//------------------------------// // Chapter 14: Feet First Into Hell // Story: Helljumpers // by CommanderApplejack //------------------------------// "TWO MONTHS!" Twilight shouted as she pummeled a punchbag, "I told them that I need to be on planet to make contact with Equis and EVERY BUCKING TIME they've told me that they're running through paperwork to get us cleared to go down to the surface!" falling down on all four of her legs Twilight rotated 180 degrees and bucked the bag, causing it to tear off from the chain it was attached to. "Calm down Twilight, they can't keep you up here forever." Mack tried to reason, "And there's something going on that they're not telling us, the battle cluster around here has only been growing." "I KNOW! That means the window of opportunity I have to make contact with home again is most probably shrinking!" Twilight fumed as she moved on to the next punchbag, "I mean look at the pile of parchment over there, since they now know we can receive dragonmail they've been updating us and asking why I haven't been able to contact them again!" Mack remained silent having nothing to bring against Twilight's point. The pony punching and kicking the living shit out of the current punchbag, she had been at it for at least one and a half hour by this point. "You done yet? I'm pretty sure any of the other soldiers that train here would appreciate not having all the equipment destroyed." Mack said, Twilight momentarily looked at the punchbags she had already gone through and decided that the sarge was right. Kicking the current bag one more time for good measure, she got her towel and made her way over to the showers. A quick shower later she was back in the hallway, fully armored up due to orders from brass that they had to be ready at all times. Having run every test she knew of at least three times over in the past two months she was anxious to get down to the surface again since the magic connection in space seemed to be too weak to allow Dash to dreamwalk. Walking into the drop-pod bay in the lower part of the ship she found Scootaloo, Lucy, and Tyler along with some other ODST's playing a card game. "Raise by twenty." Scootaloo said as she pushed two chips forward, the pegasus had become quite a bit better at the game than when she started. Having won on a few occasions, at least, when Twilight wasn't playing with them. Twilight took up a seat against a wall grabbing the science book about advanced slipspace theory she had been reading. She'd been keeping notes on the concepts lined out in the theory, they had a lot in common with how teleportation worked. The alicorn was lazily flipping through the book to the place she left off, never making it to the marked page as alarms started sounding. "All hands, Battlestations!" Every ODST present shot up and Rand to a weapon rack loading their preferred weapon into a pod, Twilight levitated a suppressed magnum and a DMR into her pod as Scootaloo slammed a suppressed magnum and SMG into hers. "Sparkle!" Mack called out to the alicorn getting her attention, "take a sniper instead of a DMR, without Woods we don't have anyone for long range!" Twilight begrudgingly pulled the DMR and it's ammo from the pod and replaced them with the long gun and its ammo. Stepping into the pod she strapped herself in, cursing the fact the seats were designed for humans. "Listen up ladies!" Mack shouted over the COM, "there's a fleet massing just outside the kill-zone of the super-MAC's if one of the bastards makes it to the surface it's our job to kick them right back into their ship." Mack continued, he clearly was getting a feed of tactical information. "I don't have to remind anyone here that this is Earth. There's no planet we can fall back to if we lose here, we either win here or we lose and also lose the war and will all die. Since I'm quite happy with my life right now I'd rather win, don't you all agree!" Mack shouted into his mic. "Yes, sergeant!" Twilight and the others shouted in unison. "Damn right we're going to win, strap in everyone. If the Dawn gets hit the captain will fire the pods to save as many crew for the fight down below as possible." The pods sealed, ready to eject at any point if necessary. Inside them, Twilight was reading out the information on the monitor. Two Carriers and thirteen battlecruisers had jumped into the system onto Earths doorstep, out of those ships three battlecruisers were already destroyed by fire from the UNSC home fleet. "One of the carriers is charging for the planet! At current bearing, it will come down over New Mombasa." Twilight said as she was quickly trying to interpret the data