During the time when the strange purple pony froze everyone inside the ship under lockdown with its strange powers coming out of its horn, Ash felt it flowing through her as she froze in horror not knowing what is happening. The female Mandorian freaked out in fear that it may be her end. The next thing she knew is that the pony slowly unfroze her as she almost collapsed on the ground while bleeding from her left hoof. Unfortunately, as most of the Sectaniums retreated from the ship they were about to capture, Ash got caught up in the chaos unable to keep up with them. Before she knew it, Ash gets knocked out by an unknown creature from behind, making her fall flat face on the metal floors.
In the present, after the ship departure from the Mandor Fueling Station, they continued on their course towards Equestria. Twilight was carried by Zeck to the medical ward through the ship's hallways. Along the way, most of the crew members secure the ship of any stragglers. As soon as they entered the ward, Twilight was about to protest. However, because she isn't familiar with this ship, Twilight can't go against Zeck's decisions despite being the ruler of Equestria. Other than that, the pain from her injured hoof is slowly getting worse as Twilight could not move it too often. The next thing she knew, Chimone appeared from outside of the medical ward with a medkit in his lower right hand.
Once Zeck set Twilight down on a hospital bed, Chimone took out several medical supplies from a medkit. One of them happens to be a small, white dress wrapping bundled up in a roll. The other was a pair of tweezers. As Chimone came closer to Twilight, Zeck stood up and gave the four-armed alien some space.
"Twilight, can you please show me your hoof?" Chimone asked.
As soon as Twilight raised her injured hoof, Chimone used the tweezers with his upper right hand.
"Do you need anything before I can treat your injuries?"
"No, I'll take my chances." Twilight reluctantly said as Chimone prepares to do the operation.
As he puts his tweezers closer to her hoof, Twilight grunted in pain while trying not to scream as she felt the tweezers enter into her flesh. During that time, Twilight immediately gripped onto Zeck's left hand with her other hoof while trying to let out the pain.
Zeck grunted at the same time as he felt a bit of pressure on his hand caused by Twilight's uninjured hoof. He couldn't tell which part of Twilight is more pressurized, her powers or her physical strength. Either way, he gritted his teeth in little agony while being forced to kneel when using his right hand to pry her hoof off him, thinking that his hand is about to break.
"Ugh. Ow! I think you can let go now, Twilight! He's already done."
Upon seeing Chimone remove the tweezers from the wound on her other hoof, Twilight lets go of Zeck's hand as she took a few deep breathes. At the time, Chimone used the dress cloth to wrap around Twilight's injured hoof to stop the bleeding.
For Zeck, he took a closer look at his squeezed hand. Thankfully, he didn't have any broken bones on it. However, he still felt a bit of stiff pain coming from it as his hand turned red, showing a small hoof mark on it.
"T-Thanks, Chimone." Twilight said, feeling relieved that her injury was treated at the moment.
"No problem, your Majesty. But seriously, did you really have to confront that Warrior by yourself? Imagine if he had you under his mind control. It would've got worse than just getting shot at." Chimone replied, before scolding her of her actions.
"Sorry, Chimone, but I already fought with people like them even before I became like this." Twilight retorted in a stern voice. "Anyway, where is Xul?"
"She'll be coming too, your highness. Thankfully, she was just out cold when they attacked us." Zeck answered briefly before turning towards Chimone.
"Kcez, nac I keaps ot uoy edistuo?" Chimone told the Captain.
Upon hearing Chimone's voice, he got up on his feet before leaving Twilight and Xul in the ward to recover.
After Zeck and Chimone left the Medical ward, Twilight turns to see Xul sitting on her bed holding her head with her left hand as if she had a big headache.
However, Xul immediately got back on her feet before going up to Twilight.
"I think they're both up to something, Twilight. " Xul told her before she left the medical ward, leaving Twilight confused.
In the hallways, Xul took out a small device from her pocket before making her way towards where Zeck and Chimone are at.
Inside the briefing room, Zeck and Chimone decided to make a private conversation.
"I still don't know why would she be the one ruling over her own homeland. Something doesn't seem to add up." Chimone pondered, going over the results of her immediate actions. "I mean, she looks pretty young for an alien monarch. If our fellow UFF leaders see her in-person, they may not take her roles very seriously since we don't have enough evidence to prove that she is worth anything to them."
"Her supernatural, inhuman powers are one thing but she didn't even tell anyone what to do yet." Zeck replied. "Not that it matters, we all should be grateful that Twilight freed us from Terram. We all owe her this much. I'm pretty sure that her fellow ponies all respect her when she was able to get along with them first, before gaining that much power back on her planet."
"That's not what I'm getting at. She didn't even pulverize those interlopers when they attempted to take over our ship when she had the chance. She hasn't resorted to any authoritative control yet." Chimone snapped at the UFF Captain as he shook his head in negativity. "Whoever made her ruler must have some foolish, naive votes aiming towards her. The other higher ranking UFF commanding officers may not be able to see Twilight as a important ally like we did. In fact, they may try to order us to take over her planet by force, using it as a base of operations while holding Twilight hostage."
"That may be a bad decision to make by the higher authorities. If she finds out about this, Twilight might......." Zeck retorted before Chimone interrupted him.
"Sorry, Zeck. I think Equestria needs a better leader. I don't think she can help us if she let those enemies off easily like that." Chimone concluded. "She may not be that powerful than she looked. Besides, I know how the leaders of my race handle their enemies whenever they see them. So, if they aren't convinced that she is any use to them as well, then once we reach her homeland, we're going to do this my way, not your way. After all, I was once the Royal Consort of the Queen that used to rule over my homeland until she was assassinated by the Sectaniums."
"You cannot be serious, Chimone." Zeck said, angrily at Chimone before being interrupted by another alien who is part of the UFF. "We told Twilight that we already pledged ourselves to treat every alien race nicely as well as helping free innocent lives from the Sectanium Empire. Also, we'd promise that we'd keep Twilight safe and that we'll discuss how we can help defeat the Sectanium once we arrive in her homeland, didn't we?!"
"Maybe so, but we still need to consult all of this with the other UFF rebel leaders as soon as we meet up with them at their nearest military port in our territory." Chimone said, going back on their promise with Twilight. "It's still possible that our fellow rebel leaders will not agree with Twilight being the leader of her own ponykind."
"That's the last thing I would want to expect. Well, I hope it doesn't come to that!!" Zeck wagered.
In a surprise, the UFF alien appeared right behind Zeck in a worried expression.
"Captain, we're receiving a message from the Sectanium Empress." The alien reported in.
At the ship's command bridge, the men operating there hear the doors open up as they see Captain Zeck and Chimone appear before them. Once both of them enter the bridge, the operators saluted the Captain as one of them opens up a huge, wide screen in front of them.
As the screen appeared, an large image of a female Sectanium alien is seen with an angry look on her face. In Zeck's theory, she felt totally flabbergasted and frustrated for a very good reason.
She was seen with red-purplish skin and is wearing a black royal gown reaching down to her ankles. She has a golden circlet on her head and has two huge diamond-like earrings hanging from both of her sides. As she makes her announcement to Zeck on the screen, the Empress makes her question loud and clear.
"This is Empress Vanista Rantu of the Sectanium Empire. Are you the real Captain of the ship?" The Empress asked sternly towards Zeck Stone.