ExtraEquestrial

ExtraEquestrial

Q&A

         The number of ponies surrounding the procession was staggering to Twilight. What had started out as a small group of just Twilight and her friends, the Princess, Torcannas, and two guards, had quickly grown, until more and more ponies came up to the group, hoping to get a look at the strange alien that had crashed into Ponyville just a few days ago. With Torcannas towering above almost everypony, and that strange, golden armor really did make him hard to miss.

Even so, it was a beautiful day outside, and there would have been many things Twilight would have wanted to do on a day like this. But what was happening now was far better than anything she could have asked for.

“I just can’t wait! Imagine how much our race could benefit from this creature’s knowledge.....”

That was the thought that was currently running through her mind as they made their way through Ponyville to town hall, where the questioning was taking place. By now, almost everypony in Ponyville had crowded around Twilight and the others. After what seemed like an eternity of walking with most of Ponyville following them, they finally reached their destination. As Twilight and Princess Celestia started the short walk up the small flight of stairs to reach the door, a pony burst out. Twilight had never seen this pony in Ponyville, so she assumed it was one of Princess Celestia’s assistants, due to the white coat and small name tag the pony was wearing.

        “Ah, right on time,” Princess Celestia said as she turned to face Twilight. “Twilight, I’d like you to meet one of my top scientists from Canterlot, Professor Estrellas. He specializes in space research, and is here to record the information that Torcannas gives us.”

“Yes, greetings Princess, and thank you for this amazing opportunity.” The professor then saw Torcannas.

 “And you must be the alien everypony is talking about? Well, I think it will be a great honor if you wish to share your knowledge...” The professor trailed off as all he received from Torcannas was a blank stare. He chuckled nervously, then turned back the entrance of town hall, and walked inside, the Princesses following behind.

        Torcannas watched as the equines filled into the building. He wasn’t sure what they wanted from him, exactly. Answer a few questions and that was all? He would be allowed to leave? Even further... where was his phoenix? He wouldn’t be able to get off the planet without it.... maybe he would be asking a few questions of his own.

The equines themselves.... these “ponies”, as they called themselves, had been strangely.... friendly to him. He had been interested, when rather than being captured, dissected, or experimented on, he had been helped by them. He supposed it would be simple enough to answer these questions. He entered the tall building, following the equines into it.

        Twilight watched as everypony entered town hall. She saw her friends, standing at the front of the crowd, while others streamed in through the pink double doors. Torcannas came in just around the time the last ponies were entering. They had been seated at a fairly large table on the stage, four chairs at each of the ends. Princess Celestia sat at the end facing the entrance, Twilight to her left, and the Professor to her right. Torcannas took the only open seat, facing Celestia. Once everypony had gotten into town hall, the doors closed, and Celestia began.

“Greetings, one and all,” she started “today is a very important day for all of Ponykind. Just a few days ago, most of you had heard that a something had landed in Ponyville. Well, that thing would be the guest sitting across from me. We are here today to find out as much as we can about him before he must leave us”, She then turned to Torcannas. “Today, I shall be asking a series of questions to you in order for us to learn more about your kind. The pony on my right will be recording your answers. Does this seem agreeable to you?” Celestia asked.

Torcannas was silent for a few moments, but soon replied with a curt “Yes”, surprising some ponies that he could speak, due to the lack of a mouth.

Celestia nodded her head slightly before continuing. “Very well. Only a few ponies know your name, myself included, but can you tell us exactly who, and what, you are?”

Torcannas closed his eyes before speaking. “My name is Torcannas. My people are called the Protoss. First born of the gods, the Xel'naga. Currently, I am a Zealot in the Protoss military.” Most of the ponies had confused looks on their faces, but, nevertheless, Torcannas continued. “ I am one of the few surviving defenders of Aiur, granted that I unfortunately did not partake in the.... worst of the battle. Does that answer your question? ”

“Worst?”Twilight asked herself. “Who would want to take part in the worst part of any battle?”

Princess Celestia had a confused look on her face for a moment, but it quickly disappeared. “Very well, then,” she continued. “Next I would like to ask; how did you come to crash here?”