available to her. New orders from the bridge appeared on the display before her, which got relayed by Mack. "Everyone hold on tight! We're dropping into the city down below" Mack said as he started up a countdown on the screens in the pod. "Thirty seconds!" He called out "Fifteen!" "Ten!" "Five!" "Four!" "Feet First!" Mack shouted at Three. "Into Hell!" The other ODST's replied as the pods started firing in rapid succession, Twilight felt the G-forces on her body as she was hurled from the bottom of the ship by electromagnets. She quickly checked every instrument to make sure nothing was off and the pod was working correctly, finishing just before she hit the atmosphere. "Nice and toasty out there!" she heard Tyler said over the COMs, the temperature rising inside as well due to the heat. "Shut up savage, no time for your BS in a drop." Mack told him. The fire around the pod died off as they bled off enough speed, that was the moment that Scootaloo reported in. "Sarge, I'm getting a bit of shimmy on my pod." She reported, "Scratch that, I'm spinning now!" Scootaloo immediately shouted afterward. "Deploy your airbrakes, Hurricane!" Mack shouted to Scootaloo who was now drifting off course severely. "Not responding!" Scootaloo shouted back, her voice strained as the G-forces on her pod were increasing. "Firing the retrograde Thrusters!" The rockets on her pod ignited, trying to slow her down but while it did succeed in slowing the pod down it also increased the rotation immensely putting a lot of stress on the drop-pod. Finally reaching its breaking point the door to Scootaloo's pod ripped off soon followed by the rest of the pod disintegrating. "SCOOTALOO!" Twilight could only watch as in the distance she could see the debris from the pegasus her drop-pod raining down to the city. Her own airbrake had engaged by this point only seconds away from touchdown. The rockets on her pod fired reducing the speed even more to an acceptable landing velocity. The pod smashed into the ground knocking Twilight into her chair, her head buzzing from the sudden deceleration. Dazed she opened the door of the pod and levitated the sniper rifle next to her checking for any hostiles finding that none were present. Further up in the street she could see Mack and Lucy standing in front of their pods, having also determined there were no enemy contacts at the landing site. "Sarge, Scoots went down a few klicks north of here. We could make it there in an hour with some luck." Twilight said over the COMs. "Negative, Sparkle. If she made it out she'll be long gone by that point, we have our orders to start pushing the covies back. Hurricane is a might be small but she's tough as nails, she'll be fine on her own until she can find a unit to hook up with." "But she__" "We're going east to hook up with other UNSC forces, that's an order Sparkle." Mack sternly told the alicorn, "Savage landed a bit further up, we'll hook up with him and move on city centre. Get a move on helljumpers." Scootaloo was frantically pushing buttons in an attempt to deploy the airbrake, moments before she had fired the thrusters on the pod to try and slow down that way. The pod suddenly shrieked as if metal was tearing off unnerving the pegasus even more, pulling the emergency released for the airbrake she finally heard the brake come out but before she could cheer the pod hit another bump causing the door to fly off along with the airbrake. The sudden drop of pressure dazed Scootaloo and before she knew it she was flying through the air in free fall as the safety harness had come loose from the pod. Below her she could see her pod disintegrating, now being out her pod she rapidly decelerated to a manageable speed. "O crap." Scootaloo unfurled her wings and beat them furiously, in the past two months she had regained the ability to hover and even have short flights but nothing coming close to sustained flight. But then again, with practicing flight there wasn't the fact that she was going to be turned into mush if she didn't figure it out soon. Remembering all that Dash and Twilight had learned her, The feeling of weightlessness Rainbow had described when she was flying and Twilight's lessons on how to flap wings. Trying to concentrate on the feeling of weightlessness she felt something moving from her chest to her wings, something that felt warm and comforting to the pegasus. The moment the feeling spread throughout her wings she started uncontrollably jerking in random directions with each flap. 