Stardust Protocol

Sirens blare. The hoofsteps of dozens of ponies wreck the midnight peace. In panic, the sleeping stallion bangs his head on the ceiling.

"For the love of..." The pony mumbles.

Sighing, he quickly jumps out of bed. The room he was in was somewhat tight, but it was the regular residential area for military use. A faint blue light dominates the room. On the other side of the room from the bed sits a rack. It is loaded with equipment. The stallion grabs the dark green suit and covers his tan coat. He grabs a nearby glass of water and splashes it on his head, he didn't have the time to freshen up. He then takes the helmet and pokes his head into it. The foul stench of sweat greets him.

With a press of a small button on the side of the helmet, he activates the visual system. The HUD in the visor of the helmet turns on, displaying the stallion's vital statistics. The sirens have already stopped. It seems that Officer Stronghoof will be late to the briefing... again...

The briefing room is a large space, with lines of chairs and a large screen in front of them. Most of the soldiers have already gathered, now they have to wait for the late ponies. The screen shows nothing much, except for a green grid with the United Equestria Corporation logo. It was a circle turning into a hexagon at the top. In the center there is the outline of a pony standing up on it's hind legs, with one forehoof brought closer to it's body with the other raised up. There are a pair of wings on the sides of the circle, and the words "United Equestria Corporation" on the bottom.

The military is a branch of the scientific research organization. These facilities belong to the Orbital Defense Division. It's task is to protect Equestria from threats coming from outer space. Since pony technology has reached such advanced levels, it has become obvious that a threat from space isn't just improbable, but, in fact, incredibly likely.

The captain of the ODD is Lieutenant 'Heavy'. Nopony knew his actual name, they just gave him this nickname for his brutal... 'style'. He stood in front of the briefing podium in front of the screen. The screen is located just above Heavy's head.

Stronghoof walks in through the open doors.

"Sorry I'm late," he apologizes.

Lieutenant Heavy sighs.

"Is everypony here?"

He looks around the room, counting the number of filled chairs.

"Right, then. Let's get started!" He exclaims.

Space is soundless. The sun shines eternally, resembling a great ball of fire. A stray rock hurdles through the airless void. As the asteroid enters the atmosphere, it is enveloped in fire. Small bits break off the falling meteor. In the end, it isn't small enough to burn up completely.

Larger bits break off the space rock, crashing into the forest, destroying trees. The meteor is reduced in size and crashes kicking up masses of dirt.

A military truck arrives, accompanied by three soldiers in robotic suits and several others. The suited ponies snuff out the small rockets in the hooves of their suits and come in for a landing. Officer Stronghoof, in his tan suit, lands in front of the other two.

"All right. We are going to load the meteorite into the truck now," he speaks through the com-link.

The lower ranked soldiers step down into the crater. With shovels, they dig out the area around the meteorite. Once they step out, the three suited ponies grab hold of the boulder from different sides and activate their hind rockets. Slowly, they lift the boulder out of the crater and load it into the truck.

And that goes there, the white unicorn thinks to himself while moving a small cable into place. He lifts his head up. His source of light is a small orb on three metal legs placed on the side of the workbench. The stallion levitates his tools down on the table. He brushes his dark blue mane off of his face with his hoof.

The rest of the room is lit with a dim blue light. In the center, there is a circular opening leading into a tunnel. At the bottom of which there is a spinning dynamo generating magical energy. The opening is surrounded by a railing.

The unicorn turns back to the doors sliding open.

"Didn't your mother ever tell you to knock first?" He asks jokingly.

"And didn't your mother ever tell you never to question a soldier?" Stronghoof replies whilst smiling.

They share a laugh , "So, you got the meteorite?" The unicorn asks.

"You bet we did."

The tan stallion gestures the two lower ranked soldiers, who are standing next to the doors. They push a rectangular container, with the recovered meteorite sitting in it, into the room. The unicorn examines it.

"Right, then. I'll begin the examination, you can leave it by the wall over there," he tells the soldiers.

After the soldiers left the room, the stallion walks up to his workbench. He opens a panel on the wall and presses a button. A mechanism activates and the wall in front of the workbench opens, then the workbench slides into the opening before the wall closes.

On the same panel, the unicorn presses another button and closes the panel. A large rectangular portion of the ceiling begins to lower. A large device slowly comes into view. With many cables, screens and panels, the contraption finishes it's descent with a loud bang. The unicorn stands onto the lowered platform and presses multiple switches and buttons. The device powers up and the screens turn on. The stallion presses a button on the top of the device to turn on the lights of the contraption.

"No, I can't allow that. Not after what happened last time. I won't greenlight another project like this until you prove it's safe. Understood?" The earth pony drops the comlink connection and, sighing, returns to his paperwork.

The pony sitting behind the desk in the office is United Equestria Corporation founder and administrator Alpha. The brown coated stallion was responsible for any projects in every branch of the organization. He gets the final say on what is continued or terminated. That, however, is usually up for debate between the leaders of the respective branches.

Hoofsteps break the sound of pen on paper. The white unicorn returned with the results of the examination and dropped them in front of Alpha.

File #228648

Meteorite Examination #257

Alpha opens the file and looks through it, "Take me to this meteorite, I want to see it," he asks the unicorn.

The earth pony stares into the viewing lens of the microscope.

"This micro-organism is showing signs of rapid multiplication, it appears to be forming into a larger organism," the unicorn comments.

Alpha stared into the microscope for a moment, before finally moving his head away and turning to the unicorn, "We'll move it into the genetics lab for further examination," he declares.

"Sir. We don't know what we're dealing with. All we know, is that it may be dangerous. We may be condemning all of Equestria," The unicorn arguments against Alpha's decision.

The earth pony pauses to think for a moment...

"This is up for debate, you know that, but we must act quickly. If we don't contain this micro-organism, the consequences may be worse," Alpha stays firm with his plans, "If it pleases your paranoia, we'll put it under high security."

"I guess I have no choice then," the unicorn pauses for consideration, "All right then."

"Good to have you on the team, Strange," Alpha pats the unicorn on the back.

The stallion stared into the stars beyond the ceiling of the dome. He sat on a bench with his hooves in the grass. Random patches of flowers littered the park. Small trees surrounding a circular area of bare dirt, with paths branching off in eight directions around it.

Stronghoof sighed lightly. He was away from his family and most of his friends. Only the fellow soldiers to keep him company. Overall, he felt lonely. New Canterlot City, the starport, was not his true home.

Hoofsteps were heard, coming from the edge of the park. They approached the bench, on which the stallion was sitting. A pale orange mare with a mane resembling fire in color walked up to him. Beside her, a dark blue pegasus with a smooth cyan mane.

"There you are! I've been looking everywhere for you," the mare speaks, "Cobalt found me running all over the place and asked me what I was doing. And he wanted in."

"A race?" Stronghoof asked with confidence.

The mare nodded, "Even though you're going to win anyway. With Gearbreaker and all that. I've made some modifications to Flameblitz that I'd like to show off, too."

"It's a race, then!" Stronghoof jumped up from the bench and onto his hooves...