//------------------------------//
// CH6 
// Story: MLP FIM/Halo: Towards the broken dawn… 
// by Evident Disaster 
//------------------------------//

CH6

Drawn to the Dawn

XXXXX

Location: Evergreen District

Time: 2:12 PM

James walked around with Skyline; he was cheered as he headed to the library where Sky lived. His countering of Trixie and her humiliation had lifted everyone’s mood; they jeered her off the stage when she finally got changed out of his cloak. Ponies believed that Whitetail was a spirit for sure, they too were frightened, but not as much as they laughed at the magician who had they had to tolerate. Trixie finally learned her lesson not to keep acting so superior, when others could easily outmatch her.

James was heralded as a hero, and ponies in Evergreen seemed to spread news rather fast, Ponies handed him flowers and small tokens of thanks for dealing with the troublesome mage. As they headed to the library past the alchemist, a large bulky called to James. 

“You there Whitetail, was it?” The buffalo asked.

“Yes.” James answered.

“You have impressive stealth skills, but you are no spirit, for I can sense true spirits. And you do not show the signs or markings, and I possess a scrying orb, one that can wash the natural from the unnatural, you show up as neither normal nor spiritual.” Wild One produced a deep blue orb.

James knew that he couldn’t really tell what this being was talking about, but he was sure that Wild One knew how to find him. 
“I’m not from here as you can tell, and I do admit that calling me a sort of spirit wouldn’t be correct, but that doesn’t mean I cannot go by such a guise can I?”

Wild one blinked and said. 
“Of course you can, I merely wanted to say that you have exceptional skills at hiding, and I do wish to give you this gift of appreciation to deal with that silly mare.” He handed James a vial.

“What is it?” James asked.

“A rare concoction from the deserts around Appleloosa, Desert Dew, it will be of aid when you travel the deserts of my home, as it keeps the body well above tolerable against the harsh conditions of the barren lands. And its orange flavoured.” He finished.

“Thanks.” James replied to the gift.

The large buffalo headed off leaving Skyline and James to continue on their way to the library, they arrived a few minutes later at the steps to the front door. Skyline unlocked the door and James followed her in through the large oak doors, the first floor which he had been only for a moment was rather interesting now that he could see it without rushing. 

Large oak like wooden shelves and cases were everywhere, there was also a counter at the front, it had a small computer and some calendars metal filing cabinets and some keys. At the back were the rooms to the rear entrance to the library and the cleaning cabinet and maintenance room, and what he assumed was a restoration facility for older books. Skyline headed off behind her terminal and began to check on something’s.

“You can take a look around on the other floor as well; just don’t go into my room like last time.” She shot a look at James.

James didn’t need another warning, he had seen her before. “I understand.” He replied.
He walked away from the mare and walked through the library, he found a door to the left wing of the library, and it had a computer sign on it. As he entered he found that there was a small computer room, he exited and headed over to the right side of the library and found a quiet reading section, and a private study isle. 

He headed upstairs shortly and began to take a proper look around. The room above was one patented for the library custodian/keeper, it was a home made for them to live within, with or without others, and there were 4 bedrooms, small and probably made for guests, 2 bathrooms, a kitchen, laundry room, dining room and one living room. The whole level was made for a family, which only raised the question. Why was Skyline living here alone?

James decided to withhold his question for a later time; he finished looking around and decided to head up the next level. The other level was rather interesting, when he came through here the last time it had many windows, and for a good reason as well, he entered into one room and noticed that it was rather dark, when he activated his lowlight vision he could see what there was. 

A large machine assembled underneath a sky roof, the shutters above were closed so that no one could enter and also stopped light from entering into the room, and he could see that this machine was some sort of reflector. There was a brake nearby and he grasped the handle and pulled it to the other side that began the movement of a pulley which then opened the shutters, but also started up the machine. 

