//------------------------------//
// Lightning Strike 
// Story: Black Horizons 
// by SFaccountant 
//------------------------------//

Black Horizons
By SFaccountant

Chapter 2
Lightning Strike





Harvest of Steel – unknown deck

Twilight Sparkle galloped through the halls of the flagship, her breath heaving and sweat dribbling down her neck.

The sound of her hooves banging against the deck echoed through the halls. They were utterly empty, with no other sound but the soft hum of cogitators and the overhead lumens. Every door was closed, secured behind a magnetic lock and a bright red indicator lumen.

Locked. Locked. Every door, locked.

Twilight became more frantic, and her horn flickered. She could teleport! Locks couldn’t stop her! But to where? Why?

A freezing wind blasted through the hall, and she felt a cold shock like a row of icicles had pierced her spine. Twilight tripped gracelessly as her legs seemed to turn to rubber, and she bounced along the empty metal halls before slowly rolling to a stop on her side.

“HELLO?!” Twilight shouted desperately, her voice echoing back. “THERE MUST BE SOMEONE HERE!! I CAN’T BE ALONE, THE SHIP ITSELF IS ALIVE THAT DOESN’T EVEN MAKE SENSE!!”

The lumens buzzed and flickered, and Twilight groaned and curled up her legs. “Not this again… Why won’t they stop? What do they want?”

The light went out entirely, and almost immediately Twilight heard new sounds: heavy, tortured breaths. Gasps for air, like someone that had just emerged from the water. Pained wheezes from long-abused organs. Rapid huffing on the verge of exhaustion.

“What… What now?” the alicorn whimpered, fearfully igniting her horn to light her surroundings.

Twilight gasped in shock and her eyes bulged. She was no longer in a hall but in a small, circular room. The floor was utterly bare, and the ceiling unremarkable, but in the walls were the grotesque alcoves overrun with cabling and wires where the desiccated “crew” of the Harvest of Steel oversaw their endless labors. But in these alcoves it was not nameless, unfamiliar humans that had been entombed. Her best friends, the other Elements of Harmony, were trapped under the cruel metal hooks and cable loops. The ponies stared down at her, unblinking, their bodies riddled with sockets and dried scars.

Also Trixie was there too, for some reason.

“You… They… NO!!” Twilight sobbed, tears dribbling down her cheeks. “How could they?! Why?! Why did this happen to you?! What did-“

“Whoa, whoa, calm down there, Princess of Drama,” Rainbow Dash said. Her wings’ feathers were gone, replaced by webs of wires that spread across the alcove interior and plugged into the walls. “Relax. We’re fine!”

“F-Fine?” Twilight stuttered, feeling sick to her stomach.

“No, we’re NOT fine! Do you have any idea how hard it is to get any moisturizer around here?! This is terrible for my coat!” Half of Rarity’s body, cut almost straight down the middle, seemed to be a blackened mess riddled with sockets and wires, while the other half was very nearly pristine. “Also the servitors are TERRIBLE at brushing! A little help, darling?”

Twilight stared for a few awkward seconds, and then rubbed the tears out of her face. “You… uh… Wh-What’s going on here?”

“Pretty much what it looks like!” Pinkie Pie chirped. “It’s not that bad, though! The Harvest is actually really interesting, and knows a ton of jokes!” Pinkie’s body was chained firmly to her alcove, and a metal cuff was secured tightly around her head and mouth, partially muffling her speech. “Plus we get immortality!”

“You…… really? You’re immortal now?” Twilight felt the last traces of panic leave her body and she sat up straight.

“Well, maybe. They promised we wouldn’t die of old age, but I warned everypony that sounded extremely suspect,” Rarity grumbled.

“Huh. Is that why you agreed to this, Trixie?” Twilight asked.

“I’m actually Chrysalis,” the blue unicorn replied curtly. “I’m just filling in for Trixie while she takes a personal day.” Most of the tubes in her alcove ran up into Trixie’s hat, with the notable exception of a thick, sparking cable that was plugged into her horn, somehow.

Twilight was more confused than ever now, glancing from one mutilated pony to the next. “Okay, hold on, was this voluntary or not? Let’s start there.”

“I was bullied into it, as usual,” Fluttershy whimpered, tugging uncomfortably at the heavy cabling plugged in where her wings used to be.

“Ah wasn’t,” Applejack grunted. She was partially suspended upright in her alcove from several wires and chains wrapped around her forelegs and belly, and had a thick central tube running down from the ceiling directly into the top of her hat. “Since Ah joined the crew, apple production has increased bah 729%!”

“Increased by what? Applejack, the Harvest of Steel doesn’t produce apples!” Twilight pointed out.

“It didn’t before, but then they plugged me in to increase efficiency!” Applejack said proudly.

Twilight slapped a hoof against her face. “Applejack, you can’t increase efficiency for production that doesn’t exist! There’s no way for the Harvest to host an apple orchard! We’re not producing apples!”

The farmer looked skeptical. “But… it went up by 729%. They had charts ‘n everythin’.”

“Zero increased by seven hundred and whatever percent is still zero!” Twilight shouted, slamming her hoof on the deck for emphasis.

Rarity grimaced at Applejack’s shocked expression. “Well, I guess somepony had to tell her…”

“YOU KNEW?!” the orange pony shouted while sparks started blasting from her wiring. “Y’ALL KNEW AND NONE OF YA TOLD ME?!”

“We wanted to, but, well… you just seemed so HAPPY about it,” Rainbow mumbled, cringing.

“WELL AH AIN’T HAPPY NOW, DASH!!”

“Please stop yelling, it makes the monster ship upset,” Fluttershy whimpered.

“Okay, look, I’m still not clear how you all ended up like this, but it seems there was some coercion and misdirection involved,” Twilight said, sighing.

“I wasn’t coerced or tricked,” Chrysalis interjected, raising an azure hoof.

“I was talking to my friends!” Twilight snapped at the changeling. “Although I should probably get Trixie out of this too, come to think of it. Mostly because I’m afraid of how her obsessive egotism might affect the ship functions.”

“BEEEEP!! BEEEEP!! BEEEEP!!” Pinkie Pie’s metal gag popped off, and she started shouting in a way strangely reminiscent of an obnoxious alarm.

Twilight cringed, feeling her vision go fuzzy from the sound. “Pinkie! Stop that… I… I can’t…”





Harvest of Steel
Deck C-13 – Twilight Sparkle’s quarters

“Buh!” Twilight flailed her hooves clumsily as she woke up, the blaring of the cogitator alarm ringing in her ears and the sterile glare of the ceiling lumens blinding her remaining eye.

Her optical turned on, and half her vision was filled with indecipherable data-screed while the other half was an indistinct blur of light. After a few seconds both sides recovered, and Twilight could finally see that she was on her bunk within her quarters.

A yawn came from below, and Spike hopped off the lower bunk and onto the floor. “Morning, Twilight.” He waddled over to the cogitator and slapped a big green button, turning off the buzzing alarm. “Were your dreams any better last night?”

Twilight remained on the top bunk, grimacing as she went through the strange and fleeting memories. “Uh… kind of. I mean, it was pretty terrible but not nearly as… intense as before.” She gave each wing a stretch before hopping down to the floor. “The others say it hasn’t been too bad either. This feels like a trend to me. Either I’m getting used to whatever was giving me nightmares, or…”

Spike waited for her to finish. “Or…?”

“Or it’s something else,” Twilight said with a helpless shrug. “I mean, the cause and effect is pretty fuzzy, here. There’s a lot of ways to cause nightmares. Anyway, let’s see what we have for today.”

She turned to the cogitator, and her horn flickered, leading a gentle wisp of purple over the console buttons. When she brought up the schedule, she blinked in surprise. “What? We’re scheduled for realspace translation today!”

“Already? We’ve only been out three days,” Spike murmured. “Does that mean you have a mission today?”

“Maybe. There isn’t much else here. I have orders to attend a briefing, though.” The screen shifted, displaying a star chart and zooming in on a particular star. “Ghessheim, huh? Six primary stellar bodies, one colonized world, one extraplanetary mining facility, two major orbital waystations.” She tapped the colony world on the screen, and new information appeared around it for her to peruse. “Wait… TWO colonized worlds. Kind of. Apparently the colony’s moon also hosts a settlement.”

“Is it a prison, like ours?” Spike asked.

“Our moon is NOT a prison. We just exiled somepony there one time!” Twilight corrected him. “And no, since you asked. If anything it’s the opposite. It says the governor’s palace is on the moon.”

“Maybe they don’t like the governor,” Spike mused.

“Rather it seems like their moon is really nice! The atmosphere is supposedly robust and there’s a strong magnetic field and an abundance of native flora. But hopefully we’ll find out more at the briefing.” Twilight jabbed a wing forward, swiping a feather across the screen to turn it off. “Come on, Spike. Let’s see what the galaxy has in store for us today…”





Harvest of Steel
Deck C-11 – communal juncture

Twilight trotted into the room through a sparse crowd of curious ponies with Spike riding on her back. She spotted her friends almost immediately, each of them already wearing their power armor with their helmets detached or disengaged. Pinkie Pie sat next to them, and next to her was a large plate piled high with doughnuts.

This part of the ship wasn’t a formal briefing room, as the humans and equines apparently weren’t given extended briefings that required dedicated areas. Instead they were funneled into a hallway intersection that had been expanded into a large room. Bleacher-like slats of metal were stacked up next to the walls, while the hallway paths crossed underneath a large hololith projector on the ceiling. Numerous mercenaries and Equestrians were already here, most of them grouped up and eating breakfast.

“Twilight! Twilight, over here!” Pinkie waved a hoof to their squad leader, pointing energetically to the doughnut pile next to her. “Looky! Looky! I have doughnuts!”

“Yes Pinkie, I can see that. Thank you.” Twilight sat down at the end of the row of power-armored mares, and Spike hopped off to sit next to her. “Where did you get doughnuts, anyway?”

“Oh, we have a bakery now,” Rainbow Dash said.

“We… We do? Really?” Twilight was surprised, obviously. She had been surprised when bakeries appeared in Ferrous Dominus, but the city-fortress was at least a city; despite the proliferation of arcane evil and industrial blight it was still expected to provide a city’s services to its residents. She’d assumed life on a void ship would be more regimented and spartan.

“Most of the raw materials came from Delgan, of course. They transferred the supplies before we set out,” Rarity said with satisfied smirk. “Cookies and Cream managed to get ahold of a plasma furnace somewhere around here and they’ve been baking up a storm ever since.”

“So when Dash says ‘bakery’ it’s more like a tin shack in the underdeck,” Applejack added. “Still, Ah appreciate the spirit! Makes me wanna take along a few bushels o’ apples and bake some pies next time ‘round!”

“I appreciate the doughnuts!” Pinkie squeaked before shoving one such ring into her mouth.


A familiar figure stomped into the junction, and Twilight perked up immediately when she recognized Gaela. She leapt down to the floor and rushed to the Dark Techpriest, shouting a greeting on her approach.

“I have arrived to facilitate your mission briefing,” Gaela said, as coldly professional as ever. “Ordinarily this duty would be carried out by an officer or an Iron Warrior, but by now it has become the prevailing assumption among the entire army that I’m some sort of pony liaison.”

Pinkie Pie jumped onto her from behind, clambering up the various servo limbs until she could climb onto the Techpriest’s shoulder pads. She started to purr like a cat, nuzzling against the cyborg cultist’s cheek.

“… Well, we do like you a lot,” Twilight offered, flushing slightly.

“I’m thrilled,” Gaela replied, not sounding thrilled at all. She walked past the Equinoughts and up to the wide open space in the middle of the room. With a glance, the lumens darkened and the hololith projector on the ceiling turned on.


“Our target system is Ghessheim. We will be translating into realspace within the hour,” Gaela announced, jumping right into the briefing. The last few pockets of hushed conversation were silenced, and everyone in the junction gave their full attention to the display that appeared above the Techpriest.

The hololith displayed a central star, and then zoomed out and to one side, showing the system’s planets stacked in a neat line in their orbital rings. Most of the planets vanished a moment later, leaving only two remaining. One was a large planet riddled with wide faults in its topography visible even in this projection, with several huge metal spike-like structures mounted within them. The other was a smaller, more verdant world, with its surface a vast sphere of blue with small patches of green and gray. Around that world were two satellites: One was the planet’s own moon, a jewel of rich green forests and blue seas. The second was clearly a space station with a great many enormous smokestacks mounted on top.

“Behold, Ghessheim IV and V. One, an extra-planetary mine manned by prisoners taken from the other, which most would consider a verdant hive world,” Gaela explained, pointing a metal claw to the fourth planet and then the fifth.

“OOH! OOH! What about the moon?! That moon is so pretty! Can we go to the moon?!” Pinkie asked, beating a hoof against her shoulder plate.

A servo arm clamped onto her tail and pulled sharply, yanking her onto the floor.

