//------------------------------// // Chapter 2 // Story: Biker Princess from Equestria // by WesFox134 //------------------------------// I looked at my iPhone again for a good while. Looking at my contacts list and seeing Celestia’s contact information, I wondered in my head; why me? There were so many people more qualified and deserving of such of a trip and to actually see a real life alien.  I mean, so many scientists would give up an arm and a leg to see what I saw a few days ago. What did I do to deserve such a thing? I’m just some average Joe that no one in the world outside of his friends and family will ever notice is gone. As I looked at the contact information one more time, I glanced over at the backpack I had next to me, stuffed with the necessities I probably would need on this trip; hygiene products, extra clothes, a couple of books as well as a charger for my phone. I looked at my previous call list, making sure I called everyone I needed to before I had to go. I walked out of my apartment with my backpack on me and headed to the road. I got some kind of buzz from my phone and I noticed I got a message from Celestia, and an image was included in it. It appeared to be a picture of her reclining on her bike, while silhouetted against the sun as if it was extremely close. I just looked at the image for a while, thinking about how majestic and beautiful she looks, but then again she is still a horse-like alien. I mean, I don’t know why I am attracted to her and why she chose me, but I suppose I’ll make the best of it while I’m on this trip with her. I also wondered just how the heck she was still surviving without any protection at all. I mean, she should have died from vacuum exposure or the intense radiation from being so close to the sun. I soon dialed the number on Celestia’s contact info and I patiently waited as it rang, but I noticed the ring tone of the phone sounded off somehow, like some kind of pinging sound. I  heard an odd sound and I saw a familiar spectrum streak across the sky. Soon I saw Celestia had landed her hoverbike in front of me. I smiled as I greeted her, “Hey, Celestia.” “Hello Wes, do you have everything you need?” I looked over at my backpack and nodded at her. She smiled as she unzipped a saddlebag attached to the side of her bike and said, “Go ahead and put it in.” I carefully put the backpack in the smaller bag, surprised it could have fit inside such a tiny container. I looked at it and asked, “So what is that, a saddlebag of holding with a pocket-dimension in it or something?” Celestia just looked at me with a smile and said, “Something like that.” I looked at her and asked, “Before we go, could we just drive around to the Cascades? I want to have one last look of home.” As Celestia smiled, she changed back into what appeared to be the same human form I saw at the diner and changed her hoverbike into what looked like a white Harley motorcycle. I smiled as I got on the seat behind her and we began to ride off to the Cascade Mountains. As we rode along I-90 towards the mountains, we passed my old hometown of Issaquah. It hadn’t changed that much, the old Triple-X Restaurant with its distinctive barrel sign on top that could be seen for a mile or two away, the Bohems Chocolates sign could be seen as well. This little town sure was unique and had beautiful vistas of the hills around it. As we passed into the Cascade Mountains a few miles from North Bend, we stopped at a nice scenic stop overlooking the mountains. I got off as Celestia set the kickstand on her bike so that it wouldn’t ride off. I walked up to the railing and looked out at the sunset, as the last of the sun’s rays were hitting the evergreen covered hills and mountains. I noticed the sky becoming a yellowish gold color with the first few stars starting to appear in the sky. “It looks beautiful doesn’t it?” I said. “Yes it certainly does.” replied Celestia. As I looked at the beautiful sunset overlooking the view and back to Celestia, my mind raced wondering how best to ask her why she chose me. I looked at the woman standing next to me, looking over the sunset. I was about to speak, but she spoke first. “You know, it’s amazing how far you humans have come.” “How so?” “Ever since I first visited Earth about 250 years ago, I’ve seen how much you have accomplished since then. You’ve created great inventions as well as cured many of the plagues that once ailed you. As well as land on your own moon without magic.” I smiled at her, “Yeah we sure have come a long way from our earlier days. Even though we do still have wars occasionally but I suppose that just growing pains, right Celestia?” Celestia just walked up to me and put her hand on my shoulder, “Yes, but all of your technological progress wouldn’t have happened as fast if it didn’t happen, you humans evolved on a world where everything was trying to kill you. You had to have these traits in order to survive and you did more than that, you thrived on this world, if anything I can’t help but sort of envy you humans. You started out so small and frail, no claws to scratch things, weak hearing and smell compared to the rest of the animals on your world, yet you had one thing going for you, small as it was, you had the spark of intelligence and cleverness. You had no claws, so you used rocks you found on the ground and formed them into daggers and made spears to hunt prey.” I was about to say something when Celestia stopped me so she could finish speaking. “But you also created great cultures and works of art as well as grand empires. Your people have slowly come together, even as you had the potential to destroy yourselves. I realize that this isn’t Equestria, but you have done extremely well given your species’ situation.” I looked at her, wondering what brought this up. It sure was interesting to see an alien not be all condescending towards a more primitive species like in those sci-fi novels and TV shows I watch.  