in her coordinates she couldn't help worrying. If the request was all made up, a joke, her life would be ruined. She'd have to become a space trucker.

The thought made her shiver. She hated navigating the shipping lanes.

Imelda buckled herself in, exhaled nervously, and hit the button. The warp drives powered up after a moment of charging and her boxy new ship vanished in a streak of light.

It was seven o'clock in the morning Greenwich Mean Time when the emergency broadcast went out. An announcement made to the entire world at the same time. The developed world at least. It was on every channel. Even the big social networking sites had to force their users to watch it. It was the most important news broadcast in history.

A meteor, estimated to be just over one-third the size that killed the dinosaurs, was going to hit with 96 percent certainty.

The leaders of the developed world tried to assure their populations that this was not extinction. NASA had determined that the impact site would be somewhere in the Pacific Ocean. The entire western coast of the United States was being evacuated. Similar evacuations were taking place in Japan, Australia, and even China. Hawaii was also being evacuated entirely. The islands were considered lost. The tsunami wave estimations were off the charts. Humanity had just over 100 hours to prepare for impact.

Imelda stared out her window at the little planet. She was coming at it from the night side and had a terrible glare from the sun blazing through her window, but that wasn't enough to ruin the view. The lights of many cities and towns dotted the dark orb, sparkling like gems in a cave. No matter how many she saw in her travels, flying towards a planet always filled her with... something. It was a hard emotion to describe. Joy wasn't right. Relief? It wasn't like space scared her. Awe might have been close. The unicorn shook her head. Did she have time for thoughts like this? Well, sort of actually. She'd probably be doing this job for the rest of her life. Until she retired she'd be... terrorizing a helpless primitive world.

Imelda closed her eyes and took a breath. Not now. She would not think about that. There was work to do.

The mercenary stepped away from the window as her navigator prepared to turn the ship and set it into orbit above the clueless world below. The pony approached a glowing table that projected a three dimensional image of Earth into the center of the room. The image was larger than herself by a bit. It spun slowly, mesmerizing Imelda for a moment. She grunted and tried to focus on the task at hand. Where should she land? What was her plan?

"Highlight population distributions," she said to seemingly no one.

The planet's realistic colors vanished and were replaced by various splotches of yellows, reds, and ugly dark purples. It looked like some kind of exotic bruised fruit. The mare examined it for a few seconds. There was no place she obviously wanted to start from this information.

"Highlight elevations."

Again the globe changed colors. It was now blues, whites, and blacks. Again there was no obvious place to start from this information. Imelda growled.

"Highlight... resources."

This time the planet became a mass of lines, symbols, and colors. It was a jumble that only the most trained eye could have made sense of. Imelda took her time studying the map and its abundant decorations. Yet again, there was no obvious place to start.

Imelda fell on her rump and swallowed. Powerful emotions welled up inside her. The decision was not going to be made for her. She had to decide where to start. Why did her eyes feel a little wet? She quickly wiped her cheek and snorted. She was a mercenary with an open-ended job in front of her. The unicorn should have been happy she got to make her own decisions. That was often the worst part of being a merc. The guys who hired you often put stupid restrictions on what you could do and threatened to withhold your pay if you didn't obey. This time she could do whatever she wanted.

But where to start?

Imelda swiped at the globe in frustration and the image spun rapidly in response. Around and around it went as she watched with an empty stare.

The mare glanced away for a moment, thinking instead about her equipment. It was limited. She had bought some pretty nice fabricators and intended to make almost all her gear and ammo here. But she needed materials first. The unicorn sighed. She looked at the globe again, still displaying all the planet's known resources.

"Highlight iron and oil deposits only," Imelda ordered the globe.

The mass of information disappeared until only two kinds of symbols were left, though there were still a lot of those. Again she growled and swiped at the image. It spun. When the mare could stand watching it no longer she jabbed her hoof into the projection and it stopped rotating immediately.

Coincidentally, one of the smaller landmasses was right in front of her. It had large iron and oil deposits.

"Highlight population again," Imelda ordered.

The symbols were replaced with shades of yellow, red, and purple. The purples were darkest in three spots along the coast, with lighter purples and reds wrapping around the rest of the huge island. There were streaks of light red and yellows reaching into the center of the landmass where most of the resources were.

Imelda whined uncomfortably. It... matched her basic criteria for a staging area perfectly. It had the resources she needed to build her equipment. It had large amounts of space with a limited population for her to retreat and rest. And it clearly had large cities for her to... attack.

The mare closed her eyes and took a breath. She swallowed. This was it. Her last chance to turn around. To stop this before it started. There would be no turning back after this decision.

The ship's engines hummed quietly in the background. Outside the window behind her the surface of the world zipped by. The unicorn was still.

"What is the name of this region?" she murmured.

The computer thought for a moment, undoubtedly searching the human internet for the answer. "Locals call this continent Australia."

Imelda was silent for a minute. Then she unceremoniously turned toward the far door and began to leave the room. "Set an alarm for 12 hours. Then plot a landing near one of Australia's iron mines. I need to relax before we... get started."

Author's Note

When I write a story I know what it is I'm trying to do. Some of my works have very deep meanings or messages baked into the subtexts. Some of my stories are just for entertainment. Some of my writing is just meant to explore a concept or idea. But this piece? Even I'm not sure what I'm trying to do.

Does this story have some kind of message? I don't think so. I certainly don't believe that humanity is this evil thing or that our population is too large. Though a good writer is one who at least plays with beliefs he doesn't necessary like or agree with.

Who is Imelda? She's certainly not a good person considering she KNOWS what she's going to do is VERY wrong, yet decides to do it anyway. And for WHAT?! She had a ship and savings already. Why does she need all this money? Why didn't she immediately report human existence to a government or something? Maybe she's also a bit dumb? Even the author doesn't know who she is. That's not a recipe for disaster...

Like I said, this is the first time I've ever written a story and not known what the point of the story is. As long as it's entertaining or thought provoking to the audience though I guess it's fine?

Chapter 2

Version: 1

Imelda finished tightening a belt around her chest with a grunt. Standing tall, her wild mane jutting out in all directions like she had just been electrocuted, she felt horribly exposed. Imelda was used to heavy armor. Thick metal plate was her typical setup. However, all she had right now was this ridiculous cloth armor. It left a rotten taste in her mouth. Kevlar had a bad tendency to cause itching and she was already starting to feel it. Yet there was nothing she could do about it at the moment. She had been really stretching her finances with the ship and fabricators alone, so when it came time to grab her starting gear she had a choice to make. In the end she decided to trust her life to the shield generator mounted in the middle of her back.

Imelda didn't like it. Energy shields were amazing, there was no arguing that, but she was a mercenary and she knew their limits from experience. Shields had three flaws which often cost the overconfident soldier their life. Shields had limited batteries, a minimum reaction time, and the infamous "ghost shot" phenomenon. The older models also had problems with overheating, but hers was a newer version so that was unlikely to become an issue. Though she had weighed the risks and concluded the shield was by far more important than her armor, it still left her feeling like she was going to a battlefield naked.

Imelda shook her head, instead choosing to give the auto-turret mounted to her shoulder a once over. The mare couldn't help smiling at this little tool of death.

Bullets. Level two technology. Primitive. Simple. Smelly. Heavy. At least her weapon felt right. Blinking once, she confirmed that her up-link to the machine gun's targeting system was working. She turned her head this way and that way and the barrel of her weapon dutifully pointed at whatever her eyes did. The muscles in her leg tightened and the turret tried to fire. A satisfying series of clicks filled the small room. Imelda was often teased by other mercenaries for her choice of firearm, but it was such a staple in pony history. The shoulder mounted auto-turret. In use for longer than even the sword. It was one of the few sentimental things she allowed in her life.

Next she had to grab her grenades. The unicorn faced the three canisters with their simple twist tops sitting on a shelf in her locker. Another gamble she had taken. Imelda recognized that her turret wasn't meant for shooting small fast moving targets like human aircraft. They could easily become a nuisance for her. The mare intended to stay away from the ocean for now so human warships wouldn't be a factor, and ground targets would be turned to Swiss cheese in seconds against her, but she didn't yet have a good counter for aircraft. So she chose to have these three air-burst grenades made.

Air-burst grenades were not even considered a proper weapon. They were crowd control. Meant to be used by police to shut down riots. They worked by releasing a concussive blast that would deafen and stumble anyone nearby. That was the effect she was counting on. That explosion of air against another pony would have been little more than a shove, but against tiny human planes? It was likely these air-burst grenades would clear the skies if they got crowded. Maybe. Hopefully.

Imelda attached the grenades to her side. Then she pulled out a large gray box that rattled. The box attached to a hook on her other side and from it she extracted a belt of ammunition. Using her hooves rather than her horn, the mare loaded the first round into her turret with practiced ease. With a click, her gun was ready to fire as soon as she turned the safety off. Finally, the mare retrieved a data pad from her equipment locker. A simple screen with Velcro straps. It took her all of a second to slap the device to her left foreleg and secure it in place. Then she took a few practice steps to make sure it wouldn't move. And with that, Imelda was as ready for action as she was going to get.

She didn't have her heavy armor. The mare would have to mine some iron and use the fabricators to make her some steel plate. She didn't have her trusty backup weapon, an ion rifle. Level four tech that could punch through just about any infantry mounted shield. Though it was unlikely she'd need something like that against humans. She also didn't have her portable artillery, her mini-rocket launcher. Again, she probably wouldn't need that either anyway. Lastly, she didn't have any backup. She'd need to get her hooves on a lot of different metals before she could print some drones to watch her back.

She felt poorly equipped. Which was somewhat illogical. From the files she'd been sent the only gear she really needed to have an overwhelming edge in the coming war was her shields. As long as human weapons couldn't touch her she could simply crush or bulldoze whatever got in her way. Her size alone would be enough to destroy anything the humans built, whether it was a building or a vehicle. However, the one advantage the humans had happened to play against one of the major weaknesses of shield technology. The only way Imelda could realistically see the humans killing her.

Numbers.

Shield tech worked by sensing incoming attacks and then reacting by projecting a repulsion field. The key was that the shield was not constantly active. That would drain the battery or overheat the unit very quickly. Meanwhile, what the humans lacked in technology or firepower they certainly could make up for in sheer numbers. She was alone on their homeworld after all. If the humans simply fired enough projectiles at her in a short enough span of time, inevitably her shields would fail. However, while Imelda's shields were not the most advanced on the market, they were high quality. Draining her battery would take a tremendous amount of ammo. And it wasn't like the humans knew this either. So would they "waste" enough bullets that her shields failed? At some point the human military was going to get desperate and throw everything they had at her. So it was a safe bet the true answer was "when" rather than "if".

