> STAR-BOUND: REBORN. > by QueenMegumin > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- > The Message > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- "Earth is doomed without this Ranger, Take this." The old woman said, passing a signal holder towards me. "Thank you." I said. "But why would I need it?" I asked. "Protect,Defend Ranger." She said. I woke up on the floor next to my bed. I was tossing and turning last night. I guessed. I checked the alarm towards my left. It was currently 3AM Earth time. I grabbed the small Signal holder on the side of my bedside table. "Well. Lets see why she sent me this." I said, looking towards the small portable Signal player. Signals are sorta like those old CD things that humans used to use thousands of years ago, except they can take Terrabytes of space, and show a full 3D colored picture of the message. Its perfect for movies. I quickly put it in and pressed play. The old woman appeared again, this time she was wearing some sort of robe. "This is to The United Federation Defense Force, a alien race is heading towards Earth and will arrive in a few weeks. You need to prepare. This race is called Cyborkrats and will destroy everything in their path. Please listen to me and defend Earth. Its all we've got." She said, just as the image flickered and turned off. I quickly checked that date. I had about a month to get towards Earth before these things arrived. I was currently at Station 042 near the Polaris System. Unless I somehow got stuck somewhere, I should be able to reach Earth with weeks to spare. I grabbed my T.W (Tactical Watch) and headed towards the main hallway. I was about to open the door when I completely forgot I was still in my PJs. After a quick change into my SRDS (Star Ranger Defense Suit) and grabbing my Pulse Blaster and Rifle I was ready to head out towards the door. I doubled checked if I left anything behind and headed towards the Hangar. "Alright Everypony!" Princess Celestia said. "Thank you for coming to the new Festival, Celebrating yearly the meteor shower that hits Equestria every year. This will help inform us the reasons why we should always stick together and stay strong!" She said in a cheerful tone. Everypony cheered. "Thank you all for coming. I announce the Rockfall Festival.. OPEN!" Everypony cheered and clapped their hooves together. All of the rides and shops opened after that, everybody was extremely cheerful. Spending a lot of bits towards everypony. Even though the Meteor shower was supposed to happen at midnight, everypony was happy to wait the day to see it. I was jogging down the hallway. I could see the other Rangers waking up, they looked through their door and moaned. "Sorry!" I whispered. I arrived at the main hangar and started to look where I parked my ship. Someone tapped me on the shoulder. It was Jay, my partner. "Sky, its 3 in the morning. Go back to sleep." "But." He looked me in the eye. "Alright. But i'm getting up later." I said, heading back to my room, I would of started a conversation with him, but we were both tired. After heading back to my room I locked the door and took out the Signal player. I wrote down everything the woman said,writing theories and times. Then it hit me. "Its not a month. Its a week!" I said, panicking. I pocketed it again and bolted out of my door and sprinted towards the hangar. I ran towards the end of the hangar to see my ship. The Aphelion. Custom built Pulse Cannons, Pulse Torpedos and a Pulse Drive. She was a red ship, small, but can sure put on a damn fight. I opened the cockpit and hopped into my seat. I pushed a few buttons and twisted the key and the Aphelion was online. "Hello Sky." APS Said. Aps is my AI System, been with me since I was 6. "Morning APS. We need to head to Earth. Fast. Turn the Pulse Drive into Overdrive and make us get there as quickly as we can." "Exiting Station 42." Aps said as the ship took off. "Buckle up Sky." APS said. "Yeah yeah I know." I looked towards the small display screen in the middle of the control panel "Show me the path, please." I said. "Displaying path." It showed 4 stars we had to travel towards Earth. "Put the drive into Overdrive. We need to get there fast." I said. "Activating Pulse Drive in 3... 2... 