//------------------------------// // Deployment // Story: The Sins Of The Celestial Empire // by Erol carstein //------------------------------// ++ENGAGING CORE FUNCTIONS++ ++UPDATING MISSION PARAMETERS++ ++MISSION STATUS: INCOMPLETE++ ++CURRENT MISSION PROGRESS TIME: TWO HUNDRED AND FIFTY THREE YEARS. NINE MONTHS. SIXTEEN DAYS. ONE HOUR. FORTY NINE MINUTES. SIX SECONDS++ ++MISSION PARAMETERS UPDATED. NEW OBJECTIVES RECEIVED++ ++NEW OBJECTIVE: LOCATE PRINCESS GENERAL CADENCE OF THE NEW LUNAR REPUBLIC++ ++ RECEIVING IMAGE FILE++ ++OPENING AND DISPLAYING IMAGE FILE++ ++PERSONAL DISGRESSION IS ADVISED. TARGET IS NATURAL BORN ALICORN. THREAT LEVEL: HIGH++ ++NEW OBJECTIVE: BRING PRINCESS GENERAL CADENCE OF THE NEW LUNAR REPUBLIC TO JUSTICE++ ++TARGET MUST BE TAKEN ALIVE++ ++MOTTO FOR THE DAY: WE FIGHT WITH FIRE AND FURY++ ++ALL HAIL THE SOLAR EMPIRE++ ≤ΘΘΘ≥ "All hands, we will be exiting phase space in one hour, prepare all weapons systems and divert all power to shields and weapons, engage battle support sensors, as of this point we are in code red" a female voice crackled over the intercom, its electronic fuzziness filling Blazes small cabin. He lay on his single bunk staring at the metal bulk-head of the roof, his mind watching as holographic fighters and bombers circled through the air, strafing across each other and occasionally exploding into showers of glittering cyan shards. "Weapon systems checked, primed and online" the voice said "all crew to battle positions, all marines to the launch bays, battle support sensors online" with that Blaze switched off his retinal projection display and the fighters and bombers evaporated like early morning mist before the rising sun. He sat up and spun round to sit on the edge of his small bunk, rubbing his head as he yawned, scratching at the input port that lay at the base of his neck. Before long he stood up and stretched his body and wings, working out the cricks and aches that had wormed their way in between his bones. He sighed and ran a hoof through his mane, the combined hues of the reds, yellows, and oranges giving the cascade of neck long hair a flaming aspect. "Are you sure you're ready for this?" asked the white mare, who'd appeared from nowhere and was sitting on the bed, her face plain and her golden eyes shining through locks of her white mane. The mares name was Angel, and she was nothing more then a holographic psycho projection. During his synthesis into an Alicorn, Blazes brain had been partially removed, with major neural cortex's instead being replaced with machinery. Angel was part of this machinery, a sentient artificial intelligence that had been by his side from the first moment he had awoken as an Alicorn. She acted as both a situational awareness module and a close companion, giving Blaze reliable combat data on the battlefield and a friend to open up to when off duty. "Your brain activity shows you haven't been getting enough sleep, your blood flow is also abnormally acidic" Blaze ignored her and went to one of the shelves, rifling through the stacks of papers that covered its surface, looking for his beloved photograph. "Blaze, we're about to go into a war zone, just tell me what's wrong and get it off your chest" Blaze found the faded photo and gave it a long look before sighing. There was nothing particularly special about the image, nothing that would make you stop and look twice. It showed a family of seven, a mother and father, two colts and three fillies. standing at the back of the image, a medium sized red earth pony with an ash-blonde mane and tail smiled warmly. On his back was a small orange filly, her cherry red mane done up with a small bow of purple silk. Blaze sighed again and placed the photo back on the shelves. "You're already in my head, Angel, you know what's wrong, so don't bother to ask" he said in an irritated voice, it was at times like this he wished he could turn off Angels psycho-projection. "Besides, it's nothing" "You've been having the dream again, haven't you?" Angel went very silent and her projection flickered momentarily. Inside his head Blaze felt Angel digging through files of information, searching for something. "You turned off the chemical inhibitor again" she said in a plainly irritated voice "Blaze, I told you not to do that. It's bad for you" "Memories aren't bad for me, Angel" Blaze said, restacking the papers neatly on the shelf before he went to the thick bulk-head that was his door. Just like every other door on the ship it was covered in yellow and black hazard stripes, he began entering the access code into the terminal by its side, the buttons making beeping noises as he typed out the code. There was a final deep beep as the machine accepted the code, and with a deep clanking and the grinding of pistons and gears, the door slid open. Blaze slipped through it and out into the metallic corridor beyond, leaving Angel behind, still on his bed. Or so he wished. "These are dreams Blaze, not memories" Angel said, standing in the middle of the corridor, waiting for him, Blaze couldn't help but sigh in exasperation "see?" a graph appeared in his vision, it glowed a light blue and two lines, one red and the other yellow, snaked across the graph, mirroring each other, except for a sharp spike in the red line. "this is a comparison graph of the pheromones you release when your dreaming" the yellow lines flashed "this is when you actively recall the memory whilst your conscious" the red line flashed "and this is when you relive it in your dreams" the graph disappeared and instead his vision was replaced by Angels face, her brow furrowed in annoyance "as you can see, the dream causes you to release a distress pheromone, which causes your natural blood acidity to rise and your pulse to elevate" Blaze shook his head and walked straight through her, Angels body flickering as the projectors in his eyes altered the image to keep it in focus. "In a language I can understand this time" he said with blatant annoyance. Along the left side of the corridor where more bulkheads, each painted with hazard stripes and with a small input terminal at hoof height, behind each was a cabin just like his own, each reserved for high ranking officers of the marines and the ship's crew. Along the right was a single window that ran the length of the corridor, through it poured swirling light. The ship was currently in phase space, moving through space at incredible speed. In order to achieve this kind of velocity without damaging the ship a phase field had to be generated in order to protect the hull from meteors and other bits of space detritus that the ship was likely to run into as it moved. The phase field was stretched out along the ship, and it caused a bright blue light to pour through the windows, a light that shifted and sent existing shadows dancing like they were cast by a flame, but the light itself didn't cast a shadow, giving it an ethereal quality. Blaze paused for a moment to watch the light dance as the ship punched through space, Angel came to stand at his side. For a few moments they simply stood watching the ethereal glow of the phase shields as they danced wildly. The ship they where aboard was Celestias grace of the northern solar war fleets, and it was heading straight into a war zone. With the recent broadcast on the intercom fresh in the minds of the crew the atmosphere aboard would quickly become tense and up-tight. So for this reason the synthetic Alicorn and his AI took a moment to enjoy the serene peace of passing space before they had to face the task at hoof. "You're not remembering it right Blaze, and it's causing you an immense amount of distress. If you keep on like this I'll shut you down and delete the memory engram entirely" Blaze flicked his tail in irritation, its long length whipping out at the projection, causing it to flicker again. "Stop doing that!" Angel exclaimed, moving a little further away "messing with the projection like that makes my programming feel weird" Blaze couldn't help but smile at that. "We both know you don't know what weird is Angel, now let's go get ready" he started again down the corridor, Angel trotting by his side. "You know you shouldn't be hanging on like this, right? The family in the photo isn't yours Blaze, it's the family of Red Earth-hoof, he died years ago" she huffed, and a strand of her white mane fell in front of her eyes. "I don't get you ponies, what's the point in emotion or memories anyway?" they'd reached the end of the metal corridor, and Blaze began to enter the code for another bulk-head. "Of course you don't get it!" he said as he entered the code "You're a machine, just a projection of part of my internal AI programming" the door opened and they stepped through, the door closed behind them with a grinding sound "If you want to know what emotion is then just look up the files" They were in a long, wide corridor with a high roof that was