'Flap your wings in a controlled fashion.' Twilight's voice echoed through her mind. Scootaloo changed her strategy from furious flapping to a controlled wingbeat and got immediate results, instead of dropping like a brick she got in a controlled nosedive. Checking on how much time she had left she quickly saw buildings coming up to meet her, going into a flare she tried slowing down to landing speed but even with the increased drag she was still going to fast. Scootaloo smashed down into the roof of a building skidding about a dozen meters before coming to a stop, groaning in agony from the impact she stayed on the floor for a moment. After the initial pain subsided a little she checked her body,'Nothing broken, Thank Celestia for pegasi bones.' She thought, hoping that she didn't have internal damage because that would be a death sentence in this situation. Checking her equipment she found that the armor plates were still in place and secure but when checking her radio she found the transmitter to be completely thrashed, "Well, bucking fantastic!" She shouted, turning the radio on to try and catch a signal. In the distance, she could see a frigate called the In Amber Clad and three pelicans coming over in her direction. Tapping into their communication she listened in on their conversation "The message just repeats, regret, regret, regret." the voice of a lady came over Scootaloo's radio "Catchy. Any idea what it means?" another lady asked, in the meanwhile, Scootaloo was looking over the roof to find a way down into the street not wanting to try her luck with flying again. She got distracted as a male voice answered the two ladies. "Dear Humanity. We regret being alien bastards, we regret coming to earth and we most definitely regret the core just blew up our raggedy-ass fleet! Hoorah!" The conversation went on but Scootaloo missed that part as she was too pre-occupied laughing, if she ever met the guy she would get him a beer. Suddenly hearing the sound of buildings coming down she jumped up and saw a scarab walking through a pair of buildings and shooting down the three pelicans, one of them getting hit by the main cannon probably instantly killing everyone inside but the other two got hit by the aa gun on top of the walker and making a crash lander on either side of the scarab respectively. Immediately jumping into action she jumped off the roof in a controlled glide this time, touching down on the pavement below she looked back at the building. she smiled under the helmet as she ran further towards the crash site, she had just successfully flown further than she ever had before that point. A few minutes of running through the narrow streets later, being motivated by gunfire, she reached the crash site where the burning remains of the pelican was located. Again she heard the sound of gunfire coming from a hallway a bit further, pushing herself around the final turn towards the soldiers that had crashed. The bodies of several covenant assault waves littered the ground but when she saw what was attacking the marines her blood went cold. Hunters. Scootaloo reached for her SMG, finding nothing. She cursed as she checked her armament to see what she did have. Two grenades and her combat knife. Looking at the two aliens she saw they had their backs turned to her, taking a few deep breaths she jumped from her cover and charged forward. Neither hunter took notice of the pegasus as they were blasting the marines in the building, Scootaloo grinned beneath her helmet as she rammed a primed grenade into the first hunter's lower back. "See you in Tartarus!" She shouted as the alien turned his head in time to see the pony backing off. Seconds later a dull explosion went off and the individual worms that made up the hunter flew in every direction. The second hunter let out an enraged roar and charged Scootaloo, her eyes widened as she made a quick roll out of the way. Not a second too soon as the shield from the alien slammed down on the concrete where she had been moments before. In the corner of her eyes Scootaloo could see something green moving swiftly towards the other hunter, her eyes widened as she recognized the armor as the same armor as that of Maria. Mjolnir, there was a Spartan here. She watched in awe as the armored super-soldier nimbly got up on the back of the final hunter and emptied a clip of assault rifle ammo into its neck, the alien roared but didn't go down. Scootaloo got out of her moment of awe and also charged the hunter, latching onto the lower back she repeatedly stabbed it with her knife. Finally having taken enough punishment the hunter collapsed into a heap and died. Another gunshot rang out and a bullet hit the armor plate on Scootaloo's chest, ignoring the pain she jumped behind cover. "STOP FIRING AT THE TROOPER