The large device unfolded and peeled open like a flower as the sky roof gave way for it, as it blossomed he could see the beauty of the machine in front of him. It was a solar sail, one that stretched around the corner of the library, its material shimmering in the sun warmly; he wondered what purpose it served, it was then that Skyline arrived from down below.

“Oh so that’s what the ruckus was.” She commented and went over to him.

“I guess you found the sun sail project.” She continued as she began to pull and some ropes. 

“What is this for?” James inquired.

“A special project my grandfather came up with, he always loved to feel the warmth of the sun, passed away some years ago, and left me with the library. The solar sails here were made as a gift for me and others, it was meant to catch light and bounce and absorb it so we can use it to power the town and further develop it, but sadly due to lack of support in the sun sail project ponies gave up on it. Only passing tourists who come here every half a year only come for the sun shifts, because the light causes the sails to emit a beautiful glow across the dawn.” She sounded rather sombre of the memories and he could tell that this item before her was deeply meaningful.

It was then that she pulled the brakes back and another lever and watched as the machine closed up and the whole machine folded back up. 
“I think dinner time’s coming up soon enough, you want to eat out?” She asked.

“I think I might have to return to the jungle soon enough…” He replied thoughtfully.

She had a disheartened look and replied. 
“Oh…”

“But I think I will stay for dinner.” He told her.

“Really?” She said in a hopeful tone.

“Yes.” He replied.

She was about to jump in joy, but held her enthusiasm and said. “Okay then, I better get changed, we’ll get something taken out from the Neighpon store down the road.” She hurried off.

XXXXX

Location: Canterlot

Time: 12:09 PM

Ponies gathered for noon tea, it was rather a fascinating spectacle as Pinkie Pie went over to make the pastry and the beverages, she was rather insistent on it and also asked to borrow the royal kitchens for an hour or so, so now they just needed to wait for the pink pony to finish her baking and come back to the room. So now we move on from there to the girls who were…

“BAM” 

A pink blur entered the room with a large silver trolley and tray and yelled. “Who wants cake and tea?” She asked everyone.
Now that I’ve been smacked aside by that very door to the front lens, might I add that the computer doesn’t come with a 1 year warranty and it’s a pain to get it fixed? 

“Oh silly don’t worry about the front screen, you should be worried about the cupcakes!” The pony replied cheerily absent to the fact that everypony was wondering what she was doing speaking to a wooden owl which had been perched atop of a stool. 

“Pinkie who are you talking to?” Twilight asked from her chair. 

Twilight had a change of clothes from the incident as she had been in a rather nasty mess, she now had a rather waistless shirt which was form fitting and a pair of blue pants on which was also form fitting and all of it was suggested by Rarity.

“Oh it’s just the author Twilight, don’t worry, he’s just grumpy I messed up his camera angle. So what’ve you been up to?” She asked pulling off the tray of cupcakes and placing them on the coffee table with a flick of her wrist.

Rarity replied. 
“Not much Pinkie dear, we have been discussing the intricate knowledge of what this alien carried with him, however Twilight cannot recall what she saw properly, and we’ve been trying to come up with a reason why.”

Twilight interjected. “Actually it’s not why I can’t recall the memories, its more that I shouldn’t recall them, from the alien, who I actually know as a person named Miguel, he’s had things rather bad, and Celestia sent me a message this morning warning me to not talk or recall those things until she and Luna can attend to us.”

“Right, because we don’t need you going nuts again and nearly sending us all flying over the room again.” Dash commented.

Applejack threw the Pegasus a glare and said. 
“We need the princesses to help out on what we’ve learned, and I think it’s good to be sure.”

Fluttershy nodded with Rarity agreeing. 
“As long as we’re all given an understanding to what we’ve seen that’s enough for me. Not to mention I do want to look at his clothes, he has an interesting sense of clothing.”

It was then that the doors opened, Princess Luna arrived with a box in her hands and a pair of glasses on her head and a number of other items she was carrying. She hurried over and placed the objects down and then greeted them all. 
“Good to see that you have all had time to rest, and it is a welcome sight to see that you are well Twilight.”