supported by girders. Ponies where running to a fro, most were crew members heading for their stations before the ship left phase space, but poking up from the press was the occasional helmet or rifle butt as soldiers and marines made their way to the launching bays. As Blaze entered however all activity came to a halt as all eyes turned to him. "ALICORN ON DECK!" somepony shouted, their voice swiftly drowned out by the sounds of dozens of hooves snapping to attention. Silence descended on the corridor, Blaze looked around to see that everypony had stopped what they where doing and were facing him, standing to attention with one of their hooves raised to their foreheads. As Blaze had predicted, the atmosphere was tense. There was something in the air, a sort of tingly sensation that made the heart pick up its pace and adrenaline begin to seep into the blood stream. The odds of the invasion being a success where stacked up quite favourably for the empire, but no war was won without casualties. The fear of death could set even the bravest soldier on edge, it was a primal thing. For the crew of Celestias grace the danger was minimal. Their target destination was a republican civic world of Threnor prime, and preliminary scouting expeditions and scans of the planet had revealed only a dozen or so facilities capable of threatening a capital ship, and none of them were effectively concentrated together to warrant the ships out-right destruction. Blaze took a second to give each of the ponies a glance over before sighing. One of the benefits of his rank was that were ever he went he was to be saluted, but the novelty had worn off about two hundred and forty years ago. "Continue with your duties" Blaze said in the most commanding voice he could muster, its deep bass tone rolling out to fill the whole corridor. Instantly everyone returned to what they where doing. If Celestias grace where to be likened to an organism, these corridors where its veins, the elevator shafts its capillaries. Running up and down the whole five mile length of the ship, the trans-links where its arteries. Whilst its brain was up on the bridge and its great heart the enormous fusion reactor in the centre of the vessel. But no matter how well made the body, it would not survive without its blood, for the life of any creature was in its blood. But the blood of Celestias grace wasn't the usual cocktail of plasma, red blood cells and oxyhaemoglobin, it was the mares and stallions of the imperial solar navy. The crew of Celestias grace had been working day and night for the past week preparing for this engagement, working with an unreal fanaticism to ensure that regardless of what the NLR threw at them, Celestias grace would emerge from the ashes unscathed. Blaze continued on his way down the corridor, once again felt something going through his head, and in the top right corner of his vision there appeared streams of hexadecimal data, streaming past faster than he even his machine mind could comprehend. Angel suddenly reappeared beside him, a look of quizzical curiosity on her face as she walked. "The coding indicates that emotion is the release of chemicals into your brain and blood stream" she said, her brow furrowing once again "But the sequencing is incredibly complex, I don't think I could compress it correctly without damaging the code" Blaze smiled yet again, Angels attempts to rationalize the pony mind always made him smile, few things did these days. "So you're not going to have any emotions yet? Aww, that's too bad, I was looking forward to it" the sarcasm in his voice was so thick you could have cut it with a knife. Angel huffed again and brushed the lock of hair from her eyes. "For your information I'm programmed to synchronise with your brains chemical output three trillion times a second" more coding ran through the top right corner of his vision, occasionally the coding would pause and a small section would flash "I'm perfectly capable of emotion, I'm just not able to support the filing independently is all" Blaze smirked. "Yeah, sure" they'd reached the end of this corridor, and had entered a large circular room that had more bulkheads around the edges. It to was filled with ponies who saluted as he entered, but Blaze dismissed them with a curt nod of his head. Above the five bulkheads that where the farthest from them where small numbers that glowed green, holographic projections. Blaze went to the one on the far right and pressed a button on the right of the door, before stepping back as he waited for the elevator. "Is there anything I have to do before the drop begins?" he asked Angel, who nodded, flickering again. "There's a message from the armoury, your battle armour needs fitting and your nanotrites need a programming upgrade and a top up. You also need to see dispatcher Lyra in the control room and establish your uplink to the ships servers so contact can be maintained" Angel paused and sighed with exasperation "there's also a private message from … " she shuddered " … Lotus … she wants you to meet her soon" "Lotus huh, what does the message say?" he asked, glancing up to check on the lift. It was still fifty three floors beneath them. Angel shuddered once again, a look of annoyance and disgust on her face. "I'm not reading this, here, you read it" the stream of code in the top right of his eyesight expanded until it covered his entire field of vision, the code flashed and the symbols and numbers began to flip from one to the other, changing one by one so that they spelled out the words of the message. He read through it quickly, scanning over it. ++Blaze, the drop's coming very soon, and me and my unit are being deployed to the far side of the planet, meet me in the back of armoury sixteen before you go. Love Lotus. XXX ;)++ "Oh come on Angel, what's wrong about this?" he asked, giving her a sly sideways glance "if I didn't know any better I would say you didn't like Lotus. Now why would you do that? She's a nice mare" Blaze smiled inwardly, he knew full well that Angel absolutely detested Lotus with every chip of her synthetic brain. "Her pheromones are off the charts, it's like she's constantly in heat, and besides, I've been over her records, she's been around with half the imperial army" Angel said, spitting the words out as if they tasted disgusting in her mouth, but of course she'd need a sense of taste for that. "And the last time you brought her back to your cabin I had to watch you two rut for two hours non-stop!" Blaze blushed at the memory, smiling at the same time. "Well we don't have any time for any diversions, let's go see Lyra first and get the uplink configured" the elevator finally arrived with a bing and the doors slid silently open. Inside the elevator was pure white, and the interior seemed to glow in the wash of the bright electric lights that where set into the roof. Two identical grey earth ponies clad in identical battle armour where chuckling to themselves inside, but quickly saluted as the door opened, from the look of them Blaze could only guess they where twins. Blaze moved to step inside but his left foreleg came into contact with something small and soft. He looked down to see a small colt wearing a courier's uniform of white and green saluting him, his eyes green eyes wide with either awe or terror. Either option was viable. when he saw the towering Alicorn looking down on him he gave a squeak and shivered slightly, the twins chuckled. Blaze gave the colt a look over before nodding to the colt. The foal practically jumped out of his skin, disappearing past Blaze by going through his long legs, galloping down the corridor as fast as his small body could take him. "He was a bit young wasn't he?" Blaze asked as he stepped inside the lift, ignoring the still-at-attention soldiers, turning his head back to watch the colt disappear into the thick press. Angel, by his side as always, shook her head. "The minimum age to sign up for the navy was lowered from fourteen to twelve several months ago. More and more of the navy crew members old enough for the draft have joined the army, so to prevent a shortage of crew members high command lowered the age necessary for ponies to sign up for low end jobs, like couriers and ammo loaders" Angel said as the doors slid shut. "Kids that young should be out enjoying their foalhood" Blaze said grimly, his demeanour changing "And this is a capital warship heading straight into an active warzone, that colt shouldn't be here" a female voice filled the elevator. "Please enter your desired deck" "Deck number five seven zero" Blaze said, and instantly the lift began to swiftly rise, smoothly gliding upwards on its magnetic guide rails. "So tell me more about where we're going, I prefer to know a bit more about the planet I may possibly die on before I get deployed" Angel rolled her eyes. Blaze was only joking after all, they both knew he was far too well trained