YOU SON OF A BITCH!" The male voice from the radio called out. "Sarge, it's an alien." The marine who shot said. "I don't care if it's an Elite wearing the trooper armor of my glorious core, the last time I checked only soldiers fighting with us got a set of that stuff. Come on out soldier." Scootaloo carefully peaked around her cover, most of the soldiers had already come down and out of the building. A black Sergeant Major strode forward from the group towards her location, Scootaloo emerged from cover standing in front of the man, "private Hurricane, 65th shock troop battalion." She said saluting with her wing, keeping her hooves on the ground so she could jump for cover. "Not anymore. Congratulations private, you're now part of this unit. Someone get him a weapon!" he said, a few seconds later she caught an SMG thrown to her by one of the marines. It wasn't a suppressed one but it would do. The squad moved into the courtyard next to the one they were in, killing a jackals sniper along with a few shielded ones as quickly as they could after arriving. A pelican lowered into the courtyard as the radio crackled alive once again, "Sergeant, I need you on that bird." "Ma'am?" The sergeant asked. "My Pelicans are going to start airlifting armor and reinforcements into the city. They'll need an escort that isn't afraid of a little hostile ground fire." The lady explained. "Understood. I'll keep an eye on 'em. Chief ... good luck." He said but before he could climb in Scootaloo had come forward. "Sarge, permission to join. I can fly a pelican if necessary and have the balls needed to fly one under heavy fire." She told him A grin appeared on the sergeant's face, "Hop on, private." Scootaloo jumped into the pelican with the flap of her wings and took a seat, the pelican blasting off towards the frigate. getting the small reprieve Scootaloo took the time to inspect her chestplate to see if it wasn't critically damaged, only finding two dents she was happy to see that the integrity of the armor wasn't compromised. "So, what inspired a fairytale creature to join the military." The sergeant asked, Scootaloo took a good look at him reading his nameplate for the first time. "Got accidentally teleported to a different planet after which I got shot by a trooper who I later befriended and joined up shortly after I heard about the covenant, I despise bullies." She grossly summarized, "Nearly got stabbed in the face by an elite along the way." She added, pointing at the scar running across her muzzle. "Seems to me that that didn't keep you down for long." "Hell no sarge." She replied as a pilot called out from the cockpit, "In Amber Clad has two pelicans loaded and ready for deployment when you arrive, Sergeant." "Good, tell them I brought my own pilot." Johnson said to the pilots who relayed the message. "It's current pilot won't be happy about that, Sarge." Scootaloo said in an offhoof manner, "He can take his issues and shove them up his arse for all I care, you're my pilot for the moment" The sergeant told the pegasus as the pelican landed in the frigate's landing bay, the two made their way over to one of two pelicans that had a warthog and a scorpion attached to the back but got stopped by a pilot. "Sir, why have I been pulled off the flight." He bluntly asked. "Because I found a natural born flyer." He said pointing at Scootaloo as he pushed past the pilot to the pelican. The pegasus, who still had her helmet under her wing, shot the pilot an apologetic glance as she followed the sergeant. A few marines gave her a weird look as she walked forward to the cockpit, although by this point Scootaloo was far beyond the point of caring about their opinions of her, she had a pelican to fly. Scootaloo reset the chair so she had easier access to the control panels and started the engines, "Cockpit is a go, just give me some coords, Sarge." A set of coordinates appeared on screen along with a COM link with the bridge. "Get those vehicles to the Chief, Johnson." The female captain said, "We need him to take out that scarab." "Will do, Captain."Scootaloo immediately punched the throttle forward shooting out the hangar, the other pelican hot on her tail. The sergeant leaned forward and pushed a few buttons on the computer starting a tune "ETA, ten minutes!" Scootaloo shouted out back over the noise the moment the computer finished the calculations. Flak started peppering the two pelicans, Scootaloo quickly adjusting course by small fractions every couple of seconds to throw off their aim. Seeing the flak the pilot of the second pelican started getting cold feet, "This flack is too heavy to fly through, Sergeant. we