Twilight thanked her for her concern. Luna then began. 
“Now I know that you had looked at some objects that the alien had possessed, however I and Celestia believe that this would be the opportunity to go into more depth of detail for specific items.”

“Because I know what they are?” Twilight asked the princess.

Luna and the others looked at her. Luna was rather surprised; she didn’t know that Twilight would catch on so easily. 
“Y-yes, Celestia explained that you have been able to delve into the mind of the alien, you had also learnt more about it than any of us here, and you should be able to determine the objects present and help reveal their purposes.” 

Twilight nodded, it was understandable, they needed to know what they were looking at, and Twilight had gotten to know more about them than anyone present. 
“Very well, but I’d rather take it slowly.”

Luna nodded; she carefully brought out the first item. It was a strange card, it was rectangular but had a certain thickness to it, and a clear cut hole was in the middle with what looked like a crystal, it made the others wonder when this object was found. 
“We found this after the incident, it was sticking out loosely from the skull of the alien, and we believe that the alien’s body must have ejected it once Twilight exited from its mind.”

Twilight was the first to look at it, she could see the outlines of the card, the intricate lines that were engraved upon it and the crystal centre glowed luminously white. It was a beautiful yet dangerous thing. She knew what it was. 
“This is a neural interface card, it was made specifically by the military organisation of this being’s race to record combat information and also to interface with a sort of hive network like our internet, but on a greater scale that encompasses whole star systems and possibly even further.”

The girls were surprised at how casually Twilight spoke about the object and how direct, it was a like listening to a computer just spouting back the words that was typed into it. Twilight put the object down and looked at the next item; it was a small black box, the six of about 2 mobile phones (Think Motorola 2009 models). 

The object seemed rather smooth and hadn't seemed to have any obvious signs of interface, but Twilight knew what it was, she pressed exactly in the bottom of the object and then twisted and the box suddenly clicked open, it revealed a small housing for other objects, what looked like a tool kit, objects like small spanners or attachable screw heads and pins. It was made for field work. 
“Maintenance kit for the troops, it wasn’t made for much aside for repairing damaged gear. It was also used to crack open enemy machines and help deal with interfacing non-solid computers.”

She placed the toolbox away and then looked into the objects and pulled some bits of what looked like fabric, a coat of arms on one of the bits of fabric made her pause. She then placed it down in a neat pile next to the other pieces, she then looked again and pulled out a circular disk like object, it was 4 layers thick and had multiple pieces of joining rings which held it together. It had a single glass orb in the middle and on closer inspection the glass had strange little shapes inside, it was like someone had made it with wires.

Twilight recalled this item as well. 
“This is a personal projector, it’s meant to be like some sort of entertainment system or computer.”

Rainbow exclaimed. 
“That’s awesome, so it’s like one of those projector things that get used in cinemas?”

“Sort of, but I think it’s got to do with 3D projections, because it isn't like a flat image, it’s something more complex. I really can’t recall too much about this, but it does have to do something like 3D…” She looked at the object and tried to think about how it turned on. 

Her memories soon found the ridges of buttons on the rim of the disk, she keyed in the activation code and then it activated, it was like doing this a million times, even though she had never done it before, she guess that it had something to do with taking in the memories of Miguel. 

“Bring up main files, start-up standard mainframe.” She said directly.

The others were about to ask what she did when the object began to glow, she laid it on the floor in front of her and watched as the projection came to life, the others gasped in surprise at the sight of the image. Glimmering lights displayed a net of boxes which stretched over the whole screen, and then the image glowed in the centre which displayed a crisscross of boxes highlighted, it was a surprising sight for sure. 

She watched as the box cleared away and the screen changed, it loaded a panel of 9, 3 by 3. It was a strange thing, the others were baffled by the difference of language and could only see similar like writing to their own, but it didn’t make much sense in terms of the characters. Twilight could see all of it though, she ran her hand over to the settings on the computer and then began to locate the language translator, and she hit the button to decipher her words. 