and far too modified to succumb to a normal gun round. "The planet is called Threnor prime; it's the governing civic world of the Threnor system. Population: three trillion. Annual Imperial tithe: four billion soldiers. The planet has three moons and has been under the control of the New Lunar Republic for the five hundred years" she said in a matter of fact tone, as if she was a teacher reciting class work to a thick headed student. "Anything special, myths or such?" "The populace have a wide spread belief that one of the six saints spent a month on the planet during the expansion crusades. The information is unclear but many believe that it was Applejack, the bearer of honesty" "That's interesting. Where's the capital city?" "the capital city is named 'New Trottingham' and it's located to the far east of the western continent, that's where high command has designated the primary drop zone" the lift finally reached their floor, the doors opening with a binging sound. Before he stepped out Blaze glanced behind him at the twins, who where still saluting despite the looks of humiliation on their faces. "If I ever see you two laughing at that colt again, I'll deal with you myself. Understood?" The twins grey coat blanched at the idea. "Yes sir!" they both said hurriedly. Blaze gave them a final glare before he and Angel stepped out into another circular room. This one however was filled to bursting point with ponies, who saluted him before his tail was even out of the elevator. With a nod from the Alicorn he set them all back to their tasks, but Blaze still had to elbow his way through the crush in order to make his way across the room, Angel simply walking straight through them. They emerged from the room into a corridor identical to the one they had just been in, this one equally packed with ponies, all of them wearing the white and orange uniforms of the communications corps. Once again they where saluted, once again a nod relieved them. Even here the atmosphere radiated tension, as if the wall themselves exuded the emotion. Ponies where everywhere, pushing their way through the crush as they made their way to their stations. Blaze wasn't really surprised at the tension. Communications, along with supplies and fire support, was one of the most important services Celestias grace had to provide for the deployed soldiers in the field. Any failure in communications, even the slightest error, could render any sort of cohesive assault against the NLR garrison useless and cause wide spread chaos amongst the empires forces. "Excuse me…excuse me" Blaze said as he made his way through the thick press of bodies, inadvertently trotting on several hooves. Normally ponies would tend to give him a wide berth wherever he went, but in the crush there was little chance of that happening. At the far end of the corridor they emerged onto a balcony over a cavernous, white, circular room. The room, or hall, Blaze wasn't sure which, was a huge place, at least a kilometre across with the walls gleaming white in the bright light and filled with the chatter of ponies. On the far wall was a single, massive screen that glowed green, along its surface where streams of code and info feeds from all parts of the ship. In the centre of the screen was a massive image of a planet that was slowly revolving in space. "So that's Threnor prime?" Blaze asked as he gazed upon the massive image. The planet was covered in blue oceans that wrapped around it like a massive snake, tiny chains of islands designated the major land masses and there was only one area truly large enough to be designated as a continent in the west. To the right of the image was an info-feed that showed images of the worlds cities and major urban centres. Like most major civic worlds the cities where massive spires of white metal that shone in the sun light, around the spires great metropolis's had grown, glittering in the images. "Hey Angel, can you upload those images into my retinal display?" Angel nodded and within a few short moments the same images that where on the screen where in his vision, each one crystal clear. "We should really ask about where Lyra is" Angel said, looking about her. "My files say that she's on the far side of the room, in section Gemini, that's just down by that control console" Blaze looked down from the balcony and saw that the floor beneath them was divided up into hexagons like a honey comb. The dividers themselves where large white worktops with screens on them, all along their edges sat ponies in white and orange uniforms, their hooves flashing out and moving pieces of information or images around on the screens as they talked into the microphones of their headsets. Within each hexagonal divider there was another hexagon and another after that and another after that, dividing each divider into concentric hexagons. At the nexus points of the dividers where they met were small circular landing pads, occasionally a wide, white levitating desk would touch down on one of the pads, and a pony carrying papers or info-files would hurriedly step off and gallop to one of the ponies at the desks, handing them glass tubes filled with computer files that glowed all the colours of the rainbow, in turn the ponies at the desks would lay the tubes standing on the desks and the tubes would sink like they were in water and disappear beneath the surface, with new images and files appearing on the screens. There was less tension in the air here, but it was an undercurrent rather then an inexorable tide. Here there was a way for the tension to be vented in a useful way, with each and ever y pony bent to the task at hand with all their will. Blaze found that if he didn't focus on specific things in the room, but rather use his peripherals, the swarm of activity was something akin to bee hive or an ants nest. One of the floating disks, this one devoid of any passages save for one hovered up to meet them, Blaze noted that underneath the disk was a set of spinning concentric circles with a blue lens at the centre, the disks where held up by gravity cancellers. "Can I help you?" asked the rather short unicorn stallion who stood on the disk, not bothering to look at them but instead focus on the holo-projections in front of him. He was a light brown, with a brown mane and tail that where streaked with lines of grey and silver. He wore a white and orange uniform; the same as all the other ponies, but on his shoulder was a small orange badge with a yellow line that zigzagged across its surface, marking him out as a supervisor. The disk floated down so it was on eye level with them, and Blaze noticed he wore a small headset that ran around the back of his head. At the ends of the headset by his ears where a pair of holo-projectors that projected a large blue screen in front of his eyes, along its surface where the same images as the ones on the main screen, and Blaze noticed he moved the images with his eyes. Beside him magically levitated a touch pad screen, on it where a set of commands that he couldn't make out from this angle "it's just that we're rather busy here, entering an active war zone and all" "I'm looking for Lyra, she's in sector Gemini. I'm here for a system uplink" Blaze said. The stallion looked up at them, his eyes going wide as he realised he was being addressed by an Alicorn. "Yes sir! Of course sir!" he said, making a fumbled salute before focusing on the projections in front of him "Let me see. Lyra, Lyra" the supervisor began flipping through images and data streams, they flashed across his projection screen. Eventually the images paused on a picture of Blaze, the stallion blinked and a small data file appeared to the left of the image, he gave it a cursory scan "you must be Blaze, sir, from the specialists unit?" he asked, he gave Blaze a glance and then his eye flicked over to Angel. "And this must be your AI?" he said. Blaze realised that the stallions' projector set allowed him to see Blazes own psycho-projections, he nodded. "Of course i can help you sir. Step on board sir" the stallion said in a hurried manner, aware of the first impression he may have made on his superior. A small white boarding ramp emerged from the side of the disk and it docked with the edge of the balcony, the railing sinking down into the balconies surface as it connected "come on board, I'll take you to Lyra and we'll get you sorted. Blaze made his way up the ramp, angel right behind him. The disk bobbed slightly as they stepped on board, and Angel squeaked. "Right then…" the stallion levitated the screen in front of him and scanned its surface "Gemini…Gemini…where is it? Ahh, here we go" he pressed one of the commands on the screen and the disk brought in its ramp and began to float across the room. Blaze glanced over the edges of the disk, watching as the ponies beneath went on with their work oblivious to the disk overhead, going about their jobs like bees in