Which is why Imelda wanted her armor. While her armor could never protect her as well as her shield, it only needed to keep her alive long enough to either get her shield running again or for her to retreat. If she had a teleporter that would have been even less of a concern.

Imelda sighed and snatched the last thing she might need from the locker in front of her. It was a capped syringe full of healing nanobots. She didn't have anyone to pull her bleeding body back to the ship if things went badly, so the nanobots would be her second life. Working alone was always risky. It was times like these she wondered why she never signed up with a mercenary company.

She growled and slammed the locker door.

The equipment room was quiet for a minute.

Imelda exhaled slowly. The stress was eating her. The mare forcefully puffed out her chest and tried to remind herself that action was coming. That was something she enjoyed. For now though, she had to get to the hanger and grab the mining gear. It was time to head out. Her ship was about to land and she shouldn't waste any time.

Most of those attending the meeting couldn't do so in person. Not on such short notice. So it was a conference call. Each member was "attending" through a computer and a microphone. And it was a mess.

"How could you confuse a meteor and an alien craft!?" someone barked.

"How do we keep this from going public?"

"What does that matter? Have you seen the looting? The world has already gone crazy. The damage is done."

"What is their intentions? What do they want?"

"Is NASA sure this time? How do they know it isn't a meteor? Maybe it was just captured in Earth's gravity."

"The craft is almost three kilometers long and half a kilometer wide. That seems pretty big for 'peaceful exploration'. I'm telling you they are hostile."

"We don't know anything yet people! Calm down and try to think rationally!"

One man sat at a desk, hands on his face, hunched forward. What was he supposed to do? Mankind had only entertained this possibility in movies and television. It was never supposed to happen. Not for real. He already had enough to deal with after the panic caused by the meteor announcement. Now they were going to tell the world it was actually alien visitors? What if they were wrong again? To announce something like that and turn out to be mistaken would be the greatest public embarrassment ever committed by a politician. Yet if he waited to announce the backlash of "trying to cover it up" could be just as damaging.

And that wasn't even touching the impossible question of First Contact itself.

Were they peaceful explorers or hostile invaders? The fate of humanity was now orbiting above their heads. The fact there did not seem to be even an attempt at communication was a bit worrying, but they had only just arrived. Maybe they were surveying the surface first?

The man rubbed the sweat that was beginning to pour down his face. There was no right answer. He didn't know what to do. Then a sudden revelation made his blood run cold.

"It's dropping out of orbit!"

"Where's it going to land?" the man demanded.

The ship bounced once, making Imelda grunt. Her new ship didn't have the best shocks it seemed. Whatever. It was a cargo carrier, not a luxury cruiser. The pony waited a few seconds until a warm beep verified the ship was firmly settled. It was time to get to work.

Imelda deftly pressed a large red button in front of her which caused an entire wall to begin falling away. The hanger door was a bit loud and she pinned her ears with a grimace. Earth's atmosphere poured in along with a bit of dust no doubt kicked up from the landing. She coughed once and waved a leg in front of her face as the high pitched whine continued. After at least 10 seconds of holding the button the door-turned-ramp hit the ground with a thump. The pony then gazed out on a new alien world.

It was a wasteland.

Imelda snorted with amusement. The only plant life was the scattered specks that were weeds and patches of dry bushes. It kind of resembled moss due to the scale of life on this planet.

Imelda stepped out into the shadow of her ship, her hooves sinking into the orange soil. She was currently facing west and the sun was just rising in the east. Early morning local time. Her ship said it had landed a few short kilometers from an iron mine which was supposed to be right in front of her. Yet, she didn't see anything but desert. The pony raised her left leg and eyed her data pad. With a few taps she accessed the satellite she'd deployed earlier and checked her coordinates. It merely confirmed that an iron mine was less than three kilometers dead ahead. The unicorn raised a brow at this. Then she shrugged.

Imelda faced the open hanger and gave a quick whistle. Three robots began rolling out of the storage space. Two of them were just automated carts with treads. She intended to spend today mining and the heavy metal bins were meant to haul the ore back to the ship for deconstruction. They were each big enough to fit two ponies with a bit of room to spare. The last robot was her mining engine.

Imelda was a mercenary, not a geologist or a miner. She knew little about the process. So when it came time to choose a mining robot she wasn't sure what the best design would be. A drill? A saw? A jackhammer? The mare eventually concluded that she didn't need to get every last stone in a given mine and she wasn't going to be staying in one place for very long. She'd have to migrate as her... prey... inevitably fled. So the tool she settled on looked like a bizarre combination of a crane, a rolling pin, and a suspension bridge.

The business end was a very wide roller covered in sharpened buckets. Behind the main wheel was a thick arm supported by cables leading back to a car with treads. Another arm connected this part to a second car further back with an obvious conveyor belt leading off the back. This monster was meant to cut and scoop huge amounts of material off the surface then feed it down two conveyor belts to the back where it could be dumped into one of her carts. It was the most brute force method there was to mining. The most aggressive open pit digger there was. It was perfect for Imelda. Except that its top speed was barely a walk.

Step. Step. Step.

In moments the unicorn was bored. Here she was, marching across some alien desert, with two self-driving wagons and a huge digging machine. Even worse, it was enemy territory and all she had was Kevlar body armor, a portable shield generator, and a single turret. Her ears turned this way and that. Her satellite watched the skies. Her eyes danced across the horizon. No movement. She was alone. Imelda huffed. Where was this mine?

The pony easily stepped over a small crevice and her robot followers rolled through it like it was nothing. Then the mare paused. Imelda glanced down at the ground. At the crack. No, that wasn't the right word for it. It was a dry stream channel, something that would eventually feed into a river. It was maybe a meter or two deep and less than the width of her hoof. For a moment she stared at it. To her this was no obstacle. Barely even worth noting. Maybe if she was running for her life, remembering this was here would save her from tripping. However, it brought to mind the size difference. For humans this would be a ditch. While she could simply waltz right over this gap, humans would need to make a running jump. She had yet to see the little creatures in action so she couldn't be sure how physically capable they were though. Maybe this would be no problem for them. Were they like insects with incredible jumping abilities? Or would they have to drop down on one side and climb up the other?

Imelda lifted a hoof and gazed at it. A human could walk across her hoof. That's how much bigger she was.

The mare shook her head. She would not think about this right now. The unicorn continued looking for the mine.

She began climbing a small hill, brushing a few of what she guessed were dead trees out of her way. Behind her the digging machine chugged as its treads bulldozed the hillside. As the top of the rise drew near she felt her heart leap at the sight. The silver gleam of metal rooftops. Though the discovery created a mix of thoughts and feelings. She knew these were buildings, but they were shorter than herself, barely as high as her barrel. It was more like stepping into someone's model. There was joy at finding the mine, or at least the facility, but there was also tension. Would there be humans here? Would the fighting start now? The mercenary paused at the crest of the hill and analyzed the terrain.

No movement. The only sounds were from her digging machine coming up behind her and the wind. There were clearly roads leading into a few of the shorter buildings which she guessed were either dumping sites or garages. She'd have to get closer to be sure. There were silos and piles of gravel off to the side, though she doubted that was all the material from the mine. Speaking of, where was it? Her head swiveled left then right. There were orange hills and dirt roads leading to the horizon, but she didn't see an entrance. Was it a shaft mine and one of the buildings acted as a cap? It was possible. All she knew for certain was there was a "mine" here. She didn't intend to go scanning for underground ore herself. The plan was to let the humans point out where the iron was for her, but for that to be effective she had to find the entrance. Imelda groaned at the possibility she'd have to go wandering around these hills looking for a hole in the ground. At best one of the many twisting roads would lead her to the mine. But how long would that take?

She went to take a step to begin her investigation and nearly fell on her face. There was no ground beneath her hoof.

"Oh, there's the entrance," she mumbled aloud in surprise.

The mare felt her face light up bright red as she stepped back from the edge. That was embarrassing. Half the hill she was standing on had been cut away, forming a cliff. How had she missed that? A single defined road led straight into a huge round dark hole in the wall beneath her. It was hard to imagine a more obvious mine entrance.

Imelda sighed and felt a wave of tension leave her. She had found her supply of iron, among the many other trace amounts of precious metals she was sure to get here too. The mare turned to the digging machine which had stopped a few steps back. "Dig here," was her simple order. Without any warning or fanfare, the roller dropped to the ground and began grinding away at the topsoil. One of the mine carts quickly got behind the machine and began catching the river of rock and dirt that began spilling off the back of the digger. The mare considered just leaving this first load here, the ore was no doubt much deeper underground, but shrugged it off. It didn't really matter in the end.

Imelda was then faced with a different problem. What to do now.

The digging machine was working quickly and the roller was sinking further and further into the hillside. But what was she supposed to do in the meantime? She couldn't simply leave them alone. While the machines were capable of doing all the work by themselves, none of them had any defenses. No weapons, no armor, no shields. Whenever they were working she had to stay and guard them. No doubt they'd be targeted at some point. Even if she could infinitely repair them with her fabricators, that would require her to haul the machines all the way back to her ship. The pony couldn't help glancing at the boxy thing in the distance. Okay, it wasn't that far. But the point still stood. If she didn't want to waste time hauling broken equipment around then she had to protect them.

Imelda sat where she was and let the roar of tearing rock overwhelm her ears. At least this was a more exciting activity than watching grass grow. Unfortunately, she still found this to be incredibly boring. The unicorn eyed her shoulder mounted turret. It stirred to life from its resting position with the faintest whine of turning gears. She aimed up, then down, then left, then right. Yup. Her gun was working properly alright. Next she studied the circular shield unit on her back. It didn't seem to be doing anything. She grunted. Imelda didn't like it. Then she lifted a leg and began staring at the many fibers that wove together to form her body armor. The fabricators did a good job on this one. Like always.

Imelda sighed and glanced up at the sky. The sun for this world was a yellow color and gently rising ever higher. White clouds drifted across a baby blue ceiling. The daily temperature was rising, but she was used to a variety of environments.

Flashes of memories came to her. The calm before the storm. What would this mission be like, she wondered. Seeing weapons was very different from experiencing them, she knew that lesson well. She couldn't count how many times a situation had been described to her yet didn't seem to prepare her at all for when shit hit the fan. It was bad form sitting out in the open like this in enemy territory, but whenever she was on guard duty her mind always wandered. The fact it hadn't cost Imelda her life yet was probably only thanks to luck and her shields.

