"We almost done, Twilight?" Rainbow Dash asked, stepping up to her purple friend.
"Yes! All we have to do is recite the spell." Twilight responded. Her friends had sketched a large circle on the ground, with golden symbols bordering it. A small piece of metal sat in the center, which belonged to a group of visitors from a few months ago.
These visitors was the RED team. They had met the girls, who had developed a fair camaraderie since their arrival. Now, they were ready to visit the mercenaries, in their world.
"Zecora, would you mind doing the honors?" Twilight asked, speaking to another girl. She was a little older, with dark skin, and hair streaked with black and white.
"Certainly, my friend. The next world will be just around the bend." She rhymed. Zecora, Twilight and her friends, Rainbow Dash, Applejack, Rarity, Pinkie Pie, and Fluttershy gathered in a circle around the metal shard. Twilight's companion, Spike watched a few feet away from the drawn circle. Another girl drifted next to him. Her hair was blonde, and her eyes peering in two different directions. She carried a mail bag over her shoulder, a few envelopes falling out occasionally.
"Whatcha doin'?" She asked, in a silly, innocent voice.
"Quiet, Derpy. They look like they're ready to start something important." Spike said, staring at the circle intently.
Zecora cleared her throat, reading an incantation from a book.
"Another world we shall face, transcend the bonds of time and space.
And with these realms we do connect, we shall cross the bridge we project!"
The golden circle around them hummed with power, and expanded. The ring soon flowed past Spike and Derpy, before raising up into the sky indefinitely. Everyone was condensed into a single point, and in less than in instant, they vanished.
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"Big Rock", Nevada, U.S.A.
November 5th, 1963
8:34 AM
The war between the REDs and the BLUs was over. After a marvelous recovery, the RED team had canceled the RESPAWN glitch and taken over every map in a span of a few weeks. But they were far from over. A man by the name of Gray Mann had appeared, a third brother of Redmond and Blutarch who had been in hiding. Gray murdered his brothers in cold blood, and created a massive army of robotic mercenaries. The RED team prepared for the arrival of Gray's robots, in a mining facility called the "Big Rock".
The Medic and Engineer promised they'd search for a way to get back to Equestria. But they hadn't found much progress. The Engie hunched over his workbench, fiddling with a modified version of a teleporter exit. It was bigger than normal, and had more wires and chips branching from underneath. The Medic entered the workshop, and met his mechanic friend.
"Any luck?" he asked.
The Engineer sat up, and sighed. "Ah'm afraid not. Ah've spent days on this thing, and it aint giving us anything."
"Vell, ve might need a different approach to zhis. Besides, ve need to prepare our ztrategy for ze robots."
The Engie stood up, adjusting his welding goggles. "Aw, hell! Ah nearly forgot!" He yelled, rushing out toward the team's bunker. The Medic followed him shortly.
As the Medic shut the door, the modified teleporter started to hum and spit sparks. After violently shaking, the device let out a bright flash. Standing in the room, was Twilight and her friends.
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The Medic and Engie stepped into the briefing room. The other even mercenaries stood around a circular table, covered with papers, maps, and empty ammunition boxes.
The Heavy munched on his sandwich, the Demoman was passed out, drunk. The Soldier smoked a cigar, leaning over a set of blueprints for robotic replicas. The Spy, Pyro, Scout, and Sniper simply sat at the table, quiet and deep in thought.
"Alright, ladies. According to the radar, Gray's robot-mover will be here within an hour or so. That should give us enough time to prepare." The Soldier said, scratching his chin. "They're carrying three bombs, so they're probably going to try to send a bomb with a wave of robots, each one stronger than the last."
"What are we up against here?" The Sniper asked.
"Oh, they got the whole army. Robo-Spies, Demo-knights, even giant robots. However, there's a possibility they could be bringing a-" The Soldier was cut off as a loud CLUNK rattled in the workshop, surprising the Engineer. The Demoman snapped from his hang over, rolling out of his chair.
"Buh? What's goin' on?" He slurred. The noise grew closer, which now sounded like whispering and footsteps. The Soldier cocked his shotgun, but the Engineer held him back.
"Hold on, rocket boy." Engie said to him. The mercenaries watched intently as the Engie opened the door, showing the visitors.
"Woo! We're back!" Pinkie said excitedly, launching a shower of confetti. Half of the mercenaries smiled to see the girls again, the other half exchanging confused looks.
"Who the bloody hell are they?" The Demoman asked, trying to focus on them with his good eye.
"Remember that time we disappeared? We ended up with them before we came back. The Scout replied, bumping knuckles with Rainbow Dash.
Rarity moved up to the Spy, smiling. "Remember me?" She asked.
"Uh... have we met?" He responded. Unfortunately, Rarity remembered. The RED Spy she met in Ponyville was an impostor, a BLU Spy in disguise. The BLU Spy was responsible for murdering the Medic in Ponyville, traumatizing Fluttershy for a short time, and betraying Rarity's trust. She had beat herself up over it for trusting a murderer.
"Oh... um, no. I'm terribly sorry." She said, a little heartbroken this Spy was not the one that charmed her in Ponyville.
The Medic curiously examined the three new people that followed the girls. One, he had remembered, Twilight's companion named Spike. But the other two girls were new to him.
"Who's zhis?" He asked Fluttershy.
"This is Zecora, and Derpy Hooves." she said, introducing her friends.
The Medic chuckled a little. "Derpy Hooves?" He said, humored by the name.
"That's me!" The wall-eyed girl replied. She reached into her bag, and pulled out a muffin. "Want one?" She offered.
"No, zhank you." The Medic said, still snickering.
<><><><><><><><><><><>
The Administrator sat in her dark office, staring at a large panel of computer screens. Most were just uneventful images of the Big Rock, the mine shafts that led to the Mann Co. building, where she sat, several stories above the mercenaries. One screen, she saw the mercenaries chatting with young girls. She sneered, and spoke.
"Miss Pauling, who let those girls into my facility?" She said coldly, to the woman standing behind her. Her hair was tied into a bun behind her head, and she grasped a clipboard in her hands. Miss Pauling adjusted her glasses, and stared at the screen.
"I-I don't know. They just appeared." She said timidly. "... and, for the record, on of them is a young boy."
"Do you know who they are?"
"Well, no. It could be possible those are their..." Pauling said, pausing, at examining her clipboard.
"Their what, Miss Pauling?" the Administrator asked, raising her voice.
Pauling flinched. "Well... they could be their daughters." She said.
The Administrator swiveled in her chair, turning to her assistant. "Are you insisting that their offspring just pop in, right before a battle that determines the fate of Mann Co.?"
Pauling nodded. "It's possible. Perhaps they miss their fathers. This war has been going on for... approximately three years."
The Administrator returned her attention to the screen. "What about that scrawny one?"
"The Scout?"
"Yes... the girl he's with... she looks just as old as he is."
"A sister, perhaps? A girlfriend?"
"Feh. Let's not get to ahead of ourselves here. I don't care who's who. Once those robots get here, they might as well be gone."
The Administrator stared at another screen, watching a giant, armored vehicle roll past a camera. She grabbed a nearby microphone.
"The first robot battalion is upon us. Ready yourselves for the first attack."