“Language Protocol, NA-A1 though to A10, Decrypt.” She ordered.

The others wondered what she said to the machine, but it was apparent that she knew what she was doing. The machine ran the changes and adapted them; everyone could then see the writing, it was as clear as day. Luna inquired. 
“Twilight how much do you know about this alien’s technology?”

“I don’t know, I just unconsciously just say it, it’s like being born with the knowledge, it’s so strange, but it works at least.” She replied. 

The others weren’t so sure about how much Twilight knew, but it was at least it was working, the machine responded to them properly now. She flicked through the programs as if she had done it a million times before, and sensed something familiar with the word archives. 
“Access public archives.” 

The screen changed to green and then it revealed everything in neat piles, history and education to the years of science, the sight was amazing, as it had over 2000 stores of data on all of the areas. Twilight was intrigued, but she didn’t dare open anything just yet, her head was still recovering from her last trip from curiosity and she’d rather wait and see if anything changes in the meantime.

She returned to the main screen and said. 
“I think we might want to hold off on doing anything till tomorrow.”

Luna and the others were confused. 
“Why?”

“I don’t feel great at the moment; I’d rather wait a little bit longer.” Twilight evaded.

The other girls knew when something was wrong, but they had to give her own personal space, she had gone through something rather traumatic only a short time ago. They agreed and Luna gave them time to go and get some rest of time off, they’d reconvene the next afternoon as soon as Twilight felt better and possibly when Celestia might take time off from the court to come and see them.

Twilight thanked the Luna princess and headed off, she needed time to think. And she’d spend that time with the alien, she knew that visiting him wouldn’t probably improve what’s happened, but she just wanted to know if anything was different. She had to know…

XXXXXX

Time: Offline

Location: Unknown

Status: Neural Reboot procedure underway, time est. 5 seconds.

Rebooting neural systems now… warning neural card has been removed. Alter mainframe to backup neural index and then restart, program underway… completed, neural backup restored and program initiated. BIOS check, POST check, ready… BOOT initiated. The neural cards came to life, his memories were mostly intact, but without a proper neural card in place he had lost his quantum processor and thus the boot was going to be a slower process than what it would have been with a quantum card still in his head.

But the emergency program knew what to do, if it wasn’t for the fact that the card had been removed it might have never woken the marine up, but stasis wouldn’t have been the smartest thing the neural processor could have thought about. Once the POST and BIOS cleared up, the marine’s body began to check if everything was ready and set.

‘All neural pathways are clear, no sign of memory loss, warning, energy surge at point 3122 may have compromised neural circuitry in frontal lobe, detection of no damage to frontal lobe, beginning emergency stimulation in 30 seconds.’ The internal neural computer stated.

Miguel could feel all of his memories and dreams pass through, his body began to check if everything was in place, he felt nothing was wrong, just sore. He then felt his eyes, his hearing and his touch come back; he opened his eyes and found darkness. He couldn’t see anything except the low hum of machines and a slow beeping noise, it made sense, his heart stimulation was unlikely to happen just from a wakeup call, the only thing that’d get him really up and going would be something more ambiguous. 

His eyes began to adjust as he got up, his augmentations from years in service also included low light vision, his eyes began to adjust to the low light and made out what was in front of him, it looked like a hospital, but not one that he’d seen before in real life, medical beds and sheets in shelves. He could see the heart rate monitor and the many other arcane instruments of medicine lying around; this was definitely not an alliance hospital, but more an old style hospital like the ones in the border colonies of Tysis.

He didn’t have much to complain about, his pod had hit higher resistance on impact and he had been knocked out by the sheer impact of hitting the ground, he did recall something in his legs breaking and his shoulder and collar bones. He grasped his shoulder and leg and found that both were now healed, his biological augmentations had probably dealt with them.