“My people were transporting a powerful and ancient craft to a location where it was needed. However, when we were nearing the destination, we were attacked by another race in that sector of the galaxy.”

The Princesshad a slightly worried look on her face before she asked her next question. “A while ago, I spoke to the doctor in charge of you, back in the hospital. He said that, when he first tried to communicate with you, it was met with no success. But a short while after, according to him, you promptly put a hand on his face, and after a few moments, suddenly spoke fluent Equestrian. How did you do this?”

“Well, I made contact with him to obtain the knowledge of how to speak your language,” he explained.“Now, most of my kind can simply reach out with our minds and withdraw or give any information we seek.”

“So you’re saying that you could just go into our minds and just take any information you want” Celestia asked, worry slightly visible on her face.

“Yes, but there would no need for that unless I needed something drastically,” he replied.

“You said that you were attacked, and that was the reason why you crashed here. What exactly were you attacked by” Princess Celestia asked.

Torcannas’s face changed to a slightly more troubled look as he answered. “We were attacked by a race known as the Zerg. A horrible race of creatures, no, abominations, individual species mutated by the zerg to serve a purpose given to them by their leader, called the “hive mind”. The “Zerg Swarm” as it is called, is one of the most horrible things ever created. They destroy everything in their path by sheer number, overrunning even some of our most heavily defended outposts and colonies. Even...,”his face darkened as he said the end of his phrase, “..even our home planet of Aiur, which is what I meant when I said I was a survivor of Aiur... so many lives were lost, most of them our proud warriors, giving their lives to ensure the escape of the civilians. Some of the dead were even not of our own, another race assisted us during the fall, a race known as the Terrans. This was one of the few times our two races have cooperated, unfortunately it has not always been this way. The sector of the galaxy, the “Koprulu sector” currently is in a state of war between 3 races: my race, the Terran dominion, and the Zerg Swarm.”Torcannas replied.

Princess Celestia waited until Torcannas finished before asking: “Wait, if these “Terrans” have assisted you before in fighting the Zerg, why don’t the two races cooperate more in defeating this common enemy?”

“Relations with the Terrans have been... problematic. Our first encounter with them wasn’t as peaceful as it could have been. If it had, we might have had a chance to defeat the Zerg together. The way our races first met happened at an unfortunate time. We had learned that one of their colonized worlds, a planet they called Chau Sara, had been infested by the zerg,” Twilight was slightly creeped out by the use of the word “infested”, “there was no way for the terrans to stop this infestation, so my people stepped in... we had no choice, we destroyed the infested planet to stop the spread of the zerg.”

Princess Celestia’s mouth hung open, in shock, similar to most of everypony's expressions.

“You destroyed an entire planet?!” Twilight said, accidentally, out-loud. “How do you even do that?” The simple thought made Twilight uneasy, how a race such as the Protoss could just decide to destroy an entire planet, killing who knows how many creatures.

“Simple, we aimed the beams of several of our capital ships at the surface of the planet until it overheated. Yes, I know, I see how the thought is sickening, but if we had not done what we had, the zerg would have killed everything on the planet anyway, then they would have spread and killed and consumed even more, so you must see that our point was justified. Unfortunately, the terrans did not think so, and ever since it has usually meant battle when our two races meet.”

“Very well,” Princess Celestia said. “I suppose that that is enough history for a while. Let us take a break and we can continue in a short time.” After she finished her statement, ponies started to rise and file out the doors. Twilight went to catch up to her friends as she neared them, they each gave a greeting, Twilight responded in kind as they made their way outside.

“Wow.... I never thought that space could be so....scary,” Fluttershy said to her friends.

        “I can’t believe that they actually destroyed an entire planet, these guys must be crazy high-tech”, responded Rainbow.

        “I’m sure we can ask him more about later”, Twilight said. “Wait, where is he?”

`        Torcannas sat, still at the table in Town hall, contemplating. “Why had I told them about Aiur” he asked himself. “There was no need for them to know of what happened... I suppose I will never forget that day”, buthe remembered that day very well, indeed.

Aiur

Year: 2500

        The planet of Aiur was beautiful, covered with lush jungles, and the gleaming cities of the Protoss. A clearing in one such forest contained two protoss, flickering slightly in their armor. Torcannas stood next to his close friend and mentor, Koranos, who had been assisting him learn the ways of the Khala.