“The moon, designated Ulaisse, is the site of the system’s capital, its seat of governance, and its most formidable defenses. You will NOT be going there,” Gaela offered curtly. “The battle plans for the full extent of the raid have not yet been finalized, but assaulting the system seat would be costly and is unnecessary. Our initial fleet action will be focused here.”

The Dark Techpriest waved an arm, and the hololith zoomed in on the space station, pushing the planets out of sight. “This is the primary orbital relay and the grand refinery Eschel. It serves as a repair station for local fleets, a transport link for inter-system trade, and a massive off-world smelting hub for the ore produced on the third planet. A perfect target… if not for its bombardment cannons holding constant vigil.”

The hololith highlighted the numerous turrets placed over the top and bottom of the space station. “These weapons represent a critical threat to our fleet operations. In conjunction with a local patrol flotilla used to drive off pirates, they possess the raw firepower to defeat us in a proper fleet engagement. As such, the upcoming assault will be decidedly… improper.”

Sections of the hololith started lighting up. “Surprise is crucial. The fleet will slowly advance on the station and negotiate docking. Rather than trying to route troops through the airlock, however, we’ll deploy a series of coordinated boarding assaults once we’re close enough and overwhelm the station’s defenses. The key objective in the assault is shutting down the station’s weapon systems before the defense flotilla can move to engage the fleet. Without the station’s support, the flotilla shouldn’t be a threat before the might of our flagship.”

The hololith again zoomed in on the station, and a particular disc-shaped section lit up. “This is where your teams will be making your attack. Your orders are to secure the area and establish a perimeter before awaiting further orders.”

“That’s it? What’s that part of the station for?” Rainbow asked.

“Refined metals storage and off-loading,” Gaela said with a shrug. “I imagine there are other supply and storage facilities in the area, but our records are ripped from old Imperial logs and likely outdated.”

“Why are we attacking there? I thought the point of the assault was to knock out their weapons?” Lightning Dust asked, sounding annoyed.

“The point of the assault is to completely overwhelm the station’s defenses and ultimately occupy it,” Gaela corrected. “In doing so, we’re launching attacks on both vital and non-vital targets. This will force the enemy to spread their internal response thin and cut off their lines of reinforcement. It also ensures the interior is well pacified when we begin plundering the facility. Other assault teams will be responsible for the primary objective of crippling the weapons systems and reactor core.”

With a gesture, the hololith zoomed out again to the planetary display, showing the fourth and fifth planets with clusters of data tags. “This concludes your mission briefing for phase one of this operation. Any questions?”

Pinkie Pie started jumping up and down, flailing one foreleg in the air wildly.

“No,” the Dark Techpriest replied.

“’No’ as in ‘no I’m not taking your question’ or ‘the answer to your question that you haven’t asked yet is no’?” Pinkie asked.

“Yes. Any other queries?” Gaela asked.

“Isn’t Equinought Squadron going to be sent on some super-important near-suicidal space mission?” Rainbow Dash asked, sounding a bit disappointed. “Doesn’t Solon even care about getting Rarity killed in action anymore?”

While Rarity looked duly offended, Gaela responded with her usual bland accuracy. “While you may be given such a task as the attack proceeds and our strategy evolves, the objectives identified thus far are insufficiently lethal to warrant your assignment.” Then she gestured toward the ceiling again with a claw.

The hololith winked out, and the lumens above the junction brightened again. “We are expecting to exit Warp space very soon. May the Dark Gods favor you and the pawns of the False Emperor falter before us.”

“Iron within. Iron without,” intoned several of the human mercenaries. Most of the ponies seemed surprised at the sudden prayer, with the notable exception of Phage Squadron. They and a few unicorns wearing dark hoods chanted in perfect sync with their bipedal allies. Then they began to disperse, turning away from the center of the junction and returning to their earlier activities.


“Lame! I can’t believe that we’re going to be fighting dock workers over a bunch of rocks instead of making an all-or-nothing sprint for the control center or something!” Rainbow Dash complained. “We have experience with boarding missions too! Why wouldn’t they send us after the munitorium or something?”

“Rainbow, darling, are you really trying to help the Warsmith get me killed?” Rarity asked, glaring at the pegasus. “We have a simple mission of middling importance and expect limited resistance. I, for one, am thrilled at the prospect. And human opponents, too! For at least one battle we won’t have to contend with snarling, extra-dimensional monstrosities, giant over-armed battlesuits, or lumbering savages too thick to fear death!”

“Yeah, Ah hear ya. Ah ain’t too psyched ‘bout fightin’ humans, though,” Applejack admitted with a sigh. “These folk ain’t done us wrong. But this’s what we signed up fer.”

“We don’t have to actually kill them, right? Can’t we just, uh, subdue them?” Fluttershy asked nervously.

“Yeah, that’s true! We can make all kinds of new friends!” Pinkie chirped, bouncing up and down and grinning.

“I don’t think they’ll be too happy about being captured rather than killed, either,” Twilight warned, grimacing. “Chaos isn’t good to its prisoners, and this vessel literally runs on captives. But… well, both Gaela and Dest were originally Imperial soldiers at some point, so maybe it really COULD happen.”


Applejack looked like she was going to reply to that, but a deep rumble filled the hull and the deck started to quiver. Rarity, Twilight, and several other unicorns all winced, simultaneously feeling a cold tingle through their horns for no obvious reason.

“All hands, prepare for Warp exit! Crews to your battle stations! Assault units, suit up and proceed to your deployment area!” barked a voice from the vox caster.

“That sounds like us,” Applejack drawled. Her helmet started moving, shifting the jaw plates into place under her muzzle before the upper part extended from her armor’s cowl. A gentle toss of her head bounced her hat up before the pieces slid into place and locked together, and the Stetson landed atop the thickened ceramite shielding. The visor turned on, and the lenses pulsed a bright crimson.

The other mares attached or engaged their helmets, and Twilight summoned her power armor with a shimmering wave of violet magic. As Twilight was preparing to see Spike off she saw that Phage Squadron was approaching with Poison Kiss, the squad leader, at the front.

“Pardon me, Princess Sparkle, but I don’t suppose you know where the good Queen Chrysalis is, do you?” the unicorn asked. Her helmet was also fully enclosed, but the others could hear the grimace in her tone. “We haven’t seen her since we boarded. Which isn’t greatly surprising, seeing as the smarmy hag could be strolling about as any one of us.”

Twilight glanced about the room and ident-tags appeared in her visor readout, listing the names of everyone as she looked at them. “She’s not in here, I think. I imagine that if she’s taking part in the assault she’ll have a special role rather than being part of an attack team.”

“How do we know YOU’RE not Chrysalis?” Breezy demanded, her wings spreading threateningly. “Who better to replace than the highest-ranking pony on deployment?!”

“Would y’all give it a rest? Chrysalis ain’t that good a spah. We’d be able to tell if she was replacin’ a good friend o’ ours,” Applejack retorted, stepping up next to the Princess.

“Besides, I’ve been with her since she woke up. Chrysalis hasn’t shown her face around our deck since we boarded.” Spike slapped his hand against Twilight’s shoulder pad, nodding sharply.

“Okay, okay, we believe you,” Kiss said quickly, shooting a glare at Breezy Blight. “We’ve just been a little shirty knowing that she’s aboard. Sorry.”

“Your fear isn’t entirely unwarranted, but she’s been under surveillance since arrival.” Gaela, who hadn’t actually left since she finished the presentation, chimed in from behind the Nurgle cultists. “Queen Chrysalis is currently being taken to the bridge to be given a personal briefing. As Sparkle said, her unique abilities warrant a specialized role in the assault.”

“The bridge, eh? Well that’s… only slightly more encouraging than having her snooping about the bunks,” Kiss mumbled.

“Yo! You guys coming?” Rainbow Dash and Pinkie were at the junction’s exit, with the former shouting and the latter waving at them. “C’mon everypony! It’s pirate time!” A slight shimmer in the air betrayed Fluttershy’s presence too as they started trotting away.

“Good luck in the upcoming mission, Sparkle,” Kiss said while she turned around. “I know we don’t always see eye-to-eye off the battlefield, but I hope the Dark Gods favor you.”

Then she whirled around to face her own team, as well as the other ponies watching the encounter. “All right you bums! Stop waffling about and get to your boarding pods and tendril docks! The cycle is young and Nurgle demands his tribute of rot and despair! Move, move, move!”





Harvest of Steel
Bridge

“Ugh, so this is what the lunatic meant when he said there were two of you. You could have warned me ahead of time.”

Chrysalis gagged as she stepped into the bridge, and her eyes narrowed at a massive figure in filthy, rusted terminator armor. Sliver only briefly paid the changeling any attention, and then turned his glowering eye lens on the spread of displays at the front. Solon was standing right beneath them, his servo limbs and actual limbs jabbing rapidly at the holoscreen around him.

“Ah, good! You’re here! It’sh almosht time for your firsht misshion!” Solon said brightly. “We’ll be launching a shurprishe asshault on the planet’sh orbital fortressh shoon.”

One of the ship’s scopes zoomed in on the space station Eschel, and Chrysalis arched an eyebrow. “It’s… big. As big as Ferrous Dominus itself.”

“Shignificantly larger, in fact,” Solon corrected. “We’re going to take it.”

“Thosse gunss will be a problem should they remain active,” Sliver said, his voice a deep rumble through the sludge in his vox. “We will desstroy them individually, but that will take time. You will dissable them for uss,” he hefted his hammer and pointed its head at Chrysalis.

“Sounds like fun,” Chrysalis mused, baring her fangs. “Shall I do it sneaky-like, or do you want me to try out more of those ‘warforms’ of yours?”

“Ideally, firsht one, then the other.” Solon pointed at the changeling queen. “Dishengage Nemeshish Lock. Authorization zero.”

Her wings quivered in delight as she felt her core start to speed up, delivering currents of raw Warp energy straight into her veins. Images started flashing before her, offering glimpses of mechanical bodies of terrifying power.

Naturally, she felt a sudden urge to take on one such body immediately, here in the bridge. Even if she felt no particular desire to try murdering the Iron Warriors here and now, it would have at least been nice to tower over the smelly one-eyed Astartes rather than the other way around. Ultimately she relented, though; there was no need to antagonize her new allies yet.


“Lord Warsmith, we’ve been contacted by the system patrol fleet,” said a Warpsmith standing at one side of the bridge. “They seem to have accepted our registratum codex as genuine and are requesting a manifest before allowing us leave to approach. They seem quite interested in where we came from… Not just our origin point, but our last dozen system transfers.”

Sliver turned his head. “Do they ssusspect anything?”

“Hmmm… No. I believe they’re simply on heightened alert.” The Warpsmith swiped a grimy, oily finger across the hololith, banishing one data feed and opening another. “There should be no issue, no matter how closely they want to parse the logs. We only have to maintain our deception until we’re in boarding range, after all.”

“The Harvest hungers,” interrupted one of the entombed crew with a growl. “Wounded prey lies ahead.”

This took some of the Iron Warriors by surprise, and Solon craned his neck to look at the gigantic eye set in the ceiling. “What do you shee? Show me your quarry.”

The scopes lost focus, shifting away from the front of the station in wild, erratic loops. Eventually they slowed and converged on one side of the fortress, tracking along a long metal spar. Anchored at the end of the spar was a ship. A rather large ship, boasting an impressive series of macro cannon batteries along its flank.

“That’sh a grand cruisher!” Solon exclaimed, bringing up several new data displays. “That’sh not part of the shyshtem fleet, ish it?”

“It doesn’t seem so, Warsmith. It’s reactor is cold, which is why we didn’t pick it up right away.”

“She’s badly damaged. Her engine block has been mostly shredded apart. Still… the batteries are certainly intact.”

“Why is she not in the repair docks? That’s an emergency anchor point. What are they doing?”

Chrysalis impatiently glanced between Solon and Sliver while the other Astartes discussed the issue. “Is this a problem? Our ship is bigger, isn’t it?”

Sliver meditated on the issue for a few seconds before turning to his Warsmith. “It will not be a problem. In itss current sstate it will not be able to join the combat in time to make a decissive difference, if it is even crewed at all.”

“The Harvest hungers!” bellowed the withered crewmen. “She is fascinated… She wishes to FEED.”

“That’sh a bit too much ship for you to choke down, my dear,” Solon chuckled. “But perhapsh we can do shomething about it after all.”

“I’d rather not divert much manpower to boarding it before we’ve sseized Eschel,” Sliver hissed. “If it becomess active, then we’ll attack it directly.”

“I’d like to shee itsh archivesh. Thoshe hull breachesh look intereshting to me. We can enshure it shtaysh out of action while we’re at it.” He swiveled to face Sliver. “One shquad should be fine, don’t you think?”

The Chaos Lords stared at each other for several long seconds. Chrysalis glanced back and forth between them, uncomprehending, as did the giant eyeball in the ceiling.