He climbed out of the medical bed and removed the wires and tubes, as soon as he heard the flat line noise, he hurried over and began to search for his clothes, he checked 3 draws and found what was left of his clothes, only the pulse resistant suit and his jacket was all that he could find, he also pulled out one thing that was overlooked, his hidden assault gauntlets.

The gauntlets hadn't much to look at, but when worn and activated they’d be able to hold onto almost anything, they had enhancers, and one glove had a hidden dagger and the other had a 12 round magazine of 11mm bullets integrated pistol. It wasn’t hard to see why these gauntlets were called assault gauntlets.
Miguel made his way to the door as he heard noise from outside, he had to blink as the lights came on and the door began to hiss open, he moved out of sight and waited at the door, as soon as it swung open a pair of aliens rushed in, they came upon the sight of the empty bed, and then they saw Miguel as he reached out and grabbed them.

He knew the human body and from what these beings looked like, they were human like enough, he jabbed with precision force into one nurse’s throats and she collapsed into unconsciousness and the other shouted in surprise, he put his hand around a pressure point and then dropped her down as well. Both aliens incapacitated he exited the room; he could hear the sounds of panic as more aliens rushed down hallways into the medical wing.

He rushed down hallways to wherever his instincts told him to go, his head was a bit slow seeing as he didn’t have his neural card, which meant that he was operating with both sides of his brain but unable to function it to peak efficiency. He still did have his incredible reflexes and reaction so he didn’t need to worry too much about his neural card at the moment.
He passed another corridor, but as luck would have it he ran into trouble, 4 aliens were in full armour at the end of the corridor he had run into, he didn’t slow down though, he rushed forwards at full tilt and got up and close and personal with them in moments. He threw his weight into his first attack and dented the armour of the nearest guard; the poor stallion never knew what hit him.

Miguel threw another punch and rammed his fist into the second guard and dropped him from the punch, he grabbed the third and lifted him upwards and tossed him into the last guard knocking them both down, Miguel didn’t waste time as he rushed onwards through the door of the next room and into the depths of the facility.

He found himself running deeper into another level and when he entered into this section, he found out where he was. He entered into a room filled with body bags and wrecked UCAF vehicles, he could see dozens of body bags with the tags of marines he knew, he could name almost all of them. He wasn’t saddened by the sight, he was remorseful for those who had gone and died in the years since he joined.

He ignored the bodies and got going again, he found the exit to the next section and hurried into an open chamber of what looked like glowing gems, he didn’t bother looking around; he could hear more guards rushing into wing. He dashed across wing to where he could see a possible escape route, or one that’d lead him straight into a group of aliens.

He found that his instincts were right on the point, he found his way into a room that headed upwards, he was rewarded with the sight of the top of a mountain looking downwards, he was currently in some sort of mountain facility, that was for sure, the only problem he had was that there was no exit here.
He rushed onwards to the next rooms and found his way to what looked like a loading bay, it was just over an open area where there were dozens of aliens milling about, and he decided to sneak around the whole mess of aliens. He made his way to the doors of the loading bay and avoided detection.

He made his way across a beam overhanging a section and found his way to a door where he assumed it was locked, and of course luck wasn’t going to let him that well off, the door opened and an alien stepped in, her body froze as she saw him and then paused. Miguel didn’t have many options; he bolted it for the alien and grabbed her.
The alien screamed loud enough to get the attention of the hangar, he grabbed the alien by the arm and pulled his own arm around its neck and pressed his pistol gauntlet to its neck and shouted. 
“Don’t move!”

The aliens seemed to have mixed reactions as they didn’t understand what he said, but they understood what he was doing, he had one of theirs and he was threatening to harm her if they didn’t back off. They alien guards gave him space as he slowly backed away with the alien to the loading bay doors. 
He backed into the doors and opened them at the control panel, the doors slid open and revealed that no one was behind them, he continued to pull his hostage along, once he got onto the loading pad he realised that it was hanging above at the top of a building, there was a sharp 6 meter drop that he could see, but with all these guards, he doubted he’d escape that easily.

