//------------------------------// // Chapter 5: Face to Face // Story: The Imperial Ace // by Navanastra //------------------------------// /Chapter 5: Face to face/ Edited by: Chrome Masquerade Proofread by: Sergeant Luftfahrer “Spitfire? Spitfire what have you done again?” “I… I’m sorry mom. Really, it…it was accident, I swear!” “You call this an accident??!! This has been the 3rd time this month!!” “I… I’m so sorry mom… please… please don’t be mad at me… please.” “Mom… mom… please mom. MOOOOOM!!!” ……………………………………………………………………………………… Spitfire slowly regained consciousness as her eyes slowly cracked open. Her mind was nothing but a lazy hazy daze as she continued to try to open her eyes fully. “Ohhh… what the? What happened? Where… where am I? Oh, gosh… why does everything feel so sore.” Spitfire moaned as she began to stir a bit. She was momentarily clueless about everything; where she was and what happened her in the long run. Until she noticed that her entire body was covered in bandages, after moving around a bit. Looking down at herself was what made everything suddenly clicked. The storm, the rough landing and awakening on that one tree, and, of course, the dragon. The oversized, fire breathing lizard that almost cost her her life for randomly throwing a rock out of anger. A scenario that almost got her killed. “I… I’m still alive? What… what happened? Wait. Where… wh-where is the dragon, then? What happened to it?” Spitfire asked to herself in a bit of a panic (still slightly dulled by her waking daze) as she began to frantically look around from her downward position. Groaning in discomfort, as her body quickly reminded her that she was still sore and injured. Her eyes suddenly widened in both shock in utter disbelief as she finally spotted the answers she was seeking. “Is…is that… the dragon? Or… what’s… left of it? Oh my… I-I think I’m going to be sick.” Spitfire groaned out. The sight of what was left of that beast in the distance was almost enough to make her lose whatever was left inside her stomach. Despite this revolting realization, Spitfire immediately felt relieved that she had somehow managed to survive this ordeal and live to tell the tale, if she wanted to, that is. But a couple of questions still remained, though. “How EXACTLY am I still alive? Who or what killed that dragon? And who found me, took me, and bandaged me as well?” Spitfire thought to herself in utter loss and confusion. She groaned again, not just because of the pain dominating her body, but her mind now, as well. All of these questions were starting to become really taxing on her still very much clouded mind. Until her efforts were swiftly rewarded as she remembered something else. “Wait… I… I do remember seeing something pre-occupying that dragon before I blacked out. It… it was like a dragon… No, no it wasn’t a dragon, it was way too strange-looking to be a dragon. It had this… weird shape, made a weird, almost scary sounding screech and was firing what I can only describe as green magical projectiles at the dragon. By the stars, what was that thing?“ Spitfire thought to herself in an attempt to piece it all together, trying to come up with something her mind could understand. But unfortunately, nothing came up, as nothing she knew or had seen before in her past came even remotely close to what she had witnessed that day. In fact, what day was it? How long was she really out? “So many questions, absolutely no answers whatsoever.” Spitfire moaned in discomfort as her head was slowly starting to kill her, along with her body. Even though she felt utterly confused and baffled with all of this she was still happy to be alive and kicking, despite her situation. Spitfire took this peaceful opportunity to have a better look around as she carefully lifted her head from the ground, to not strain her already stiff neck. It was night. The moon high, and the stars were bright as the sound of crickets and owls entered her ears, giving everything this very peaceful and serene feel to it. The calm after the storm, if you will. The cold night air was blowing gently through Spitfire’s coat and mane, helping ease some of the pain and discomfort, and also helping her mind with any more problems and questions. She sighed, enjoying this wonderful moment of quiet and peaceful bliss, until she noticed some movement in the corner of her eyes, or more accurately, a flickering source of light with dancing shadows on it. A campfire, if the sounds of crackling wood was anything to go by, which immediately brought out some nostalgic memories of her Filly Scout days. Whoever was there with her was probably the pony that found her and treated her, therefore a proper thanks was needed to be given to this pony for bandaging her and generally saving her life with it. Spitfire tried to carefully get herself back on all fours, grinding her teeth in anticipation of the incoming protests of her body doing so. Imagine her surprise when