“As you wish, Warssmith,” Sliver finally said. “We cannot alter our approach to get the grand cruisser within the range of the asssault tendrilss, but with itss void shieldss down our teleporter will do.”

“Excellent! Proceed with the attack.” Solon started scuttling toward the rear of the bridge. “I’ll make the necesshary arrangementsh.”

“Of coursse, Lord Warssmith,” Sliver mumbled, returning to his tactical hololiths. “Queen. Come closser. We musst disscusss your targetss.”





“We’re being… re-directed? Where?”

Twilight and the other Equinoughts were clustered in the Dreadnought berths, waiting for Pinkie Pie to clamber into her walker. The area was dimly lit and mostly quite macabre, with skulls and daemonic reliefs in every wall among the vein-like tubes and wiring. It contrasted rather sharply with Pinkie’s actual Dreadnought bay, which had clusters of balloons tied to the various chains and hooks on the wall and a motivational poster featuring a cat hanging by a tree branch.

“To the grand cruisher… what wash the name… Blesshed Redemption. It’sh in berth behind the shtation, and we weren’t expecting a ship of itsh massh to be involved in thish engagement. You will be teleporting inshide it to enshure that it will not be,” explained Solon over the vox. “We can’t divert any additional shquadsh for thish misshion, sho you will be taking care of it on your own.”

“YES! This is exactly what I’m talking about!” Rainbow Dash cheered, jumping up in glee. “A single-squad mission to take out a space ship! It’s PERFECT!”

None of the other mares seemed nearly as pleased, and Rarity quickly opened up her channel to speak. “What kind of resistance are we expecting to face on this mission, exactly?”

“Very little. Perhapsh none!” Solon laughed. “The vesshel’sh reactor ish cold; it’sh crew ish likely on the shtation or planetshide. They’re not expecting an attack. Any reshishtance you meet should be deshperate and feeble.”

“Oh.” Rainbow became considerably less excited, her visor dimming.

“Should be? So we don’t know for sure?” Rarity asked, skeptical.

“Would you rather attack with the main force that will be facing hundredsh of dedicated defenshe crewsh?”

“We-We’re not saying that!” Fluttershy assured the Warsmith. “We’re just, uhm, concerned about having no other help going into the ship.”

“You don’t need to shieze the vesshel, or even shweep the interior. I merely want you to shteal it’sh primary datashtacksh and shabotage the reactor. Then you may hold poshition until you’re extracted.” Solon paused briefly, and then data inload feeds appeared over the Equinoughts’ visors. “You’ll need a Techpriesht, of courshe, sho Gaela will accompany you. She’ll meet you at the teleportarium.”

“Okay!” Twilight said brightly, suddenly much happier about the new objective. “We won’t let you down, Warsmith!”

“Good. Proceed at once. We’ll be in poshition shoon.” The vox link cut off.


“Okay, so maybe it’s not the most important or action-packed mission, but at least it’s special,” Rainbow grumbled.

“I’m not thrilled to be sent off on our own again – as ever Solon seems quick to separate us from his enormous army of trained killers and nigh-invincible supermen – but I do like the part where the vessel will probably be abandoned,” Rarity added.

“Ah wouldn’t bet on it,” Applejack grumbled. “They ain’t sure what this heap is doin’ here, right? Ah reckon if’n they haven’t figured that out, there’s probably somethin’ weird and dangerous inside.”

The whir of massive gears announced that Pinkie Pie had finished whatever absurd process she used to activate the Contemptor Dreadnought, and the massive walker took its first heavy step out of its bay. “Off to the teleporter room, then! Maybe there’ll be something cool inside the enemy ship!” Pinkie, as ever, sounded extremely excited to set out.

“Let’s go everypony! We could be in position any minute now!” Twilight commanded, galloping down the hall. The rest of her squad followed, the heavy clang of armored boots ringing through the dark halls of the Harvest.





Space Station Eschel
Command center

“That’s quite an impressive trading fleet. And who are they, exactly?”

“Zellenis Merchant Association. Some kind of operation run out of Sevrill in the Sector Solar.”

“They’re an awful long way from home, aren’t they?”

“That’s the nature of fleets this size. Their logs check out.”

“And they’ve been nowhere near Arghost? Or Nikkalus?”

“Correct. Not within the last ten standard years, it looks like.”


The Director Primus of space station Eschel watched in fascinated silence as the trading fleet slowly floated past the system patrol ships running close-range scans of the newcomers. It was unusual to find a convoy fleet of this size that wasn’t chartered by the Administratum or Departmento Munitorium, if only because void travel was dangerous enough that having so many ships traveling together invited catastrophe that few other entities could afford the risk. The odd lost freighter was a harsh but manageable loss; any corporation, merchant family, or planetary government that lost an entire flotilla of them plus a megafreighter would be destitute.

“This is fortuitous,” said the Director’s aide, her fingers steepled beneath her chin. “With the loss of Arghost our output capacity far exceeds our current sales. The forge world Archaeus can surely ramp up their own purchases, but it will take time to expand their logistical capacity to take the excess material and put it to use. We can sell the excess stock to these traders.”

“What excess stock?” asked another advisor. “We still have a contract shipment to Arghost. We owe them that material. We’re not going to sell supplies that have already been purchased, are we?”

“Do you really think we’re going to ship supplies directly into the teeth of a Tyranid incursion?” she countered sharply. “The Imperial warfleets can’t guarantee the safety of our convoy if we approach orbit, much less if we attempt to make landing planetside. The world is completely infested. Attempting to deliver it now would be negligence bordering on malpractice.”

“So in response to a xeno invasion, we’re going to starve the target – a loyal Imperial customer! – of their supplies?!”

“The lives of our crews come second, right after our bottom line. Neither of them benefit from carrying fresh material into the jaws of the alien. The defense crews of Arghost come… later.”

“That’s enough of your squabbling,” grumbled the Director. Once his underlings silently turned to face him again, the elderly man drew a long breath. “Have the incoming fleet berthed and resupplied as necessary. I will inform the Governor and confer with him as to what portion of our primary stock is for sale.”

He pushed himself up off of his chair and then started plodding toward the exit. “Also, offer to have our visitors’ ships swept by enforcer teams. There’s no reason to suspect they’re carrying hostile organisms, but we ARE on heightened alert.”

“Valley Nostrus, adjust your heading according to our transmitted relay points,” directed a technician at the edge of the command center. “Your approach angle is too shallow.”

The Director paused briefly to listen to the request before ignoring it. “Once they have docked, ensure that the Captain and any merchant liaison has proper accommodations planetside. I imagine they came for more than metal.”

“Director,” another technician interrupted, “we don’t have sufficient docking facilities for the megafreighter and its attendant vessels to be served at once. Our anchor spars could accommodate them, but…” she trailed off uncomfortably.

The Director sighed. “Of course. Warn them that the Blessed Redemption is in quarantine protocol Beta. The adjacent spars are restricted. In fact, they should give the grand cruiser a very wide berth so long as they’re in-system. They may feel free to take up high orbit and arrange their own landings.”

“Yes, Director. How much should we tell them?”

“As little as possible. Loyal Imperial citizens know better than to test a vessel quarantine.” Then he turned around again and gestured to his aide. “Since we’re on the topic, how have the teams sweeping the vessel fared?”

“Progress has been… slow, Director. We’ve cleansed the operations sections and kept the infestation contained. But it’s dreadful in there.”

The aide would have elaborated further, but suddenly the comms technician started shouting into his vox receiver again.

“Valley Nostrus, do you copy?! Cut your speed at once and adjust your heading! You’re cutting it too close!”

“What’s going on?” the Director demanded, turning to the hololithic display being projected in the middle of the room. It displayed the space station Eschel in its vast industrial glory, with a very large ship leading the entire merchant fleet directly toward it.

“They’re not responding to our comms anymore!” complained the technician. “They’re not following docking instructions! I don’t know what’s wrong!”

“Should we fire a warning shot?” asked a weapons officer.

“Of course not! I don’t think-“

“D-Director!” a different technician sputtered, recoiling from his screen display. “The merchant fleets’ reactors just… their output has almost trebled! Something’s happening!”

“We have new signum traces coming from all vessels! They’re powering weapons!”

“I see primary turrets on the scopes! Where did those come from?!”

“Torpedoes! We have torpedoes incoming! Turret gunners to your stations! All battle stations! We are at red alert! This is not a drill!!”

“Something else is happening! The Nostrus is… opening up? What are those?!”


The station’s Director Primus watched the unfolding panic in stunned silence, his face as pale as a sheet. In the hololith, the megafreighter’s bow was yawning open, exposing massive metal tendrils that were slithering out into the void. Torpedoes, boarding pods, and assault gunships were all being launched from the merchant fleet in rapid, coordinated volleys, turning the space between the fleet and the Eschel into a swarm of tiny sensor contacts. What little return fire came from the station’s point-defense turrets was panicked and utterly insufficient.

He turned, trembling, to his equally shocked aides. “Prepare for boarders. Fortify this room and do all you can to keep turret control active. I must get a message to the planetary Governor.”

“Y-Yes, Lord!” one of them stuttered back.

“The torpedoes have landed! We have negative detonation! Those are boarding munitions!”

“Hull breaches detected in section 7! Section 8! Section 12! Section 5! Emperor help us, they’re everywhere!”

“Detecting another energy surge from the megafreighter! Their teleportarium is active!”





Harvest of Steel
Teleportarium

“System charge at 72%. Coordinates locked on. 260 seconds until spatial folding.”

Gaela listened patiently while the other Dark Techpriests worked at the cogitators surrounding the teleportation dais. The mares of Equinought Squadron stood around her in various states of unease, with Pinkie Pie’s massive, brightly decorated Dreadnought standing at the edge. Energy danced between the metal tines positioned above, and tubing running along the floor and ceiling pulsed and writhed like a living thing.

“Explanatory: You will be inserted directly into the reactor block, in the aft fuel reserves.” A Dark Techpriest explained to the assembled troops. “That is the closest area to the target station with sufficient vacant capacity to reduce chances of teleporter error to below one percent.”

“Noted. If there are any crew at all, they’ll likely notice such an incursion immediately and be able to trace it,” Gaela said. “We will move on the reactor immediately.”

A deep groan rolled through the ship, and several muted thuds came from the decks above.

“Cannon fire,” Twilight whispered.

“Looks like it’s time to git this show on the road,” Applejack mumbled. “Ah hope Daniels is doin’ okay. He-“

A sudden shout cut her off. “Outta the way, nerds!” the voice growled, instantly setting most of the ponies on edge.

Rainbow Dash spun around. “Tellis?!” she asked, at once excited and perplexed.

Sure enough, the Chaos Lord was barging his way into the teleportarium, shoving aside the Dark Acolytes trying to block his path. Tellis grabbed an errant servo arm and flung the hapless cultist it was attached to into one of his peers, scattering them across the deck and clearing the path to the teleportation dais.

“ALL ABOARD THE PAIN TRAIN!!” he howled, leaping across the room with his flight pack roaring. Tellis landed on top of Pinkie’s Dreadnought, kneeling over her shoulder and grabbing onto a smokestack for balance.

“Hey! No! Stop!” Twilight sputtered, waving a hoof at the Iron Warrior frantically.

“Priority maximum: Lord Tellis, vacate the teleportarium dias!” bleated the Techpriest at the main controls. “The calculations for mass transm-“

“Shaddup and fix it, dork,” Tellis commanded, pointing a claw toward the cultist. “I’m going on a pony mission!”

“Sweet!” Rainbow cheered.

“NO! No this is not sweet!” Twilight cried.

“Consarn it, Tellis! Git offa her!”

“Techpriest! Adjust the mass calculations, quickly!” Gaela shouted.

“Teleportation event in 10 seconds!” the Techpriest warned as his limbs started clambering across the console in a desperate flurry.

“So am I the Pain Train? Is that what we call the Dreadnought now?” Pinkie asked, stooping over to address the other mares. “I don’t really like that name.”

The energy in the teleportarium peaked, and the Equinoughts shrieked as a thundering flare of power consumed them.





Blessed Redemption
*Error – signum rebound lost*
*Location unknown*

“Aaaaaah! Aaaaaaaaah! In case it was not previously clear, AAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!”

Twilight staggered away from the teleportation site, her helmet visor and augmetic display reduced to solid sheets of static. Her entire body felt weak and nauseous, and her muscles ached inexplicably. This wasn’t the first time she had used the human teleport technology, but now she was dearly hoping that it would be the last.

The other ponies weren’t any better. Applejack groaned and fell over onto her side, Rarity wailed and curled up into a ball, and a pained moan was coming from Pinkie’s Dreadnought. Rainbow Dash immediately jumped into the air and slammed into a bulkhead wall in her confusion. Gaela wobbled and took a single step forward, and then promptly collapsed onto one knee. Fluttershy’s reaction was less dramatic than the others, although they could all hear terrified wheezing sounds from behind her vox grille.