1..." The ship took off at incredible speeds. "Sir. We've detected a unknown ship in this sector." The Tracker said. "Keep a eye on it. Keep the cloak system online." The Commander replied. The Cybrokrat Dreadnought ship was carrying millions of battleships, fighters and destroyers towards Earth. "Sir! This ship appears to be apart of the UFDF!" The Tracker replied. "We can't take any chances, Fire!" The Commander shouted. The pulse cannons fired, sending the ship down towards the planet. "Sir, were still detecting a signal from the ship." "Send a drone down. We need to make sure he doesn't signal the rest of the UFDF" He looked towards the main window "For years, we've been ignored. Mistreated, killed! Its time we fight back!" The entire crew in the bridge cheered. Everypony was watching the sky in glory. It just turned midnight and the meteors were starting to fall. Celestia was watching it as well. She saw something a bit bigger then the Meteors that fall. "Bring the Scientist." Celestia said. The white pony ran over carrying her saddlebags. "Yes Mistress?" Marshmallow said. "Keep a eye on that Meteor." She said, looking at it more closely. "Mistress. Thats not a meteor." Marshmallow was looking through her binos that she attached onto her saddlebags. "Will it burn up in the Sky?" Celestia asked "It might, its a 50 50 chance." Marshmallow replied "Keep work on that sickness cure with Zecora." Celestia said, trotting off. "Alright Mistress!" Marshmallow said, galloping towards the Everfree forest. "I just hope it doesn't hit Equestria." Celestia said, walking over towards the Royal Guards. "Keep a eye on that thing in the sky. If it gets to serious get the Wonderbolts check it." "Yes Princess Celestia." They replied. She looked towards the sky, seeing the Meteors flying through the sky. The one she told Marshmallow about was falling slower then the rest of them. "Lets hope Marshmallow was right." She said, trotting off. > Crash Landing > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Everypony was watching the skies. Looking as the meteors shot across the sky. Celestia was still looking at the slighty bigger "Thing" that Marshmallow talked about. It was moving slower then the rest of the meteors but as fast as a Pegasus. "Serve, Defend, Protect. Ranger." She replied. "I will." I said, I was currently standing on the planet known as Pandora. A place where slums and other troublemakers go to. "Earth will be doomed without the signal. Send it as quickly as you can. You have one month in Pandora time." A month for Pandorians was 1-2 weeks. "Now, go!" She said, rushing me. 5 Minutes before Touchdown We were currently in the EQG3 Solar system, named by the famous explorer Edward Quest Garrison the 3rd, one of the first humans to go interstellar. The system was right next to Alpha Centauri A, the closest star to Earth and Sol. "Sky, I am detecting a unknown heat signature nearby to Jool" Jool was a gas giant, sometimes random heat waves appear from it, but most ships don't detect them. "Just ignore it, its just a heat wave from Jool." I said, eating my lunch "This heat signature seems too cold for a heat wave. Im detecting it to also be higher then any heat wave recorded on Jool." "Like I said-" "The signal is heading towards the ship." "Aps! Its alright. Charge the pulse drive." "Preparing to jump.." Suddenly the ship shook. I checked the Pulse drive and we were over 4000% "APS THATS TOO M-" We jumped, and the amount of force caused me to blackout. I woke up with alarms flashing all over the ship, APS seemed to be shutdown, prehaps to power loss. I had no clue where we were and what was currently going on, I opened my eyes to see one of the wings on fire, with the ship entering a unknown planet. For a second there I thought we were on Earth. But we would of jumped too far to be in Sol "Aps?" I said, looking around for the AI switch. "All systems are offline, We are currently entering into some sort of planet. I'll explain details when we touchdown" "Can you fly?" "I currently have no control over any systems on the ship." I flipped a switch and turned the ship into manual. I pulled on the trigger as hard as I could, trying to take us into a controlled entry. I looked to my left and saw the wing rip into shreds, all the parts headed towards different parts of the land I was heading towards, I heard another crack to see the other wing rip and fall off the ship. The canopy was starting to melt from the extreme heat and the system's power was starting to shutdown due to the massive amount of heat the core was dealing with. We passed through a cloud to see a mountain right in front of us. We scraped it and started sliding down from it, the Canopy shattered and send shards falling