a hive, which when coupled with their hexagonal surroundings, reinforced his earlier analogy of the communications centre. He noticed that all the members of staff where unicorns "seems like you've got a lot going on here" Blaze said, trying to make idle conversation as the disk drifted slowly to its destination. "Pardon sir?" the unicorn asked, looking away from his display. He blinked twice in rapid succession and his projection screen blinked off, the lights on the sides of his headset dying down to a dull blue glow. "oh yes sir, from here we're going to manage every single communication that takes place during the operation" he pointed over to the back left of the room, just under the balcony. "that's section Alpha, sir, image processing. Every image we have of the planet and every image that will be taken during the operation will be transferred into that machine. He pointed to a thick glass tube that rose from the inner most hexagon of the section, filled with machinery that glowed green, and around its base where wide nozzles. Occasionally one of the glass tubes he had seen earlier would emerge from one of the nozzles, and when it did it was swiftly picked up by a courier, who would take it to one of the docking pads and wait for another disk to land before stepping on board and taking the tube to wherever it wanted to go. The stallion then turned to the right section of the large roof, sweeping his hoof out on several of the hexagons "that's section Delta, sir. Central communications are over there, very important stuff. From there we manage all communications between the squads during the mission and ensure we can maintain a broadcasting frequency that allows them to stay in touch with us" In the centre of the section of hexagons was a large dome structure, the projection engine Blaze assumed. Around its base where clustered ponies in bright orange jumpsuits wearing hard hats, they seemed to be deep in debate about something. "Why do you have engineers up here this close to the start of the invasion?" Blaze asked, feeling an uncomfortable sensation in his stomach as he pointed to the orange suited ponies. The supervisor looked to where Blaze was pointing, his smile faltering. "Well sir" he began, before clearing his throat slightly. "We're experiencing ... difficulties getting the projection engine to work properly. Blaze felt the sensation in his stomach worsen and he gave the pony a whithering stare. "B-but not that that's any issue, sir" the supervisor stammered "The engines always been a bit temperamental, no need to worry, sir" He swallowed the lump in his throat and gave Blaze a quick, uncertain smile "But that's not for specialists like you though, sir. For that we have Gemini" he now gestured to a single hexagon right by the base of the screen "Section Gemini, sir, special forces communications. Each team of specialists gets a personal handler; they're there to ensure you keep in touch and up to date with the latest Intel. If you need anything at all, sir, just drop them a line and they'll get you whatever you need. Weapon drops, heavy armour support, food, drink, you name it sir, we can get it to you" he smiled smugly to himself. Blaze felt the sensation in his stomach lighten slightly, but still felt worried about the implications this would have for the rest of the invasion. "Why are all the staff unicorns?" he asked, trying to clear the air with a new subject "I mean, surely pegausi would be more useful for carrying messages" Blaze didn't particularly care, but he'd thought about possible reasons earlier and wanted to get the itch to ask the question out of his head. "well, we did have pegausi once, sir. But after a while we began to have…problems, getting them to work attentively, you know how those lot are, sir, always have their heads up in the clouds, and don't even get me started on the earth ponies. No, unicorns are smarter and more attentive when it comes to administrative things such as this" Blaze decided to ignore the slight the stallion had made to earth ponies "Are they all natural?" he asked, keeping his tone neutral and even. "not, at least three quarters of the staff are synthetic unicorns, sir, myself included" the stallion pulled back his hair and Blaze saw faint scarring around the base of his horn "we've never had any problems with them though, sir, except for the occasional magical outburst. Oh, here we are, sir, this is your stop, let me show you to Lyras work station, sir" the disk landed with a small whuffing noise and they stepped off, Blaze noticed that Angel seemed more than happy to be off the disk, he suppressed his laughter. Surprisingly no-one stood up to salute him, they all remained hunched over their work stations, absorbed in the data in front of them. Another Alicorn might have been offended, but Blaze found it a relief, that for once he didn't have to hold everything up just because he'd walked into the room. he wondered about why he hadn't been saluted and could only reason that so many Alicorns passed through this part of communications that it was common place to see one walking around. The stallion led them through row upon row of hexagonal work stations, the ponies didn't look at them twice. They skirted around the inner most hexagon and made their way to the outer most hexagon, to a work station that was right up by the wall "here's Lyra, sir" stallion said, gesturing to a blue unicorn mare who had her back hunched over her work screen "if you'll excuse me, sir, I have to get over to section Delta, we seem to be having some more processing difficulties with the projection engine. Good day, sir, and good luck" and with that the stallion turned about and left them behind as he returned to his disk. Blaze walked up to the unicorn mare and gently tapped her on the shoulder. She jolted and turned to face him, her eyes wide and her chest heaving from the shock. " I didn't do anything!" she said without thinking, the words simply falling out of her mouth. "Blame the engineers! they told me it was all fixed up, I didn't do anything wrong!" Blaze, though taken aback by her out burst, quickly gathered himself. "Sorry, I didn't mean to scare you, are you Lyra?" Blaze asked. "Oh … it's no bother. Yes I'm Lyra" she gave him a look up and down "and you're a synthetic Alicorn, so you must be Blaze" he nodded "excellent, take a seat" a block rose out of the floor and Blaze sat down next to Lyra, staring at the data streamed as they rolled down the screen. "Sorry about my ...outburst, I'm just a little stressed out is all" she gave him an apologetic look "We're employing some new tech that I haven't used before and I'm a little worried that there may be some bugs in the system" "That's what you're worried about? We're about to launch an invasion and you're worried about software?" "Well ... yeah, that too. But this is more important" she patted the work surface "This piece of tech's what's gonna be keeping you in contact with me. It's gonna be keeping you alive just as much as your armour, so I've gotta make sure it's all checked out and working without any bugs" The light blue pony returned to her work "But if something does go wrong, blame the engineers" There was a few moments of tapping as Lyra worked her computer. "right, let me just got the synchronous program running" Lyras hooves flash out over the screen, bringing up a series of boxes filled with processing data. "and there we go, let's get you hook up" A small hole opened up beside the screen where Blaze was sitting and a large input jack emerged from it, its surface covered in tiny silicon fibres that gave it a furry appearance. "Turn around" Lyra said, and Blaze scooted around on the block so his back was to the desk. Lyra lifted up the back of his mane and revealed the large input port that lay at the bottom of his neck, she gave it a blow and Blaze tensed as he felt ice cold air touch against the top of his spinal column "now this may nip just a little bit" Lyra stated, and before Blaze could ask what she meant he felt the input jack enter the input port with a faint click and the hum of electricity. Within the input port where thousands of microscopic docking ports that hooked were hooked up to the nerves in his spinal column. When the input jack was docked into the port, the tiny silicon fibres that covered its surface connected with the internal docking ports and began to transmit data. This allowed Lyra to transmit data into the artificial elements of his brain by using his spinal column as an organic cable for a direct hook up. He gasped and instantly his projection screen filled up with yet more data streams, the numbers and symbols rolling down the screen at an immense pace. Within his head a voice was talking in monotone, reading out a series of words as they appeared in his HUD display. ++SYNCHRONISING BRAIN WAVE EMISSIONS++ ++SECURING NANOTRITE FEEDS++ ++ENGAGING UPLINK++ ++PATCHING