Pinkie Pie bounced along the wasteland. That meanie commander had kept coming down on all her totally awesome parties on the battlecruiser, even the ‘everybody pretend it isn’t a party on the bridge and don’t tell the commander it's a party’ party. That one still confused her, but she chalked it up to him just being that good at sniffing them out.
But none of those parties, not the ‘Check out the armory’ party or its ‘Spider mines are super fun’ after party, not even the ‘refit all the medivacs with minibars’ party had been half as good as the one that got away... and the medivacs one had been extremely popular with the marauders and marines. The hottest phrase, somewhat slurred, of that night had been: “Screw Manesssk, Pinkie fer Emprhhs!”
Those had been good parties, but the greatest of them had been the most elusive. It had, in fact, not happened at all. There was a sound behind her and Pinkie whipped about hoping someone was there, but there was not. It was enough to make her a grump for almost an entire second. Then she shrugged, and bounced along.
On the battlecruiser she’d gotten so far as somewhere called the ‘Main weapons bay,’ and just her being there had set off an awesome speaker system and a whole bunch of disco lights. It had been like a portent of awesomeness to come, except then that meanie had rushed in, wild eyed and frantic and dragged her away.
What had he said? Oh yeah - “Pinkie!! The last time you were left unattended the entire ship nearly warped backwards. And you were in the cantina the whole time! That shouldn’t be physically possible. You’ve put an adjutant into therapy, which, frankly, I didn’t think was even possible either, and don’t even get me started on... the coffee machine.”
The pony paused mid bounce, literally, and winced with the memory. That one had been entirely an accident. The last she’d seen of the battlecruiser, the port engine was still trailing plasma burnout from the damage.
“So-” and here the commander had been clinging to reason like a drowning fish clings to its bicycle, “What could possibly make you think you are allowed anywhere near the weapons bay? The infested themselves will dance before I ever see you get anywhere near having a ‘Yamato Party Cannon: three hundred megatonnes-o-fun' party.”
And so, that night, a couple of burly marines had rushed in and grabbed her. One quick escape pod ride later and here Pinkie was, battlecruiser-less. She reread the little missive she’d found inside the escape pod.
Sorry, orders are orders. No hard feelings? Those parties were totally awesome.
-Your friends, the marauders and marines.
She smiled. They’d been awesome party guests. Her bouncing gave way to a limpid walk and she bowed her head low. She was bored, and getting lonely already.
But she wasn’t as alone as she thought.
A billion micro-muscles thrummed at a subsonic frequency, pounding the compact rock and soil around them into a pasty sand. The infestor slid through it all like a land shark, at least, insofar as predatory intent went. As for the idea of sleekness and sharp fins... not so much.
There really was no way to describe the infestor as something other than a huge fat caterpillar with claws and a hundred tiny bug legs. One couldn’t help but to think in seeing it that, if only it were put on its back, it’d be entirely harmless, even amusing in a way as all its little legs kicked uselessly at the air.
That might very well have been true, but the important little detail there was about being seen first. The infestor wasn’t much to look at, but it more than made up for it with the downright bizarre biological processes it managed, and could slide through the ground undetected.
A chance presented itself to try demonstrate the most ridiculous of them. It sensed that just above it there was a powerfully pink pony, entirely conspicuous to the universe at large. As if that wasn’t enough, she was also bouncing along and singing.
Now, zerg weren’t largely given to language let alone emotions, but at the moment the infestor burst from the ground it was thinking a fair enough analogy of “Aha!”
The pony gasped in mid air as the muscular protrusion extending from the zerg latched to the back of her head with a schnick, and the force of the impact pinned her into the ground.
With the connection established the neural parasites set to work, interweaving the two creature’s synaptic pathways so quickly that Pinkie Pie didn’t even struggle. It pushed its thoughts unto the pony.
SERVE THE HIVE.
I CONTROL THE GROOVE...
What? That wasn’t right...
SERVE THE HIVE.
I CONTROL THE GROOVE...
Neural static. Static with rhythm-
SERVE THE HIVE.
I CONTROL THE WAY YOU MOVE.
Pinkie stared into the infestor’s eyes with a vacant expression. Then she smiled, and the infestor managed a brief mental scream.
HOw yOU LIkE MY GRoOVE, PINkIE?
Pinkie hoof pumped the air. “Well done! Now turn it up!”
The Infestor started full body head banging, which, because of the node linking them, whipped Pinkie through the air like a bauble. She was thrilled with it.
“WOOah! Yeah! Turn it up!”
Whatever there had been of the infestor’s mind left fled before the sheer awesomeness of the music and dance that spilled into it from Pinkie in and endless torrent.
“Oooh, what’s this do?” Pinkie said as she rummaged through the creature’s mind without challenge. At some compulsion, the big creature flung half a dozen green blobs, each big enough to hold a pony, in a rough circle around them.
Then they hatched. Monstrosities with too many tentacles and too few limbs ambled closer.
“WOO!” Pinkie yelled ecstatically. “It is officially a party!”
“SERVE THE PARTY!” the infested cried out, grooving to their own lurching, thrilling beat.
Pinkie beamed a wide smile at her newfound friends and looked up to the sky.
“I believe this means I can go get the Yamato Party Cannon now. You think three hundred megatonnes-o-fun will be enough?”