have to break off!" "Negative, soldier! Keep your ass on the current bearing!" Johnson shouted but the pelican was already changing course, moments later getting hit by the flak having its port engine exploding, "I'm hit Mayday, Mayd__" The craft exploded before the pilot finished his sentence, "Dammit. Hurricane, what's our ETA?" "Sixty seconds!" Scootaloo called out back, turning the pelican behind a building out of the range of the covenant flak cannons. Lowering the pelican down and releasing the Scorpion, giving the controls to her co-pilot she walked out back to the ramp of the pelican where she saw Johnson walking up to a soldier. "Where's the rest of your platoon?" He asked. "Wasted, Sarge." The lady replied, the other marine speaking up immediately after. "And we will be, too, sir, if we don't get the hell outta here!" The sergeant stopped him in his tracks, "You hit, Marine?" "N-no, Sir." The marine stuttered, "Then listen up!" Johnson said, "Usually the good Lord works in mysterious ways. But not today! This here is sixty-six tons of straight up, H-E-spewing dee-vine intervention! If God is love, then you can call me Cupid!" He said ending with a smile on his face. "What about that scarab?" The female asked again. "We've all run the simulations, they're tough, but they ain't invincible. Stay with the Master Chief, he'll know what to do." He told her, "Hurricane! Stay with the Chief as backup." "Thanks for the tank. He never gets me anything." The voice of an AI came over the COM while Johnson was climbing back into the pelican, "Oh, I know what the ladies like." he said with a smirk while cocking the machinegun turret at the back of the transport craft. "What are you? I can't find any known records of your species in any databases outside of mythology." The AI asked, her name and service number showing on Scootaloo's HUD. CTN 0452-9, aka Cortana. "I'm a pegasus. As for how its possible for my species to appear in your mythology, you'd have to ask an egghead. I believe Twilight had a theory on that." The cannon on the Scorpion fired once, hitting a wraith up further on the bridge. "Interesting." Cortana replied, staying silent afterward. In Scootaloo's peripheral vision she could see two banshees approaching, "Marines! focus on those banshees!" She shouted getting the attention of the two marines who promptly fired a rocket each at the two flying craft. "Score!" Scootaloo shouted as two burning hulks, the marines keeping the tactic of shooting the flying craft while the chief focussed on the bridge. The group made it over the bridge relatively quickly blowing up two wraiths at the end of it that were waiting for them. The tunnels weren't that much more of a problem with the scorpion tank as the Chief just blasted through any resistance with High Explosive shells. At some point in the tunnel, they encountered a barricade which prevented the tank from going any further. The spartan nimbly climbed out of the tank and moved up past the barricade, dispatching all enemies behind it at a speed that made the pegasus extremely envious. Moving up through a sewage out of the highway tunnel they entered a courtyard filled with covenant soldiers. The Chief snuck forward to a sniper jackal and snapped his neck, relieving it of his weapon. A warthog drove around the courtyard coming over to where she, the chief, and the soldiers were located. "I could use someone on the gun here!" The soldier driving the warthog called out, Scootaloo seeing her chance lept off the ridge and glided onto the back of the car. "Give me a moment to lower this thing!" She told the Gunnery-Sergeant driving the hog, "Get it done quickly because we have incoming!" He shouted back pointing at two ghosts moving towards the hog, Scootaloo quickly rotated the gun around having lowered it down a bit. "Eat lead, motherbuckers!" She shouted as she fired the Gauss cannon, the warthog slid a bit from the recoil of the gun but the ghost she was targeting flew apart in an awesome spectacle. She turned the cannon towards the second ghost but it dodged out of the way right as she fired, "Dammit!" Scootaloo shouted, adjusting her aim. The ghost backed around and boosted towards the hog with the intention of ramming it, Scootaloo grinned as she saw the vehicle coming towards them In a nearly straight line. She pulled the trigger and the second ghost also was consumed by a purple fireball. To her right, she could see the chief running over to the hog and jumping in having finished clearing the courtyard. "Go." He curtly ordered the sergeant who floored the accelerator driving towards a tunnel system, clearing a wraith and a few