into the interior, the front of the ship was dented and torn and was taking in most of the force. We came to a stop in a small clearing in a forest. "Holy shit." I said panting. I pulled out my small flip knife and cut the seat belt and crawled out of the ship. We left a massive hole in the ground where we stopped, tons of trees where hit and taken down and the ship was dented through the middle. Wires were split and sparks well all over the ship, the engine was exposed and plasma was leaking from the shields. "Aps?" "I tried to eject the probe. Its currently stuck." Aps said from the speaker inside the Aphelion. "Currently we have more problems to deal with. Do a thermal scan for Titanium and plastasteel." I said, grabbing my Multi tool from the cargo "Titanium has been found underneath us. Plastic Steel is 800 meters to the north." Aps said from the speaker "Ive detected drinkable water nearby. Is it possible for you to place the Aphelion in the water to cool the core." Aps said from the broken speaker. "Alright." I started to pull on the ship towards the area that the lake was nearby. Princess Luna was watching Celestia, she looked distressed and annoyed. Everypony from Ponyville was shaken from the comet crashing into the Everfree forest, it nearly hit Canterlot Luna thought. "Everypony, please calm down." Celestia shouted. She looked towards her sister. "ALRIGHT!" Luna shouted. Everypony calmed down and started to listen to Celestia. "This is a big deal. Never before has this happened." Celestia paused. "I just want to inform you that this isn't a comet." Everypony looked shocked. Celestia trotted over to Luna and whispered something into her ear. "Go get the Engineer and the one with that cupcake sense thing." "Got it!" Luna said flying off. After letting the engine and core cool down, I pulled it out of the lake and and started pulling parts of the back of the ship. The parts were soaking wet, once I got into the core I pulled it out, shutting down APS, and started having a look at it. Wires and coolant were leaking from it, showing that it was destroyed completely. "Dammit!" I said, reconnecting it to the Aphelion. Lights flickered as power surged into the ship. "APS, how much power do we have?" I asked. "22 Percent, dropping 5 Percent every hour." Aps replied. "Open out the solar panels, i'll attach some batteries to them when its day." I grabbed a flashlight from the glove compartment and turned it on, I was using the ship's light to navigate in this darkness. "For a night, its quite bright." I said. "Deploying distress beacon." APS said, a small pole came out from the side of the ship and started flashing, it was sending a signal out towards space. "Aps, deploy the surface drill, once we get some titanium ill get out the refinery." I said. This is going to be one hell of a jigsaw puzzle. I thought, turning the beacon more towards the moon. > The Attack > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Jay was taking a sip from his glass on the SR Cortana, it was in orbit above Earth, scanning for any signals. PAS was processing battle simulations. "Simulation complete. Wins, 0. Loses, 41." PAS said. "Really?" Jay said, taking a sip "Do it again." Jay said, putting his drink down and looking at the view. "Restarting Simulation." PAS said. "Wait." Jay said, standing up. He was looking through the window and saw a glimmer nearby the moon. "PAS, get the ELITES on call." Jay said, looking closer towards the glimmer. "Magnifying." PAS said. "You read my mind." Jay said, he could see the glimmer more closer. "Holy shit! Its a super dreadnought!" Jay said, watching it fly closer, two smaller ships came out from the side, Dreadnoughts. "They're going for a invasion!" Jay said. "Connected with the ELITES." PAS said. "Jay, this better be good." ELITES Commander said. "Theres a sup-" The signal cut out and all of the lights in the ship went out. "EMP!" Jay said, now currently floating. He falled back towards the floor and all the lights turned red. "Emergency Power online." "WARP US OUT OF HERE!" Jay shouted. "Sir, we detected a small corvette ship in orbit." The Tracker said. "We cant take any chances, Deploy the Dreadnoughts and fire a EMP blast towards Earth." The Commander said. "Copy that." The Tracker said, he pushed a few buttons on the red console and the crew heard a click as the hangar bays opened and sent out the dreadnoughts. "We have a confirmed hit from our EMP." "Good, Now they have nothing to hide. CHARGE!" The