"Does it fear that its enemy will come here?" Princess Luna whispered to her sister.
"Quite possibly. We need to reassure it, somehow, without taking it outside to see. Do you remember the mental projection spell I taught you, Twilight? Luna and I are going to try that, and I need your help." Princess Celestia declared softly, still holding her ground as the alien watched them all in silence.
"I'm ready, Princess."
"I must warn you, Twilight, this creature comes from an entirely different world than us. They may have developed in such a way were this spell doesn't even work on them, such as with Dragons. I just need you to keep the link strong along with Luna while I do all of the 'talking'. Do you understand?"
Giving a determined nod and turning once more to face the alien, Princess Celestia smiled proudly down at her student before turning towards her sister and nodding in unison with her; all three of their horns glowing brightly as little strands of magic began protruding from the tips, connecting into a larger one and snaking its way through the air towards the alien, who took a step back as it approached and soon found her back connecting with the cold metal wall of her cell as the tendril phased through its mask and into its mind...
Princess Celestia felt cold. Very, very cold. Back in reality, she was sure her body shivered, but in the darkest depths of the aliens mind, all it was was a feeling.
Celestia was incredibly curious, however, as the purpose of this age-old spell was to calm enraged beasts of the wild by being able to explain that everything was going to be alright, in short.
But nothing greeted Princess Celestia's vision, and the soft sounds of tired panting came closer and closer, slowly, until a blinding light erupted and Celestia had to shield her eyes as a loud voice boomed.
When she reopened them, she was greeted by the most bizarre scene: several scaleless, tailless, and bland-looking little dragonlings were running side by side in the mud, and it appeared as if Celestia was watching from inside one of their heads.
Is this one of the alien's memories? Princess Celestia thought in confusion. How did I end up here?
Celestia snapped her attention back to the view as the alien looked up and to the side at a much taller, meaner looking version of the scaleless dragonlings, who screamed in anger at the alien.
In response, Celestia was granted a vision of mud and found herself riding along as peach-colored arms grabbed out to pull the being forward under shiny, sharp-looking strings of metal.
The view continued for a few more minutes, showing the creature running again, alongside several of the same creatures, while the taller ones continued shouting at them.
The scene faded to black after the group of small aliens reached a tall flag pole and began climbing to the top, and Celestia found herself bathed in darkness once more, until the thundering sound of an explosion rocked her head and the scene changed.
Now, Celestia was looking through a green-tinted black box. In it, she could make out several bipedal creatures running around and glancing about before the the little plus sign in her vision locked onto the head of one of them and tracked it like a hunter as it fled.
A moment later, another thunderous boom sounded and Celestia had to blink just to clear her vision as she found that the green-tinted box was attached to a long and menacing-looking stick which the creature wielding it apparently tossed behind itself as it stood and began running in the opposite direction.
Celestia could tell that it was night time, but... But it was off. It looked almost like the sun was up and casting its beautiful glow through the heavy rain.
The creature hurried through the undergrowth at incredible speeds and disappeared through the swath of plants as her vision blackened once more.
When it returned, Princess Celestia found the creature holding onto, and studying, two metal tabs attached to a thin chain as a voice talked softly into her right ear. Celestia couldn't understand any of it, and the creature seemed to ignore it as she simply sat there, staring at the metal tabs with strange markings etched into them.
When the alien turned its head sideways, all Celestia saw were lifeless bodies of beings not unlike the tall, shouting ones from the first memory. The voice in Celestia's ear kept repeating one phrase softly every now and then, as if trying to get the creatures attention: Bae thae oun tou.
Celestia figured it might be the aliens' name, but she also understood that she might repeat it completely wrong if she said it aloud.
What Celestia took for a sigh sounded and the creature closed its eyes before opening them again to reveal a completely different scene. Now, Celestia recognized some of the creatures the armored alien had drawn from before, brought to life from nightmares rather than reality, it seemed.