The Levels of Technology. There weren't solid lines between them. The whole idea was more of an estimate or a thought experiment that went too far. The border between two levels was vague and full of exceptions. For example, technically bullets were considered level two tech, but Imelda's own shoulder mounted turret was a level three weapon. Barely. Because of its automatic targeting system. The Levels of Technology mostly referred to the main energy source of a race or planet and to the inventions and technology that had a strong tendency to exist along with it. Level one tech was stone age. When the main source of energy was a campfire. It barely qualified as a tech level. Level two was built on the use of fossil fuels. The higher density energy source went along with the development of metallurgy and bullets. At the third level fission energy, nuclear, took over and laser weapons emerged as well as basic AI computers. The fourth level was called the Nano Level for a number of reasons. Nanobots, advanced AI control systems, and the extraction of energy from non-radioactive elements. It was also when shields, plasma, and mega-structures emerged. Finally, there was the fifth level, Hardlight.

Imelda didn't herself understand what defined Hardlight technology, only that it was the most sophisticated reality manipulating tech ever built. Only scarily powerful empires and companies had it. Though she also had a piece herself now. Her ship's drive was officially hardlight tech and it had a bizarre name she wasn't sure she could even pronounce correctly. Other than that, her fabricators were the next most advanced thing she had. Which was going to matter a lot in the coming war.

There was a major difference between nano fabricators and hardlight fabricators. Nano could only build on a molecular level, hardlight could build on the atomic. Because Imelda's fabricators were nano tech she was limited by the periodic table. If she had iron she had iron. Period. And while she could build any molecule or alloy she wanted, she needed to have the basic elements to do so. For example, she already knew that ammo was going to be a pain to make. Steel for the bullets themselves wasn't too hard, for that she just needed iron and carbon. But gunpowder was a mess of elements she'd have to have a steady supply of if she wanted to shoot a lot. Carbon, potassium, nitrogen, and sulfur.

Where was she going to get that mix of ingredients?

Imelda turned her attention away from the digging machine as it continued to dutifully eat dirt and instead focused on her data pad. The mare began furiously tapping away as she tried to determine the best source for each element she was going to need.

The device on Imelda's leg quickly informed the mare that potassium and nitrogen were common in Earth soil and rock. Though they were bound up in different salts and oxides, that wouldn't be a problem for her nano tech fabricators to sort out. With a hum Imelda realized sulfur could be tricky. She wasn't a genius, but even she knew most sulfur was concentrated in volcanic rock. She glanced nervously at her digger as it turned a hill into a field. Imelda didn't think chopping into a volcano was a particularly good idea even if she had a good shield. There were limits. So where else could she find sulfur? Her ship's computer began feeding her possible sources.

Volcano was its first suggestion. Which she expected, but immediately ignored. Farmland was the next suggestion and made Imelda quirk a brow. Apparently sulfur was common in fertilizers and pesticides. At least on other planets. It was more of a guess. The mare wasn't sure she wanted to waste time on a gamble and moved on to the third suggestion. Oil. Again Imelda was surprised. When she asked the computer for an explanation all she got was the simple answer "sulfur is a common contaminant in crude oil".

Imelda chuckled. She already planned to raid an oil field for the carbon. Learning that another troublesome ingredient would also be there was pure convenience. But that was a job for tomorrow. For now, she was mining for iron.

Suddenly the pony's ears perked and her body went stiff.

There was a sound in the air other than the wind or her digging machine. High pitched and artificial. Imelda turned toward the horizon and her eyes narrowed. Three flying specks were heading straight for her...

Author's Note

One of the things I love about writing stories that take place in the "real world"? The research they make you do. Like, I've learned so much in the past few days from asking basic questions. For example, I was trying to figure out how to scale ammunition for Imelda and I wanted to know a bit about how bullets are made. From there I learned a lot of cool stuff. Like WHY the standard metal for cartridges is brass. Or the importance of the bullet being made from a softer metal than the barrel of the gun. Really interesting stuff. Though Googling stuff like that probably got me on an FBI watch list...

Chapter 3

Version: 1

Imelda's heart raced, adrenaline flooded her veins, and her muscles tensed. The humans were here, but what was their first response? What was coming? The mare glanced at her data pad. It was connected to her ship's main computer and her satellite above. She quickly asked it to scan the incoming targets.

Three human military helicopters, each about half the size of her head.

Imelda narrowed her eyes in thought at that. She couldn't imagine any military would bother attacking with such a small force. And she didn't intend the pun either. It must have been a scouting mission. They were disposable soldiers meant to get a look at her. There was no doubt they were recording her and sending the images back to their commander. The question was what to do about this.

The helicopters were small, but they didn't appear to be particularly fast. She'd probably waste a number of bullets, however Imelda concluded it would be easy to shoot them down. But should she? Did she care if they were watching her? The unicorn peeked over her shoulder at her digging machine. It just finished filling one of the carts which then began heading for the ship to drop off its load. What would the human response to this be? Imelda didn't feel ready for combat yet. She really wanted her armor and she only had 100 bullets. Delaying the fighting until she was fully equipped was her primary concern, but plans rarely worked out during war. If humans shot first then she had to retaliate.

Imelda didn't consider herself a master strategist. She wasn't a leader, she didn't give orders. Thinking about her actions like this did not come naturally to her. She was used to having her equipment and intel and simply jumping into the fight. Hesitation often got you killed in her line of work. However, the current situation was backwards from the norm. She had to make her gear while deep in enemy territory, yet the enemy didn't even know she was hostile to them. It twisted Imelda's mind around like a pretzel. It made her feel like she had to plan every move. The mare felt her anger stirring. The desire to simply act was bubbling up.

She stomped those feelings down for now as the helicopters began to circle her and the digging machine. The whirring of their rotor blades made her ears turn toward them. She glared at the closest one as it strayed nearer to her than the others. She got her first in-person look at humans from a soldier leaning partially out the side. She wasn't sure what to make of them. It looked just like one of the images she had been sent and they were indeed tiny things.

What was her strategy here? They hadn't shot at her and she hadn't impulsively fired on them either. Yet Imelda felt like she was being hunted. Three enemy aircraft were circling her. Her left leg twitched. No. This was a good thing for her. The longer the humans did nothing the more she could prepare. It was to her advantage to let them think whatever they wanted as long as they didn't try interfering for a little while longer. Tomorrow she would get oil. The day after she would have her armor and more bullets. That's when she intended to start. If she didn't provoke a response before then it would make her job much easier.

In other words, she needed to stop glaring at them!

Imelda forced herself to look away, to pretend that their presence didn't bother her. If they did fire on her the shield unit on her back would protect her more than long enough for her to return the favor. So she focused on her data pad again as the humans continued to orbit her. She could feel their eyes. They were studying her. She swallowed. Imelda had to ignore them. So what could she do with her data pad to distract herself?

Oil. The mare had to decide where she was going to get oil. Imelda needed it for its high carbon content so she could turn her iron into steel and she needed the sulfur to make her bullets. So where was she going to get it? The answers were not encouraging.

All of the small continent's oil deposits were either off-shore or along the northern coast. Imelda wanted to avoid the ocean because war ships tended to have big guns and she didn't want to put herself in range of humanity's strongest weapons yet. Also, she didn't want to build her own oil pump and tap the reserve herself. If humans were already pumping it, she hoped she could simply swipe their supply. But where were they keeping the oil they extracted? Imelda searched her data pad for the answer.

Of course the only refinery on the entire western half of the continent was just outside the only major city on the western half of the continent. And that was also right on the coast.

Imelda's ears pinned as she sighed in frustration. That wasn't good. If Imelda wanted to tap an oil reserve herself, she was heading for the coast. If she intended to steal human oil, she was heading for the coast. She didn't have a choice unless she ditched the oil plan entirely and tried to get her carbon and sulfur somewhere else. She growled and looked away from her data pad to see if the helicopter situation had changed. It hadn't. The three were still hovering just out of reach of her bare hooves and appeared to be more interested in her digging machine as it continued to level the area. Imelda snorted and returned her attention to her resource problem.

She could try raiding a fertilizer plant instead to get her sulfur, but what about the carbon? She didn't need huge amounts of it. It didn't take much to turn iron into steel. She asked her computer for possible sources. The first suggestion was the air itself. Earth's atmosphere was 0.05% carbon dioxide, but her fabricators could easily separate the molecule. Imelda considered it, however filtering air was slow. The next suggestion was to cut down a forest. Earth trees were packed with carbon. The mare eyed her surroundings skeptically and noted the very apparent lack of trees in the area. Much of Australia was a desert so forests were going to be in short supply around here.

The final suggestion made Imelda's heart stop. It must have been the worst thing her computer had ever suggested.

Humans.

Humans were carbon based life forms like the majority of sentient life in the universe. So their cells were packed with it. She could throw humans into her fabricators and have them broken down to extract the valuable carbon she needed to make her steel armor.

Imelda felt light-headed. Something threatened to come up her throat. Was she getting sick? An image appeared in her mind. She saw herself wearing a suit of armor made from countless human corpses stitched together like some kind of... depraved art piece. She stumbled even though she was already seated. The mare stared at the ground and swallowed. She shook her head.

That was NOT an option.

Oil would be her source of carbon and sulfur. But which source would she go for? The refinery or the oil field?

Sergeant Matthews wasn't a war veteran. Most of his military career had been pretty boring. Sure, there had been some emergency deployments. There had been the big flood several years ago and the nasty wildfires more recently that needed the military to organize the evacuations. Most of his career had been training, responding to natural disasters, and sitting around.

Today he got a mission he could have never imagined. A top secret assignment that, at first, he was sure was meant to be a joke.

He and his team were to observe and possibly make contact with aliens?

The Sergeant wanted to laugh. They had enough problems with angry citizens screaming at them for "lying" about the meteor. Australia was a mess and emergency services were already stretched thin trying to reestablish order and confidence in the system. Was this some poorly thought-up plan to raise morale with a crazy joke?

Once he saw his orders, and the sheer scale of the total operation, Matthews began to feel something in his bones. Was the alien story a cover for something even more serious? It was the only thing he could believe. It was ridiculous. They were evacuating Mount Magnet, a mining town of just over 600 people, and blocking all roads into an area within 50 kilometers of the town. And the wording of the orders was disturbing. Anyone who resisted was to be moved by "force". That wasn't a term that came up even during natural disaster relief. Normally the order was to simply leave those who couldn't be convinced. It was more important to save as many people as possible over fighting with someone who wanted to die.

It couldn't be aliens. He wasn't stupid enough to believe that. But he was a soldier and he followed orders. If this was coming down from the chain of command then he would see it through. Sergeant Matthews got his team together, briefed them, deflected their questions and disbelief as best he could, and got them in the choppers.

Armed with cameras instead of guns, him and his team left the airbase in Perth and headed north-east toward Mount Magnet. There wasn't a lot of chatter on the way. He knew his men felt odd about the whole situation. Obviously their orders were a lie, which meant they really had no idea what they were in for. That thought began to fester in Matthews. They were being sent into the unknown because the higher ups didn't trust them. It was insulting. It could even get them killed depending on what they encountered. He eyed the stupid cameras they had been assigned. Maybe they didn't expect the mission would be dangerous. Matthews glanced at the men in the helicopter with him. He bitterly hoped they all came home alive.