“What’s up with you guys?” Tellis asked, hopping down from Pinkie’s Dreadnought. “Teleportation sickness? Walk it off, you’ll be fine.”

It took several more seconds for everyone’s visors to reboot so that they weren’t completely blinded. Gaela whirled on the Chaos Lord immediately, glaring up at the Astartes from beneath her black hood.

“Are you MAD?!” the Techpriest hissed, her mechanical fingers gripping her axe tightly enough for the gears to squeal.

“Yeah, a little. Stabbing stuff usually helps with that, though. Why?”

“Assault teleportations are dangerous operations, Lord Tellis. A sudden change in target mass can be catastrophic,” Gaela explained tightly.

“Oh, so what? You’re all fine!” Tellis retorted.

“Ah think Ah mighta left a few organs behind,” Applejack whimpered.

“Okay, well maybe not ‘fine,’ but if it wasn’t a super important organ you can get it re-installed when we get back.” Tellis turned away from the Dark Techpriest and found Rainbow Dash picking herself up off the floor. “Hey Rainbabe, you all right? You didn’t hit the wall too hard.”

“Yeah… I… ugh… I’m okay…” the pegasus slowly pushed herself upright, groaning. “We all made it, right?”

“Yes… it looks that way.” Twilight took a moment to fight down another wave of nausea. “Despite Applejack’s concerns, I don’t think we actually got any internals juggled around in transit. It just… feels like it.”

“See? I told you it was fine! This is going great!” Tellis insisted. He turned around, staring down a dimly lit metal corridor. Then he turned around some more, looking down an equally bleak, empty corridor.

Finally, he looked down at Gaela again. “So what are we doing here, anyway?”

“Why did you insist on coming along if you didn’t even know the mission?!” Rarity shouted.

“Because you guys get all the best jobs! Assassinating Warbosses, assaulting Gargants, raiding derelicts, teleporting into… whatever this is!”

“He has a point,” Rainbow said with a shrug.

“Have you considered that maybe YOU would get the ‘best jobs’ instead if you actually stayed on-task and paid attention to briefings?” Twilight asked.

“I have not considered that, no.” Tellis crossed his arms over his chest. “So where are we going? I wanna kick something!”


The mares were mostly exasperated by his impatience, but Gaela seemed preoccupied by something else. She stared at a small sign bolted onto a bulkhead, and a burst of static escaped her vox as she cursed.

“It seems we translated safely, but the quantum banding restabilized in the wrong location. We are NOT in the reactor block,” the Dark Techpriest said grimly.

“Oh. Well, that’s not a big deal, is it?” Rainbow Dash asked.

“Without knowing the current crew complement there is no way to know whether we’ve endangered our objective or ourselves. But we appear to be in the underdecks, meaning it will take some time to reach the correct area.” Gaela glanced over her shoulder. “In addition, without a readily available cogitator I’m unsure of the correct path.”

“Let’s ask that guy!” Pinkie said, pointing the enormous hand of her Dreadnought over Fluttershy’s head.

The meek pony squeaked in fright and activated her cloak. With the dim light passing straight through her, the others could see what Pinkie had seen: a human hand, laying on the floor, sticking out from behind a cargo container.

“Well, that ain’t good,” Applejack grumbled, approaching the container. “Oi, ya all right back there? Ya can come out, we ain’t gonna hurt ya.”

“We aren’t? Then what was the point of coming here?” Tellis groused.

The others ignored him, and Applejack reached the hand. She leaned past the corner of the cargo container and wasn’t especially surprised at the sight that greeted her: a dismembered arm lying at the edge of a patch of dried gore.

“He ain’t all right, guys,” Applejack said, backing away. “This boardin’ mission is startin’ to look a lot like the last one.”

The other mares stopped short, not caring to see the extent of the carnage. Gaela had no such qualms, however, and walked past Applejack to get a good view of the scene.

“Fascinating… These remains suggest the crewman was hacked apart, and likely eaten on the spot,” Gaela explained. “The blood trail is at least a week old, judging by the rate of decay, but I cannot distinguish actual tracks.”

“Let’s not go that way, then,” Rarity advised.

“Wait, wait, hold on.” Twilight shook her head. “This person was dismembered and EATEN? By what? There’s nothing on this ship except for humans, right?”

“That was our presumption when establishing mission parameters, yes. It appears we were mistaken.” Gaela turned away from the site of the massacre, idly kicking the disembodied hand out of sight. “We need not seek out the killer, though. Let’s proceed.”

“What if I want to find the killer, though? Maybe we can trade carving tips,” Tellis swung an arm, his lightning claws leaving bright red streaks that seemed to flicker in the air for several seconds.

“You can do what you’d like,” Rarity sniffed while she followed Gaela toward a different hallway. “You joined this mission by force and have no particular interest in its objectives, so we’re not going to try to keep you from wandering off.”

“C’mon Tellis, let’s take care of the objectives first!” Rainbow Dash said, lightly kicking his greaves in passing. “After that we have to wait for extraction, so we’ll have hours to run around the ship doing whatever we want!”

“Huh. Okay, that sounds pretty good,” the Iron Warrior admitted, following the ponies just ahead of Pinkie Pie’s walker. “So what’re the objectives?”

“We have to steal the primary datastacks and sabotage the reactor core. That way the ship can’t join the fight and help the defense fleet,” Twilight explained.

“That first thing doesn’t have anything to do with the ship fighting. Why do we need the ship’s robo-brain?” Tellis grunted.

“Because the Warsmith desires it,” Gaela replied coolly. “His whim is our command.”

“Yeugh. Dweebs.”


Despite the Raptor’s protests, he followed the others into the depths of the cruiser. The vessel seemed completely silent, and almost all of the rooms they passed by were locked and their doors unpowered. The doors that were not closed and locked were mostly destroyed; there were several rooms which had obviously been entered by force, with the doors torn open or partially melted down. The boarding party didn’t search these rooms as they advanced, but a passing glance revealed they were in a state of disarray and painted liberally with blood.

In fact, shredded corpses seemed to be a regular fixture of these underdecks, with gore splatters and blood trails interspersed through the halls. Gaela and Tellis were unbothered by the sight, walking by each grisly marker without a second glance. The ponies weren’t quite so jaded, and each body – or conspicuous lack of a body amidst a blood splatter – helped put their nerves on edge.

After nearly twenty minutes, Gaela spotted a cogitator console mounted into a bulkhead wall ahead of them. It looked inactive and dirt-encrusted, but it bore no obvious damage or contamination from the murder scenes scattered throughout the deck. It was also situated next to a set of blast doors cutting off access to the next section of the ship.

“Pie. Stand next to the cogitator. I’ll need to use your reactor,” the Techpriest commanded as she reached the device.

“Why? Can’t we just cut our way through here?” Tellis murmured, reaching the doors and slowly dragging a lightning claw against it.

“If we don’t wish to keep wandering the vessel aimlessly for hours on end, I must receive guidance from the ship’s logic engines,” Gaela insisted as she went to work.

Pinkie’s walker stomped up behind her, and then awkwardly turned around, its shoulders lurching to and fro to expose its back to the Techpriest. Gaela drew a cable from the cogitator and attached it to a corresponding nozzle attached to the Dreadnought’s power plant. With the twist of a knob, the console started to light up.

“I don’t suppose you could use that connection to find out what happened down here, could you?” Rarity asked.

“With sufficient time, perhaps, but that is not our objective and it’s not relevant to our chosen task.” Gaela lowered a small servo arm to the console and plugged in the dataspike at the end.

“Ya don’t think some kinda monster stalkin’ the underdecks might be relevant when we’re tryin’ to get around?” Applejack asked.

“If we encounter the predator, we should kill it. Otherwise it does not concern me.” Gaela tapped several buttons, and then spread a mechanical palm against the cogitator case. “Ancient beast of steel and flame, the mariners of the Warp command thee. Divulge thy secrets and render unto the servants of Chaos our bounty.”

The cogitator started sparking, and the screen flickered on and off before receding into static. Gaela closed her eye, and then began to draw data from the ship. “This console was not meant to be reactivated. It’s been disconnected from the rest of the vessel as part of a quarantine protocol. But there’s enough here. I have a path to the reactor.”

“Awesome! We’ve got this!” Rainbow cheered, jumping up and kicking the air.

“Just a moment and we can proceed. I’m unlocking the blast doors.” Gaela tapped several more buttons, and then unplugged from the data port. The heavy lock started to turn while she disconnected Pinkie’s Dreadnought, finally opening with a hefty clunk.

“Hey, anyone else hear that?” Applejack said, tilting her head to the side.

“Hear what?” asked Twilight. It was hard to hear anything over the machinery grinding away within the blast doors, but she had been busy transcribing Gaela’s prayer to a data file and hadn’t been paying attention.

“I feel something strange, now that you mention it,” Rarity mumbled. “It might still be the teleportation, though.”

Applejack frowned up at the door as it cracked open, releasing a puff of fresh air (or at least more recently recycled air) into the hall. “Ah coulda sworn-“

A scythe blade shot out from between the blast doors, stabbing into the farmer’s helmet. The ceramite squealed as the plating split open, followed by a terrified whinny within the helm. Applejack tried to scramble backward while the door kept opening, and a second blade shout out of the darkness along with a feral snarl.

This one stopped with its tip millimeters from Applejack’s visor, seized by a silver and gold gauntlet.

“Ooh, what do we have here?” Tellis yanked hard on the bladed limb in his hand, and a loud thump came from the blast doors as the body on the other side was slammed into the barrier. Another firm tug ripped the limb off entirely, and he held up the scythe blade in the light while green and orange fluids dribbled onto the deck.

Nearly five feet long from base to tip, the weapon seemed to be composed of bone narrowed to a fine, serrated edge. The blade was attached to a knob of segmented carapace; milky white in color with a red streak across it, and marred by grime and encrusted blood. The ponies didn’t know what to make of it and were anyways still reacting to the sudden attack, but Gaela recognized it immediately.

“Tyranids,” the Dark Techpriest hissed.


Applejack kept scrambling backward as her assailant squeezed through the slowly opening blast doors. It was much larger than a human, with upper arms bearing scythe-bladed talons and lower arms melded into some sort of amalgam of exposed organs that vaguely resembled a gun but pulsed and bulged like living organs. Its head was large even in proportion to the rest of it, bearing a long, spine-riddled shield of hardened chitin that tapered to a snarling maw full of needle-like teeth. A whip of chord muscle made up its tail, ending in an axe-shaped head. It was a monster as fierce and horrific as any daemon, but it lacked the bizarre, uncanny qualities of many Warpspawn.

Rarity tried to draw her sword, but a cold chill blanketed her mind, and her horn fizzled when she tried to levitate the weapon. It was a feeling she had only experienced once before, and the sudden shock left her frozen in place as the alien shouldered its way toward the group. Twilight experienced a similar sensation and quickly activated the psionic manifold, protecting her mind from the looming psychic shadow.

In the end though, she couldn’t deploy her harmonizer blade faster than Tellis could punch the creature already in arms’ reach.

“Sweet! We got bugs, you guys!” the Iron Warrior crowed, smashing one set of talons into the Tyranid’s neck. With a twist and a sweep of his leg, the alien was decapitated and its headless body slammed onto the deck.

Rarity shuddered as the shadow in the Warp fell from her consciousness. It almost felt as if she’d been submerged underwater and had finally broken the surface again as the alien died. “That… It… It’s the same as before! In Canterlot! This sensation is the same!”

“What? We were fighting the Tau back then. There are Tau in here?” Rainbow asked, confused.

“Negative. The Tau were utilizing the Tyranid’s capacity for suppressing psychic powers with their own experimental devices.” Gaela walked up to the still-twitching corpse and jabbed it with her axe. “This is the real thing. It appears we’ve found our mysterious predator.”

A bestial snarl came from the halls beyond the blast doors. The doors had mostly opened by now, exposing the next length of dimly-lit hallway. Blood and ichor splashed across the deck in long slashes and winding trails, and piles of gore lay in every corner. Much of it was clearly the heaped and mostly eaten remains of humans, although that was only obvious thanks to the bloodied wargear and clothing that lay nearby the site of each massacre.

“This is even better than I expected!” Tellis said brightly.

“Are all Ty-Tyranids this b-big?” Fluttershy stuttered, hiding behind the leg of the squadron’s Dreadnought.

“No. This particular strain is a Warrior. It is one of the more common – and smaller – varieties. There are many more, and many kinds are much, much larger.” Gaela glanced behind Pinkie, down the hall they had come from. “Of course, an infested void ship can only host specimens up to a certain size, given the limitations of interior hull space. We’re not likely to encounter any xenos much larger than this.”

“Okay, so I’m a little confused, here,” Rainbow Dash admitted. “This ship doesn’t have humans on it after all? Just monsters?”