Several of the taller ones wore white armor that looked more ceremonial than battle-ready, and one that ventured too close was struck with the end of the stick before it pointed back down at it and erupted into an endless stream of thunder and small lightening as the creature beneath it let out a pained roar and soon fell still.
A few more thunderous booms sounded all around Celestia, some coming from the stick she could see, before the room fell silent. When the creature turned towards what Celestia could only imagine was a large metal bird incapable of flight, a bulky, orange-colored being stepped into sight wielding a log, as opposed to the sticks that the others she had seen held.
Now, much to her horror, Celestia saw that the others who had previously been alive and fighting not all that long ago lay collapsed on the floor with puddles of blood around them; most with evil-looking purple spikes buried in them at odd angles, as if whatever had placed them there continued to do so after they had fallen.
Whatever being she currently inhabited paid little attention to them and hurried around the bulky creature to some odd machine on the back of the bird.
Celestia sat and watched in sorrowful silence as the two remaining beings exchanged a few words before the orange one disappeared outside the transparent wall, a small tear splashed against the inside of the beings helmet.
And then, everything went black, yet again.
Celestia felt no cold, no fear, no anger.
Nothing, except a peaceful calm.
She couldn't help but bend her knees and lay on the warm, sun-baked grass that-
Grass. Celestia realized with a start, flicking her eyes open to see her own face reflected back at her in the aliens' mask.
This is how the spell was supposed to go. It was supposed to transport the two minds into a calm and peaceful environment, which quite frequently happened to be a plain, grassy field expanding on forever.
And yet, Celestia's heart thumped in her chest as she stared into the beings mask, hoping that whatever deity above her would keep it from doing anything drastic, despite Celestia knowing full-well that she could not be harmed in this realm of dreams.
The creature began to speak, its garbled and guttural language taking a moment to clear itself out before it began speaking clearly.
Usually, this didn't take as long as it did, but it made sense, to Celestia, that whatever god or goddess currently observed was as unfamiliar with their language as was she.
"-my weapon." The creature finished, its voice a hard feminine as Celestia imagined a block of polished wood sliding against an unpolished granite floor.
"Hello. My name is Princess Celestia, and I-" Princess Celestia began, hoping to keep everything calm and orderly as if she was dealing with a diplomat.
The alien, however, would not have any of this and repeated its demand. "Give me back my weapon, horse."
"Well, I'm actually a pony, but-" Celestia explained with an awkward smile.
"I don't care what you are. Just give me back my weapon and I might cooperate with you and your kind." the alien commanded, still sitting on its knees in front of Celestia.
"You are in no position to be making demands, alien. Especially ones concerning that thunderous device."
"That 'thunderous device' will save your planet's life, and my own, when they come."
A brief silence overcame the two as the bipedal began looking around. "Where are we?"
"Who is they?" Princess Celestia asked.
"I asked you where we were, hor-"
"And I asked you who 'they' is. If my little ponies are at risk of being thrown into a war with an unknown alien species, then I have every right to be prepared!" Princess Celestia snapped, rising to her hooves.
In response, seeing it as preparation for an attack, the alien struck first- delivering her elbow into the creatures jaw and building up for a swift kick.
She would have followed through, however, had her fist not passed right through the horse as if it were a hologram.
But Celestia did not feed into the anger that she felt building up inside of her; moreso towards the thought of a millennium of work being undone, along with the possible extinction of her kind, rather than towards the alien.
"You cannot harm me, beast, but neither can I, you. My sister and pupil hold the gates for us to return, but they will only open at my command, and I will only open them after I have answers. Do you understand, and agree? This will be a very long silence, otherwise." Princess Celestia said sternly, not letting he gaze drift from the creature's reflective mask.
"Fine." was the only response Princess Celestia received, and with that, she let out a deep breath that she hadn't been aware she was holding. "But on the condition that I have my weapon back. Even without it, your 'little ponies' are hardly a fight."