They flew over the town of Mount Magnet. The army was already there dragging everyone out. A lot of people were trying to fight. Demanding an explanation the soldiers didn't have. Sergeant Matthews watched out the window as a young soldier tried to calmly explain to a civilian that if he did not comply he would be arrested. Matthews frowned. This was a mess. What was happening?

Their destination was not the town however. Their trio of helicopters was headed further east up the mountain towards the mine that employed most of the people who lived here. They hadn't traveled more than a minute out from the town before he heard his radio buzz.

"Uh... Sergeant? Have you ever seen anything like this?"

Matthews stood from his seat and leaned over the pilot's shoulder. What he saw on the horizon made him blink. There was something off about it.

There was some kind of huge crane or some other machine with lots of cables supporting a long body. They were too far away to make out the details, but it was absolutely enormous. Had he ever seen a piece of equipment that large? And that thought sent him down a chain of questions. Mount Magnet didn't have a mine big enough for this kind of operation. It was a small mine, from what little he knew. What was going on?

Then they saw the alien.

"What... the... fuck?" he mumbled. He was only vaguely aware of the others in the chopper gathering behind his shoulders and staring ahead too.

"S-sir?" someone said.

"Get the cameras..." Sergeant Matthews whispered.

Imelda felt like she was bird watching. The helicopters just kept going around and around. It made her a little dizzy. The tension of the situation had since melted away into a tedium. A second and third cart of minerals had been sent back to her ship, making the current fill the fourth load. The humans didn't seem to be doing anything but watching. Though maybe they had reinforcements on the way.

The unicorn sighed. She had to make another decision. Where was she going to get the oil? Was she going to head far north to the oil fields and pump it herself or would she head south and steal the oil from a major refinery at the edge of a city? Pumping it herself was pretty much guaranteed success, but she would have to have her digger disassembled for the steel to make the pump. It would only really cost her time. However, stealing from the oil refinery didn't require her to build new equipment and it would be even faster because she didn't have to wait for a pump to extract the oil. She could just take entire storage vessels the humans filled in advance.

The oil refinery was very appealing. It'd be a quick operation. Get in, get the oil, get out. The problem was the nearby city and the fact she was going to be raiding a human owned refinery. Imelda glanced at one of the helicopters that was keeping an eye on her. For now the humans weren't doing anything, but if she robbed a refinery they would definitely start fighting back immediately. However, if she went north to drill her own oil instead, they might just stay neutral for the time being.

The mare bit her lip and considered. Did it matter? Yeah, her shield would likely shrug off most of what they had. However, she at least wanted her armor first which she would not be able to make until after she got the oil. A day too late. Then again, preparing a military response took time. It was possible the humans would take days to actually start fighting back even after they realized they needed to do so.

Two other factors played into the decision as well.

Attacking the oil refinery would also deal a blow to the human war effort. Energy was the life blood of civilization and machines. If she didn't just steal the oil, but also demolished the only refinery on the western half of the continent, the human military would be crippled before it ever took a shot at her. It could be a powerful opening move in the campaign.

Yet none of those facts compared to the last one. Hitting the oil refinery required her to enter a city. A place densely packed with civilians. Non-combatants would certainly die.

Imelda kicked at the ground idly as the roar of her digging machine continued to fill the air.

She was going to massacre helpless little aliens. Imelda had already accepted that. It was just... she didn't want to start with civilians. She wanted to exchange blows with their military a few times before she went crushing their cities. There was a... process. An order of steps. Yeah. That's what it was. Imelda couldn't skip steps. It wasn't... proper.

Imelda took a deep breath and closed her eyes for a moment.

She was being stupid. This was war and every last human was an enemy. There was no such thing as civilians. Not in this conflict. She was stalling. She was being weak.

Imelda grit her teeth. No more stalling. No more wasting time. She would attack the oil refinery and make it clear to the humans she was their enemy and she was to be feared. She snorted with determination. Tomorrow she would make the first real move.

Imelda Noble stared at the readout. This could be a problem. She hadn't gotten as much iron as she anticipated. It was far from none, but apparently the mine had about as much gold as it did iron. While gold was valuable for making computers and electronics, it wasn't what she wanted right now. Suddenly, Imelda feared she'd have to spend another day mining to get the amount of iron she needed. With what she had now, once she raided the oil refinery, she would have to decide whether to use the steel to make bullets or armor. She probably wouldn't have enough steel for both. But that decision was obvious. If she got oil from the refinery, the fighting would have started, and you couldn't fight without ammunition. She would have to make the bullets.

So she was reconsidering attacking the refinery.

For a day at least.

She growled and stomped to her bedroom where she threw herself into the pod on her back. A hoof fell across her forehead while her mane spread out across her pillow. The day had been a mix of tension and boredom. The human helicopters had left after an hour or two and not returned. Imelda had stayed there watching the digger work until the sun started to set, then she stopped the machine and returned to her ship. It was night and her ship's shield generator ensured she had nothing to worry about. Being powered by the hardlight reactor meant it was borderline impossible to overwhelm. The humans could do nothing about her ship itself. Though they could amass an army around the door and ambush her as soon as she stepped outside.

For some reason that mental image amused Imelda and she chuckled into the darkness.

"But what am I going to do?" she thought aloud somberly. Launching an attack with only 100 bullets seemed ridiculous. Though she could always smash things with her hooves. The mare lifted a leg and gazed at the tiny grooves ringing her foot. They were nothing more than near imperceptible lines to her, but to a human they were probably fully usable as handholds. She had now seen a human. They were so small. They were real.

Her leg fell to the bed with a dull thump.

"I've gone insane," she concluded.

She shrugged. So what she didn't have as much iron as she hoped? Was the armor really that important? Why was she so obsessed with it? Maybe she was too preoccupied with defense and not taking her offense seriously enough. The gold gave her options. She could think about making other robots to help her sooner rather than later. Not that she had a real schedule for the war figured out, but she hadn't even considered making drones to help her fight so quickly.

Imelda growled and held her head. She rolled onto her side and curled up. It was too much. She was thinking too much. This was hard. So hard...

The mare sighed and relaxed into the sweet smelling sheets. She was going to age like crazy if she kept this up. She had to stop thinking. Just follow her instincts. Stop trying to be some great general with plans within plans. She was just Imelda, a unicorn mercenary. She was just doing a job. Nothing more.

Tomorrow she would attack the oil refinery. Her goal was to steal as much oil as she could and to destroy the facility. Then she'd set the fabricators to make her ammunition and explosives. The heavy armor could wait. She could trust her shields to protect her for a little while at least.

Author's Note

In case you haven't figured it out, this is a slow burn kind of story. I'm taking my time building up to the action. Not because I'm trying to raise tension or sense of the stakes, but just because I want to highlight what I think would be the most realistic progression of events. If I move the story too quickly I feel that some of that aspect would be lost.

Also, I do not live in Australia so I'm sure I'm not going to describe/portray it accurately in multiple areas. Though I'm trying to write this story as though it were taking place in the real world, please understand that there are limits to how much I can or am willing to research to do so. My accuracy is limited and I am going to take shortcuts. I apologize to any Australian readers who might look at this and be scratching your heads in confusion at my bizarre mistakes. Also, I did not set this story in Australia as an insult against the country or its people. I'm not trying to subtly tell you I hate Australia. I really didn't know anything about the nation/continent before, other than that it existed. I set it there because it honestly seemed like a logical place for the story to start. Assuming this story goes on long enough, you will see the violence spread to other continents and nations.

Chapter 4

Version: 1

Imelda finished getting ready by tucking the nanobot syringe into a pocket under her barrel. The unicorn then closed the locker and glanced at the mirror. It was strange to see herself in this kind of armor. She sighed. No steel plate for her. Not for a while at least. The mare shuffled out of the equipment room and into the narrow corridor that ran almost the entire length of her ship. It was a bit dark, but she liked it that way.

Imelda sat down so she could more easily navigate her data pad's menus for a moment. She quickly brought up a satellite image of the landscape between her and the refinery. What was the best way to do this? The distance from where her ship was currently parked straight to the refinery was a little over 500 kilometers (300 miles) south-west. The mercenary hummed in thought. There were two ways to go about this.

The first way was obvious, just move the ship. However, that would take Imelda away from the mine she had already stolen, so she'd have to move the ship back after she got the oil. She still needed more iron after all. But Imelda didn't really feel like moving the ship near the city and then moving it back. Did she have an actual reason not to? It was a trivial thing. Yeah, but she still didn't want to.

Alternatively, the unicorn could simply walk there. It would take Imelda a little less than half a day to hike 500 kilometers, so it was definitely doable. March to the city, get the oil, return to the ship. It would use up the whole day. Would she be vulnerable during the trip? Technically even if she came under heavy fire she could call the ship to herself for an emergency extraction. Imelda felt drawn to this option too. She could make the excuse that she was scouting the land, but maybe she just wanted to see more of this tiny world. Looking at it on a screen or through a window simply wasn't the same as touching it.

Move the ship or walk?

Imelda sighed. She decided to walk.

It was a bad move from a strategic standpoint. It would waste a lot of time. But she wasn't a machine. Ponies were meant to run.

The mercenary soon found herself in the hanger with the two mine carts behind her. She had thought about having them remade into proper tankers so she wouldn't risk spilling any oil, but in the end she shelved that idea. If Imelda made them into tanks she'd also have to bring a pump which would require her to figure out a way to suck the oil out of the silos the humans kept it in. Brute force was her solution. She planned to just steal entire silos, oil and all. Imelda knew she was going to spill a ton of oil on the way back, but eventually surrendered to that fact. It wasn't like she needed that much and taking it away from the humans might have been enough of a reason to attack the refinery by itself.

The mare opened the hanger door and stepped out into the morning. She was immediately on alert as experience had taught her to be. Her eyes swiveled left and right, her shoulder turret following her gaze just like it was supposed to. No movement. No change to the environment that she could spot. The area was still a barren wasteland speckled with weeds and bushes, though it now also sported sharp cuts in the soil from the treads of her machines coming and going yesterday.

No ambush. Imelda was clear. She turned back to the ship and whistled. The robot mine carts rolled out, actually able to go a bit faster than herself while they were empty. That realization made Imelda consider riding in one of them, but she shook her head at the mental image. She'd look way too dumb doing that. She was not a little filly anymore. The mare consulted her data pad and deftly oriented herself. There was nothing but orange dirt and rock all the way to the horizon. For the pony it was relatively flat terrain with the occasional wide mounds, but a human might have called it hilly.

