Adrothe awoke to the sound of nature in the middle of a dark forest. "Where. is. this?", he said, his robotic eyes scanning the small clearing surrounding him and his two friends. He immediately noticed his his ghost was not by his side to scan this new environment. "Are you there?", he said, searching for his missing ghost. He found no trace of it, so he moved on to his second task. Waking his fellow guardians. "Get up Joah", he hollered as he violently shook the hunter.
"I'm up, i'm up", called Joah as he smacked Adrothe's hand off of his shoulder.
"Me too.", said Blaze as he lifted one knee and hoisted himself up. "Where are we?"
"Some forest on an unknown planet", reported Adrothe. "Our ghosts appear to have been misplaced after our journey through the Time stream in the Vault of Glass."
"What's THAT", Joah remarked as he pointed to a large stream of black smoke coming from somewhere in the the brush of the towering, dark trees that covered the land around them.
"I say we find out!", Blaze hollered behind him as he took off in the direction of the smoke.
"Woohoo, a new mission!", said Joah before he followed shortly after.
"Looks like I don't really have a choice, do I?", Adrothe said as he ran to catch up with his fireteam.
["Sir, all the test results were positive, our population will surely thrive on this new planet."], hissed an Acolyte in hive tongue.
["Good, send a signal to Crota, stating we have crash landed on a new planet just off of Sector 6, that can be used for the new creation."], said Kranox, as he paced back and forth in his torn apart scout ship.
["Um, s-sir?"], stuttered a second acolyte as he approached his leader.
["What?"], said Kranox, as he stopped pacing and turned all his attention to this new acolyte.
["We appear to have found a new species that inhabits this planet, and they appear to be sentient. We have captured them. There are three in total"], explained the acolyte
["Bring them to me."], demanded Kranox.
"Incoming thrall!", shouted Blaze as he shot down thrall after thrall with his trusty Red Death. They discovered several packs of thrall, with an occasional acolyte as they created their own path through the forest towards the smoke, which was getting fairly close now.
"What do you guys think is causing all that smoke?", commented Joah as he threw a throwing knife into the head of an acolyte standing behind the thrall."
"I think its a hive ship that crashed, and just happened to do so on the same planet we did.", commented Blaze, as he punched down the final thrall.
"That is most likely the case, and if so, we may be able to use their ship to get back home if it is repairable.", said Adrothe as he holstered his Thorn.
"I'm just glad we still have our weapons!", said Joah as he slid his Icebreaker onto his back, and began to start walking again.
Back in the Hive Ship...
A large black cage was wheeled into the command room, containing three small fillies. One of them, with a short, scraggly, purple mane , wings, and an orange mane spoke up,("Let us out, you big ugly monsters!")
("Quiet Scootaloo!, you're gonna make them mad!"), whispered a filly with a yellow coat and a bright red mane.
("Shhhh!"), said the third one, which had a short pink-and-purple mane and a white coat, with a small horn on her forehead.
[ "SILENCE!"], yelled Kranox in his language. Even through the language gap, the three ponies understood he was angry. ["They are no threat to us, take them outside and kill them."], said Kranox grimly, as the acolytes slightly flinched, but did as they were told. The fillies watched this exchange, and put two and two together, realizing that they probably weren't going to be released and see their families again, they started to whine and cry for what seemed like the end. Until a certain fireteam broke down the door between them and Kranox. The acolytes transporting the fillies immediately let go of the cage and pulled out their weapons and began to fire as their commander screeched in frustration and began firing his Shredder.
"Joah, you take left and pick off the enemies, me and Blaze will go for the boss.
"Got it.", said The Hunter and Titan in unison. Blaze ran past Adrothe, and created a ward of dawn to protect him and his ally. Adrothe threw solar grenades and shot Kranox with his Thorn, while Blaze stopped to observe his surroundings. He noticed three multicolored creatures that appeared to be crying, and realized the hive had taken them prisoner. He then heard Adrothe yell, "Blaze! Get it together!", which snapped his attention back to the matter at hand, and he helped his teammates finish off the hive Knight's life.
"Hey guys, check these out.", said Blaze as he walked over to the cage he noticed earlier.
"What are they?", said Joah curiously.
"That information is not relevant to our situation, so, could you two get over here and help me?", said Adrothe in an annoyed tone.
"Fine", they both complied. After some tinkering with ship's controls, the three guardians came to the conclusion that the ship wouldn't fly. While they were working, the three fillies just sat and stared in amazement at these peculiar aliens that saved them. The Titan turning over to look at them and making an assortment of random sounds "don't worry, we'll get you little guys out as soon as we're done", caused them to stop staring.
("What do you think they're gonna do to us 'Bloom?"), whispered Scootaloo.
("I don't know, but the one with the cape doesn't seem to favor us."), replied the yellow and red pony, named Apple bloom.
("They seem pretty nice, I think they're gonna let us out."), commented the third one.
("Yeah Sweetie Belle, and I bet they're gonna escort us all the way back to Ponyville, too."), said Scootaloo, with a sarcastic smile on her face.
("Shut up!"), squeaked Sweetie Belle. This got the attention of the three guardians.
("Now you've done it Sweetie Belle"), said Scootaloo. Then, the hooded guardian started walking over the cage, with the Titan not far behind.
"What should we do with them, Oh so amazing Adrothe?", said Joah, with a smirk on his face.
"They look like inhabitants of this world, so I say we get them to lead us out of this forest.", said Blaze, as he stared at the small equines, absorbing all of their features.