“I expect it has both. Emergency protocols for countering intrusion may lead to sections of the vessel being sealed off for later purging. A detailed account of what happened will have to wait until we reach the ship’s datastacks.” Gaela pointed her axe toward the gore-slicked halls. “Shall we proceed?”

“Uh… Y-Yes… but first, can you give us a brief rundown of Tyranids and what we can expect?” Twilight asked nervously. “These aliens seem very different from the others.”

“Tyranids are a psychic hive species that specializes in genetic modification and weaponized hyper-consumption. They use mass spawning to facilitate warfare, creating soldiers as needed and relying on the communal will of their psychic hive mind and instinct rather than training or strategy. They eschew the use or construction of tools, instead improving their bodies directly with successive generations. This is… highly efficient, if nothing else, and ensures that each individual Tyranid is a formidable physical specimen while also being easily replaceable. However, it does mean that their weapons and armor tend to be less effective.”

“Bugs go SQUISH!” Tellis brought his boot down on the disembodied head of the Warrior, crushing its brainpan under his ceramite heel. “Let’s get going! I wanna kill more of ‘em!”

Twilight sighed. “All right Tellis, since you’re so eager you can take point. Just make sure-“

“BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD!!” the Chaos Lord roared, immediately rocketing down the hall with his flight pack burning behind him.

“Wait! Tellis, we… and there he goes.” Twilight groaned.

“Should I go after him?” Rainbow asked.

“No. He can take care of himself. We should stick together as much as possible. Pinkie Pie, take the front. Applejack, stay close to her so you two can cover our advance with the flamers if you need to.”

“Whuh? Oh, uh… okay,” the farmer mumbled.

“Yo, AJ, are you okay? You sound a bit rattled,” Rainbow Dash pointed out.

“Rattled… Yeah, that’s about right,” Applejack replied. She could feel blood trickling down her neck, originating from a scratch just under her ear. The scything talon that had struck her helmet hadn’t penetrated deeply, but it was just enough to slice into the flesh underneath.

Sucking in a breath, Applejack marched up next to Pinkie. “Ah’m okay. Let’s roll, ponies.”

A feral shriek and a lunatic’s laugh echoed through the bulkheads in reply, and Equinought Squadron descended into the darkness of the underdecks.





Space Fortress Eschel
Cargo deck G-6

“Move! Move! Get some cover and dig in! Stay away from those fuel canisters!”

*Watch the left corridors, shas’la! The Iron Warriors took the other one, we won’t see reinforcements from there!*

Human and Tau soldiers bolted from their landing craft, sprinting to reach the blocks of cargo containers stacked in untidy towers within the cargo docks. One section of the docks was still alive with the crack of lasers and shouting as deck ratings and defense troopers tried to hold their ground against the oncoming assault. The other side was a veritable graveyard littered with still-warm corpses and dozens of bolter shell casings. The Chaos Space Marines had stormed the docks first, overrunning the defenders immediately and advancing deeper into the station. So quick was the assault that the soldiers not standing directly in the path of the attackers were left all but untouched and were still huddled behind cover when the second wave of pirates arrived.

Heavy bolters roared from the landing craft, stitching a line of mass-reactive bursts over the breadth of the cargo docks. Very little of it reached the rear space of the facility, which was shielded by the stacks of containers and lifting cranes filling the busy docks. It was here that the main Imperial resistance was found, and the cluttered  walkways and loaders were soon surrounded by webs of criss-crossing lasers and pulse charges.


“Suppressive fire! Get suppressive fire down the hall! Keep their reinforcements’ heads down!” Daniels fired a rail round into two soldiers sprinting for cover, slicing a hole straight through the first and piercing the other. The void-rated combat armor did nothing to impede the shot, and both men staggered to ground in pain.

Jerriha reached cargo container adjacent to Daniels, pressing her shoulder against the paneling while lasblasts streaked overhead. “Why do we always end up fighting in the same engagement zones?!” Her pulse carbine opened up under the muzzle, loading a photon charge into the launcher.

“I guess you’re just lucky!” Daniels shouted with a laugh. “Could be luckier, though! Last I heard AJ was supposed to be here with us!”

“Ugh.” Jerriha slapped a device onto the edge of the crate, and then raised her gun over her head to point it over the crate. After a few seconds a feed from a micro-camera opened up on her helmet display, giving her a view of the enemy firing line. “Remember to blink!”

The photon grenade launched, and for a few seconds the world went white. The Fire Warriors jumped up immediately, spraying burst fire at any enemy soldiers who hadn’t already ducked into cover while also bolting to new firing angles. The mercenaries were largely content to stay to their positions, using the respite to hurl their own grenades or reload.

A pair of pegasi zipped over the defender’s positions, landing atop the container towers so they were out of sight of the men on the deck. A few seconds later explosive charges were hurled over the edge, plummeting down one side of the container stacks before the ponies lifted off again. The defenders scattered in a panic just before the detonations started, pulverizing and incinerating the entrenched deck crew. The stacks of cargo were also unsettled by the explosions, and two of them collapsed atop the flames.

“Hey! Whoever’s in charge of the ponies around here, watch the explosives!” Daniels shouted. “We don’t know what’s in all these containers! There are fuel supplies around here!”

Lightning Dust swooped in toward the container tower, kicking off the side and then back-flipping to land next to Daniels. “Aw, c’mon! Let us cut loose a little! This is our first official pirate raid!” the pegasus said, grinning under her respirator mask.

“Are you maniacs ENJOYING this?” Jerriha demanded while her carbine spat a flurry of energy flares across the hold.

“Absolutely not! I’m a professional! We don’t have fun!” Daniels insisted before jabbing a finger at the pegasus. “You guys are doing fine; just be careful! If you blow up anything important it could cut this assault short real quickly!”

“Okay, okay, I get it,” Lightning said, waving a wing toward the mercenary. “Where’re we going once we push through these chumps?”

“We’re not going anywhere. The job is to hold this area while the Iron Warriors gut the fortress and the Scavs carry off the cargo,” Daniels explained.

“Well that’s kind of boring, but I guess I’d rather fight in here anyway,” Lightning mused. “There’s hardly any room to fly in the halls.”

“If you want to fight here, stop talking and start shooting!” Jerriha shouted, popping a battery cell out of her pulse carbine and sliding in a fresh one. “They haven’t stopped reinforcing this firing line yet, you know!”

“Weapons servitors! Down! Get down!” shouted someone behind another container.

A second later the staccato bursts of numerous heavy bolters rose above the sound of lasguns and pulse rifles. A full dozen lurching cyborgs stomped into the cargo docks with heavy weapons built into their shoulders, spitting streams of explosives across separate lines of fire and promptly suppressing the invaders. Rumbling along in their wake was a pair of Kataphron Destroyer servitors: pale, bloated torsos implanted atop a pair of heavy treads and within a cage of armor and weapons that straddled the line between infantry and tank.

“Hey, don’t we have a few of those guys too? Did we bring them along?” Lightning Dust asked, hovering just high enough to see over the intervening cover.

She promptly ducked down again when one of the Kataphron Destroyers fired, launching a streak of blazing plasma across the docks. The blast struck the top of one cargo container, burning a deep trench through the top before exploding. The soldiers sheltering behind it bolted away, fleeing the splash of molten metal as best they could under the beat of the heavy bolters.

Jerriha mumbled a curse, bitterly regretting that her regiment’s battlesuits were allocated to a different assault point. There was a great deal of infantry to hold this area, but not much in the way of heavier armor or weapons. “Aren’t those things controlled by a Techpriest?!”

“Usually, yeah!”

Jerriha activated her tactical camera within her visor display again, grimacing at the veritable barricade of pounding guns, armored shielding, and mutilated flesh barricading the largest exit from the cargo hold. She spotted a patch of red and zoomed in. A Techpriest was there behind its entourage of cyborgs, but it was working at some console near the exit rather than engaging or making any serious effort to direct his servitors. She was sure that basic tactical control was part of some hived-off sub-routine that occupied a marginal portion of the cultist’s brainpower while it focused on other things, but this wasn’t her first time fighting Techpriests. They wouldn’t be prioritizing a cogitator over a firefight unless it was truly more important somehow.

“There’s a cogitator behind the gun line! The Techpriest is there!” Jerriha called out.

“Well that’s not good! Somebody put a stop to it!”

“What’s he doing?” Lightning Dust asked.

“Something bad! Probably trying to vent the docks or deactivate the gravity plating!”

Another burst of plasma exploded against the container tower, and heavy metal components started flooding out onto the floor as a molten hole was torn in the side. Several mercenaries scattered to get away from the debris, only to get ripped apart by heavy bolters if they strayed into the servitors’ fire lanes.

“Ready photon grenades!” Jerriha shouted, setting up her launcher again.

“Nah, that won’t work,” Lightning interrupted, waving a wing in the Fireblade’s direction. Then she turned her head upwards and shouted “Yo, Shifty! Over here!”

A puff of violet smoke popped out of nowhere in front of Daniels, and he was only slightly surprised to see a unicorn walk out of the shroud. He was guessing it was a mare from its slighter build, because otherwise the pony was almost totally wrapped in a hooded magic cloak and partially scorched bandage wrappings. Even her eyes were covered with a silk blindfold, and it was only her exposed horn and muzzle that let the other soldiers know her coat was a light blue. The symbol of Tzeentch was drawn over the center of her blindfold, and the ancient sigil pulsed in time with her horn as she addressed Lightning Dust.

“Say no more, Captain. I know what you seek,” the strange equine said. Her voice was a lilting whisper, sounding as if it were on the verge of a giggle. It was also barely audible to Lightning Dust, given the constant thump of heavy bolters pounding away at their cover.

“Neat! Let’s go over it anyway!” Lightning barked, leaning in closer. “Shifty, I need you to get behind the firing line and take out the Techpriest. Once the cultist is down, bug out! We’ll handle the servies!”

Another plasma explosion came from above, and Shifty took two steps to the left without looking up. Dollops of molten metal and searing plasma splashed onto the deck where she had been standing, sizzling against the durasteel plating. The unicorn nodded absently, as if she was thinking about something else.

“The paths open. So much blood! But I can see the way,” Shifty Sights giggled while her horn – and the Mark of Tzeentch drawn on her blindfold – flashed. A second later colored smoke exploded around her, and the cultist seemed to get sucked into nowhere.


The combat servitors continued thundering away into the docks, battering the cargo containers with relentless bursts of their heavy bolters to suppress the soldiers sheltering behind them. Hundreds of hot, spent casings rolled across the decks, and spent magno-capacitors popped out of plasma calivers amidst spurts of blistering steam. The barrage was entirely excessive, pushing the heavy weapons to their absolute limits to close off any possible path of approach; a wasteful tactic of singular purpose.

A puff of smoke popped up from nowhere to the side of the fire lanes. A unicorn in a blindfold stuck her head out uncertainly. Half the servitors swiveled toward her immediately, their guns leaving a trail of tiny explosions sawing across the deck.

Shifty vanished within the cloud, and the heavy bolter slugs blasted through it without effect, scattering against the adjacent bulkhead.

The unicorn appeared again, stepping out of another purplish puff just in front of the wall of servitors. The appearance of an enemy this close warranted a change in combat tactics rather than simply aiming lower, and the nearest cyborg stopped firing and reared back its servo arm.

Shifty giggled and hopped forward, slinking away into another bloom of colorful smoke. A metal claw swung through the cloud after her, clamping shut on nothing but air.


The next burst of magical vapor came from behind one of the Kataphron battle servitors, the fanciful colored gases mixing with the choking black exhaust from the cyborg’s engine  block. Shifty crawled forward, her tongue wetting her lips as she beheld the red backside of an Imperial Techpriest. Her horn pulsed, and she couldn’t suppress an excited titter as she prepared to attack.

The dataspike struck like a scorpion’s tail, lashing in a long arc downward while Shifty was mid-spell. The adamantium tip punched through the mare’s skull with ease, plunging into the spongy-

Shifty hopped to the right, and a slivery blur whipped by her ear. A metal spike pierced the deck plating, embedding partially in the flooring surface while the Techpriest whirled around.

Shifty answered the attack by blowing a thin plume of azure flames at the engineer-cultist. The blast was nothing like the intensity or spread of a proper flamer, but the magical fire clung to the cyborg and burned well enough to ward off an immediate attack of his axe.

The rumble of an engine shifting gears provided ample warning, but the mare was focused on her objective and didn’t immediately identify the sound as a threat. The Kataphron servitor suddenly lurched backward, its heavy treads rolling its considerable bulk over the surprised mare. Her leg was caught-

Shifty threw herself to the deck, flattening her body as much as possible as the engine next to her shifted gears. The Kataphron servitor lurched backwards, its grinding treads passing on either side of the mare. Her horn crackled ominously, and an amulet hanging from her neck started to vibrate in sympathy.

The Kataphron was suddenly wrapped in bright, coruscating whips of lightning, and the servitor flailed wildly while its electro-dampers overloaded. Capacitor cells on its plasma culverin popped one by one, drenching the Destroyer’s flesh in acid and lodging metal shards in its head.