Then Imelda paused. Here she was, two mine carts behind her and a fight ahead of her. For the next couple of hours she'd be marching deeper and deeper into enemy territory. She could be attacked at any time. Somewhere in that desert was a city. She wasn't after the city itself yet, but she'd have to cut across a fair amount of it to reach the refinery that was her target. This was it. As soon as Imelda left this hill she'd officially be declaring war. The refinery would be the first battle. She was an army of one, the enemy of an entire planet.

The mare stared at her hooves all wrapped up in body armor. She felt the sun shining on one side of her face as it rose in the east. She felt the wind blow through her mane. Her lips tightened. She took a deep breath through her nose.

Imelda Noble took a step forward. Then another. Her automatic mine carts followed behind her on light treads. She was cutting straight across the desert of Australia. The mare's destination was on the opposite side of the city of Perth. The only oil refinery on this side of the continent.

"They failed to make contact," one of the younger men at the meeting criticized arrogantly.

"Did you even watch the footage?" a woman in formal attire hissed. "Clearly it wasn't interested in talking."

"What was it doing?" someone asked.

"Mining, duh," someone sniped.

"Why travel a million light-years to the only inhabited planet in this star system just to dig up some metal? Why not mine Mars?"

"It's an invasion. Not even the movies predicted an attack like this!"

"What are you talking about, old man?"

"It's going to go from mine to mine, stealing our resources, while we sit here debating and doing nothing. It's weakening us!"

"Whoa whoa whoa," a gentleman in the room called for calm. "We are jumping to conclusions. This is an alien life-form. We need to consider that its mind and motives might not be so easy to understand. All we know is what we saw. And what did we see?"

The woman sighed. "It was digging."

"Mining," someone added. "Those were mine carts. It was taking the ore and rock back to its ship. That's mining. It's not simply moving dirt around out there."

"But why?" another asked insistently. "It makes no sense."

The room was silent for a few moments.

"How do we talk to it?" the gentleman asked the others.

The silence persisted. His brow creased in frustration.

The youngest man at the meeting threw his hands up. "Someone needs to walk up to it and just try. That's what I say."

"What we've seen so far wasn't even the real alien," the oldest man in the room rebutted. That got a few uncertain glances.

"What do you mean?" the gentleman grilled him.

"No living thing could be that big."

"What makes you say that?" the woman challenged.

"The largest land animal alive today is the African Elephant. The largest ever was a dinosaur that was at most twice that size. The thing our scouting party saw? Was closer to 10 times the size of an African Elephant. That thing could juggle elephants!"

"Looked pretty organic to me. And it's an alien. Who knows what evolution could have produced on another planet."

The old man continued as though the younger man hadn't said anything. "That thing is a robot. A mech suit probably. The real alien is likely inside, tucked away behind layers of armor."

The gentleman massaged his temple. "Whether the thing we saw was the alien.... or some sort of armor, that doesn't change the question. How do we talk to it without provoking it?"

"Can we even provoke it? The thing is huge. I doubt it's scared of us."

From there the meeting picked up as ideas were thrown back and forth. Though the gentleman at the head of the table contributed little to the conversation as it progressed. Somehow the talk evolved into an argument of the best way to keep the alien's arrival a secret. Or if they even could keep first contact secret from the people. It was during those discussions that an aid rushed into the room and whispered in the gentleman's ear.

"Sir, we have a situation. The Visitor is making its way across the desert. The Ministry of Defense has a live satellite feed ready for you."

"What?!" he shouted, making everyone in the room stare. "Where is it headed? How fast is it? How much time do we have?"

The aid hesitated, briefly eyeing the room's other occupants. "We're not sure where it's headed."

Everyone was stunned. You could have heard a pin drop.

"Show me the live feed now!"

Another room, this one packed with men in military uniforms and computer monitors. The far wall was a single large screen currently displaying a map of Australia. More specifically, it was showing Western Australia. Highlighted at the center of the screen was a large red dot that was slowly moving south and which had a faint yellow cone of possible routes projecting from it. In the bottom right-hand corner was a column of words and numbers. One was speed. It was fluctuating a bit, but seemed to be hovering around 80 kph (50 mph).

"It seems to be loosely following the 95 Greater Northern Highway," a thin man with gray hair explained. "Though it obviously isn't on the road and is cutting across the open desert right now."

"Where is it going?" the gentleman demanded simply.

"We can't be certain, but if it continues on a straight path like this it will run right into this place." The thin man nodded to a tech who typed something into her terminal.

The main screen scrolled downward and highlighted what might have been a town. Then a label appeared. "Mount Gibson Mine".

"It's possible the Visitor is heading for another iron mine."

The gentleman covered his mouth as sweat began to roll down his forehead. "How long?"

"About one hour."

"Can we evacuate the area?"

"Easily. There is no town near the mine. So we just have to tell the workers to flee. Though we don't have time to get any equipment or personnel there to enforce it."

"Do it," the gentleman ordered immediately. "And send the scouting party in again. Tell them to watch this thing closely."

Imelda didn't let her guard down as the minutes slowly turned into hours. There was a road to the left her data pad was telling her was a highway. It only had two lanes, one going north and the other going south. She didn't see any vehicles using it though. Either it wasn't an important route or it had been closed by the locals when she landed. It did lead to the town just beyond the hills of the mine she'd pretty much landed on. In-between searching for threats, Imelda wondered if the town had been evacuated. What did primitive species tend to do when advanced races first made contact? She wasn't really a student of history. She'd barely attended school herself. Maybe she could have gotten a job that didn't involve killing people if she had. Then again, she made a lot more money and got to travel far more than the vast majority of people in the universe.

She sighed to herself. Life was all give and take.

As she strolled across the desert she passed a few unusual things. Lone buildings seemingly in the middle of nowhere. Random circular patches of pure salt. And other oddities that didn't show up on her map. She didn't have time to investigate any of them and was fairly certain her mine carts had destroyed a few of them as they followed her, so she wasn't going to be examining them later either. Speaking of destruction, she also cut across a rail line that ran east-to-west. She hadn't planned on it and hadn't even known it was here, but she also couldn't find a reason not to sever the connection. She was here to wage war against mankind after all. Other than that, the trip was incredibly mundane and the terrain didn't slow her down much.

For some time the only thing Imelda had to guide her was her data pad. The highway to her left kept twisting with the natural grooves of the landscape and often disappeared around hills or even curved way out into the east. It wasn't useful to her as a guide or as a road. She could barely fit on it if she tried. Each of her hooves were as wide as a lane. So she mostly ignored it and trusted her satellite map as she cut across the open desert.

Then it appeared right in her path.

The highway had wound back from its journey east and turned directly into her way. Along with some kind of facility with gleaming white metal roofs and well-worn dirt roads. They looked like garages for large land vehicles, though large was relative on this planet. None of the buildings were taller than her knees. There was a chain-link fence surrounding an expansive area with steep dirt mounds and other structures she'd have to get closer to identify.

For a moment Imelda paused standing on the opposite side of the highway from this facility. It was the largest and most interesting thing she'd encountered so far and she'd been walking for a while now. The mare quickly checked her data pad and was mildly surprised that it had been about two hours and she was roughly half-way to the refinery. The remaining journey promised to be much more interesting however. She already knew that civilizations always congregated around the coast and this planet was no exception. Populated areas were coming up.

For now, Imelda decided to take a little break to investigate this place.

"Wait here," she said to the mine carts which immediately paused. Then she faced the facility and the one road leading off the highway and through a gate. She stepped onto the road, cracking it but not fully destroying it beneath her. It felt kind of like stepping on a thin piece of wood that was just barely able to take her weight. But that wasn't what her mind was focused on. She lowered her head, bringing her muzzle down to the fence gate.

The fence was only two meters tall and made of probably the thinnest wire she'd ever seen. It was like it had been braided from hair. This fence was taller than a human? This barrier could stop one of the natives? She lifted a hoof and stared at it. Her eyes flicked to the fence. Gently, she nudged the metal.

The barrier bulged inward and one of the poles that anchored the fence in place bent and even began to rip out of the ground.

Imelda froze. It was that easy? She applied a bit more force and another pole began to bend. A whole section of the fence was deformed from merely poking it. The mare withdrew her hoof and marveled at her work. She swallowed. This was incredible, but she wanted to try something else. The unicorn stepped forward, deliberately lowering her hoof onto the next section of fence.

Effortlessly, her foot bent and crushed the metal and drove it into the ground.

Imelda gawked at the destruction she had unleashed using zero energy. A defense like this, while minor even if it were scaled for her, still would have slowed her down. Even with wire cutters this would have stopped a team for a minute or two. Yet, here she was able to completely wreck it with only a touch.

Imelda felt something. Empowered might have been the word for it. What else could she do?

She took a deep breath and eyed the rest of the facility. What was this place? The mare consulted her data pad briefly which notified her she had reached the "Mount Gibson Mine". She quirked a brow. Another mine? It could be useful. Maybe a little inspection wasn't such a bad idea.

Imelda stepped forward, one of her back hooves crashing through yet another section of the fence as her attention latched onto the white arch roofs to her left. She lowered her head and discovered that they were indeed open front garages. Some kind of trucks were inside the three buildings, one boxy yellow vehicle to each. Interesting.

To her right was a variety of strange objects. There was an enclosed area filled with boxes wrapped in some kind of packing material like plastic. There were two long rectangular buildings that did not look particularly durable. And there was a large white cylinder on its side that just screamed "I'm full of water". She didn't do anything about these things.

Ahead of her was a sizable gray building with a fairly flat roof. She figured it was a warehouse. It was barely shorter than her knees, but it was about as wide as she was tall. Imelda mostly ignored it too. Instead she followed the dirt road that curved around the building and deeper into the mine, towards the dirt mounds and yet another structure.

It was a crusher. Where the dump trucks deposited their loads to be broken down into more manageable pieces. Standing next to it gave Imelda that strange feeling again. She knew this was a major piece of equipment. To a human this thing was huge and the conveyor belts leading away from it would have taken a while to follow to their respective dumping sites. Yet the tallest tower barely reached as high as her barrel. In just a few steps she could circle the entire thing. It was like a toy. A plaything she'd give a growing colt.

She was tempted to touch it, but a sense of awe kept her hooves firmly planted on the ground. Instead her eyes latched onto the dirt road that led even further east, away from the highway. Where was the mine itself? The mare stepped up a hill and followed the line for a minute or two until she stumbled upon the dig site.

It wasn't your typical open pit mine. It was more of an open canyon. Maybe 100 meters (300 feet) wide and about a kilometer (0.6 miles) long, with multiple levels running back and forth towards the bottom. Obviously so the mining vehicles could get back up.