she felt nothing at all, and in fact managed to get herself back up on all four of her hooves pretty easily, as if nothing was wrong with her body at all. Well, sure, there were some very minor protests around her back side, but generally she was expecting much more pain and resistance from her body than she actually got. “What the? Did… did most of my injuries heal already? How is that possible? Is it magic, some sort of special potion, or something else? Or was I perhaps knocked out for a couple of weeks, or even months? No, that is just ridiculous. If that is the case, then wouldn’t I be long dead from starvation? I mean I’m not in a hospital or any other place where a somepony can receive proper care and treatment. I am still here in the fields located in the middle of… nowhere, and the… dragon’s… remains *Gag* still look somewhat… fresh, from the look of it. So… how? So many questions.” Spitfire asked herself, totally confused as she tried her best to make sense of this. But all it really did was give her already foggy mind more unwelcome headaches, so she decided that all these questions would have to wait. Besides, she might actually get those answers sooner or later if she found the pony that took care of her. If it even was a pony, that is... Nodding to herself, Spitfire carefully began to follow to source of light, minding the bandages all over her body, as she slowly rounded the huge rock that separated her from the pony on the other side. As Spitfire rounded the corner she was expected a lot of things. A pony, a gryphon, heck even a diamond dog of all things, but NOT what immediately greeted her seconds after she poked her head around the rock. “Is… is that… that the thing? That… screeching beast I saw fighting that dragon before blacking out?” Spitfire ask herself in complete shock as she spotted the object in question, just proudly sitting there a few meters away from her. That was not the only thing that shocked her, though. close to it where a collection of metallic crates and boxes, stacked on top of each other and forming a circle around the only thing she recognized. A big, but basic, campfire. Some of the boxes were open, some of them were not, but the ones that were had some really strange-looking objects and stuff hanging out of them. One of which was something that immediately caught her eye. A black, long, metallic thing that had a long rod with holes on it at the tip, going all way to the middle where it started to thicken out, with a small ring in the middle and another rectangular metal thing protruding out of it. A metallic looking club was her guess, judging by the way it looked. Spitfire, for some reason, felt both fascinated and intrigued by that particular item. Its alien-like design and look somehow speaking to her, though that sense of intrigue immediately changed into shock when she spotted something else setting right next to it that she hadn’t noticed before. Until now, of course. “What in… What in Tartarus name is THAT?” Spitfire whispered in shock. Sitting there, behind some of these metal crates, facing the campfire and away from her, was a type of creature she had never EVER seen before. It was completely black, covered in something she could only identify as chitin-like armor. Its surface shimmered within the reflection of both the moon and campfire, giving it an almost ghostly glow on its surface despite its pitch black color. Another thing she randomly guessed was that the thing might probably be bipedal judging by the body shape and posture, similar to a minotaur or diamond dog, for example, though she couldn’t really be sure. But the most surprising feature of this entity was -no doubt- its size alone. Even from a sitting position Spitfire could already tell that this creature would easily tower over her, at full height, even rivaling or surpassing Princess Celestia, now that she thought about it. The size in combination with its looks were easily intimidating alone, without mentioning what its face looked like. “What… is… that thing?” Spitfire quietly whispered as she didn’t dare to make a single move in hopes of not drawing its attention. “*Beep boop* beep*?” Spitfire’s blood froze when a strange and unexpected sound suddenly assaulted her ears. Even worse, it sounded like it was coming from right behind her as well. Fear quickly gripped her heart and mind as she began to sweat, all of her previous experiences of having JUST escaped death multiple times over these last few days were still hammering on her nerves and mind. Her irises began to shrink, her ears going flat against her head as she stayed stiff, not daring to breathe or make a single move in hopes that whatever was likely just behind her was going to mistake her for a statue or something. Yeah… a really dumb idea, but moments of panic really don’t always encourage logical thinking. “Something is behind me… like right behind me. Oh gosh oh gosh OH GOSH! WHAT NOW?” Spitfire