Shifty rolled out from under the servitor to face the Techpriest again.

The Techpriest recoiled, bringing the melta cutter of his servo harness to bear. The servo-

Shifty’s robes lifted as her tail – thick and serpentine, and with a tip of hardened bone – whipped forward. A bladed metal hook on the end sliced into a servo arm as the Techpriest recoiled, and with a sharp tug the augmetic limb was severed.

Without missing a step, the Techpriest pivoted, his axe coming down-

Shifty jumped away, the power axe buzzing by her nose while her amulet crackled again with magical charge.

“Sorry friend. Your paths are closed, now,” the unicorn sang just before lightning erupted from her horn.

The Techpriest shuddered as arcs of terrible power overloaded his augments and seared his remaining flesh. The servo arms flailed wildly, capacitors popped, and sparks blasted from his optics in brilliant fans. The cyborg reeled, and then collapsed with a shriek of binaric cant.

The servitors promptly lost their tactical cohesion as their individual combat programming took over. Most of them stopped firing entirely, finally letting their heavy weapons rest. Several started turning to address the hostile pony behind the firing line, bringing their combat claws and whip-like cabling to bear. Others detected very low ammunition supplies and dangerous heat levels, and those cyborg servants began a clumsy withdraw back into the hallway. Almost immediately they were chased by incoming fire, and two servitors were quickly struck down by pulse fire.

“Oops! So long, chums! See you again after the DarkMech rewires your brain bulbs!” Colored smoke burst around Shifty, and once again the unicorn disappeared before a servo arm clamped shut on her.


Daniels leaned out from the corner of a cargo container and fired his rail rifle at the Kataphron servitor as soon as the suppressive fire let up. The shot sliced clean through the cyborg’s chest and tore through part of its backpack, spraying blood and shrapnel onto the engine block that served as the Destroyer’s chassis. Lasblasts and pulse bolts battered the servitor after the initial wound, and its systems went dead seconds later amidst shuddering blasts of sparks.

“I’m baaaaaack!” Shifty sang, hopping out of another puff of smoke behind the mercenary.

“Good work, lass! The servitors are breaking formation! We’ve got ‘em!” Daniels ducked back behind the container and reached up to scratch Shifty behind her ears. The mare grinned and leaned against his hand, a dark flush coming over her cheeks.

Jerriha snapped off a few more pulse blasts before dashing between the cargo towers and covering next to Daniels. “We’re holding position while the DarkMech starts loading up cargo! Get the wounded to the medicae and hold the perimeter!”

“Aye, in a bit.” Daniels poked his head up above his cover, scanning the ground near the exit. “We need an enemy officer.”

“We do? For what? Interrogation? I was under the impression we had the intel we needed.”

“Not sure. It was part of our orders. Did you see one?”

“Not alive.”

“Dead will do. The orders just said the face needed to be recognizable…”

Lightning Dust and Shifty shared a worried look. Then they turned toward the edge of the docks. The original landing craft had all left after delivering their assault forces, and a second wave of transports and even a few landers were moving into position now to begin the process of looting the cargo.

One of the transports was much smaller than the others, and its hull shimmered as it floated through the atmospheric shielding that kept the docks pressurized against the open void beyond; a sure sign of a light-refracting stealth field. The transport sunk to the deck, its landing gear bouncing lightly against the flooring.

“She’s here,” Shifty whispered, her ears falling flat against her head.


Chrysalis emerged cautiously from the Lighter transport, her head snapping left and right as if she was expecting to be under fire at any moment. It wasn’t an unreasonable concern; although she had been deployed after the docks were secured, the air still stunk of smoke and there were bodies littering the deck everywhere. Soldiers were still running back and forth and rummaging through the corpses as well, and though the only ones free and alive were clearly Chaos troops the changeling Queen didn’t let her guard down.

“This hangar stinks of fear, anger, and death,” Chrysalis grunted, her wings buzzing. She lifted off from the deck, zipping over the walls of crates and containers separating the loading docks from the battlefield beyond.

“So this is how the humans wage war. How artless. Effective though, I suppose. It’s no wonder they swept the hive so easily without me there to defend it,” she sighed, landing atop a crane. Once she spotted a circle of ponies she set a path of descent and jumped off, flying down to the equine soldiers and the mercenaries speaking to them.

“You there!” Chrysalis barked at Lightning Dust. “I require an enemy officer! I was told you’d have one for me.” She landed in front of the ponies, sneering down at the shorter creatures.

Shifty shivered and quickly backed up behind Lightning Dust, which the pegasus thought was very odd. Nonetheless, she stretched one wing off to the side.

“They’re getting it now. Take a load off, Queenie.”

“My task requires HASTE, equine,” Chrysalis sniffed. “I don’t have time to wait on you to perform yours.”

“Well then I guess you should have shown up earlier, when we were still fighting! Maybe you could have even saved a few of our guys!” Lightning snapped back. “You DO have weapons, don’t you? They managed to give me a lasgun and a knife, what’d you get?”

Chrysalis’s left eye flash bright crimson. “Would you like to find out?” she asked.

Shifty squeaked and curled up in a ball behind Lightning Dust. “N-No! Please! T-Too many paths! Too much p-pain! Stop!”

Lightning Dust didn’t seem at all perturbed by the quivering unicorn behind her, and Chrysalis took a step forward while her horn flickered threateningly.

“Hey! We found a guy!” Daniels shouted, interrupting the encounter. He had a body on his back in a fireman’s carry, and Jerriha was following behind him with her helmet off.

Chrysalis continued glaring at Lightning for a few seconds, and then her expression fell and she turned toward the mercenary. “Finally. Who do we have here?”

“Name’s Daniels. I’m-“

“Not YOU, the unfortunate cretin you’re carrying,” Chrysalis clarified.

“Ah. Right. I think I see what’s going on here.” Daniels dumped the body on the floor in front of the changeling, rolling it onto its back. The body was that of a young man with jet-black hair wearing light combat armor. On his chest plate was a squad leader’s rank insignia right above a large black spot where much of his ribcage had been burned away.

Chrysalis was speechless initially, so Daniels held up a small datacard that he had taken from the body’s belt. “First Sergeant Timothy Reim! Have at it, lass.”

Chrysalis stared at the corpse, and then up at Daniels. She looked rather upset, and her lip curled to reveal a number of dangerously sharp, curved teeth. “A Sergeant?! Isn’t that the lowest of your ranks? And this one is broken!”

“Yes, well, they don’t have many primary commanders patrolling cargo docks in the middle of a standard operational cycle,” Jerriha explained. “Also, I aim for the ones shouting orders first. Sorry.”

“Actually, we did find a Lieutenant too, but we couldn’t get him loose of the cargo crate that crushed most of him.” Daniels shrugged and pointed at Lighting Dust. “That was your girls’ doing, I think.”

“Meh. Job was to take the room first, nab a ranking guy second. This is fine.”

“Be silent!” Chrysalis snapped at the others. “This one is no good. Go get a live one!”

“My instructions were to hold this area and get you a body, Miss.” Daniels shrugged. “I’m not going anywhere.”

“What, can you only mimic live people or something?” Lightning asked.

“No, I could obviously take on this cadaver’s face. But how am I to mimic his words when I’ve never heard the wretch speak, idiot?” Chrysalis snarled. “You think infiltration and subversion is so easy? That I simply slap on a new face and stroll behind enemy lines?”

“I haven’t thought much about all the different ways to lie to people, so yeah. I kinda did think it was that easy,” Lightning retorted.

Jerriha sighed wearily and scratched at the base of her topknot. “Look, you’re going to have to make do with what you have. In the midst of all this do you really think someone is going to notice if your voice is off?”

“You’d be quite surprised at how perceptive and testy victims can be when they already know the enemy is close at hand,” Chrysalis hissed. Then she stared down at the corpse and heaved a sigh. “Whatever. I can work with this.”

Her horn flashed, and the changeling was consumed by an aura of bright green magic. The aura expanded and shifted, leaving behind a near-perfect recreation of the dead Sergeant. The main differences were an inexplicable patch of red over her chest and the lack of any injury.

Chrysalis swiped a hand over the red spot, and a relief of the Aquila – the twin-headed eagle that was the universal emblem of the Imperium of Man – covered the aberration. Then she glared down at Lightning Dust and pointed to her stomach. “Here. Shoot me in the abdomen.”

Daniels snapped his rifle up, and Chrysalis threw herself forward just before a rail shot sliced through the air behind her. The rail stabbed into the deck, tearing a trail of shredded, glowing metal behind it for almost a full meter before it stopped. Chrysalis herself seemed unharmed, although the back plate of her armor had been partially cut open just from the shot passing nearby.

“I WAS TALKING TO THE PEGASUS, NOT YOU!!” she roared, staggering upright again. Her eyes flashed brightly, one of them pulsing an eldritch green while the other blazed crimson.

“Oh. Sorry about that,” Daniels said, lowering his weapon. “I didn’t think it mattered which one of us shot you.”

Jerriha wordlessly stared at the mercenary, then down at his rail rifle. Her eyebrow arched, and she looked up at him again.

“Why do you even need one of us to shoot you?” Lightning Dust asked. “Can’t you just copy the wound?”

“I appreciate your asking pertinent questions rather than immediately opening fire on me,” Chrysalis hissed. “I don’t have time to explain the intricacies of changeling shapeshifting right now, but the short answer is no. I can’t copy a wound convincingly. Now fire your laser rifle ONCE and aim here!” She pointed again to the unblemished body armor over her stomach.

Lightning reluctantly did as asked, firing a single lasbolt into Chrysalis. The changeling Queen flinched as the shot burned a blackened hole into the main armor layer, and then grimaced.

“Hmm… this wouldn’t be a serious wound, but it will do.” She paused to glare at Daniels, and when she spoke again her voice was a perfect match for the mercenary’s own. “Keep your men from advancing any further. The command center’ll be empty soon.”

“Sure thing, Miss. May the Dark Gods favor you,” Daniels said simply.





Blessed Redemption – underdecks

The loud, rapid thumping of Pinkie’s butcher cannon echoed through the bulkheads as she stitched a line of fire across the width of the hallway. One of the incoming Tyranids took a round in the leg, and a third of the creature vanished in a puff of fire and gore. Two more dodged and weaved through the storm of cannon fire, bounding over crates and kicking off of walls with shocking agility.

As tall and strong as a Space Marine and somehow even faster, the Genestealers were shock troops of terrifying purpose and ability. The alien skirmishers danced through the incoming fire, long tongues hanging out of jaws lined with razor-edged teeth. Their four arms each ended in long, hardened talons that could carve through ceramite with ease. Only their light exoskeletons presented anything akin to a serious weakness; the carapace folded quickly before the generous spread of weapons that they encountered while bearing down on the pirates.

Applejack shot her gravity lash forward, only for her target to bounce to the side. A burst of shuriken caught the Genestealer before it could accelerate again, slicing deep into the alien’s body. It staggered forward, wounded but still alive, and then a round from the butcher cannon finished the job.

The third Tyranid continued loping forward, and it leapt over a screeching purple beam and ducked under a plasma bolt. Applejack’s flamer swung around to intercept it in the last few meters before it was in arm’s reach, but the Genestealer bunched up its legs and jumped again, vaulting completely over the heavily armored mare.

“Chaos TAKE YOU!” Gaela swung her power axe just as the Genestealer reached her, hewing off a shoulder and the better part of two arms with an arc of sizzling crimson. The alien landed on her nonetheless, slamming Gaela to the deck and punching one set of talons into her shoulder.

Its last free arm reached back to strike a killing blow, but Gaela’s servo arms moved first, clamping down on the alien’s wrist and rotating the vise. The Genestealer snarled in rage, splashing ropes of saliva over Gaela’s helmet face.

Rarity’s power sword punched into its back and out its chest a moment later, and the feral shriek weakened into a gasping hiss. Gaela slugged the Genestealer in the head, knocking it off of her so that it could die without slowing her down.

“Gaela, are you okay?!” Twilight gasped between force beams.

“The damage will not be a hindrance,” the Dark Techpriest replied while she stood up. “Advance. More waves are incoming.”

Smaller Tyranids started flooding into the hallway section from the rooms ahead, their chittering rising to a fevered pitch within the dimly-lit halls. Larger Warrior bio-forms raced behind the swarm, guiding them onward in a tide of teeth and blades.

“Fluttershy, now!” Twilight shouted, turning her face away from oncoming hostiles.

With a frightened squeak and a muted thump, a photon grenade flew toward the Tyranids. It hit the deck just ahead of the swarm, instantly blinding the smaller Tyranids with the pulsing flashes of light. Several of them tripped or veered into each other, only to be shoved and trampled by the next row of aliens. The larger Warriors merely flinched from the flash, their more sophisticated biology quickly adjusting to the changes in light intake and their senses less reliant on sight. They stopped to re-order the horde of Hormagaunt drones, driving them forward over the bodies of the slow and blinded and into the armored intruders.