Imelda nodded. This was a mine alright. And it was potentially valuable to her. She'd have to make a note of this for when the mine she was currently using ran out, which probably wouldn't be more than a few days if she was aggressive about extracting the ore.

However, as Imelda was turning back to return to her mine carts, her data pad began beeping. The unicorn immediately spread her hooves and perked her ears. Her eyes jumped from point-to-point as she looked for threats. Her turret whirred to life and the safety clicked off. The mercenary was ready for a fight.

Her heart raced and her breathing became deep. Yet she couldn't detect any immediate danger. Carefully, she raised her left foreleg to her face and read the warning. There were five aircraft heading her way. The mare glanced in the direction they were coming from. She didn't see anything yet, they were still too far away. But they'd reach her in a few minutes.

It was the helicopters again, but last time there had been only three. Were they going to shoot her this time? Should she attack them first? Imelda licked her lips. Dirt tickled her taste buds so she quickly spit. Like before she decided to let them set the mood. She gave her turret the mental command to return to resting position, but left the safety off. Then the mercenary stood her ground and waited.

Like a flock of bugs they appeared. Five black helicopters. Military vehicles. It was hard to imagine that each one was carrying several humans. The helicopters were only slightly bigger than her head, and that was only thanks to their long tails. However, Imelda's plan to let them do as they pleased immediately smacked her in the face. The helicopters weren't heading for her. They were aiming for her mine carts back by the highway!

The mare's eyes widened at the realization she'd left her transports alone and completely undefended. If the humans brought rockets a single well-aimed shot could cripple their mobility. So the mercenary dashed back the way she'd come, stumbling around the mounds of dirt and buildings as she raced to intercept them. Two of the human helicopters seemed to notice and steered toward her. She instinctively sent a mental command to her turret to take aim.

Imelda reached her carts before the humans did and she boldly placed herself between them. The helicopters stopped their advance and backed away from her warning glare.

A standoff began. The helicopters hovered a short distance away and she stood guarding the first cart.

Imelda felt a bead of sweat run down the side of her face. The sound of whirring rotor blades filled her ears. The wind calmly blew across the desert. Neither side made a move for some time. The mare eyed each vehicle carefully. They were all identical and she didn't see any obvious weapon mounts. They really were the same model as the first group that watched her yesterday. It was unlikely they had anything to shoot her with beyond small arms stored inside. She lowered her head and snorted. She'd made a mistake. She had simply assumed the humans had interpreted her actions so far as hostile. However, if they were sending scouts again, it was more likely the humans were confused. They weren't sure what to do about her yet. The mercenary could have taken advantage of that fact and gotten all the way to the city before revealing her true intentions, but she'd gone and blown it with this maneuver. It was almost a certainty they viewed her as an enemy now. So what should she do?

One of the helicopters landed.

Imelda was dumbfounded a few moments later when a little human in a green speckled uniform approached her.

It was the most ridiculous and bizarre scene she could imagine. The creature was tiny. If she were to turn her hoof sideways the bottom of her foot would have been twice as tall as this being. And it was just waltzing right towards her. It didn't appear to have a weapon. She didn't see any equipment beyond basic clothing, but it was hard to be sure due to its size. When it was about two steps away from her it stopped. It met her eyes. They stared at each other. Then it shouted something at her and held up its arms.

A display of dominance or surrender? It depended on the species.

Some races raised their limbs to appear bigger and seem more threatening. Some raised their limbs to prove they were unarmed or harmless. Which was this? Imelda wouldn't have felt threatened by this tiny thing even if it was holding a weapon. Unless humans were insane it was a stretch to think any would be stupid enough to try intimidating her. Trying to appear large when you were the size of a tube of lip-balm was a ridiculous thought. It was more reasonable to assume this was an attempt at... surrender?

No, it was a request for peace.

Imelda narrowed her eyes at the human. Her ship was still exploring the human internet and chewing on a translation program. It would be a few more days at least before it had a prototype for her that wasn't just the names of places. So she had no idea what the human had actually said to her. However, that didn't matter. This human's wild stunt had given her something she wanted. A way to diffuse the situation.

Imelda let herself visibly relax.

She stood straighter, her weapon dropped back into resting position, and her scowl faded. Imelda glanced at the human aircraft pointedly and they soon scattered. The mare attempted to follow one with her eyes, but the human on the ground tried to speak to her. She looked down at it and it immediately went quiet. What was the best course of action here? Imelda tilted her head and gave the little creature a bored stare. It tried to say something again. She cut it off after a few seconds. "You are wasting your time. I can't understand you." The human seemed surprised by her response. Mysteriously, it attempted to tell her something yet again. The unicorn raised a curious brow. This was unexpected. She thought it'd shut up and leave after she spoke in her own language.

She peeked over her shoulder and caught two of the helicopters making wide circles around her mine carts. The third seemed to be inspecting the damage to the fence she had caused. The fourth was flying off to look at the rest of the mine. The last one was still grounded in front of her. Interesting.

Imelda chose to ignore the human attempting to make contact with her and sat down. Now with her fore-hooves free the pony began poking her data pad. She'd rested, discovered a new mine, and managed to avoid starting the fight early. It was about time she got moving again. She brought up her ship's map and easily located herself. It took Imelda a few taps to determine her route from here, meanwhile she could hear one of the helicopters drifting somewhere behind her. It was spying over her shoulder at what she was typing. Did it matter? Probably not. Imelda continued with what she was doing, which was simply figuring out what direction she needed to head next.

Now oriented, the unicorn stood up and stretched. The human beneath her stumbled back, stuttering something that sounded like begging. She focused on it and snorted once. She flicked her head to the side as if saying, "get out of my way." Surprisingly, the human spun around and rushed back to his helicopter which then rejoined the others flying around her. It made Imelda uncomfortable to have five enemy aircraft tagging along, but they hadn't done anything but block her path or study her. So the mercenary did her best to ignore them and continued on her way towards the city of Perth.

Chapter 5

Version: 2

Imelda Noble marched across the desert, two automated mine carts and five human military helicopters trailing behind her. The highway that had partially accompanied her before still was, though now it wavered back and forth to her right. In some ways it was intimidating being followed by her enemies because her exact position and direction was now certainly known. However, there was also something amusing about the current situation. The aircraft were about the size of a pony's head and had assumed an escort formation around her. One helicopter flew ahead of Imelda, two in the back, then the remaining two were split with one to each side. She was also confident that none of them were armed. For herself it wouldn't have been a problem regardless, the shield generator on the unicorn's back would have stopped anything they could have had. But her mine carts were just hunks of metal. Their treads in particular were a weak spot and one good explosive could stop them dead.

Imelda was walking in a straight line to the only oil refinery on this side of the continent. The problem that lurked between her and her objective was the city surrounding it. The mercenary had considered trying to cut a circular path around the metropolis, but the developed area was just too big. No matter what she was going to be knocking some buildings out of her way. So far the destruction had been minor by any measure as Imelda had only broken a train track, a few small sections of road, and a bit of fence. This was mostly thanks to the expansive desert lacking much of anything for her to ruin. The chaos she expected to unleash once she reached the city however would be on an entirely different level.

Imelda had left the Gibson Mine and been walking peacefully for about 15 minutes when the helicopter in front of the mare suddenly stopped and turned around with surprising agility. The mercenary was actually startled and nearly lost her balance trying to stop in time. Then it was another standoff much like had happened back at the mine. Imelda raised a curious brow. What was this about? Why had her escort stopped so suddenly?

The helicopter in front of her drifted closer. Imelda blinked. Then it drifted even closer. Imelda's eyes narrowed. The human aircraft was half the length of her leg away. Its blades were about to clip her and be repelled by her shield. Imelda took a step back. Yet the vehicle ate the distance again. Imelda glared. The humans were up to something and she didn't like it. Imelda felt like she was being challenged. Instead of continuing to backpedal, the mare stomped and snorted. The helicopter pilot seemed to at least partially get the message and stopped advancing. The mercenary scowled through the windshield at the little human inside. She lowered her head, threatening to aim her horn at him. The vehicle didn't budge. The unicorn glanced to either side. She should have realized it sooner, but now she was boxed in. A mine cart behind her, helicopters hovering at neck height to her front and sides.

Imelda's glare deepened. The only way out might require her to get violent. Was it a test? Did they suspect her true intentions? Not like she was making it very hard for them. The mare took a moment to consult her data pad. She still had over 300 kilometers (200 miles) to go. That was three hours if she set a good pace. She didn't have time for this. Imelda had to get moving if she was going to be done before nightfall. She dropped her leg and snorted again. The humans didn't retreat. How much clearer could she be?

The pony widened her stance, pulled back her lips, showed off her teeth, and audibly growled. The standoff continued for a few moments. Finally, after a tense minute, the aircraft backed down. Imelda swallowed, relaxed her posture, and gave her mane a flick. A part of her felt proud. Diplomacy was never her strong suit, but she thought she'd handled that confrontation well. Better than the previous standoff anyway. Yet she wondered what they had been trying to do.

Imelda shrugged and began marching south again.

Once more the mare was crossing the desert with her mine carts and five human military helicopters. The highway to her right twisted with the landscape. Oddities came and went like a random windmill by itself in the middle of a dry lake bed. Or a metallic shed sitting by the side of a dirt road that connected two otherwise isolated points. The vegetation was sparse besides the weeds and bushes, though there were some vaguely tree-like plants crowded around some of the roads and stream channels. After 45 minutes though, a transformation of the terrain itself occurred. Square patches of land fenced in and with the flora arranged in tidy rows. Farms. Imelda was now cutting across farmland. Looking ahead, the cultivated region went on for some distance. It didn't really change anything other than guarantee the ground would be even more level for her and her carts. So she kept going.

For another hour and a half she trudged through field after field. Her steps alone smashed the crops beneath into pulp. She didn't even bother looking back to see what her carts were doing to the farms. She did occasionally peek at her escorts though, but they didn't seem to be doing anything other than following her. Which, counter-intuitively, didn't reassure her. Imelda was clearly destroying one of the most valuable resources any species on any planet had: the food supply. Yet that didn't so much as get an outraged cry from the humans? Had she scared them that much? They weren't even willing to fly next to her ear and yell something?

The lack of even a minor retaliation made the hairs on the back of the mercenary's neck rise. A sense that something was coming bubbled in her veins. Her ears swiveled constantly. Her muscles began to ache with adrenaline. She was ready for action despite the lack of any obvious trigger.

A dirt road slipped between two cultivated fields. A set of train tracks heading north cut across the road. Short trees crowded the intersection. It really was the middle of nowhere.