THROUGH TO SERVER++ ++SYNCHRONOUS COMPLETE++ This wasn't the first time Blaze had been hooked up to a machine in this manner, but he found it uncomfortable regardless. The sensation of having an ice colt object enter his body and send chills up and down his spine made his fur stand up on end and his coat crawl as if it was covered in ants. He was vaguely aware of Lyra telling him something, but the world sounded as if he where submerged in a deep pool of water, and then he gasped again as the input jack was removed, sending a trendil of ice running down his back and making the hole in the back of his neck all the more obvious. He stood up and rolled his neck, trying to get the sensation out of his spine. "And that's you sorted" Lyra said with a smile, she raised a hoof to her right ear "testing, testing, can you hear me?" Blaze stared at with puzzlement and then suddenly Lyras words echoed in his head, loud and clear, he nodded. "EXCELLENT!" Lyra exclaimed "I'm gonna honest with you" she blushed, as if she was about to say something embarrassing. "this was my first cerebro-synchronous link. But it looks like everything worked" she patted her work station affectionately "I'll be right here if you need anything, just send the word and I'll be on it" Lyra raised her hoof to her ear again "uh huh" she said, and Blaze realised she was communicating with somepony else "yeah he's here…now? Yeah sure, I'll send him right down" Lyra put her hoof down. "That was from the armoury, they need you down there pronto" she gave him another smile "Good luck, Blaze. Good hunting ... or whatever it is you Alicorns say to each other" and with that she returned to her work, her back hunching over again as she became engrossed in the data before her eyes. Blaze thanked Lyra and he and Angel made their way back through the hexagonal maze to the landing pad, where the self same supervisor was waiting for them with a smile on his face. "Everything sorted for you, sir?" he asked as they came back on board, Angel once again squeaking every time the disk bobbed up and down. "Yeah, no problems so far. But there's one thing I want to ask" Blaze rubbed the back of his neck, scratching at the area of skin around the import. "This…cerebro linking thing…is it new by any chance?" the stallion raised a hoof to him. He was flipping through the commands on the floating console, Blaze waited patiently until he was finished, and then he asked the question again. "Well…it's relatively new in a sense. We've had the technology for about ten years now, sir, so it's not new in that sense. But ensuring that we can maintain an active server to host all the input feed from the soldiers in the field is tricky business. This is only the second time high command has deemed it necessary for the cerebro-synchronous connection uplink to be deployed in the field, so it's definitely new in that regard, sir" The stallion looked rather uncomfortable as he told Blaze this information. "And when was the last time this system was used?" Blaze asked. A bad feeling began to roil in his stomach. "The…erm…the battle of Goliath nine, sir" the stallions said, shifting from hoof to hoof, Blaze shook his head. The battle of goliath nine had been three years ago, and it had been one of the bloodiest and most humiliating defeats of the solar empire. Barely fifteen minutes after a drop zone had been established the central communications hub on the commanding capital ship had failed and caused a massive communications black out for the entirety of the operation, cutting of the companies and battalions below from the fleet. Preventing them from requesting and supplies, ammunition, vehicles, even orbital support. Within a month three quarters of the strike force where dead and dying, and those still alive where so badly wounded they wouldn't last until they reach proper medical attention. In the end high command had ordered the planet be subject to an exterminatus, and the fleet willingly complied, bombarding the planet's surface with cyclonic torpedoes and viral dispersion bombs to kill any kill anything that was still alive. High command had withdrawn the fleet and the officer in charge of communications was give a court martial under the charges of facilitating the failure of an imperial military operation. "for the love of all that is good tell me you've fixed the kinks by now" he said, looking the stallion in the eye, his own deep blue filled with unspoken menace "it may be safe for you lot up here in space but I'm the one who's actually going planet side, I don't want to get there and then I turns out I can't phone home" the stallion raised his hooves defensively. "I wasn't part of the original team that developed the system ok, sir? And besides, we've had three years to fix the bugs!" "He's telling the truth Blaze" said Lyras voice in his ears. He scratched at his right ear. "Lyra?" he asked, wondering what she was doing now "how can you hear him?" "I've got a cerebral link to your brain remember? I can hear everything you hear" Lyra sounded awfully smug. "just calm down and let the guys get on with their job, besides, I had the engineers give your link a double check, just to make sure everything was running smoothly" "Well that was kind of you" "Don't mention it. If you pull this next mission off it's a nice fat pay rise for me, maybe even a promotion if I'm lucky. How does 'Lyra, head of communications' sound?'" "It suits you rather well actually" "Sweet! Now get going, Bull's getting pissed, he's waiting for you. And remember, if something, anything, goes wrong. Blame the engineers!" there was suddenly a dull whuffing noise and the disk came to a halt, Blaze realised they had reached the balcony again. Giving his thanks to the supervisor him and Angel stepped off and went back into the tightly packed corridor, which was just as busy as the communications centre. For what felt like the hundredth time today everyone saluted him, and he once again dismissed them with a nod. "So where's the armoury?" Blaze asked Angel as he pushed his way back to the elevators. He stepped on someponies hoof and a mare yelped loudly "sorry!" he shouted back over his shoulder. "The armouries on this deck, at the fore of the ship, by the plasma beam projection array, about four miles away" Angel informed him "we'll have to take a translink monorail to get there" Blaze nodded in understanding. They were back in the circular room, and Blaze made his way to one of the doors on his immediate left, rather than the lifts at the back of the room, and pressed the large green button by the door, it binged. "Why did you want those pictures anyway?" Angel asked. "I just wanted to see what this world looks like before we fuck it up" he told her. In his mind he visualised the images, and they appeared in his field projection screen, moving from one to the next like a slide show. Most of the images where of the central spire at the heart of what he presumed to be the capital city, but there where images of the vast urban sprawl of glittering metal that sat at the base of the spire, the slums, factories, and docking ports. Running straight through the centre of the city was a gleaming river, bisecting the metropolis into three parts. Threnor prime obviously hadn't been idle whilst in the possession of the new Lunar republic. Mechs where teeming in the streets, massive war constructs made of heavy duty mechanisms. They ranged in size from bipedial scout walkers to massive six-legged mobile battle fortresses. Dotted all around the city where quad-barreled flak cannons, each on of them pointed skywars. "I'm seeing a lot of flak batteries as well, the drop pods are going to be swatted down like flies" the terminal made a beeping noise and the doors to the translink silently opened to reveal a small, rectangular, windowless compartment big enough for four ponies with seats running along the edges. Thankfully it was empty, so Blaze got a brief respite from the salutes. Blaze and Angel stepped inside and sat down before Angel answered him. "Before launching the pods the fleet have been commanded to bombard the planet with EMP's to cut off the power for the majority of the defences. However, estimates show that some of the flak cannons are powered by old plasma reactor technology, and will not be deactivated by the initial bombardment" plasma technology was nowhere near as efficient as fusion technology, but plasma reactors where powered by immense heat, so they couldn't simply be switched on and off with the flick of a button. "initial casualties are still acceptably low, roughly at five thousand" it sounded like a horrendous number, but Blaze knew that things could go terribly wrong during a drop, losing only five thousand wasn't too bad. The doors slid shut and a female voice asked them. "Please select your destination" To which blaze replied "armoury seventeen" and the translink was off like a bullet, inertia