“Hope no one minds me startin’ a barbeque in here!” Applejack shouted, blasting a spread of flame into the oncoming swarm. Fire bloomed around the Tyranid vanguard, swallowing the head creatures and baking them inside their shells. They struggled onward for a few more seconds before collapsing, their bodies providing more fuel for the thirsting blaze. The aliens kept coming, clawing their way over their kin even as their limbs caught fire and their bellies cooked.

A fireball from Twilight exploded near the pyre, blasting away the massing aliens and blowing another wave of fire over the swarm. The flames rose higher as they filled more of the hallway and swallowed more Tyranids, and at last the aliens stopped advancing into the inferno.

“Kill the Warriors! The others will break when the synapse controllers are dead!” Gaela ordered. Her laser fired, cutting into one such alien.

It fired back, its barbed strangler swelling before spitting a spine-covered pod over the flames. The weapon struck Applejack atop her armor’s mantle, and the pod promptly exploded outward in a thrashing morass of grasping, barbed vines to entangle her and the others.

“Ow! Hey!” Rainbow Dash got one of her legs caught by the vines, and soon felt her other legs and one of her wings being tugged downward toward her heavily-armored friend. She hit her free wing’s booster, spinning around in the air, and then fired a single impulse blaster to tear herself free.

“I think I’m starting to appreciate the crude simplicity of Ork weapons!” Twilight grunted while she spun her harmonizer, slicing through several tendrils at once. The weapon bounced up in the air, and then a screaming ray of violet slashed across the Tyranid horde. One of the Warriors staggered from having its leg cut open, and then a pair of shots from Pinkie blew it apart.

Rarity was completely entangled by the strangler vines that had sprouted from Applejack, but could still see well enough to aim the plasma gun floating over her head. A burst of howling plasma bolts struck another Warrior, instantly melting through its carapace and burning away the interior of its torso. “One more!” she shouted.

Gaela’s ion blaster released a loud, piercing whine as its capacitors overcharged, and the discharge tines sparked angrily with ribbons of white-hot power. “Dark Gods, quicken the circuit with divine fury! Strike down this xeno filth!”

Her ion blaster discharged with a ferocious thunderclap, and an arc of lightning leapt through the flames. It struck one Hormagaunt, incinerating it instantly, and then leapt to another to slay it as well, bouncing from one target to another down the line. In the blink of an eye it had jumped into the last Warrior bio-form, and the Tyranid quaked in pain while its muscles spasmed and its organs roasted.

The alien dropped to one knee, shrieking, and then the psychic scream of its death exploded through the hall. Twilight and Rarity winced at the sensation, while the smaller Tyranids staggered as if struck. Some of them were thrown to the ground, gasping, and a few even hurled themselves into the raging fire. After the initial shock, however, the swarm immediately turned and ran away from the blaze, largely uninterested in the creatures on the other side. Within seconds they had evacuated to other rooms or fled further down the hall, leaving the infiltrators safe at last.


“Hurgh!! Gah! Consarn… alien plant… thing! LEGGO!!” Applejack strained against the web of vines that had coiled around her armor, slowly snapping the tendrils one by one.

“Darling, please. Relax before you hurt yourself.” Rarity’s power sword carefully dug its tip into the vines over her shoulder, searing them apart with gentle pulses of its disruption field. “Here, let me get you free.”

“Well that went pretty… good? This is good, right?” Rainbow Dash asked. “I mean there’s a big fire now and we’re pretty much still surrounded by the angry bug things, but this is progress!”

“I think Tellis went that way, though,” Fluttershy pointed out, shimmering into the visible spectrum to point toward the inferno. The fire hadn’t gone out, and in fact had spread with the addition of Tyranid bodies to burn through several supply crates and reach combustibles within. Many open panels on the wall and ceiling had also caught aflame, and sparks were frequently blasting out over the deck.

“We can just teleport over that, right?” Pinkie asked.

“I’d rather not teleport into unknown areas if I don’t absolutely have to. It’s not safe with all these aliens waiting in ambush and some areas are inaccessible and damaged,” Twilight noted. “We aren’t in so dire a situation that we need to take extra risks. This isn’t like the Space Hulk.”

“Agreed. I have conceived of an alternate route.” Gaela walked toward a blank bulkhead wall with a slit cut into it and reached a servo arm into the slot. “We’ll take this maintenance tunnel to a new section to bypass the fire. Sparkle, remain here with Pie. After we have secured the area you can teleport her through.” The servo arm ratcheted downward, and the entire bulkhead plate opened up to reveal a relatively small walkway laden with cabling over the ceiling.

“Okay, that looks good. Applejack, are you okay now?”

The farmer kicked away the last of the barbed vines while Rarity pried the seed pod off her armor mantle. “Yeah, yeah, I’ll take point. Yeesh.” She stomped over to the narrow pathway and slipped inside. The corridor was barely wide enough for the thickened plating of her armor suit, and the boltgun shells hanging on one shoulder pad scraped the walls frequently.

Gaela followed, and Rainbow eagerly jumped in after her. Rarity and Fluttershy clambered in after them, less eager to advance but not wanting to sit and wait next to the slowly spreading flames.


Rainbow Dash didn’t wait in silence for long. “So what’s going to happen to those little bugs now? As soon as the big ones died they all broke and ran! Ooh, is one of them going to grow up now to be a new queen, or something?”

“The Hormagaunt bioforms will remain feral until they are again within reach of the psychic hive mind extended through the Warriors,” Gaela explained. “The entire Tyranid army is a web of psionic conduits driving swarms of mindless, animalistic slaves. In practice it is similar to conventional systems of tactical command, but far more efficient and exploitable. Eliminating the largest command organism should always be the tactical priority.”

Fluttershy frowned, but remained silent.

Twilight’s question came next over the vox. “If there are really enough enemies on this ship that they couldn’t just fight them off during boarding, why didn’t they just leave and depressurize it? Can they not do that?”

“They can, if they’re willing to vent the entire vessel of atmosphere. It wouldn’t work, though,” Gaela explained. “Tyranids can hibernate in hard void if they are not adapted to it directly. It might have made clearing the infestation safer, however. I can’t be certain what protocols or technical restraints they’re operating under.”

“Are these critters some kinda common space bug ‘round the rest of the galaxy?” Applejack wondered.

“Not exactly ‘common,’ no. Tyranids are an invasive, voracious species of devourers that descend on star systems with the purpose of stripping them of all life and leaving the worlds behind as empty, barren husks.” Gaela ducked under a steaming pipe that was situated just low enough to bar her path forward. “If a Tyranid fleet had invaded Ghessheim we would have detected it on approach. The Blessed Redemption must have fled here from a different combat zone after being attacked and boarded.”

“Was there any point to us coming here if the ship is infested?” Rarity asked.

“Perhaps. Judging by the lockdown procedures I observed, it may be possible to man the ship’s batteries without engaging with the areas of the ship in quarantine.” Gaela stopped to observe a ruptured tube ahead, analyzing the leaking gas for corrosive properties before she continued. “Between the intensity of the attacks, the state of the vessel, and the number and estimated age of the bodies, I believe the Blessed Redemption was engaged with Tyranid bio-vessels and suffered multiple boarding actions before fleeing the combat zone. Efforts to purge the intruders collapsed, and the surviving crew managed to lock down much of the ship in quarantine before they made berth here. The Tyranids have spent days, at a minimum, wandering the underdecks hunting down the survivors and attempting to defeat the lockdown procedures.”

“Wow,” Twilight mumbled, “and I thought the daemons were bad.”

“Do you, uhm… think they’ll get on our ships?” Fluttershy asked.

“These ones? No. They won’t be leaving this vessel. I’ll be making sure of that.”

Applejack reached the end of the walkway, and then slammed a boot against the hatch door. “This’s it, right? Open up!”

“Stop that. You’ll alert the xenos,” Gaela commanded, leaning over the farmer. Her servo arm reached forward into the lock and clamped down, and with a twist of its pincer the hatch cracked open.

“Thanks, sugarcube. Now we-“

The hatch was suddenly wrenched open from the other side, and a long, serrated limb stabbed into the opening. The point struck Applejack on her back, carving a gouge in the top plating before sliding off and striking Gaela’s leg. Another limb reached into the opening just as quickly, and as Applejack recoiled in shock its claws swiped for her visor.

“LICTOR!!” Gaela snarled, shifting a servo arm over her shoulder. It clamped onto the long impaling limb as it tried to withdraw back outside.

“What in Sam Apple’s name is a Lictor?!” Applejack asked, bumping up against the Dark Techpriest.

The alien’s head peeked over the hatch door as if in response, giving her a good look at its face. Its skull was smaller and lacked the expanded brain case and broad, protective crest of the Warriors, but the most obvious and disturbing difference was that its head ended in a beard of dripping, prehensile tentacles rather than jaws. It reared back its hand again to strike.

Gaela brought her axe down on the scythe-limb, hacking through the segmented plating and reinforcing spine within. The Lictor wrenched backwards in response, missing its swipe at Applejack’s nose.

“Gaela, I can’t get a clear shot! Should we back up?!” Rarity asked in a panic, trying to squeeze to one side or another to see past the Dark Techpriest.

Applejack let out a sudden howl of rage and then bolted forward, ramming her shoulder into the hatch door. It swung wide open, smashing the Lictor aside and throwing it across the hall. The alien struck the deck and rolled, eventually screeching to a stop with its claws digging furrows into the metal deck plating. Applejack stumbled out of the tunnel, huffing angrily with fire leaking from her flamer’s mouth.

A snarl to her sides alerted her to two more Tyranids lying in wait. With barely a glance, Applejack snapped her gravity lash to her left, striking the Genestealer that was rushing to attack. She swung away, yanking the alien clean off its feet and sending it flailing into a second Genestealer on her other side. Applejack followed after them with an angry shout, swallowing them in fire.

Gaela emerged after the farmer, her focus locked onto the Lictor. The creature was nearly twice the height of a human, with thick, powerful arms and legs and a hefty tail. Nearly as long as the entire alien was tall was the mantis-like talon that emerged from the Lictor’s shoulders; part of a pair, until it had stuck one where it wasn’t wanted.

A heavy laser fired from Gaela’s harness, and the Tyranid shifted to the side with uncanny speed to evade the sweeping crimson beam. It bunched up its legs, and its remaining shoulder talon chambered itself in preparation to strike.

Rainbow Dash blasted out of the maintenance tunnel like a missile, nearly knocking Gaela off her feet with the backwash. The Lictor pounced, and pony met alien in a frantic mid-air collision.

The Lictor was caught off-guard by the impact. Rainbow wasn’t. After smashing her shoulder into the xeno, she hit one of her impulse thrusters and propelled her face into the Lictor’s, stunning it. Both of them landed on the deck and rolled, but the Tyranid’s many limbs flailed and cracked against the impact while Rainbow bounced up into the air again.

“Ninja stars to the FACE!” the pegasus announced, putting words to action as soon as her movement stabilized. The shuriken catapult fired a spread of blades into the Lictor’s head, slicing through the thin carapace and reducing it to a mess of shredded pulp and oozing ichor.


By the time Rarity took her first step into the hall, plasma gun and power sword hovering overhead, the Tyranids were dead. She glanced at the twitching corpse of the Lictor, and then over at the pyre where the Genestealers cooked.

“Ah. Well. Good job, ladies,” she said curtly, mag-locking her sword to her back again. “Area secured, then?” Fluttershy crept out after her, flickering back into the visible spectrum.

“I’m detecting a few Hormagaunts in the adjacent rooms, but nothing we have to worry about. Form a perimeter.” Gaela glanced at the deck, and a micro laser from her optical array painted a spot on the floor. “Sparkle, we’re clear. Submitting telemetry data now.”

Purple sparks flashed around the designated point, and then after a few seconds Pinkie’s Dreadnought appeared in a flash. Twilight followed, bounding out of the light distortion with her force harmonizer at the ready.

“Can somepony else take point next time?” Applejack asked, stomping back to her friends. “These Tyranid critters keep goin’ fer mah face.” A trio of new slash marks decorated the front of her helmet, running across the nose and cutting over one of the visor lenses.

“All right, but just once. And be careful with that flamer!” Twilight agreed. “Gaela, where to next?”

The Dark Techpriest scanned the area. This hall was larger than the last, with numerous damaged maglev carts and smashed crates scattered about. One path led deeper into the underdecks, and was marked by inoperative lumens and the echoing snarl of lost aliens. The opposite direction, on the other hand…

“This way. There’s another blast door and cogitator ahead.” Gaela started heading in that direction, and the pounding footsteps of the Contemptor Dreadnought soon followed.

The other ponies did as well, but they were more hesitant. “Awful lotta bodies down there,” Applejack mumbled.