The human helicopters suddenly got in Imelda's way again. However, their method was a little different this time. Instead of one vehicle hovering in front of her, she now faced three. They floated there in a line roughly at the same height as her head. Their rotor blades spun and their engines hummed. Imelda glared at them. This was a bit more effective than their last attempt. Individually they were small enough that she could have cradled one like a foal and she knew they were unarmed, yet together they formed a wall that gave the mercenary pause.

At a surface level it pissed her off, but it also made her ask why. She tried to look past them, but she didn't see anything other than more farmland. Had they figured out where she was going? Were they trying to dissuade her? She had been walking a straight path so she couldn't imagine they didn't have a clue at least. Maybe they were just hoping to slow her down. Her options hadn't changed though. Fight her way through or try to scare them again. Imelda decided to stall by studying her data pad. She was about 70 kilometers (40 miles) from Perth's outermost suburbs. Another hour of hiking. The mare glanced up at the barrier the helicopters had formed. It seemed a bit early for this in her opinion.

Impatient, Imelda took a single forceful step forward and snorted. The helicopters didn't move. She lowered her head and aimed her horn at the middle one. She growled too for good measure. Then she waited a minute or two, but they still didn't get out of her way. The mercenary was impressed. They had gotten bolder. Now she had no choice left other than to get violent. Imelda huffed. The aircraft blocking her path were about a leg's distance away and she was in a hurry. She stomped forth, putting herself in range. She growled once more as a final warning. They didn't listen.

Then she swatted.

The mare's right foreleg rose into the air faster than the helicopter could respond. There was a sound not unlike two cars colliding. Then the whine of an engine struggling filled the air. The tip of Imelda's hoof had bent the entire chassis and raised the vehicle several meters in a fraction of a second. The helicopter was deformed, but still recognizable. While the pilot might have escaped the kick with only whiplash, the passengers were probably seriously injured. It was definitely a survivable hit despite the middle portion of the aircraft being crumpled upwards. Imelda's foreleg dropped back to the ground and the helicopter followed shortly after. The rotors turned slower and slower and the craft tilted more and more as it fell out of the sky. It bounced on the ground as its blades disintegrated and pieces went flying. Dust was kicked up and the vehicle rocked, unable to settle as chemicals dripped from the broken underbelly.

The incident was over in only a few terrible seconds. The mercenary was equally quick to aim her head towards the next closest aircraft which prompted all the human pilots to give her plenty of space. Imelda snorted and eyed the fallen helicopter once before moving on. She saw movement inside, but she wasn't interested in sticking around. She had someplace to be and, luckily for the crash survivors, their plummet to the ground had also landed them out of her way. So Imelda didn't even have to think about stepping around them. She simply marched right past, hooves stirring up the dust as she went. However, after several steps, she peeked over her shoulder. Of the four aircraft that remained, three were now following her at a respectable distance while one remained behind and landed by the downed helicopter. Imelda hummed and faced forward. An interesting glimpse of human priorities.

With that encounter now behind her, Imelda picked up the pace. She felt weird again. It was a mix of bizarre emotions that was more confusing than anything else she had experienced. The mercenary barely noticed the increasingly green farmlands she was now stomping through. That helicopter must have been a major piece of equipment. On her scale it would have been valuable and formidable. Facing one without proper countermeasures would have been dangerous. Imelda could remember more than once being pinned down by enemy aircraft or armor. Only because backup arrived with the right tool for the job did she survive those battles. Yet here she could take down an enemy vehicle with a single kick. The mare glanced at her hooves as she walked. One touch was all it took. Not a bullet, not a grenade, not a rocket. A flick of her leg and the threat was destroyed.

She felt powerful. If that's all it took to deal with human weaponry then she truly had nothing to fear. On the other hoof however, she knew what it was like to face impossible odds. The drowning despair. The hopelessness. The humans would soon see her as an unstoppable killing machine. The mental image stirred feelings of guilt in Imelda. She never expected to be seen that way. It was usually her facing certain death and escaping only by the skin of her teeth. That was the life of a mercenary. Was she really okay with this? Nearly exterminating an entire species?

Imelda shook her head violently. The lunatic who requested this job had a point. Too many people always led to widespread suffering. A lot of humans were going to die anyway once their population hit the tipping point. What difference did it make if it was her doing the killing versus themselves? Besides, she was going to get rich harvesting Earth's resources while she was at it. After she made all the equipment she needed of course. It was better to get the tragedy over-with now rather than later when it would take much longer and cost far more lives. That was Imelda's reasoning.

She had only been brewing on these troubling thoughts for a few minutes before she encountered the forest. The "Julimar State Forest" according to her data pad. Not that this planet's trees were very impressive, especially this variety. Each specimen was skinnier than even a human and maybe twice as tall. The forest edge was a blatantly unnatural straight line too and had a road running alongside it west towards the coast. This was the turning point where Imelda had decided her travel strategy would change. No longer would she be headed straight for the refinery. Now she would begin following the human highway that ran roughly alongside the forest south until she reached the suburbs of a smaller community called "Midland". From what Imelda could tell, Midland was a dense suburban outlier of the greater city of Perth. It was there Imelda had determined things would have to get violent. As in she would have to start knocking down buildings.

In the meantime, the unicorn turned west and followed the small road towards the highway. The mine carts were still trailing her and the human helicopters were still shadowing her. She soon passed the corner of the forest which had been squared off and turned south-west. The highway was a few kilometers away, but her final destination was more south than it was west from here. So she slowly distanced herself from the forest while roughly angling toward the major roadway that would lead her where she wanted to go.

The highway was just coming into view over the next hill when her helicopter friends tried for the third time to block her way. Like the previous attempt they formed a wall about two or three steps away from her and hovered at around head height.

For a moment Imelda paused to glare at them. This was getting old. The mare had already knocked one of them out of the air, did she have to do it again for them to figure it out? The pony stomped and growled at them. They didn't scatter. Her eye twitched in frustration. Her patience was hanging by a thread at this point. Imelda began stomping forward, not even caring about the dents she was leaving in the ground, as she moved to swat another one of them. But as soon as she started moving the helicopters fled. The mare found herself alone in a field of green grass. She eyed the aircraft that were now hovering well out of reach. For a second she considered shooting them, but figured they wouldn't try that a fourth time.

Imelda returned her attention to the highway and was stepping onto the paved surface a minute later. The highway was a meager thing with only two lanes, one heading south and the other north. Each of her hooves filled an entire lane. Strangely, she didn't see any traffic and it was getting fairly close to midday. No, wait. The explanation for that was obvious. The human military must have already shut down the area in preparation for her arrival. She probably had the whole road to herself. Not that any traffic would have been a real hindrance for her, it still made her feel a little better that she wasn't going to have to bulldoze a hundred cars today.

A cracking sound made Imelda spin around in alarm. However, it was only her mine carts rolling onto the road. The asphalt couldn't quite handle the weight even when they were empty. There was another problem she noticed though. Her mine carts were about twice as wide as she was and their treads were pulverizing the pretty trees that the humans had obviously planted along either side of the highway. The mare grumbled at this development. It was a flaw in her plan but not a disaster. She knew she was going to be obliterating the road when she headed back to her ship with the carts full of oil, but running over everything directly alongside the highway all the way into the city? The day was far from ruined, but this wasn't part of the plan. It hadn't even occurred to her that her carts might be too wide.

It made her feel horribly unprofessional, but she couldn't do anything about it other than turn back now and declare the day a wash. Which she was not about to do. With a sigh of resignation, Imelda continued with the mission while behind her came an endless cacophony of breaking trees and splitting asphalt. The mare's ears pinned. This was so embarrassing. And she had three helicopters full of humans witnessing the entire thing. She must have looked so dumb.

For a few minutes all Imelda did was follow the road while doing her best to ignore the nonsense that was accompanying her. The scenery alternated between grass fields and blocks of trees. The occasional building off the side of the road added some eye candy for the trip too. For the most part the mare simply enjoyed the smell of fresh air. It was a drop of peace before things got ugly. Then she came upon what might have been called a town.

It was really just a consistent line of buildings that hugged either side of the highway for a bit. There also didn't seem to be a larger settlement branching outward. What was this? The sight made her pause with interest long enough for something to happen. A human car that would have neatly fit underneath a hoof pulled out of a parking-lot and attempted to turn toward her, only to suddenly swerve and stop with a screech. Imelda raised a curious brow as a human stumbled out of the vehicle after a few seconds and stared at her legs. Then her barrel. Then her face. She smirked. The little man's jaw dropped. One of the mare's helicopter stalkers suddenly circled around in front of her and hovered close to the man outside his car. A soldier hung out the open door of the aircraft and began yelling. There was a brief exchange Imelda couldn't understand.

The mare took the opportunity to study the miniature community that was in her way, but there wasn't a lot to look at. There was maybe three dozen buildings in total distributed on either side of the highway and not one structure looked taller than her knees. There were a lot of trees though and the design of the buildings varied enough not to be boring. Though almost all of the buildings had pointy metallic roofs, some were red and some were blue and one was green and so on. There were large buildings she suspected were businesses and small buildings she would have thought were homes, but the sheer amount of parking space around them left Imelda uncertain. There were a lot of signs in eye-catching colors too. However the mare was mostly concerned about the width of the road and how close the various structures were to it. Were her mine carts going to fit through this community or would she cause enough destruction here and now to get a proper military response?

Imelda looked up in thought. The refinery was pretty close now. Only 100 kilometers (60 miles) to go. That would take just over an hour to reach even if she was being slowed down by... human civilization. She entertained the thought of getting violent now, but shrugged it off. She had already decided in advance where she was going to do that and she'd already made it this far. Then the unicorn realized the civilian was trying to argue with the soldier in the helicopter. Her brows dropped. She didn't have time for this.

The towering pony stepped forward. Each fall of her hooves didn't fully crack the asphalt, but the black rock did visibly flex beneath her. Immediately the civilian was staring at her and the helicopter began flying higher and away. Imelda was both surprised and further annoyed the lone human hadn't jumped back into his vehicle and sped away. Instead he was just standing in the middle of the road stupidly gawking up at her. She came to a stop looming over him. She could have reached out with a hoof and crushed him or his primitive car. Still he didn't move. Of course, he was frozen with fear. The mare glanced at the vehicle. The unicorn's horn began to glow a baby blue and a faint matching glow encompassed the car. Slowly the vehicle rose into the air while the owner stared in amazement. Then Imelda gave her neck a tiny flick and the car was sent flying. The front smashed into the ground of the parking-lot and for a moment the sedan stood on its nose. Then it tipped forward and collapsed upside down. The windows blew out and the roof crumpled in. The civilian cried out in horror and began backing away from the huge equine. Imelda glared at him. Wrong way moron, she thought.