ghosts along the way, before driving into the city where they with the help of other UNSC forces destroyed a few more vehicles. "There are Marines trapped inside that building, Chief. Concentrate on the Wraiths, they're the biggest threat." Cortana told the chief as they made their way to a square, "There is a Marine Command Post in that building. We'll need to help them deal with that Scarab." she added, putting a waypoint at the building the wraiths were targeting. The Spartan deciding not to waste time jumped off the warthog and sprinted to the wraith on the right, seeing this Scootaloo focussed on the second one. Peppering the tank with shells she got its attention, it fired one of its slow-moving plasma bolts at the warthog that the sergeant easily evaded. Readying another volley scootaloo cursed as she saw a ball of plasma coming from the other wraith but paused as she saw it arching towards the wraith she was firing at. the plasma engulfed the second tank moments later, Scootaloo shot it one more time for good measure before disembarking and joining the master chief who had already reached the front door. "Sir! Corporal Perez, A-Company! CP's this way! The Lieutenant got hit as soon as we dropped in." A corporal greeted, looking past the chief at Scootaloo. "She's with us." Cortana said before he could ask, "Who's in charge now, Corporal?" "Uh, Sergeant Banks, ma'am. He's pinned down up top. Come on, I'll show you." The corporal replied initially stuttering a bit, he led them up a flight of stairs past a few checkpoints to a balcony facing the square. The sergeant was hunkered down with another marine who was manning a heavy machine gun, he looked over at the new arrivals and jumped up walking towards the Chief. "When I asked for reinforcements, I didn’t think they’d send a Spartan." He looked over at Scootaloo, "Nor did I expect a pegasus." Scootaloo couldn't reply as the scarab they had seen on occasion came lumbering around the corner of the end of the street, "We got trouble!" The sergeant shouted, a scorpion that had just been dropped in fired two shots before being destroyed by the main plasma cannon of the scarab walker. "See this look? It's terror!" The marine behind the heavy machinegun shouted, "Marine, did I give you permission to bitch?" The sergeant shouted back at him as the marine opened fire. "I don't think it's stopping; get your heads down!" The sergeant shouted as the scarab just walked over the building completely ignoring the soldiers on the balcony, "That thing is really starting to PISS ME OFF! Marines, time to kill us a Scarab!" "It's over here, sir!" A marine called out over the COM, the chief running to the back of the building where the marine had called out from with Scootaloo right on his tail. Out back there was a walkway where a lot of marines were perched shooting down at the approaching scarab. The chief grabbed a Shotgun and waited for the scarab to walk under the overhang, "What's the plan, Sir." Scootaloo asked him while grabbing a shotgun of her own, instead of replying the Spartan looked over the ledge at the scarab below him and jumped down. "Give 'em hell Spartan!" A marine shouted, a few others giving the same sentiment. Scootaloo looked down at the spartan who was blasting a few elites that were on the deck of the scarab, "I'll be damned if I let you do that alone." Scootaloo muttered under her breath and attached the shotgun to a magnetic pad under her wing, jumping after the Spartan. A small glide later she hit the deck besides the chief, "Duck!" Cortana shouted prompting Scootaloo to fall down on her stomach, the Chief firing a shell over the pegasus down the stairs nailing an elite in the face. The chief made a few motions with his hands signalling the Scootaloo were to take left while he would take right. The pegasus nodded and the pair made their way down the stairs taking their respective turns, BANG The Chiefs shotgun went off hitting an elite at the far side of the room, Scootaloo followed immediately afterwards by shooting a grunt. Moving up a bit another elite Showed its face and both the Spartan and the pegasus put a shotgun shell into it. A grunt panicked and ran into the open where the two UNSC soldiers quickly took it down. "One more target on motion tracker, Hurricane." Cortana reported to Scootaloo since her helmet lacked a motion tracker. "Copy that." Scootaloo acknowledged, slowly creeping forward with her shotgun pointed in the direction of the front. The sound of an energy sword being lit stopped both the Spartan and Scootaloo, the two waiting for the alien to reveal itself. The elite jumped from cover on the chiefs side