//------------------------------// // Prologue: Second Chances With A Slice Of Surprise. // Story: A War Of Unseen Proportions. // by ArkKane //------------------------------// This is the beginning… this is when I lose my old life and emerge in a new world, and it’s as strange and fucked up as I expected. From what I’ve heard in this world it seems likely that I was brought here through Discord’s machinations in an attempt to either help Equestria or torment some random mortal… in truth I wouldn’t put it past him to be doing both at the same time! Right, introductions, I unfortunately do not remember my name from my human life, so we’ll simply refer to myself as ‘Subject’ and work from there. When I was Subject I had a rather sub-par life, I had video games, internet, and a decent income. Every day I enjoyed fresh fizzy soft drinks and several apple-based drinks and slices along with whatever was convenient at the time, either ordering out or simply cooking my own meals. Like I said, this was an okay lifestyle that I enjoyed, the only qualms I had was the reality of my own mortality. Just before another bout of intrusive existential nightmare fuel could force its way into my mind during my alone time, I heard a knock on my door. Normally I would not be so eager to answer, but in truth I did not want to face that singularity of my existence, so I opened the door wide. I found it surprising to find no-one there, the only item set upon my porch being a simple brown package. I picked up the white package and carried into the house, setting it upon the table. I investigated the blue package incredulously, no-one would have left me a package at this time, especially not a red and white striped package, as no holiday coincided with its delivery. Of course Halloween was coming soon but that was no reason to deliver green sequin packages to someone with no return address. That set off some red flags as I looked over the glittering pink parcel, no matter how many times I scoured the orange and black paper I saw no sticker with a return address, or even a sending address, all it had was a tag with my name on it. I weighed my options, either I would attempt to ignore the reflective foil box to the best of my ability while my crippling doubts and depression continue to eat me alive… or I open this package which probably houses some sort of demon. Sighing, I reach my hands to the tape of the silky red package and tear it off, opening it to reveal only a costume. That costume being that of a Cybran ACU from the original Supreme Commander, a note was attached to its chest. “O...kay? What in the fuck?” I chuckled a little. “Someone’s playing some dumb joke on me.” I mused to myself, not knowing what I do today. Like I said, Halloween was just around the corner, and someone has anonymously gifted me with a costume from one of my favourite series. Since I did not find the coincidence itself to hide malicious intent I decided to try it on. The suit was accurately proportioned, and made slightly bigger than needed, so with only some slight altering to the straps it was a loose but reasonable fit, and the arm cannon looked pretty cool. “This is cool… say why is this bit glowing?” I asked to myself upon looking at the barrel, considering the suit itself had no electronics, this was concerning. Immediately afterwards a burst of energy erupted from the arm cannon and into the wall, however instead of getting a new window, I ended up creating a strange gateway. I didn’t understand what was happening until it pulled me in, but it was clear the moment I entered the rift, someone had used a Quantum Gate on me. At the very least that was the only explanation as to what I saw when I emerged. When I looked around, I was in a clearing in a strange forest, standing in the centre of a Cybran-made Quantum gate that had honestly seen better days, and the base that was here was a lot worse. By what I could see the buildings were scaled accurately to my form, which meant that they were really tiny in comparison to the tall trees that surrounded the area. My first thought was to reconstruct the base and get it operational, but that thought was countered appropriately by ‘what the hell am I gonna go to war with? Spiders? Raccoons? A slightly over-enthusiastic dog?’ and proceeded to merely place a waypoint on the map and leave the wreckage for when I can find something useful for it. As I walked through the area in order to search for any kind of civilisation, I found myself thankful that my motor and hydraulic functions were more finely tuned and reactive than standard ACU systems, I didn’t have to suffer the stiff, clunky and very slow movements of what one would expect from a normal Armored Command Unit. this revelation started out as a brisk walk, then a slow run, and then a full-on sprint, all of which never once strained my range of motion as I rushed through the trees with no qualms with exhaustion or dehydration. I still had no idea what the Neural Link Software was about, maybe I get to remote control individual units like in Warzone 2100 or Executive assault or something. “Hahaha!! This is what it’s like to be alive!!” Indeed it was, I laughed, I ran, I felt the wind rush over my faceplate and for once I no longer feared the curse of a limited lifespan as I rushed out of the forest and looked upon the open sky. The sun shone upon me as I took it all in, seeing the chance at a new life, a new world, with a whole new power. As I finally slowed, I searched around only to find a village in the distance, which I ran towards. From my improved optics all I saw were anthropomorphic equines but I just did not care. This is it! This is a gift from gods, I’m free! Free to live forever with no grim reaper as a badass robot- why’s that blue streak heading towards me? *WHAM!* I flew back and crash into the ground, I looked down to find, thankfully, no dents… but with a blow like that knocking off my feet, it’s clear something got jostled. Though I didn’t have time to focus on that as my assailant, a cyan pegasus with hair that fits more in a gay pride parade was standing over me. “Alright, you freaky demon thing! Nopony tries to attack Ponyville on my watch.” Ponyville… dumb horse puns… “[warning! Warning! Neural Link Software compromised, disabling connection.]” Disabling it? That would imply I was already- I could not finish that thought as a sudden headache overwhelmed me as it felt like my brain was being pulled back down into something, causing me to black out for a second. However it was what I saw when I woke up that terrified me. My eyes opened as a visor and several cables disconnected from my body and moved up into the ceiling of the room I was in, I was no longer laying on the grass but sitting in a chair in the centre of a small command centre. There was a holographic-telepathic hybridised command system in the chair to command the motions of the construct I was in, directly in front of me was a tactical map of the area, akin to the games, and past that… Past that was a large frontal view-screen was what I had exactly seen when I was looking through what I thought were my eyes, the cyan pegasus looking down at me… my ACU. the sound of my surroundings played from speakers yet my terror left me numb to the sound, I shakily looked down at my real hands, seeing the Symbiont augments and the specialized pilot suit as the realization dawned on me and I looked back to the Giantess Anthro Pony. “Oh, fuck me!!”