Commander shouted. I woke up yawning, it was daytime, and the trees were slightly swinging gently. After I got up, I took out the small parts of shattered glass from inside the Aphelion and tried to put them together. I managed to lay them down to see where they went. I thankfully didn't lose any of the glass. "Great. Now I need to find the thruster compartments from the wings" I said, checking how much power I had, I managed to get it up to 80% and it was only dropping 1% every 2 hours. "I managed to find the leak and labeled it on your visor." APS said. "Did you say you detected some sort of building before?" I asked. "Not that I recall." APS said. I looked towards the mountain that we crashed down on, it looked massive, bigger then Mt Everest on Earth, but no snow on the top. "We have detected a signal towards the Moon." APS said. "Play it then!" I said. "One small step for Mare. One giant leap for Pony Kind!" Bubblegum said, leaving the shuttle. She was on the moon, with Cupcake, Cupcake was floating around, jumping high in joy. "Cupcake, don't go too high." Bubblegum said, fiddling with her suit. "Okie dokie Bubblegum!" Cupcake said. There was a knock nearby and the simulation turned off. Cupcake and Bubblegum were sitting in a white domed room. The door nearby was being knocked on. "Hello? Who is it?" Bubblegum said, taking off her helmet. "Its Princess Luna." The voice said from the door. Bubblegum turned the valve and the door opened. Princess Luna was standing there, looking distressed. "Hey Bubblegum, I need you to do something for me." Luna said. "Oooh! Whats up Luna?" Cupcake said, poking her muzzle behind Bubblegum "Celestia asked me to get you guys." Luna said. "Let me guess, its something about that comet that crashed last night?" Bubblegum asked. "Yes, we need to you look at it. Celestia would of done it, but currently she's busy with the amount of scrolls she has to write." Luna replied. "Alright, Cupcake start up the CAB, i'll meet you there." Bubblegum said, trotting of with Luna to continue talking with her. Marshmallow was galloping towards Canterlot Castle. She had a lot of news to bring to Princess Celestia. It turns out that it was carrying some sort of cargo, It wasn't safe to just go towards. It seemed to be armed. "Princess Celestia!" Marshmallow said panting. "Sorry, Celestia isn't here." The royal guard said. "I'll just wait here." Marshmallow said, lying on the hard marble floor. "EMP blast was fired correctly towards Earth." The signal said. I was moulding some parts and attaching them to the Aphelion. "Let me guess. Cyborkrats?" I asked "Yes, we also seem to have detected a signal from the SR Infinity, the Star Ranger's Dreadnought. It is currently in Binary, but the signal says that the SR Beyond Battleship was deployed and sent towards Earth." APS said groggily. "Just work on getting enough power online. I dont want to be stuck here alone. Start processing where we are." I said. "Already done that. We are in Galaxy EQA in Star 14. The planet were are on is 14A with 14AA for the moon." "Alright. Now where the hell is EQA?" I said. "Distance is 4582.7 Light years away from Sol." "So we aren't even in the Milky Way?" I asked. "No." Jay was floating in the Cortana, the lights were red and flashing alarms with no sound were all over the ship, Jay opened his eyes and quickly floated to the control seat. He flipped a switch and the oxygen and the gravity turned back on, he fell to the floor and got up quickly, he turned on PAS "Pas, start processing where we are...." He saw a light flashing on the console, it was the distress beacon light, he flipped the switch and turned on the comms. "Hello? This is the Cortana?" > In The Middle > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Commander was looking over EQA14. The planet was full of life, and he could see the smoking spot where the ship was shot down before. He could see the small town and the castle on the mountain. "Men. Launch the colony ship, send it down and take over this planet." The Commander said. "Copy that." The Tracker said. "After its landed send down the destroyers and dreadnoughts." "After its landed send down the destroyers and dreadnoughts." The Commander looked towards the crew. "Today! We will Strike! We will take over this planet! And we shall take over Earth!" The Commander said, the crew cheered and ran towards the Colony ship. "Sky, i'm detecting a high amount of force in front of us. I've taken a thermal image." Aps said