"Why do you desire that thing of destruction so much? All it does is destroy; surely you must wish for a rest from war, if what I gathered is correct. You are a soldier, yes?" Princess Celestia began calmly.
"Yes, I am a soldier. My weapon is my life. Without it, I am defenseless- I am weak. With it, I am strong- I am a symbol of hope."
"Hope for whom?"
"...For humanity."
"I don't understand." Princess Celestia said with a shake of her head. "Why would humanity, which I can only assume is the name for your kind, need hope from a being of destruction and war? Do they not know peace?"
"One question, one answer, and then we switch. Deal?" the alien challenged, to which Celestia smiled and nodded.
"Good. Now, where are we? There's not a cloud in the sky, nor sun- and yet there's light. This plain goes on forever. It's impossible."
"And yet, here we are." Princess Celestia replied. "I have never thought to give it a name, but this is the place in between places; the space which occupies nothing. It is a terrain in which only the mind and spirit can traverse. To put it in less riddle-y words, our minds- our sense of reality, if you will, has left the real world and came here so that we may speak. Our bodies are right where we left them, unharmed. When we finish here, we will return and only a second will have passed in the real world."
"You seem to know an awful lot about this place." the alien replied.
"I've been here before, yes. I'm not sure if it is different for others, but whenever the spell is used, it always drops me here. It's a place where boundaries of no kind exist. You can walk off in any direction and find yourself right back here in a few moments. That is also how we are able to understand each other, finally. The gods are rather curious about you, I think."
"It'd be best if you keep gods out of this." the alien said, quietly.
"I understand. Now, as the spell is incredibly straining on the caster, we really should hurry along. What do you eat and drink? The salad was a tremendous guess, but I'm glad you found it appetizing enough to down in a matter of minutes." Princess Celestia chuckled.
"Meat. Vegetables. Water." the alien said with a bland tone, clearly unamused.
Celestia's smile immediately vanished and she blinked away the shock. "I... I see. Unfortunately, very few species in Equestria thrive off of flesh, and ponies are not one of them. I'm afraid you will have to make do with vegetables. Hopefully your diet will be stable enough..."
"Who are you? What is this place; Equestria?"
"My name is Princess Celestia. I rule Equestria, a peaceful nation of ponies, alongside my younger sister; Princess Luna."
"Princess Luna. I take it the dark blue one, judging by the crescent on her ass?"
"Yes, the... The one with the moon... On her ass..." Princess Celestia confirmed, fighting back giggles.
After a moment, Princess Celestia regained her composure and cleared her throat. "Where did you come from?"
A long silence filled the near-nothingness that was their little grassy plain, until the alien shifter he weight slightly. "That's classified."
"Classified? Ah, I understand. Because a nation of peaceful, non space-faring ponies would be an incredible threat to a race of bipedal aliens that look like demons, no offense." Princess Celestia joked, giving a slight laugh.
"The last creature to call me a demon choked on his own blood while I killed the rest of his squad."
"...I-I meant nothing by it. P-Perhaps I should stop trying to lighten the mood and just get to the point, then..."
"Perhaps you should." the alien suggested. "Who is that other horse, the purple one?"
"That pony is Twilight Sparkle. She is my student in the magical arts, training to become a full-fledged Princess." Princess Celestia explained.
"You train to become a Princess?" the alien said in confusion.
"Oh, no, no, no. Twilight Sparkle has been my student ever since she was a little filly. She has been through so much with her friends, from defeating the evil within my little sister, recapturing a corrupt god- and then reforming that god -, not to mention learning the magic of friendship." Princess Celestia said.
"...The magic of friendship?" the alien inquired, unamused.
"There is little to do that is as exciting as the things that you may be accustomed to. Think of it as a form of psychology. You understand what that is?"
"The study of the mind and what makes the creature it's attached to tick."
A simple nod was the only answer the alien received.
