The green blood that had oozed from the wound was on the brown dirt, forming a stark contrast against the terrain. It mirrored the encounters The Rookie had faced with other extraterrestrial beings in the past. Green blood.
Oddly, it... somehow shared a semblance with his own blood. It never got easy to look at.
When The Rookie pulled the trigger, precision guided by his human instincts, he didn't aim for a vital organ. Even through the disorienting effects of the illusion, he managed to target a leg. No species he encountered had crucial organs in their lower extremities.
A voice cut through his contemplation. "How long are you going to stare at this green goo?"
Nova, his newfound companion, interjected, jolting The Rookie from his trance. How long had he been staring? He sighed and stepped back, turning around to assess his ship. The cargo bay doors were unscathed; the aliens had failed to inflict any damage. Despite catching only a fragment of their conversation, The Rookie sensed an unsettling truth. She, whoever she was, not only wanted the contents of his pelican... but also anticipated its location.
"How did they know we would be here?" The Rookie's voice cut through the air, dry and probing.
"I don't know," Nova replied, her uncertainty underscoring the mysteries of their predicament. The uncharted land held secrets that demanded unraveling, and The Rookie couldn't shake the feeling that more challenges lay ahead. "I don't detect any trackers, I can't even sense any electronic equipment that isn't ours. They must have different technology, or... just found us by dumb luck."
The Rookie sighed as the echoes of the encounter lingered. Swift and practiced movements disarmed his weapon, each step revealing the expertise of a seasoned warrior. He walked towards the small hill that revealed the forested treeline just beyond.
His black-armored figure stood solitary against the backdrop of the bright green landscape. He looked out of place, out of order. He did not belong here.
A sense of unease lingered in the air as he spoke, his voice barely above a whisper. "We have to leave. Do you think the town is safe?" There was a small break in his voice, a moment of uncertainty.
"We are alone."
In stark contrast, Nova's voice burst forth, a lively counterpoint to the solemnity of the moment. "Maybe. The... people, if we can call them people, in the town, are different than those bug guys. I was going to show you what I managed to capture before we were attacked. I can still show you. They are cute horse people, just like I said."
"Show me," The Rookie responded, his demeanor shifting as he prepared to face the unknown once more. The juxtaposition of the stoic warrior and the exuberant AI hinted at the delicate balance they would need to navigate in this peculiar world. Images of the people showed up in his visor.
The dull, gritty display of the visor's built-in colors failed to capture the vibrancy of the pictures Nova presented. The Rookie sensed that his helmet was limiting the true spectacle of the scene. In the images, various horse-like creatures adorned the screen. Some gracefully flew with wings on their backs. Pegasus. Others sported horns akin to the recently encountered aliens. Unicorns? Despite their diverse forms, each creature displayed a riot of bright, whimsical colors, radiating an aura of innocence. The low-quality images hindered facial details, or really any detail, leaving him confused. The last image was the strangest. A blue mass, a rainbow behind it. It was what took out the drone.
"I... What?" The Rookie's voice cracked, breaking his stoic composure, for a moment. The bizarreness of the fantastical creatures against the backdrop of his military background left him in a state of bewilderment. It was a world unlike any he had encountered—an unexpected blend of the familiar and the extraordinary. No other alien looked so... familiar. These looked like horses, no, ponies, from Earth. He could remember what those looked like, he saw some at a zoo, he could faintly remember.
"I am in just as much disbelief as you are! Soooooooooo let's gather more info before we-" Nova's voice was suddenly interrupted.
"...lo?"
His drone. The drone that had been downed in the town yesterday, it reconnected. Suddenly, and quickly. The Rookie felt tense, he couldn't see Nova, but he could feel her tension too. Nova cleared his screen clear, and silently brought up the camera feed.
"...ello? Hello? Can you hear me?" Audio streamed from the connection. The camera feed was down, but audio had come back. He recognized the voice, a woman's voice, the one who had tried to prevent the destruction of the drone just the day before.
"I'm sure I fixed the thing that my friend broke. This thing has so many wires, it took me all night! I was really worried I wasn't going to be able to fix it, but..." Her words spilled out rapidly, a mix of excitement and relief evident in her voice. The fragmented audio revealed snippets—a chorus of voices, laughter, and someone expressing fascination with the alien technology. The connection was fleeting, but it felt human, a connection to something beyond the isolation of the past few days.
The transmission abruptly cut off, but not before he caught the last sentence amidst the overlapping voices.
"We... are friendly."
"Please come to P...ville."
"We want to learn all about you!"
"We'll throw a party!"
The Rookie stood up, a decision made. "We will go to their town."