cancellers keeping the occupant, or occupants depending on if you counted Angel, from slamming against the wall. "So Angel, what does your probability programming say about the chances of success?" "The mission will succeed, we have four times the soldiers, a veteran war fleet, and enough fire power to destroy this world into dust if we wanted to" Angel said, staying calm despite the fact she was talking about the death of trillions "however…there's something that's troubling me" "And that is?" "I've been going over the mission parameters and…well…there's a high chance that you could die during the operation" Blaze raised a eyebrow "you're going after an immortal Alicorn who's been charged with over three hundred times for the breaching of pony rights and is responsible for the deaths of fifteen trillion souls. She was alive during the time of the six saints Blaze; she was with the first exploratory fleets" "I know its dangerous Angel, but this has to be done" "But what makes you think that Princess General Cadence will even be here? Why would you join up with the fleet just to hunt this one pony?" Angel asked him. There was a hint of fear in her artificial voice and her holographic eyes where wide, her golden iris' shining and her pupils dilated. "Because Cadence was the one who ordered the strike on Rylelia" Blazes wings tensed against his back as he remembered the image of his dead home floating in black space. "I've spent months on this Angel, years. It seemed like she was impossible to find. But then I got a vox message from the white mare, who told me she was here. The planned seizure of this planet was a nice coincidence, that's why I joined the fleet. It would be easier to kill her during a planetary assault rather than having to hunter her down on my own" he gritted his teeth as the image of Princess General Cadence appeared in his vision projector, her perfect face smiling at him with white teeth "I'm going to find Cadence, and I'm going to make her pay for what she's done. Not just for Rylelia, but for all the ponies she's tortured and killed, for all the orphans she's left homeless. I'll kill the whole of the new Lunar republic before she gets away from me" a beeping noise filled his head, and the graph Angel had shown him outside of his cabin reappeared. This time it was the yellow line that had spiked, shooting up and down across the graph like a mountain chain. "Calm down Blaze, you're getting stressed again; try not to think about it" Blaze sighed and sagged back into his chair, the tension leaving his body. "I guess you're right Angel, let's just get the job done and I can finally lay my family to rest" the translink suddenly came to a halt and the voice spoke again. "Armoury seventeen" Blaze and Angel left the translink and stepped out into a packed armoury, filled with shouts, the clicking and clanking of weapons being knocked together and the pulsing booms of power weapons being tested. Blaze pushed his way through the hodgepodge of weapon maintenance staff, ammo colts, soldiers, marines, and techno-savants. A saluted as he passed, Blaze nodding to each in turn. Sweet Twilight, he was getting sick of salutes. He trotted through aisle upon aisle of weapon racks, filled with plasma rifles, EMP shotguns, long range pulse rifles, rail rifles, plasma carbines, heavy duty machine guns and simple side arms to a large room at the back of the armoury. Inside the room was lit up with the orange and red glow of machinery and the air was thick with the clanking and grinding of gears, cogs, and pistons. In the centre of the room was a raised podium large enough for him to stand on, attached to the roof over it where several mechanical limbs, each one pointed in drills, magnets, and needles. Over to the right was a large, blue, earth pony stallion that was entering commands into a large console built into the wall. Around his head was a projection set, and it was filled with schematics and cross sections of weapons, it also meant he could see Angel. He paused as he heard Blaze enter, his hooves clanking on the grated floor, and his brow furrowed in annoyance. "You're late, do you know that. We're leaving phase space in twenty minutes and you don't even have your armour on" he stated in a gruff tone, no hint of a salute anywhere about him. He nodded by way of greeting to Angel. "Nice to see you too Bull" Blaze said, a grin on his face. Blaze and Bull went a long way back. They'd fought side by side across the surfaces of three planets. On the death world of ianose after taking a shotgun round to the chest Bull had carried Blazes recumbent form over twenty miles to the nearest medical centre, saving his life. On Frakelra Blaze had paid him back by saving Bulls from being crushed under the hooves of a massive, bipedal war machine know as a devastator, using his force hammer to smash the machines legs to pieces. The two had become firm friends since then, but Bull had been forced to leave active service after a plasma grenade had almost taken his legs out from under him. Not one to leave a fight Bull had instead signed up for maintenance work on the war fleets, and his natural aptitude for weapons had led to his swift rise to head armourer of the capital ship Celestias grace upon which they were conveniently now travelling. "Shall we get started?" "You still talk funny, you know that?" Bull said, turning back to the console "like you're from some sorta posh place" the console bleeped and its screen flashed "step on" he said, absently gesturing to the podium, Blaze complied. "Right, first things first, let's get your armour on" Bull pressed a button on the console and the podium rose higher into the air. Around its base the grated floor slid downwards and out of sight, from the holes that it left there rose sections of dark blue armour, shoulder pads, chest pieces and wing guards. The pieces floated in the air, held suspended by a magnetic field. Bull pressed another button on the console and the mechanical limbs on the roof jerked into life and extended downwards, descending on Blaze. Instead they reach past him and picked up section of the armour. "Hold still" Bull said, as another pair of limbs lowered from the roof. They were carrying a piece of metal framework that was little more than a few pieces of lightweight ceramite, however on the chest piece glowed a bright blue, compact fusion reactor, held onto the frame work within a circular chest piece. Blaze reared on his back legs and spread out his wings and front hooves, the limbs lowered the framework around him and then came together, sealing his body within the frame work. There was a light whirring sound as the pieces where connected together, and then the two limbs returned to the ceiling, the other limbs now rising to circle around Blaze, section of armour held in their grasp. With more whirring the limbs began to attach the armour sections to the framework, making deep clanking and grinding noises as each section was bolted on. First was the chest piece, with a small circle of bullet proof glass at the centre that would go over the fusion reactor. As it was being firmly attached the other limbs moved simultaneously, raising up the shoulder pads. The chest piece was only just on when the shoulder pads where attached, once they were on the limbs that had fixed them on began adding more sections of armour to his front hooves, covering them in ceramite armouring. On his hooves where attached adamantium studs, adamantium was heavier then ceramite and the studs would lend extra strength to his bucks and punches. They joined on with a clank, sealing his top half in the armour. The same process was repeated on his lower half, sealing his body in air tight armour. More limbs lowered from the roof and slid two metal sections along the rims of his wings, when the limbs retracted there was a clicking sound and Blaze stumbled forward slightly as two plasma shields glowing a light cyan shot out from the sections and encased his wings. An input jack that looked like a nozzle with orange liquid dripping from the end that was attached to a see through pipe emerged from the roof and was lowered down towards the back of his neck, it moved like a snake, and it paused for a moment in mid air before shooting forward, plugging into the port in the back of his neck. After a second orange liquid filled the tube and the nozzle began pumping a fresh batch of nanotrites into Blazes blood stream, after a few short seconds the flow came to a halt and with a gurgling noise the nozzle detached from the port and returned back up to the roof. Whilst the nanotrites where being injected a limb unfurled from the ceiling and began spraying his tail with an aerosol that glittered like diamonds and it floated through the air, the substance stuck to his tail, coating each hair in a fine case of nanoscopic conducting particles. There was a zapping noise as Blaze flicked his