receiving a buckshot shell center mass from the Spartan but with its stronger shields it kept charging the chief who had to dive out of the way of the swipe. Scootaloo in turn also fired a shell into the torso of the alien, straining the shield even further but also getting its attention. The alien tried to charge but got is feet swiped from under it by the chief who was already back up, Scootaloo fired another shell into the alien finally popping its shield allowing the chief to finish it off with a magnum. Scootaloo took a deep breath as she realized she was holding hers for the entirety of the last engagement, "How do we kill this thing?" She asked. "You head up top, private. I've got this." Cortana ordered her. Scootaloo swiftly running up top, moments after she reached the top fire and explosions started erupting from the hull and a shriek later the scarab was a collapsed burning corpse. The chief casually came walking up the stairs and walked out front looking towards the now fleeing super-carrier. A pelican came hovering behind them, sergeant Johnson standing in the cockpit and using the external speakers. "That's right you mothers. RUN!" "Not if we can help it sergeant. Extract the chief and return to In Amber Clad." The captain of the frigate ordered Johnson. "Roger that." Johnson answered, the pelican moving to the front with the ramp down so that the Spartan and Pegasus could board. "Get us to the In Amber Clad, stat." Johnson ordered the pilot before moving into the back, "Good to see you two made it out on one piece." Scootaloo wanted to reply but saw the carrier open a slipspace portal in front of itself, "Sweet Celestia, they're jumping!" She called out in shock as the pelican reached the frigate and docked. "Get to the drop-pods and prepare for the possibility of a quick jump!" The sergeant ordered, the three soldier running out of the pelican towards the bay where the pods were stored, ready to launch at any moment. Sealing herself in so she would be shielded in the event of a jump. Her mind jumped to Twilight for a moment making her feel incredibly cold for a moment, she would leave the system without her companion truly being the only one of her kind wherever she'd end up. A tingling sensation crept up her wings making her thought a reality, the ship had just jumped. Twilight let off another shot with the sniper rifle she was carrying, the squad had slowly been driving back covenant forces towards the super-carrier. That was until the carrier started moving away from the city. "What the Fuck?Are they retreating?" Tyler asked from his position further up in the street. "They wouldn't, they must have left a lot of assholes for us to clean up." Lucy responded as she emptied another clip into the advancing covenant soldiers. Twilight took aim at another jackal down the street but got distracted by a magic fluctuation to her right, trying to locate the disruption her eyes fell on the super-carrier. Her blood running cold as she saw what it was doing, Twilight quickly ran the numbers through her mind to get a rough estimate of the damage a collapsing slipspace portal would cause. 'very bad. very, VERY BAD!' "EVERYONE, GET OFF THE STREET INTO THE UNDERGROUND! THE CARRIER IS JUMPING!" She shouted into her helmet, jumping from her vantage point and gliding down to the street running to the entrance of the subway. The others having already reached the entrance were giving her covering fire. Two grunts had taken cover nearby behind a car and lobbed two grenades to the group, Twilight saw the ordinance coming and in a desperate attempt to stop them she put up a spherical shield blocking the grenades. The two explosives stuck to the outside of the shield and both detonated simultaneously, Twilight having reached the group suddenly felt the feedback from the shield taking the hit and her magic reserves almost completely emptied in an instant. "AAAAARGH" she screamed, shriveling up into a ball her entire body burning from the lack of magic. "Sparkle!" Mack shouted, dragging the pony down into the subway. "Stay with me, soldier." Mack removed Twilight's helmet, a cut running on Twilight's forehead was seeping blood along with a trail of it coming out the corners of her eyes and nose. The rest of the squad had moved down by that point and was shooting up the stairs to prevent the covenant coming down too. A loud explosion suddenly came from the surface and a wave of blue energy rushed by throwing the ODST's of their feet. Twilight's horn was violently sparking magenta energy as it adsorbed the magic radiating from the energy-wave caused by the slipspace rupture, finally having had enough