He decided to even the odds, he aimed high at the top of a crane that he could see, it held a box in its claws, he lifted his arm and fired 3 rounds, the bullets tore through the cables and dropped the box down, all the aliens had cleared well out of harm’s way and the guards were distracted, Miguel dropped the alien hostage and ran to the edge of the platform and hit the lower level in moments.

He was in the courtyard of the facility and he began a full sprint to the gates of the facility, he could hear the shouts of many aliens on approach. He reached the gates where he saw 2 armed guards with rifles, he didn’t waste time as he fired at their weapons, his 11mm rounds ripped their rifles apart with ease and he proceeded to kick them out of his way.
He grasped the gates and pulled himself over them, he was now outside of the facility in what he could see was an open street of a city of sorts, what amazed him was that there was civilians all around the area, he made his way through the streets to wherever he could find cover, or a place to recuperate.

However as he ran through the streets he found it harder to find a safe spot as he soon ran into plenty of civilian places, aliens screamed as he ran past, of course they’d scream he had the blood on his fists and arms, not to mention he himself had obvious differences from these aliens. He ran into a café where he was greeted by some waiter, he pushed by and ran through the fancy café.

Aliens all around stood up in shock others knocked back as he pushed through, he ended up at the back of a balcony next to a water fall, and it led down to the next couple of levels into the more urban sections of the city. He could see some rather aristocratic looking aliens who seemed to be shocked, appalled or simply curious to see him there.

He saw a blue haired male with a monocle and in a very expensive looking suit with a pink haired super model, she seemed to grasp his shoulder as Miguel went over and pulled the table cover from the table and tied it into a makeshift chute, he didn’t want to break his legs again. He heard the noise of guards and this time they came from above.
He could see, winged aliens pointing at him, he would have assumed he was hallucinating if it wasn’t for the fact that he needed to escape, but what also caught his attention was the 9 aliens in skin tight suits rushing at him. He didn’t waste any more time and vaulted the balcony and downwards to the next level of the city.

He didn’t seem to have much luck on escaping the sights of the flying aliens; they chased his makeshift parachute as it made its descent to the ground, he got about halfway to the next level when they made their move, a sleek looking female made her move and got behind him, she tried to grab his legs and another 3 made their move to grab him from all around.

He kicked and knocked back, and then he knocked one male and he flew into his parachute, the grasp of the chute was torn from his grasp, he dropped into the waterfalls’ grasp and he went down in a sharp pull to the aqueduct below. He hit the water with his feet down. When he breached the water he saw another thing that’d probably confuse him further, aliens with tails and fins smiling and laughing now looking at him in surprise.

He didn’t know how much more his head could take before he began to think he was truly messed up or delusional, he pulled himself out of the water and onto a wall of the aqueduct, he pulled himself up and was then greeted by the sounds of dozens of armoured feet, dozens of aliens rushed in, they surrounded him from the air and the ground, he thought how many he could take on.

He didn’t have enough time to go start the largest punch out in the history of Equestria as a sudden burst of light dropped a young alien in front of him. She had purple skin and purple eyes, they glimmered so warmly, she looked at him and then he knew her, she was from his dreams. She reached out and grasped his face and her horn glowed.
He didn’t feel anything else afterwards.

XXXXX

Now this is quite serious, but as a question from one reader, he’d wonder if I should add tails, now about the tails, I need a vote, and someone willing to help me go over my work, as in if you can just adjust a few scenes and suggest where else the tails might be noticed just tell me so I can edit sections. 
But first the vote, would you rather I leave them without tails, which means they’re neko’s anyway in a more direct fashion, because they aren’t necessarily horse like at all, and people have been bringing that up, but the term still does kind of fit them, so I don’t know. You guys need to tell me.

I have been working hard for a while and updates will be slow, so you'll have to wait a while longer.