tail, sending electricity racing down it and causing it to crackle and flicker with energy. The last piece to be attached was his helmet, the same deep blue as the rest of the armour and with a large see through visor that showed most of his face, it also had a hole in the top for his horn. It slid down his horns length and nestled gently on his head, crushing his long mane down onto his head. There was a clicking noise and segments of plate rose up his neck from the chest piece to cover his neck and connect with the helmet. The grinding and clanking came to a halt and the limbs returned to their positions on the roof as the podium was lowered back down to the floor, Blaze stepped off, now encased head to hoof in deep blue combat armour, with only his horn exposed. He gave the armour an inspection, nodding in approval. "Nice work Bull, but did you have to give it a fresh coat of paint? It looked way more badass with all the scratches on it" Bull smiled and picked something up from the console, holding it delicately in his large hooves. "Here's a little something I made 'specially for you" he said. He stepped forward and pulled Blazes head down, placing the piece of armour over his horn and down its length. When it came into contact with the helmet there was a whirring sound and the armour was now complete. Blaze reached up with a hoof and ran it down the length of the horn guard, feeling metal teeth bite at his skin. "What is it?" "It's a chain guard, you know. Like a normal horn guard, but it's got a small chainsaw on it. I also refilled your body's supply of nanotrites and gave them all the latest programming upgrades, as far as the rule book is concerned, you're the best armoured and destructive thing anypony could be without being designated as a small tank" "Sweet…so how does this thing turn on?" Blaze pointed to the chain guard. "I designed the piece so that it has several magical neurone receptors in it, just focus some of your magic and it'll turn on" Blaze nodded and closed his eyes, taking deep breaths. Then he opened his eyes again, and focussed his mind. In his mind's eye he saw he chain guard rev into life, and he focussed on this image. As he did so his horn began to glow underneath the armour, and with a fierce grinding noise and the revving of a small but powerful motor, the chain guard roared into life, its metal teeth biting through the air. Blaze laughed and swung his head from side to side, listening to the teeth of the chain guard slice through the air. He lowered his head and scraped it along the grate flooring, sparks flying as he sliced through the metal with ease. Once he was done messing around he discarded the image of the chain guard from his mind, and the engine idled down, the metal teeth coming to a halt. Blaze was grinning. "That's awesome, cheers Bull" he said, his cheeks flushed. "I also made this for Angel" Bull picked up a metallic sphere about the size of a tennis ball from the console, he gently tapped it and four metallic legs slowly unfolded from the spheres smooth surface and it picked itself up, crawling around the surface of Bulls hoof like a spider. "it's a mobile storage core" he said, he stepped up to Blaze and placed the sore on his back, it stood still for a second before crawling along his back, down one of his legs, and then across his chest, where it disgorged a small plug and connected with the armour. "oh!" Angel said, her projection flickering as the core synchronised with Blazes internal systems "it's like a walking hard-drive" "in essence, with this you can go walking about and crawl through and spaces too small for Blaze to squeeze through, it's also got its own self defence laser, in case you run into any trouble" the core disconnected from the armour and crawled back up onto Blazes back, it made its way into the small space between his wings and settled itself in a small semi-spherical depression, a click and beep signalling it was now connected with the armour. "Thanks Bull, for everything. Don't know what me and Angel would do without you" Blaze said "pity you couldn't come with us" "Don't mention it, and honestly it ain't to bad working in the armoury. Now get down to the launch bays, you've got five minutes before we leave phase space" Bull slapped him on the shoulder and returned to the console "and try not to scratch the paint!" he shouted over his shoulder as Blaze and Angel left. They made their way back through the armoury, their passage much easier this time as ponies stepped out of the path of the heavily armour synthetic Alicorn. "Shouldn't you pick up some weapons?" Angel asked, looking at the rows of weapon racks as they walked past "I think they might be necessary where we're going" Blaze smiled and nodded in agreement. About half way through the armoury to the translink he made a right down a small aisle. The aisle was filled with racks and racks of pulse weapons, Blazes armament of choice, and he scanned the rows carefully with a professional eye. Eventually he picked up a heavy, snub nosed pulse jezzaile, designed for taking out enemy armour and long range engagements. He gently spun it round, taking in the weapons profile. A weapon like this would be useful in a war zone, allowing him to take out both tanks and mechs, as well as the heavily armoured bodyguards Cadence was likely to keep about her at all times. He placed the weapon against his side and it stuck tight, a powerful magnetic attraction from the armour keeping it in place. He then left the aisle and went to another about five rows from the translink terminal, and from it he plucked an automatic rail gun, a weapon designed to fire highly magnetic payloads to rapid succession that was effective at close and long range. Satisfied with his chosen armaments he left the aisle and proceeded to the terminal. When they reached the translink Blaze pressed the button and they waited for the monorail to show up. Blaze looked Angel up and down. "You're not seriously going into a war zone like that are you?" he asked incredulously. Angel gave him a quizzical look, her appearance the same brilliant white as always. "What do you mean?" she asked. "Well, we are just about to seize a planet from the grasp of the new lunar republic and kill General Cadence. Don't you think you should wear something a bit more…you know" he gestured up and down Angels body "war like?" Angel stared at him in disbelief and then rolled her eyes as her projection began to flicker. She disappeared entirely, and for a brief moment Blaze was left by himself, before she flicked back on. She was wearing armour exactly identical to Blazes, except she lacked a helmet, and her armour was a light cherry pink. "How's this for you?" she asked with an annoyed voice, her left eyebrow raised. Blaze pondered her armour for a second and then nodded in approval. "I might have gone a different way with the paint scheme, but apart from that it's alright" he said, as the doors to the translink opened and three soldiers stepped out, ignoring Blaze and walking straight through Angel. "This armour is completely unnecessary" Angel told him as the boarded the translink "I'm only a psycho-projection of your internal AI, I'm not real, I don't need to wear this" the doors closed behind them. "Please select your destination" "Launch bay number four" and with that they were off "so, are you ready?" he asked Angel. "Of course I'm ready, are you?" "Obviously" they sat in silence as the translink took them to the launch bay, and when it arrived they exited with the clanking of armour following behind them. the launch bay was one of twenty aboard Celestias grace and each one of them was a massive, cavernous hall, with a large window on its right side and filled with hundreds of orbital drop pods designed to be launched from high orbit onto any world below. The pods that currently lay within the launch docks where the orbital assault variants, primarily designed to literally drop squads into the thick of the fighting, but there were also variant models designed for boarding actions between ships and even models large enough to deliver tanks and war mechs into battle. The launch bay was filled with marines, soldiers specially trained for orbital drops, as well as many specialist personnel such Blaze himself, but no other Alicorns. Due to the urgency of the situation no-pony made any effort to acknowledge Blaze. Thank the six for small mercies. Blaze made his way through the mass of ponies to one of the sergeants, who was bellowing at the marines to get a move on. "SERGEANT!" he shouted over the din "I'M BLAZE FROM SPECIALIST BATTALION, SERIAL NUMBER ONE HUNDRED-NINETEEN!" the blue earth pony wearing a green military uniform with a cap on his head saluted quickly and then pointed over to the far right side of the launch bay, by the huge window. "SPECIALISTS ARE OVER THERE SIR!" he shouted back "GOOD LUCK. RIGHT, NOW GET A FUCKING MOVE ON YOU