screamed in her head in panic. She desperately wanted to run, desperately wanted to disappear so that she could finally get away from all this madness and finally be safe somewhere, but the fact that just around the corner was the strange alien creature and the fact that she was still completely unable to really run or do anything drastic in her current state. There was only one last dreaded option for her. She might as well face her end with whatever shred of dignity was left inside her. Sighing mentally and building up her courage for whatever horror she might face, Spitfire slowly turned her head towards the source, expecting and steeling herself to be greeted with the most horrifying nightmarish image to all of ponykind and beyond. Instead, what she was greeted with immediately replaced her fear and dread with complete and utter confusion, as she had absolutely no idea what she was looking at. There standing right behind her was a creature… or thing that left her completely blank and speechless. Right there in front of her was a metallic-looking blue and white striped sphere that was just a little bit smaller than she was. It had another smaller half sphere on top of it which she guessed was its head with the same blue. A white coloration covered the rest of its sphere shaped body. It had a large round eye at the center with a much smaller one on the lower left side of it and lastly, a small antenna-like thing stuck out from the back of its head. As Spitfire observed all of these features from this odd looking… thing, it began to tilt it’s so called head to the side in a gesture of curiosity. *Beep boop boop beep boop beeeeeeep?* “Uhhh…” Was all Spitfire could say as she stared dumbly at the thing in front of her. At this point, Spitfire had absolutely no idea what to think or feel about this thing. On one hoof the thing looked weird and alien, but on the other it looked kind of intriguing and -strangely enough- somewhat adorable, to her. Despite all of this, she still felt somewhat unsure about her current situation, momentarily forgetting her previous plight while watching the thing carefully in front of her. That quickly changed, though, when the thing suddenly began to shoot out some sort of a red beam from one of its eyes and scaring the ever-loving crap out of her as the beam began to move vertically up and down along her body. “WHA… WHAT THE BUCK!!!” Spitfire shouted as she fell onto her butt with an audible thud. “*Beep beep boop beep*” “No, no! stay… s-s-stay away from me.” Spitfire stammered in panic as she hastily began to crawl backwards along the ground, trying to keep her distance from that thing as it slowly began to move closer to her. “N-N-No, stop! D-D-Don’t get any closer, or I… I…” Spitfire continued to stutter as she increased her frantic crawling, her heart pumping into her ears as she slowly started to hyperventilate. All of her actions quickly seized as she suddenly bumped her back into something, stopping her dead in her attempts and she immediately froze up as she realized that she stupidly managed to crawl herself right out into the open where the other alien creature was. A huge shadow suddenly loomed over her with a very distinctive shape as her body froze once more in fear. “OH BUCK! OH BUCK! OH BUCK! I'M BUCKING BUCKED NOW! what am I supposed to do now?! What?! WHAT?!” Spitfire screamed in her mind in utter panic as her eyes began to dart around everywhere. A million thoughts run through her still-hazy mind on how this could possibly end up for her as she desperately tried to think of something, ignoring her slowly re-emerging headache from her frantic mental work. Images of her getting raped, tested, caged, dissected, or simply being killed right then and there flashed through her mind as many more horrible things and ideas swiftly raced through her head before she could even fully focus on a single one, doing nothing to ease her still light minded head and increasing pain. This was it. She was done. Spitfire simply closed her eyes as she awaited her unavoidable fate, too weak and injured to run or to put up a fight. Her body going stiff with both fear and acceptance as her fur got more and more drenched with her own sweat. “Well, look at that. She is finally awake. I told you to just scan her, not wake her, BB-5.” A deep, distorted sounding voice suddenly announced, taking Spitfire’s scared mind completely by surprise. “Did it… did it speak… Equestrian?” Spitfire wondered to herself in shock as she slowly opened one of her eyes out of deep twisted curiosity, which she hastily regretted as the sphere she was trying to back away from was directly in front of her with one of its eyes once again slightly glowing in this deep crimson color. Spitfire again began to visibly panic as her body started to shake a bit. She once again closed her eyes in order to block the horror she was sure that was going to ensue and steeled herself for any pain that was going