//------------------------------// // Chapter 4: The Reveal (fixed). // Story: A War Of Unseen Proportions. // by ArkKane //------------------------------// It took three hours once I arrived at the ruined base, but thankfully none of the structures became unsalvageable in my time away, so now I had a fully established base. Another bonus was I didn’t need to waste time or resources upgrading my fabricator so I was able to fully tech up much quicker as well. Speaking of ‘tech up’ I had already begun sending in some tech 3 engineers through the Quantum Gate to the beacon’s signal location and have received confirmation of their landfall and successful construction of a second Quantum Gate, linking me and Prime’s worlds together and to subtly keep an eye on my forces over there. I was rather disgruntled when he seemed to make only Monkeylords and not a single Megalith, but I wasn’t really risking my butt over there so I let him do his own thing. Me on the other hand, I started work on establishing a stable enough economy with what few Mass Deposits I had and a good amount of Storage, before working on an Experimental for myself, the Megalith, like I stated before. Before anyone has any gripes about me making such a monster so soon let me explain something to you… I. Am in. The EVERFREE FOREST! Sure a big enough group of Loyalists might be able to deal with Timberwolves or at best a Manticore, but what if I need to handle a Rok? A Cragodile? A Hydra? So yeah, I’m going to make the big fuck-off titan unit, sue me. As I had to wait a lot longer for this than the rest of the base since it’s from scratch and I need to reclaim a bunch of trees to make room, I was able to relax and begin to properly analyse what was going on outside while my ACU was on autopilot. First thing of note was the ports at the palms of my hand drones, you remember the hand drones right? From the second chapter? Well anyways another point was when they were installed on my arms, the antennas at the fingertips were acting in place of my main fabricator device. A simple gesture and I detached them from the arms, this resulted in them flying at my side and showing them to also be a replacement for my original remote drones. Not really an upgrade to them, just that little aesthetic touch, and I liked that. Unfortunately, as well as downright obvious for me, was that the Megalith was really freaking big, meaning I’ve essentially relayed the location of my base to anyone with eyes. So I decide the best situation is to start work on a Soothsayer, using the tactic of having a tech 1 engineer continue to work on the Megalith while me and the ‘tech 3’s work on the big observation tower. Side note: I have found out that I can’t call any SACUs, I suspected as much since it made more sense that I was requisitioning support command units from Cybran space and not actually constructing them using a portal which had no factory-based systems, and since I haven’t heard so much as a peep on my communicator, my network was not strong or advanced enough to do anything more than connect to the internet (the only reason I could link up to Prime’s equestria was because that beacon was attuned to my signature, so it acted as a kinda pseudo-token that the two gates can piggy-back on). As the micro-cameras dispersed into the air from the Soothsayer, as luck would have it a couple of patrolling weather-ponies saw the forming outline of the massive mecha and immediately fled to inform the town. Seras crunched the numbers and it seems that in all likelihood, Celestia and Luna would be coming over to see for themselves, considering I don’t know the Equestrian schedules, that could also include Cadence and Shining Armor, and Twilight… and The Elements… and Discord-oh no wait, he’s already here, he’s just disguised as a tree. Thank you Omni-Sensor array! Getting around even Chaos Magic Bullshit to give me the info I need. Deciding I needed a distraction, I put my speakers on full and began to pull off the best act yet. “Damn, that tree is UGLY! I mean, I hear that statement about falling from the ugly tree but I didn’t think that meant for actual seeds, damn it’s somehow got a face that not even Mother Nature would love-” “OKAY! I GET IT!” The Draconequus yelled angrily as he flew right up in my ‘face’, his disguise now in tatters. “Oh hey Discord, you trying a new look? Doesn’t work for you, you should stick with your natural beauty.” I commented as I turned back to my work. “Well aren’t you a funny one, I guess someone has been enjoying my little present.” He said as he circled me, and I surprise him as my ‘head’ immediately turned to him, selected lights dimming out in my eyes to simulate a squint. “What you talking about Discord?” I ask, gaining an unnerving grin from the lord of Chaos. “Oh come on, with that Symbiont brain in that little ant-sized head of yours you would’ve figured it out.” Suddenly the memory of a certain box and a certain name flashed in my mind. “You motherfucker!!” “Yes, I decided to have a little fun and bring a Cybran to colorful ponyland! What are you going to do about it?” He said with the smuggest grin as he stares me down. I turned to him, letting my Engineers take on the rest of the work as I stared him down, reattached my arms, took a deep breath with an expression of pure rage and said one simple line. “I’m telling Fluttershy on you.” I stated calmly, and watched as he quite literally went paler than an egg, and I could tell because an egg wound up on his face. As a measure to ensure he could not respond, I turned and bolted through the forest to around where I knew Ponyville was in order to find her cottage. “Nononono! Wait! You don’t need to bring Fluttershy into this!” My serpentine acquaintance said, stopping me in my tracks as he appeared in front of me, so I decided to hear him out, crossing my arms as the ACU mirrored my actions. “I mean, you’ve just been attacked twice by overzealous ponies and despite Prime’s little promise, your core isn’t as stable as you want it to be. For the record, being big is rather overrated, there’s a lot of things you’ll be able to enjoy at your small size, and just to let you know that I didn’t install the neural-link system in there just so you ‘walk’ big.” he said, knocking on the… codpiece. My eyes widened to the point I almost turned the LEDs in my ACUs optics into Hi-Beams. “You didn’t.” “Weeeell… no.” I went deadpan. “But it’s not like you can’t, you don’t exactly have a limit on upgrades if you can design them all to fit together.” he patted me on the head. “I’ll let you finish up, you’ll be having some important guests soon! Tata!” he chuckles as he melts and slides down into a drain in the ground that wasn’t there before, and wasn’t there anymore after a brief flash of light. I slowly turned around, and asked the three questions I needed answered from Seras. “Seras, do my cybernetics ensure I won’t get alcohol damage?” “Yes?” “And can this ACU produce substances from this world using the information from the net?” “Well… yes?” “Could you please synthesize my lunch with Apple Cider today… Hard.” There was no verbal answer as I simply looked at the deployed table adorned with food and requested drink, I sat back and took a long swig from the large glass I was given that was soon refilled. “*sigh* Housten, we have nooo problems…”