The halls were riddled with blood, burns, impact deformations, and partially-eaten corpses. Tyranid Warriors that had been cannibalized by smaller bio-forms lay against large scorched sections of wall. Burnt-out circuitry fizzled in the bulkheads, exposed by the claws of furious aliens or stray autocannon rounds. Dropped and broken wargear was strewn about among piles of gore and splintered bone.

Every one of the mares could recognize the remnants of a desperate, pitched battle by now.

“So… who do ya think won?” Applejack mumbled.

“That depends greatly upon which side of the blast doors one was on before they closed,” Gaela said. “What’s most interesting to me is how recently this battle occurred. The corpses from before had been there for about a week. These were killed within the last twenty-four hours.”

“What’s most interesting to ME is that there are a lot more dead Tyranids here than we’ve had to face so far,” Rarity retorted. “How many of these monsters are there?”

“Not so many that the idea of clearing them via kill teams was deemed obviously impossible,” the cyborg replied. “But enough that they failed.”

The blast doors at the end of the hall were covered with deep slashes and stains from a variety of weapons and bodies that had been dashed against them, but they remained intact. Huge armored bands centered around hefty magnetic locks sealed the blast doors tight, ensuring that no amount of simple biological muscle or acid that could reasonably fit within the corridors would be able to breach them. To a Techpriest, on the other hand, conquering the obstacle would be a matter of minutes.

Gaela removed a man’s upper torso from the cogitator next to the door, pushing it off the row of input keys. The console was quite dirty, but undamaged except for a large hole on one side of the monitor screen.

“Do you need a boost again?” Pinkie Pie chirped.

“Negative. This console is powered,” Gaela mumbled, leaning over it and snaking a mechadendrite into a data port. “There may be other impediments to our progress, however.”

“Ya mean the door?” Applejack pressed a boot against the massive barrier, leaning her weight against it.

“Again, negative. I can open the door.” Gaela tapped away at the keyboard, and the monitor turned on and started streaming raw data. Every few seconds it would flicker and turn to static briefly, but the machine largely worked despite the damage. “… As I thought. We have a bigger problem.”

“More Tyranids?” Rainbow asked eagerly.

“Worse. Humans,” Gaela spat.

The monitor screen sparked briefly before displaying several smaller windows with vid-captures. The images were grainy, and the damage to the monitor made some of them unintelligible, but they were unmistakably showing groups of soldiers planted behind heavy weapons or moving crates through the halls.

“Well, so much for ‘minimal or no opposition.’ How does this keep happening?” Rarity groaned.

“How many guys are there?” Pinkie Pie asked, leaning her walker over to try and get a better look.

“Enough to hold this access point against a xeno strike force were it to break through,” Gaela grunted, bringing up new vid screens. “This is the main thoroughfare connecting this section of the underdecks to the rest of the ship. Most of the other access points have been sealed off. I expect they are mined as well. This is intended to be the primary muster point for the kill teams sweeping the ship of xenos and is fortified appropriately.”

“So I guess Pinkie goes in first this time?” Rainbow asked.

“That’s a lot of heavy weaponry, Dash,” Twilight mumbled. “Like I said earlier I’d rather not teleport us through the ship, but it may be the only way to get past those barricades.”

“Wait, but what about Tellis?” Rainbow asked. “He’d be cut off down here!”

“Well he should have thought of that before he decided to endanger all of us by jumping in to begin with!” the Princess retorted. “If the only way forward is through magic or through ordnance, I choose magic!”

“They’ll detect the energy surge, of course,” Gaela said, closing the vid screens. “But it’s preferable to-“

An angry screech echoed through the dimly-lit halls.


Sickle-clawed Hormagaunts raced through the dark, hissing and snarling while their hooves pounded across the deck. The aliens sprinted down the hall without clear direction, leaping on top of crates and searching left and right constantly. Some of the swarm broke off into the open rooms that lined the hallways. Most of the Tyranids, however, clambered toward the squad of boarders near the blast doors.

A shot from Pinkie’s butcher cannon sailed into the group, and one of the aliens vanished into a puff of ichor and shattered chitin. The aliens scattered, shrieking angrily. Most of them started flooding into the open rooms, while others veered around and ran back where they came from. A few just sped up, racing toward the pirates with their heads down.

“What’s going on? They’re not acting like before!” Rarity hit one of the oncoming aliens with a plasma blast, reducing the entire front half of the creature to a molten lump.

“There’s no synapse creature! They’re not being controlled!” Gaela announced as she cut down another with her laser. “They’re panicking. Slaughter these beasts and our way is clear.”

Twilight and Applejack started marching forward, ready to finish off the last few aliens at short range. Then a pleading shout from behind stopped them short.

“No! Wait! Stop shooting!”

Fluttershy flew over the other mares, landing in front of an utterly perplexed Applejack. The Hormagaunts rushing forward started to slow their approach, raising their heads and scything talons into an attack stance.

“Please, calm down! It’s okay!” Fluttershy’s helmet broke open with a hiss, revealing the mare’s pleading, sorrowful expression.

Four Tyranids had survived the sprint toward the boarding party, and they stopped in front of Fluttershy with their talons extended and teeth bared, as if they were going to pounce. But they didn’t pounce.

“You must be so scared. You don’t know where you are or why. But you don’t have to be afraid anymore.” Fluttershy shook her head, and then smiled softly.

The Hormagaunts stopped hissing and lowered their talons, blinking at Fluttershy and sniffing the air.

Then an ion bolt slammed into one of them, and it died shrieking in pain.

“Gaela!” Fluttershy whirled around while the other Tyranids recoiled and snarled. “What are you doing?!”

“I’m slaying the wretched alien,” the cyborg replied, sounding slightly confused. “Why aren’t the rest of you shooting? There are still more targets.”

“Fluttershy asked us to stop that, darling,” Rarity chided, wagging an armored hoof at the Dark Techpriest. “Incredibly, it looks like she has this under control.”

“… And we’re NOT going to use this opportunity to kill them? Why?” Gaela demanded.

By this point the remaining Tyranids were huddling around Fluttershy, sensing that the pegasus was protecting them. One of them crept cautiously toward Applejack, while the others nuzzled the wings of Fluttershy’s flight pack.

“Okay, Gaela, think of it this way,” Twilight sighed. “If Fluttershy has them pacified then it would be a waste of time and energy to kill them, wouldn’t it? You didn’t kill US when we met, and we’re aliens to you!”

“You are not Tyranids,” Gaela replied coldly. “They are mindless devourers, and cannot be left alive lest they fall under the sway of some other synapse node and regain their usual disposition.”

“They are NOT mindless!” Fluttershy protested. “They’re not like the bigger ones! They’re just frightened! They won’t hurt us if we don’t hurt them!”

“They also won’t hurt us if we hurt them first.” Gaela’s laser started to heat up, and the aliens jumped at the high-pitched whine coming from her harness.

“Gaelaaaa…” Fluttershy’s voice carried just a hint of a growl, and she stepped forward while the Hormagaunts cowered.

“Don’t think to give me orders, pony,” Gaela replied, her voice like ice.

“WHOOOOOOOOO!!! BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD, BABY!!”


The tension was utterly ruined by the delighted shout, and was followed by an agonized screech. Fluttershy whirled around again and Gaela finally took her attention away from the surrounding Tyranids. The Hormagaunts immediately panicked. One of them curled up into a ball next to Fluttershy, while another jumped into a crate to hide. The last one, which had been in an uneasy staring contest with Applejack, dashed around the farmer to take cover behind her.

Another swarm of Hormagaunts came rushing through the halls. Again, most branched off into adjacent rooms to hide, but the bulk rushed straight down the hall toward the boarding team.

“Against the wall! Quick! Get out of the way!” Fluttershy ordered, jumping aside.

The others followed suit, including the apparently tamed Hormagaunts. The rush of incoming Tyranids paid them no mind, sprinting up to the blast doors and clawing at them desperately.

“Ha ha ha ha ha!! C’mere you!” howled Tellis, his voice followed by the roar of his flight pack.

A pair of Genestealers sprinted into the hall, one of them bleeding badly from the stumps of its right arms. Tellis rocketed into the intersection after them, slamming into the injured Tyranid and throwing it onto the floor.

“Blood for BLOOD GOD!!” Tellis emphasized the last syllable by stomping a boot on the alien’s head, reducing it to a dark smear across the deck.

Then he blasted forward again, catching the other Genestealer by seizing it by the back of its swollen head. “Skulls for the SKULL THRONE!!”

With a grunt of effort, he twisted the alien’s head off. The Genestealer’s death shriek was cut off by the sharp crack of splintering chitin, and its arms flailed about comically for several seconds until the decapitated body collapsed.

“So, Twilight,” Rarity mumbled, staring nervously at the dozens of Hormagaunts clawing at the blast doors right in front of her. “How about that teleport? Would now be a good time?”

“Hey! There you guys are!” Tellis leaned over the Genestealer corpse and quickly drew the Mark of Khorne onto the deck with its blood. “Man, I’ve been looking all over for you!”

“Our armor signums aren’t obscured. You can detect our direction at will,” Gaela pointed out.

“Okay fine, so I only realized that you weren’t following along behind me just now. Whatever.” Tellis dropped the Genestealer head onto the Chaos Mark, and the gore-smeared rune started to glow with eldritch light. The Chaos Lord stood up again and pointed down the hall at the clustered smaller Tyranids. “Hey, you gonna kill that or can I have it?”

“No! Don’t!” Fluttershy jumped into the middle of the hall, her flight pack spread. “We don’t need to fight the little ones! It’s okay! They won’t hurt us!”

A series of rapid clicking noises and gentle hisses came from the Hormagaunts, and slowly they seemed to calm down. The ones clawing uselessly at the blast doors finally stopped, and the swarm started milling about nervously rather than scrambling to get away. Several more Tyranids poked their heads out of the nearby rooms, gently tapping their claws on the deck and sniffing the air.

Tellis looked back and forth between the pony and the aliens. “So I guess Fluttershy can control Tyranids now. Neat!”

“I strongly object to this turn of events,” Gaela added. Her servo arms were still spread wide in attack position, although at this point there were so many targets it probably wouldn’t have helped.

“Fluttershy, are you… SURE you have them under control?” Twilight asked.

“Yes. They won’t hurt us,” the pegasus insisted. One of the Hormagaunts hissed gently and nuzzled against her shoulder pad. “They seem… well, lost. They had a voice guiding them and it… uh… died.” She winced as more clicking and hissing noises came from the aliens. “Died painfully. I think they felt it. The shock was terrifying for them.”

“Yeah, that was me. Stabbed a lot of those big bastards on the way here. My bad,” Tellis volunteered.

“No, not bad. Good. Very good,” Rainbow corrected.

More of the Hormagaunts were creeping out of the nearby rooms now, slowly trotting down the hall toward Fluttershy while giving Tellis a wide berth. Twilight brought up a body count on her visor screen, and couldn’t help but gulp when she saw the counter rise above seventy targets and continue ticking up.

“So… we have a bunch of alien pets now! Cool! What are we gonna do?” Pinkie Pie asked cheerfully.

“We’re getting rid of them,” Gaela said firmly.

“What? No! Please, don’t kill them!” Fluttershy pleaded. The Tyranids sensed her agitation and started snarling, and dozens of scythe blades rose to threaten to the pirate boarders.

“The moment a Warrior bio-form stumbles within range the swarm will be back under the hive mind’s control and they’ll turn on us. Your tiresome empathy toward lower life forms is no match for the will of the Tyranids’ gestalt consciousness,” Gaela explained, walking toward the blast doors. The Hormagaunts parted in front of her, hissing angry threats and swiping their claws through the air. “However… it need not be us that slays them.”

“Oh HO! I see where you’re going with this!” Rainbow Dash said, doing a backflip in the air. “Awesome!”

“Ah. You want to… Okay.” Twilight watched Gaela reach the lock and then clamp her servo arms around it. “I guess we’re going straight through the defenses after all.”

“What? You mean…” Fluttershy looked pensively at the Hormagaunts crowding around her and calmly waiting for her direction. After being pacified the aliens acted more like trained animals than wild beasts, creating a slowly rotating perimeter of blades and chitin around their new mistress and eyeing the others with suspicion. “Do we… have to?” the pegasus asked, her eyes shimmering with unshed tears.

“We’re not taking the xenos back with us,” Gaela said, her tone leaving no possibility of argument. “They’re not going to survive this mission. So at the least they should die to our benefit, fighting against our mutual enemies.”

“Could someone fill me in on these mutual enemies? I just got here,” Tellis asked.

“There’re a bunch of fellers dug in on the other side o’ this thang,” Applejack said.

“And we want to kill these aforementioned fellers?”

“By hurlin’ all of Flutter’s new creepy bug friends at ‘em, yeah.”

“I am SO glad I joined this mission!” Tellis cheered, pumping his arms in the air. “BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD!!”