to come at any second. But it never came. To her confusion, all she heard was a continuous high pitch sound as a red light continuously began to pass by her closed eyelids. “I would say that this animal never came into contact with anything close to a droid… or tech in general, if it's freaking out from a simple laser scanner. Which then means that my previous assumptions were wrong, or I landed in a complete backwater planet. Brilliant.” The same distorted voice commented as Spitfire could still feel that light passing all over her body, leaving a somewhat warm sensation. “Hey… I'm not just some animal. I am a Pegasus and just as sapient as everypony else.” Spitfire instinctively retorted, replacing her current fear with her Equestrian pride from the insult of being called an animal. Though that didn’t last long as she her eyes shot open in shock as she covered her mouth with her hooves with a small eep. “Ahhh, so we are dealing with a sapient, then. Interesting, and a bit surprising. Never have seen or heard of a sentient quadruped. Let alone one that can speak galactic basic.” The distorted voice replayed as Spitfire noticed the shadows around her growing in size with audible steps getting closer and closer to her. Spitfire gulped as she once more, against her better judgment decided to turn her head around to face the approaching creature behind her. Shock quickly gripped her as she saw just how big this thing actually was from up close, easily towering above her even if she would try to stand up on her hind legs. Her eyes went wide and her jaw dropped in sheer shock as she slowly raised her head, her gaze going along its black shiny body until her gaze finally rested onto the creature's face. If she thought that thing was intimidating before, well now she felt more or less terrified by it. Its huge black form combined with its blue glowing semi-connected eyes displayed like a frown and a long diagonal mouth or nose like think in the center was a combination that would possibly make even the most daring guard ponies wet themselves at its sight alone. Heck even she almost felt On the verge of losing her bladder control just staring up that thing. If there was anything in her bladder to begin with, that is, judging by her only now recognizably dry throat. *Beep boop boop beep boop beep?* “What? Oh, right the helmet.” The thing suddenly said as it lifted its arms towards its head and resting its hands on its sides. Spitfire simply watched curiously at what it was doing as she flinched back when the head suddenly gave away a light hissing sound with a light cloud of steam shooting out from underneath. Then the thing twisted it a little bit to the left side before removing it. Spitfire’s eyes widened even further at what she saw afterwards. What she thought to be the creature's head turned out to be nothing but a simple helmet as a foreign, alien-looking face greeted her from underneath it. A face… she honestly didn’t find as terrifying as she originally imagined, besides the horrible, long scars it had on one side. Another thing that both captivated -and also, again, intimidated) right from the get-go were the alien's eyes that stared down at her. She could immediately tell that these piercing, blue colored eyes radiated a sense of a predator in them. The same kind of look she could see within gryphons and even diamond dogs, though far less extreme compared to this alien. His eyes reflected more of an APEX-predator, now that she had a longer look at them. A look that supposedly only exist within creatures like feral dragons or Ursa Majors. A realization that only made her shiver. “What I am supposed to do? Well I could… talk to… it. It speaks Equestrian, so at least there is some form of communication possible between me and… him? I think it’s a him, judging by the voice. But what the heck would I know? I don’t know what genders aliens have, if at all. Oh, dear Celestia, why am I going off track in a situation like THIS? Come on just… say something, Spits before things could possibly get ugly… for me.” Spitfire frantically thought to herself as sweat slowly began to form on her brow and… basically everywhere else at this point. A reaction that somehow caused her body to remind itself of something else as Spitfire was still trying desperately to think of something in hopes that she could get out of this situation in one piece. Her brain quickly picked the very first thing it was receiving from her lower regions right after she was about to open her mouth to say something. “I-I think I need to pee.” She blubbered out, almost on instinct. She immediately froze after realization of what she had said out loud, as a furious blush was forming on her quivering cheeks. Both the big alien and the small ball thing raised their eyebrows respectively at her with the ball thing actually tilting its head backwards while giving off some weird beeping sounds. “Beep Beep boop beep?” “I am so SO dead.”