She stomped forward and the man spun around and tried to sprint. The unicorn stomped forward again, mock chasing the fool. He began blubbering nonsense and screaming as his hands flailed in the air. Imelda snorted with amusement. She purposefully dropped her next hoof just behind him and he dove onto the asphalt. He flipped over and stared up at her. The mare decided then that she had had enough fun. So she ignored him as she stepped over him and continued through the strange puny town.

The helicopters that followed Imelda seemed more frantic as they zoomed this way and that way. Several times they quickly crossed in front of her like buzzing insects. The mare didn't have to break her stride, but it was a bit startling. She could also tell by sound alone that the road was indeed not wide enough. At least the signs and trees were being obliterated beneath the treads of her mine carts. The unicorn blushed and her lips tightened. Fortunately, it didn't sound like she'd bulldozed any buildings by the time she escaped the town.

And that was it. She was back on the road with the scenery switching between blocks of trees and open green fields. Not that either were an obstacle. The tallest trees barely reached her knees and were constantly brushing against her due to how narrow the human highway was. And while two lanes were only barely enough for her, it was nowhere close for her mine carts. Every short stretch of woods her ears were filled with the crashing of trees being destroyed behind her. As for Imelda's helicopter friends, they had calmed down only a little after she had moved on from the town. Instead of matching her pace and keeping their distance, now they periodically circled her or flew ahead and waited for her to catch up. They still maintained a gap between themselves and her, no doubt to avoid getting swatted out of the air, but not as much.

If they intended to do something about her before she struck they'd have to do it soon. Yet they did nothing for the next half hour as she merely continued following the road with its hills and turns.

Then they suddenly weren't with her.

The constant drone of their rotors she had grown so accustomed to was simply gone. Imelda felt the hairs on the back of her neck rise and her ears began swiveling. Something was wrong. The mare slowly came to a stop and took a moment to analyze her surroundings. There was a thin line of trees on either side of the highway here that she could easily see over to the open fields beyond. There was a settlement of some kind ahead as well, though most of it appeared to be to the left of the highway and not along it. She still hadn't encountered any traffic either other than the one car incident back in the previous town. If Imelda wasn't sure the authorities had closed the highway ahead of her she would have begun doubting that this was really a road.

Imelda couldn't think of an obvious reason for her escorts to abandon her so suddenly. So it must have been for reasons that were not obvious. Was the human military about to bomb her and they didn't want to be in the area? Possibly. She was about to pass through another populated area and she hadn't exactly done anything to make herself appear friendly. The mare took a deep breath. Her nerves were getting to her. The unicorn knew the humans had no weapons capable of penetrating her shields and there was only a minuscule chance of the "ghost shot" phenomenon screwing her over. A "ghost shot" being the random one in a billion chance that a shield would simply fail to repel any given projectile. Besides, even if she did become a victim of a ghost shot, she had her healing nanobots to fix her up.

So Imelda mustered her determination and marched forward.

To her left was definitely a town. Tightly packed buildings along winding roads that stretched into the distance. To her right was an airport of some kind. Imelda was not particularly familiar with airports, usually if she had to take a public form of transportation she used a spaceport, but she could identify a runway easily enough. And this airport had at least two runways with other thinner roads connecting various parts of the facility. Her attention, however, was divided between the airport and the other detail that became apparent as she approached. The roads leading into the town had been blocked by large trucks. Well, large for humans anyway.

Imelda strolled past the edge of the airport, but came to a stop by the first roadblock. She eyed the surrounding area, yet she did not see any humans. Her ears perked, however she heard nothing. It was quiet. Then it occurred to the mare that her helicopter escorts probably weren't allowed in this airspace due to a risk of collisions, but the mercenary didn't see any activity on the runways. Or anywhere else. Everything was still. Imelda licked her lips. She glanced at the truck beside her and at the little wooden stands the humans must have put up. Red stripes and flashing yellow lights. The military must have dragged everyone into hiding. The mare nodded once. Good for them. Probably the smartest move the humans could make if they were still unable to decide if she was a threat.

Imelda decided she had wasted enough time and continued on her journey following the highway. She could make basic observations while on the move anyway. For example, the airport's parking-lot could hold maybe 100 vehicles and it looked like it was almost full right now. However, when Imelda glanced at the many buildings again, she still did not see any movement. Why? The place must have been packed. All she could do was mentally shrug.

In the blink of an eye she left the town and its airport behind.

It was then that an ominous aura began to engulf her. Even as her helicopter escorts returned to her sides from wherever they'd been, Imelda felt an emotional weight pressing down on her shoulders more and more with every step. The next pocket of civilization is where it would all begin...

Sergeant Matthews sat in his helicopter seat with the door open. Alongside and a little below them the alien was following the 95 Greater Northern Highway. Cradled in his arms was no longer some science camera meant to document everything. Now he held a rifle. All his men were now armed. Throughout the course of the day the situation just kept getting worse and worse. Yet still the higher-ups waited. Hoped. Prayed. No one was sure what would happen. Well, Matthews was pretty sure at least.

He'd watched the giant down one of his choppers and send five good men to the hospital with serious injuries. Yet, all the brass cared about was fatalities. Which there had yet to be. The Sergeant's grip on his weapon tightened. Did they not see its face? This thing was definitely hostile. It made no attempt to communicate when one of his Privates had insisted on trying. It had knocked a helicopter out of the air without a hint of remorse. It even charged them when they tried to deter its advance a second time. Then there was the incident in the town of Bindoon when the creature threw a car and chased a civilian.

It was extremely dangerous and they should have been given the order to attack it when it marched right by the Air Base in Bullsbrook!

But no. The Prime Minister and all the rest of the fools sitting in cozy offices on the other side of the country were afraid of starting a war. They desperately clung to the belief that this thing was just "misunderstood". Sergeant Matthews swallowed. He wanted so badly to defy his orders. To open fire. Yet he... was afraid.

The alien was clearly armed and the weapon was huge. What kind of damage could this thing do? It took out a helicopter just by kicking it for God's sake! The pitiful rifles he and his team were carrying? They might as well been peashooters against something that huge. They'd need much bigger guns. Until someone higher ranked than himself deployed those bigger guns however, the Sergeant had little hope. He was certain a lot of people were about to die and he did not look forward to saying "I told you so".

The suburb of Midland was next and, from what Sergeant Matthews had heard on the radio and at the base when they were getting their gear switched, the people were not being entirely cooperative. While it wasn't exactly a riot, some were not interested in heeding any more government emergency announcements. While most people had gone home as ordered, a large number had refused. Maybe that was for the best. Some of the homes directly in the alien's path might be empty. Then again, that was assuming it continued to follow the highway as it traveled towards the coast. It was a mixed blessing having seen the map on its wrist. Some nerd at a computer had been able to study the pictures his crew took and figured out roughly where the thing was headed.

Kwinana Beach.

It was an industrial complex on the coast just south of Perth. Which facility the alien was after specifically wasn't clear, but it was a fact that region could only be reached in one of two ways. In a world where God had mercy, the creature would travel much further south then circle back up north again to avoid any populated areas. There was a corridor of sparse development that way the alien could take. More likely, the option Sergeant Matthews knew in his bones was coming, the alien would have to cut across very large and densely populated territory. Just using the highway as it had so far had badly damaged it. What would those mine carts alone do if it tried to slip through the narrow roads of a major city or crowded neighborhoods? They had already gotten a few tastes of it and it wasn't pretty. The Sergeant could easily picture the swath of destruction clearly in his mind. It terrified him and no one in a position of authority seemed interested in preventing it.

He had orders only to follow. He had weapons he knew would barely annoy it. He had a giant alien heading for thousands of helpless civilians. The nightmare was unfolding moment by moment.

They had reached Midland. The highway ran right through and there clearly wasn't enough room.

The alien... stopped?

The Sergeant's helicopters began to slowly circle the giant as it studied the road ahead and the surrounding terrain. It was a wall of homes. Beyond which was a sea of roofs and side streets. The Swan River cut across the landscape in a serpentine path a short distance to the west, closer to Perth. One of the computer lackeys suggested the alien might use the river to get to the ocean, then wade along the shore to its final destination. But that might just have been hopeful thinking. Even ignoring the bridges it would have to smash, it wasn't like they could tell the invader what to do. If they could they would have told it to stay away.

For a minute or two the giant just stood there eyeing the buildings in its way. The tension grew, but so did a tiny seed of hope. The alien lifted its leg and prodded the screen that was strapped to it a few times. It was adjusting its route. It glanced up from its navigator and he even saw it chew on its lip in thought. That little glimmer of hope began to grow into a flame. The creature... wasn't entirely hostile. It wanted something from Kwinana Beach, but it might just take the long route that would avoid hurting anyone.

Sergeant Matthews felt his heart pound in his chest. The alien lowered its leg and gave the helicopters a quick glance before focusing on the suburban sprawl in its way with a very human expression that screamed of something... uncertain. A cheer rose in the Sergeant's soul. God was going to show them mercy. His lips tightened and he might have cried with relief if he wasn't a man on duty at the moment.

An explosion like that of artillery rang out. Followed immediately by at least two more. One of his helicopters plummeted from the sky with gaping holes torn in the fuselage.

The Sergeant didn't understand. What was happening?

Then his brain caught up as the weapon on the alien's shoulder spun around to face a second helicopter. Another series of bangs filled the air and with each one a substantial portion of the aircraft was shredded along with anyone inside who happened to be standing in the wrong place. Matthews jumped to his feet, one hand still holding his rifle, the other grasping the handle on the ceiling so he could hang out the door. "Get us out of here!" he ordered. But it wasn't necessary. The pilot was already turning and trying to gain some altitude. He could hear the rotors above him speeding up.

But the helicopter wasn't nearly fast enough. The attack happened in slow motion for the Sergeant.

He watched as the alien merely peeked over its shoulder and the cannon spun around to aim at them. He looked into the equine monster's eyes and saw... emptiness. Evil. It fired with a deafening explosion. He felt a powerful rush of air go right past him. There was a sound of tearing metal and he suddenly lost his balance and was falling out of the helicopter. He tried to tighten his grip on the handle above him, but as he continued to tumble out the open door he realized why. The bullet the giant had fired tore straight through his elbow. From his wrist to just below his shoulder was simply gone. He'd left his hand back in the helicopter on the handle. And a gaping hole existed where the head of the helicopter pilot was supposed to be.

The alien hadn't been aiming for the Sergeant specifically. It had targeted the pilot, but the angle of the vehicle had put his elbow in the way.

The Sergeant, a man who had never fought a battle in his life and never fired his weapon at another human being, plummeted to the earth below while more shots rang out. He was barely conscious of his men being blown apart above him. Just before he hit the grass his last thoughts were simply, "nice shot..."

Author's Note

It begins...