"It doesn't take a genius to figure out why you're really here. You made a fuss about defending your planet and then dropped the subject as soon as I began to cooperate. Why don't we save the pointless questions until later? After all, this 'spell' is such a strain on the caster." the alien commented.
"Are all of you humans this bright?"
"Only the ones that survived "
"Survived what? You still haven't told me what war your kind is fighting against. Soldiers have a purpose, guards stand around and watch things." Princess Celestia said.
"Have you ever wondered what was out there, among the stars, while you lay on the cold grass and stare out into space? Humanity did, a long time ago. It lead us to build new cities on new planets. Some people didn't like being ruled by a central government- preferred to do as they pleased, when they pleased, and yet another chapter of war opened up in our bloody history." the alien began, only to be interrupted by a curious white alicorn.
"How bloody is your species history?"
"Enough blood has been drawn and spilled to fill your deepest ocean one hundred times over." the alien replied grimly. "Again, it was humans fighting against humans until the Covenant showed up. Turns out the age old question, "are we alone in the universe?" had finally been answered. Harvest fell not long after it, and the war against the Insurrectionists was officially put on hold to deal with the threat of our entire race being annihilated but a group of genocidal freaks just because "we're an affront to their gods".
The alien bowed her head slightly before speaking again. "I'd sure like to give whatever gods they worship a piece of my mind... We threw everything we had at the bastards, and they just walked through it like we were flies just spitting on them."
"Flies?" Celestia inquired.
"Bugs; tiny and bothersome, not a threat to anything. Bottom of the food chain, too." the alien explained. "And then, some genius up top decided we might need to actually start doing something if we're going to survive as a species. That's where soldiers like me came in: Spartans. Biologically engineered and augmented to be twenty times anything a normal man could be. Scores of the genocidal assholes fell to us, but we lost too many of our own in the process. And yet, they decided to train more and keep chucking them at the wall."
"Interesting. And did you not try peaceful negotiations with the creatures? Surely you had something to offer them, as another sentient, space-faring species?"
"Anything we had that they wanted was taken when they killed our kind and glassed our worlds. We couldn't stand against them long enough."
"I see... So, how did the war end?"
"It didn't. That forest you pulled me out of? Did she tell you about the giant chunks of heated, purple metal that littered the woods?"
"She did, actually. We haven't been able to figure out what it does, or what it was a part of." Princess Celestia explained.
"It was part of a ship. Their ship. I detonated the bomb that blew it to pieces and sucked it through space. Somehow wound up here, and alive."
"So that was what I saw, with the orange one..." Celestia whispered to herself. "Your final moments..."
"Jorge? You saw Jorge?" the alien asked, worriedly.
"I believe I did. You say that was a ship? In space, correct? Then why did the orange one simply walk of of it?"
"He had to get down to Reach, the planet we were stationed on. There wasn't a ship to take him home, so he had to jump..." the alien explained, softly; sadly.
Princess Celestia remained silent with the creature for a moment before it spoke up, again. "I'm not talking anymore; at least not today. I'd like my weapon back, please."
Celestia tilted her head, curiously, at the alien; trying to see through its reflective mask and into the mind of the bothered alien soldier. "Why do you need it so badly? There is no war here, and I will work my hardest to keep it that way."
"It's not for war, anymore... It's just... All I have left..."
Princess Celestia fought back comforting the alien as she turned away and began trotting out into the forming clouds in the distance. "I will do my best to see that you get your weapon back, on the condition that you never, ever, wield it against my little ponies. There will be dire consequences for you if you choose to do so, and I will make sure your kind never steps foot on my planet."
"I understand, and agree."
"Good. One last thing: what should I call you? You do have a name, correct?" Princess Celestia asked, turning to face the standing alien, clad in black and battle-scarred armor.
An uneasy silence followed as Celestia waited for an answer, and her chest swelled with an unnatural feeling as her veins filled with adrenaline.
"My name is Noble Six."