“Focus, Torcannas, as I have told you before, your mind must be clear if you are to be successful”, Koranos chastised the student.

“Yes, master”, Torcannas replied as he readied himself for another attempt at creating a psi-blade. He held out his arm, gauntlet attached, and focused. He harnessed the pool of his psionic energy, and focused his thoughts. A blue blade began to extend out of Torcannas’s gauntlet and grew to a fair length, but swiftly disappeared after several moments. Torcannas lowering his arm after the blade dissipated.

“Good,Torcannas, very good. That is progres, I-” , he stopped abruptly as they both saw dark shapes fall towards the surface of Aiur.

“Master, what is that” Torcannas asked his mentor.

“If it is what I believe it to be... Torcannas we must hurry! To the shuttle, now”, Koranos replied as he began to run swiftly to where they had landed their shuttle, Torcannas following rapidly behind him. As they neared the craft, four serpentine creatures, Hydralisks, began to slither out of the forest towards them, getting closer by the moment. When the hydralisks had gotten close enough, they threw back their heads and a stream of spines flew out, each one hitting them -or would have hit them, if not for their shields and armor. Why his master insisted on them wearing the armor of protoss warriors during training, he would never know, but he was glad on this day they had chosen to do such, it would no doubt save their lives. As the hydralisks prepared another barrage of spines to be launched at them, Koranos’s hands began to glow with a blue light, he spread them and two of the hydralisks...simply exploded, ripped apart by the force of the Temlpar’s attacks. As the other Hydralisks shot their spines at them, again to only be melted by their shields, Torcannas charged at the two monstrosities, his thoughts and focus centering, and a psi-blade jumped from his gauntlet, faster than it had ever before. When he got into range of the zerg, he stabbed the first hydralisk through the mouth, it releasing a horrible screech before its death. Torcannas swiftly removed his blade from the head of the crumpling creature, before swiping it to his left, cutting off the claws that were about to attack him, as well as the head of the creature who they belonged to.

“Very impressive, Torcannas. Now we must hurry”, Koranos told him as they continued to the shuttle. As they reached the craft, a platform lowered itself and they-

Torcannas?

Torcannas?

Torcannas!

Twilight stared at Torcannas, he had been simply staring into nothingness. “Torcannas? Torcannas?...Torcannas!” Twilight called him. At the third time, Torcannas jolted himself and stared at Twilight.

“Yes Twilight Sparkle? I am sorry I was... reliving something unpleasant.”

“Oh, it’s fine, it’s just that Princess Celestia wanted to show you something.” Twilight said back. “Come on, we don’t want to keep her waiting”, Twilight continued as she began to head for the door. She saw Torcannas rise and follow her out the door. As they exited town hall, they found that Princess Celestia was waiting for them.

“Hello, Twilight, hello Torcannas.”

Both of the ones addressed responded back, and Princess Celestia continued. “I thought you might want to take a look at your....spacecraft and see if it is damaged before you go, however if you wouldn’t mind, I would like to know more about the history of what is happening in space, Torcannas.”

“Of course, if you may show me to my craft, I will be glad to answer any more you may have concerning the history of the war.”

With that, the Princess led them to the crash site. “The reason it is still here, is that whenever we try to get close to it, or move it with magic, a blue orb surrounds it and we can’t do anything”, the Princess stated as Torcannas stepped over the barrier that blocked off the crash site.

“That would be the shields of the ship, preventing your interaction with it”, was Torcannas’s reply. Unlike the other ponies, who, when trying to get close to the ship had ran face-first into a searing hot ball of blue, Torcannas simply walked up to the spacecraft, the nose of it lifting up, and he climbed in.

Torcannas climbed into the cockpit of his phoenix, amazed that it, apparently, had not been too damaged by the crash. Now for the real test. He walked over to the control seat, connected himself to the craft, and began to power it with his psionic energy. The energy held...that meant the ship was functional. That meant he could get off of this planet. He was about to test how it flew, when he heard screams from outside. He stepped out of the cockpit

                 -Only to be met by the eyes of a hydralisk.