"It could be dangerous," Nova interjected, concern evident in her voice. "We don't even know what these... people are! We should study them at a distance, watch them. Not to mention, this would break first contact-"
"We have already broken rules, Nova. I fired on those who were here today first. These aliens, they speak our language. They-" The Rookie spoke with a calm determination.
"We are outnumbered if they attack, Lance Corporal. I-"
"We are outnumbered, I know. I have tried to reach someone, anyone, for the last few days, before you were with me. There isn't a single, not a single satellite in this region of the galaxy, much less this star system." The Rookie's frustration and agitation were palpable. He wasn't accustomed to being in command, to arguing. He would let them argue for days and not get involved, they...
They.
Who were they?
Memories surged, incomplete, hazy. They overwhelmed him, driving him to his knees. Clutching his head, he groaned in pain, the familiar headache accompanying the fragments of his past. It felt like an icepick... no, a bullet to the temple.
"Rookie!" Nova's urgent cry pierced through. Panting, he staggered back to his chair, lifting the control panel.
"We will go to this town. We are alone, Nova," The Rookie declared, his tone cold and demanding.
"I know..." Nova sighed audibly. "I know."
There wasn't much spoken, other than the routine flight checks from Nova as they ascended into the sky. The silence that ensued was deafening, creating an itch in the Rookie to break it, but his mouth felt dry with words. The flight itself was brief, almost uneventful. Taking off consumed more time than the journey to the quaint town below. The pelican descended gently, finding its place in a field a few miles outside the town. Here, nothing but grassy expanses stretched around them. In the nearby distance, an apple orchard and a charming cottage added to the picturesque scene, as if pulled from a fantasy movie.
The pelican's arrival in proximity to the town didn't go unnoticed. In the distance, flying horses observed them, sporting a variety of expressions. Some displayed fear, while others wore looks of perplexity and confusion. The Rookie marveled at how distinctly he could discern their emotions, their reactions mirroring those of humans.
The town center lay not far off. Utilizing the magnification setting on his helmet, he observed the gathering populace on the outskirts. They regarded his vehicle with the same range of expressions as the flying beings. Horns, which he had noticed in the blurry images earlier, adorned some of the inhabitants here, though not all. Most appeared without wings or horns.
The colors of these peculiar beings spanned a wide spectrum. He spotted a blue individual with vibrant hair standing beside another in hues of grey and yellow. Attempting to discern their gender, the Rookie noted a size difference between males and females, though uncertain if this mirrored Earthly species norms.
A palpable silence hung in the air, seemingly stretching into eternity as the Rookie locked eyes with the alien inhabitants, and they reciprocated the gaze. Suddenly, a stir among the townspeople caught their attention, as they gravitated toward a group of figures, potentially leaders or some form of military. The distance made it hard to discern the details.
"This is so out of SOP, Rookie. I hope you know what you're doing," Nova's voice, tinged with judgment, echoed in his helmet.
"I don't."
The Rookie stood up and reached for the pelican's hatch, hesitating as he pondered his next move. Casting a glance at the shifting mass of people, he took a small breath and pushed open the hatch, leaping out. Armed with nothing but a sidearm, he stepped onto the grass below. A slight gust of wind accompanied his boots touching the ground, offering a refreshing sensation. He walked forward step by step, gaining a clearer view of the surroundings.
Approaching him were a group of armored horses, drab in color compared to the vibrant townsfolk. Uneasy glances were exchanged among them, a small group of five guards alongside another group of six. The Rookie halted, feeling an uneasy tension. Despite wielding archaic weapons like spears, the guards posed a potential threat if they got too close.
They stopped a mere hundred meters away, scrutinizing him. Among the group that didn't resemble soldiers, each individual was uniquely strange. An orange one wearing a western hat regarded him with suspicion, a white unicorn stood nearby, her wide eyes conveying an ambiguous expression. A blue pegasus with a colorful mane seemed upset, standing protectively in front of a cowering yellow pegasus. Adjacent to them, a pink one smiled strangely, prompting the Rookie to quickly avert his eyes due to... how weird she was.
Leading them all was a purple figure, distinct from the rest, including the guards. Unfazed, she continued walking, displaying a horn on her head that differed from others he had seen. A sudden scattering of feet brought his attention to behind her. He hadn't noticed earlier, but there was some sort of gremlin in this group as well. He panted as he caught up to the purple one, the leader. He was scribbling on a parchment, with... a quill. The letter suddenly poofed away, as did the quill. The little bipedal creature, the only he'd seen here, suddenly tried to pull on the purple one's leg to halt her, but she didn't stop. He seemed too afraid to keep going, leaving her approaching him, saying one last thing as she approached.
The Rookie watched as she approached. His helmet looked down at her when she finally was just a few feet away.
"My name is Twilight Sparkle. What is your name?"