LOT!" he said, turning his attention back to the milling marines. Blaze pushed his way through the crowd and after two minutes of pushing and shoving reached the pods by the window, all of them bathed in the blue light of phase space. His team were waiting for him. "OI, BLAZE, OVER HERE!" he heard a familiar voice call to him, and he looked down the line of pods to see three synthetic Alicorns and their AI's standing by one of the pods, he trotted over to meet them, Angel right behind him. "it's good to see you again Blaze" said the one who had called out to him. He was a relatively small Alicorn, with creamy coloured skin, deep golden eyes, and a mane and tail that was filled with varying hues of red. He wore the same armour as Blaze, except his was a bright green, and beside him stood his AI, an earth mare who was just as white as Angel with pink eyes. "Jester" he said, smiling "Ivy" he nodded to the AI. "Don't forget about us" said the second of the three synthetic Alicorns, a thick set stallion with an electric blue coat. He had bright orange eyes and a blue mane and tail streaked with white. Again he wore the same armour as Blaze, but his was a brown colour, like fresh bread. Behind him hid his AI, a shy program with the same orange eyes with a white coat, mane and tail. "Wonder bread, how could I forget?" he said "and I see Buttercup is as shy as ever" at the mention of her name the AI squeaked and pressed herself against wonder bread. "And last but not least, Sugarcane" Blaze said, winking at the third Alicorn. She was a mare, with bright brown eyes, dusty colour coat, and a light brown mane and tail. By her side stood her AI, a tall stallion named Strike who was winking at Angel with his own brown eyes, just as with the other AI's he was pure white. "You lot ready for the drop?" "I was born ready" said Sugarcane in her strong, confident voice "how about you? I heard that you where meant to be meeting Lotus in the armoury by now" she winked at him "word travels fast amongst us mares" she punched him on the shoulder with an armoured hoof "and you shouldn't have left her hung up like you did, the girl doesn't know what she's missing" Angel rolled her eyes and Strike chuckled. Blaze made a move to change the subject before Angel got angry. "Have you checked all the load outs and mission parameters?" he asked Jester, his tone serious "we're going after a notorious mass murderer, I don't want any slip ups" Jester nodded, and beside him Ivy nodded in perfect synchronous. "Yep, we went through it all" he affectionately patted Ivy on her holographic shoulder "Ivy here sent the data files to command with the requests, we've got everything we need. Commands given us a priority over-ride, anything from orbital strikes to drop-offs, you name it, it's ours" "And everypony knows what the mission is?" Blaze asked, looking at each member of his team in turn, all of the nodded. "We go in, we capture Princess General Cadence, we get out, we get paid" Sugarcane said "it's simple, nothing's going to stop us" she patted Blaze on the shoulder "we'll get her Blaze, don't you worry" Blaze nodded his understanding. He went over to one of the pods and began entering codes into the terminal by its ramp, the console bleeped, and then a schematic appeared on the screen, showing their designated drop pods. "Right, come on everypony, it's almost time for launch" he said, and then the grated floor beneath them began to rumble. "All hands" the female voice said over the intercom, echoing loudly in the launch bay "we are exiting phase space, prime all weapons and raise shield output to maximum" Blaze looked out the huge window and watched as the blue rippling waves of the phase shields suddenly dissipated, their blue light vanishing. Beyond the phase shield was black space, and then with a sound that sounded like a god punching a mountain, the capital ship exited phase space with an enormous boom that caused the floors to shake and bits of loose equipment to fall over with a deafening clatter. ≤ΘΘΘ≥ ++THE SOLAR CAPITAL SHIP CELESTIAS GRACE ARRIVES IN ORBIT OVER THRENOR PRIME. FLANKED BY A KODIAK ASSAULT CRUISER++ ≤ΘΘΘ≥ In the void of space there hung a blue planet, floating silently in space, as of yet unaware of the imminent threat that had just arrived in orbit. Massive storm clouds were covering the planet surface, and occasionally one of the clouds would flash as an immense bolt of lightning would smash into the ground below it. As Blaze watched more ships appeared in space, suddenly appearing out of nowhere as they exited phase space, within a few moment the whole fleet had rematerialised, and they cast a shadow on the world below. Loud clangers and alarm bells began to ring, and the lights over head switched from a bright white to a dull red, bathing them in blood. The alarms where going up all over the ship, and beyond the window space began to shimmer, like it was being seen through a thick desert haze, as the shields came online "All marines prepare for drop. Firing EMP's" the voice said, and the floor beneath them began to rumble as energy was directed towards the forward cannons. After another few seconds the deck shook as the four huge plasma cannons at the prow of the ship fired their payloads, launching bright blue balls of light out into space and towards the planet. The assault had officially begun. "All marines into your drop pods" the voice said, and instantly the doors to the large, cylindrical pods slid downwards, revealing the single seats within. Blaze made his way to his pod and sat in the cushioned seat, shifting to get himself comfortable, Angel sat beside him, part of her body overlapping his since there wasn't enough room in the pod. Thick metal wires emerged from the walls around him and began plugging themselves into tiny ports along the surface of his armour, locking themselves in and holding him tight against the chair. An input jack emerged from behind the seat and plugged into his cerebral input port, and when it entered Blazes image filled with a cross sectioned picture of his body and several graphs filled with his vitals information. He looked across at Sugarcane, who was in the pod opposite his, and she winked at him. Then there was a hissing noise and the pods doors slid closed, blocking off his view and cloaking him in darkness. He sat in the dark for a few seconds, and then a dull red light turned on over head, painting him in monotones of blood red. "Checking vitals" said the female voice on the pods intercom "Heart rate: normal. Blood pressure: normal. Engaging Nanotrite feed. Activating inertia canceller…Pod is now ready for launch" through the thick armoured walls of the pod he could still hear the alarm bells ringing, he sighed and settled down in the chair, waiting. "Blaze? It's Lyra" the unicorns' voice filled his ears "good luck down there ok, I'm right here if you need anything alright" "Gotcha Lyra, I'll see you when this is over" Blaze said back, beside him Angel was fidgeting. "I'm nervous, oh goddess I'm nervous" she said, her eyes where wide "drops always do this to me" "Hey, don't worry. We're going to get through this in one piece, ok?" Blaze told her. Angel was hardwired into his own psyche, so if she was nervous, it meant he was too. "I've just got a bad feeling about this Blaze. What if we don't make it? What if we mess it up? She'll get away again" Angel was staring at him with wide, frightened eyes. "She's not going to get Away Angel, not this time" Blaze said, tensing up at the mention of Cadence. Just then the intercom came back to life. "Pods four hundred through five hundred, prepare for launch" the pod began to rumble as the booster engines fixed to the roof roared to life, causing the pod to shake. However the mooring clamps held firm, and they stayed fixed in position. Outside he heard the screaming of RAM jets as one by one the pods in his row where released and rocketed out into space. "Pod four eight seven prepare for launch" the voice said. Blaze gritted his teeth and tensed "hang on" The pod filled with a high pitch screaming as the engines reached terminal velocity. The pod shook violently, and then there was a metallic clang as the mooring clamps deactivated and Angel screamed as the pod shot downwards like a stone, its jets powering it onwards. When they passed through the shields they entered the vacuum of space, and the pod became silent as it flew through space. There was a clanking noise, and then two metal sheets in front of the door slid to the sides, revealing a window into space. Below them the world gleamed, the light of its sun causing the oceans to sparkle where it wasn't covered with clouds. Blaze could see hundreds of other pods in front of his, and knew hundreds more were following behind. 'I'm coming for you Cadence' he thought, his lips pulling back as a feral growl came up from his throat 'and I'm going to make you pay for what you've done'.