groggily. "Have you detected the thruster components?" I asked "Yes. I put it on your HUD. Once the engine is fixed we should be able to hover there." APS said, cutting out midway. "Alright got it. But we have run out of soldering iron." I said. "I've detected some iron nearby." APS said. "Ugh." I moaned. "There must be a better way to solve this damn issue." I said. "No UFDF ships detected in a 400 KM year Radius." "If there was another ship, we could put the Aphelion in the cargo and rebuild it back on the SR Infinity." I said. "Wait a second. Detect ANY Flying vessels." I said. "4048 Vessels detected." "Civilian?" I asked. "Fully armed and heading towards EQA14." APS replied. "How long will they take to land?" I asked. "30 Minutes before touchdown of vessels." APS Replied "Race?" I asked. "Unknown Race, no known data in UFDF Databanks." APS said. I looked towards the sky to see the small vessels enter the atmosphere, With closer inspection, they were massive, Destroyer to Dreadnought size. They were going for a full on invasion. "They're Invading the planet..." I said, I heard the comm unit beep as a signal went into it. I grabbed it and pushed play. "THIS IS TO ALL LIVING LIFEFORMS. YOU HAVE 3 DAYS TO LEAVE THIS PLANET." A voice said from the speaker. another signal went in. "This is the UFDF Aurora Warship, we got your signal Aphelion, and were planning to send down some small pods to assist you around your area. Over and out." Princess Celestia looked towards the sky, she could see the boxes floating in the sky. "What are they?" Celestia asked. "Miss Celestia! We tried to get the Pegasi to look at them but it was too high!" The royal guard said, crashing into the room. "Careful. I sense danger." Celestia said, she looked towards the boxes in the sky again, to see one come down closer to the planet. "Shall we bring the Scientist?" The royal guard asked. "Make it snappy." Celestia said. The royal guard flew off towards the Everfree forest. "I just hope she knows what to do." Celestia said, looking towards the sky. I saw a small capsule come out of the atmosphere and smash into the ground near me, I pushed the bushes away to see a pod with the word "ARMORY" on the side of it, I placed my hand on a small tablet and it clicked open. "APS. Is your turret system working?" I asked. "All Pulse cannons and the back Pulse Missile are online and will work successfully." APS Replied from the small speaker in my suit. I picked up the Assault Rifle from the pod and headed back towards the Aphelion. "Do you still have those tank wheels that I was planning to install in you?" I asked APS. A storage tank opened and two small tank tracks fell from it. "Alright. Now lets turn you into a tank." I said, grabbing my welder. The royal guard entered into the small clearing in the Everfree forest, he landed down next to a rock and knocked on it three times. This was the secret code to the Lab inside the ground. The rock split in half, with a metal staircase opening from the ground into the depths. "Showoff." The royal guard muttered. "Welcome back, Royal Guard." a speaker said in the rock. "Princess Celestia wants you." The Royal guard replied. "This better be important." The speaker said, some sounds came from the speaker and another voice came from it for a split second. "I will be coming in a second." The speaker replied. The royal guard looked around to see Marshmallow appear from the staircase carrying her saddlebags. The unicorn looked towards the guard. "Yes?" "Princess Celestia wants to see you about the small boxes in the sk-" A capsule smashed into the ground next to them, pushing them both into the air, they hit the ground, sliding before a bit before they both got up. "This looks incredible!" Marshmallow said, inspecting the capsule. "Its not one of Bubblegum's Inventions. We need to bring it to Celestia." Marshmallow replied. "SIR! UFDF SHIPS IN THIS SECTOR." The tracker said. The commander was looking towards the planet. "Setup the cannon on that mountain, we will frame these animals for shooting down their ship, then once they are weakened. We will strike and destroy them both." The commander said. "SIR, THE ANIMALS ON THIS PLANET HAVE ALREADY SEEN THE COLONY SHIP. THEY SEEM TO BE STAYING BACK FOR NOW BUT FROM-" The Commander put a finger on the Trackers lips. "Bring out the guns." The commander said, he put his finger down and waited for The Tracker's reply. "SIR YES SIR." The tracker said, he grabbed the speaker and turned on the comms.