"I guess since this ship is no longer capable of flight, we should try to find other means of returning home.", said Adrothe.
"Why do we even hang out with you?", asked Joah as he started trying to fiddle with the Hive's lock mechanism. Adrothe then pulled out his Thorn, and shot the lock, shattering it to pieces.
"That's why.", said Adrothe coldly.
As the door swung open, Blaze said in a gentle voice, "Hey, you can come out now, we won't hurt you." The fillies then decided the guardians were not going to harm them. They sensed this weird feeling, like these aliens had a certain "light" to them. The one with a yellow coat took a step out, said something in their language to the other two, and they followed.
"They appear to be sapient, and have their own language as well.", said Adrothe, now curious what they were and why they were here. The titan then proceeded to lead them out of the hive spaceship. Once they stepped outside, Blaze noticed it was darker than before.
"I think we'll have to set up camp here for now, its getting dark.", said Blaze as he scanned the area with his eyes. He then turned to see the three equines huddled, whispering about something. After they broke the huddle, they all took one final glance at their saviors, and took off, straight into the brush.
"They're our only way out of here, we have to follow them!", said Blaze as he started running after them, his fire team following shortly behind. The trek was long and rigorous, but the fillies eventually slowed down a bit, when they realized the aliens wanted to follow them. Eventually, they came into a dirt trail, that seemed to be perfectly clear, and much easier to follow than pushing through branches and other brush. Soon after they found the path, the group found themselves walking toward a what looked to be a town. The guardians just quietly observed the town these small creatures had led them to. Suddenly, all three guardians found their entire bodies constricted by some sort of purple "haze", that they struggled to escape.
"It's a trap!", said Blaze as he stated the obvious.
"LET. US. GO!", howled Joah as he flailed around in the air.
("Girls, get behind me, there's no telling what these monsters will do to you"), said a lavender unicorn with a dark purple mane that had a single streak of magenta down the middle.
("No!, Twilight wait! They saved us!", said the yellow filly. The guardians then instantly dropped from the floating position they were in, ungracefully landing on the dirt.
("Are you sure? They haven't brainwashed you have they?"), said Twilight as she gave the filly a concerned look.
("No, we saw it too."), said Sweetie Belle.
("Yeah), said Scootaloo, as she stepped up next to her friends.
"I'm going to massacre them...", whispered Adrothe as he picked himself up, one hand gripping his Thorn.
"Wait!", said Blaze. "Look. I think it was a misunderstanding." The other two guardians then looked over, to see the three creatures they saved, and it it looked like they were saying something to the larger creature.
"Not yet, anyway.", said Adrothe, holstering his hand cannon.
"Did you say something, Adro?", questioned Joah.
"No", replied Adrothe.
("So they don't speak Equish? That's certainly interesting."), said the now embarrassed purple unicorn. ("Let me just fix that...") The unicorn then charged up her horn, causing it to glow a faint magenta. Then, with a flash of light, the unicorn cast her spell.
"What was that?", said the confused hunter.
"Why that happened to be my translation spell. Now we can understand each other.", said the unicorn, a proud smirk on her face. "My name is Twilight Sparkle, personal student of Princess Celestia. And who might you three be?"
Blaze, being the first to recover, said, "I am a Blaze, a human guardian, same as my friends, from the Traveler, this guy is Joah, a Hunter, and he is Adrothe, a robot Warlock."
"Humans? Traveler? Just where are you three from?", asked a confused Twilight.
"Sector 5. More specifically, the last city on Earth.", replied Adrothe.
"Wait a second, are you three from another planet?!?!?", questioned Twilight.
The three guardians all nodded together. "Oooohhm. Can we talk about this later? Killing all those Hive enemies was exhausting!", yawned Joah.
"I second that.", said Blaze.
Adrothe looked around at how dark it had become. "Hmm, I guess my engines could use some time to recalibrate."
"Fine. you three... humans"
"And Exo."
"...and exo, can stay at my house for tonight", said Twilight as she turned to the three fillies. "Go back home, but don't tell anypony about these 'aliens'.", then started walking into the now vacant town. "You three follow me.", she said as she glanced back at the guardians.
It was a short walk to "Twilight's" house, which happened to be a giant tree. 'Talk about a green thumb', thought Blaze as he entered the tree. It was a huge, hollowed out tree, filled with shelves upon shelves of books. 'Talk about a bookworm', thought Joah, as his eyes scanned the house.
Adrothe stared down at some of the books scattered across the floor. "Oh sorry about those, I just wanted to read through them a fifth time.", said Twilight as she bent down to pick up the books. Adrothe noticed one of the books she picked up. It's label said 'Dictionary', and it was at least a foot thick. 'Talk about intelligent beings', thought Adrothe. "There's a guest bedroom to stay in over there, i'll bring some pillows and blankets to you in a second.", said Twilight.
"Ok, thank you Twilight Sparkle.", said Blaze.
"Yep, thanks.", called Joah as he dove onto the bed in their room. "Ooh, softer than the beds back home, sweet." Moments later, Joah fell asleep, not even bothering to take his armor off.
Blaze took the blanket and pillow from Twilight, and followed Adrothe as he entered their room as well. Adrothe crouched in the corner, set his helmet off behind him, and powered off, his green eyes disappearing in the dark room. Blaze slowly took off his armor, and neatly set it aside from the blanket he laid out.
'This could be interesting.'