Twilight's eyes rolled back and she fell into unconsciousness. Rainbow sat on her haunches looking at Twilight's dream-bubble, her friend had managed to contact her about two months ago once and after that her bubble had just remained dormant. This bothered the life out of Rainbow since she had seen a snapshot of the world Twilight had to survive in. Suddenly a fluctuation in Twilight's bubble happened, putting Rainbow on edge. The fluctuation remained for a moment but soon died down again, Dash released a breath she was holding at the return of the status-quo but shot up again as the bubble went active. Leaving the dreamscape she ran down Canterlot castle where she was staying for the moment to the throne room, in the throne room she found Rarity and Fluttershy talking to Princess Celestia. Rainbow stopped for a moment as all the heads in the room turned in her direction, the princesses had decided to not tell the other bearers about Twilight since they hadn't been able to re-establish contact with the alicorn. "Rainbow, Darling. We were just talking about you." Rarity said. Rainbow shot the princess a look trying to communicate that she needed to talk to her in private, Celestia immediately picked up on Rainbows intention and already guessed what the subject was about. "Rarity, Fluttershy, Please follow me and Rainbow Dash." She curtly asked the two oblivious ponies, "Is it active again?" The princess asked as she and Rainbow made their way to a back room with Rarity and Fluttershy on their tail. "Yes, Princess." Dash answered quickly, Princess Luna was already in the back room looking into a portal that allowed viewing into the dreamworld. Dash quickly bowed as she saw the princess, "My Sovereign. Uhm, I mean Princess." Dash's weird behavior surprised the other two bearers, "Are you feeling okay Rainbow?" Fluttershy asked "Rainbow Dash is under the effects of an oath she took with my sister." Princess Celestia glared at the blue alicorn, "She'll be released after she's finished the task she set out to do." "Speaking of that task, we have already prepared the viewing window into the dream realm." Luna continued, "My apprentice would thee please open the dream-bubble, we will be indisposed keeping the spell running on this side." Rainbow nodded and put herself into a trance, entering the dreamworld. "Princess, would you please be so kind to explain what's happening?" Rarity asked, being utterly confused about what was going on. Through the viewing portal the ponies could see Dash meddling with a dream-bubble opening it for everyone to see. The world she landed in was completely white with a pony clad in black armor lying in the middle. "Twilight?" She asked, the pony in the dream stirring and raising her head to face Rainbow. Seeing her friend again tackled tackled Dash into hug. "We've got an audience, Twilight." Rainbow said pointing at the other disruption in the dreamworld that showed Princess Celestia, an astonished Rarity, and Fluttershy. "Girls?" She asked realizing she still had her helmet on and levitated it off. The ponies on the other side gasped as she set the helmet down, Twilight realized her mistake immediately. She still resembled how she looked while awake so she had cuts running along her face and blood pouring from her nose. "Darling, is that you?" Rarity asked not believing her eyes. "You look absolutely awful." "Tends to happen when you get hit by the magic discharge from a collapsing slipspace portal." Twilight said, Turning back to Rainbow afterwards. "The covenant have located Earth, we've pushed them back for the moment but more will come. I don't know how long I have until I regain consciousness." "I'm sorry, but what's the covenant and why does it sound like you're fighting?" "I also need to you to send a letter to Scootaloo, we lost her in the drop I have to know if she made it." Twilight said, Rainbow's eyes going wide. "Scootaloo is also involved?!" Twilight? "She made the decision on her own and she can take care of herself, Dash. In some respects she's a better fighter than me." "HOW CAN YOU BE SO COLD ABOUT ALL THIS TWILIGHT!" Fluttershy shouted on the verge of tears. "BECAUSE IF I BREAK DOWN NOW I'LL DIE!" Twilight shouted back at the shy pegasus, her eyes full of tears. The dream-bubble started to ripple indicating that Twilight was waking up again, "I'm sorry, Fluttershy. I just can't right now." Twilight said, tears freely flowing. "Please send that letter. I'll probably be back soon anyway, I'm going to be down on the planet for a while." With that The dream-bubble became passive again as Twilight awoke, leaving five astonished ponies in her wake.