Celestia looked back at me and I asked, “Why did you choose me out of all of the people on the Earth? It isn’t just about the payment for your tea when we first met… is it?” Celestia just smiled at me and said, “Just because.” “That’s not really a reason.” “Well you’re free to come on this trip, aren’t you? You called up your friends and family telling them you’ll be going on an extended vacation right?” “Well yeah I did, but Celestia …” “Then it’s settled!” I watched her stifle a giggle. I had a feeling there was something she wasn’t telling me, but I didn’t pry about it at the time. I looked up at the stars starting to appear in the sky and I smiled thinking about amazing it would be to visit those stars and see what creatures could be there. Celestia asked, “Are you coming or not?”. She had changed back into her horse alien form and her hoverbike returned to its original look.  She patted the seat behind her, wanting me to come sit down. I smiled as I got on the seat and she gave me a small black ball. I looked at the strange thing wondering what it was. On a hunch, remembering a few days ago, I placed it on my forehead. It then enveloped my head and transformed into a motorcycle helmet. Celestia put a similar helmet on, even though some of her flowing, animate mane was sticking out from it onto her back. She looked back at me and said, “Hang on; this is going to be the most awesome ride of your life!” Her smile was well seen behind the glass of the protective helmet. As she revved her hoverbike I could see some kind of protective translucent golden shielding cover the area around us and the hoverbike like a bubble, but it faded after a moment. I also noticed that the hoverpads glowing as we lifted up into the sky. I held on to Celestia tight with my eyes closed as sort of an involuntary reaction to flying in a hoverbike. as the Hoverbike flew higher and higher through the sky. As we slowly passed a few clouds we soon reached the stars, my reaction was, well, quite surprising. “OH SWEET GOD WE’RE GONNA DIE, WE’RE GONNA GET THE AIR SUCKED OUT OF US!” I exclaimed with quite a lot of gusto. “Wes, relax”, Celestia said, ”It’s all right.” I opened my eyes and saw that we were flying up into the stratosphere, completely safe. We slowly went up higher and we saw the curvature of the Earth. I thought this was the most amazing sight I ever saw, but that certainly would be topped at what I would see later. I’m seeing something in person most people would only see in a picture or video. I’m actually up there, it was more amazing than any picture or video could ever give. I took a deep breath and said, “I can’t believe it, I can still breathe this high up, as if I’m still on the ground.” I took a few more deep breaths as I started to breathe normally.  I still couldn’t believe this as we slowly lifted up into interplanetary space I asked, “So Celestia where are we going to go first?” . I watched her place a few locations into her hoverbike on a screen in front of her, it seemed to be some kind of navigation device. She then replied, “Oh to a little place I know to get a bit of grub and to refuel the energy in my bike’s cells.” Soon as we reached the upper atmosphere, I heard a strange revving and buzzing sound as the rear engine appeared to give off a glow I noticed from behind me. We soon rocketed towards something going through what appeared to be some kind of wormhole. I watched as we rode through the wormhole, it had a kaleidoscope of colors like something out of 2001: A Space Odyssey. I just stared at the “walls” of the wormhole, entranced by the sight until we left it. The Rainbow tunnel dissipating into the inky blackness of space dotted with stars. We soon approach what appears to be a floating space station. It had a long platform like an aircraft carrier. I noticed a bright sign on it in some kind of alien language on it as well as what appeared to be like a gas station. As we got closer we passed through what appeared to be some kind of bubble and Celly landed her bike near what appeared to be a recharging station. She turned off her bike and appeared to plug in a hose into what appeared to be some kind of energy pump from her bike as blue energy started to flow into the clear hose. I watched as she took off her helmet and shook her flowing hair a bit as she says, “It’s perfectly all right, Wes, the enviro-shields are up.” I carefully took off my helmet and took a few deep breaths to make sure it was alright and I could breathe normally. I put the helmet on the seat after I got off and Celly took me by the hand and says, “I don’t know about you, but I am starving, let’s see what this little place has in the way of grub!”. I just nodded as we both walked closer to the restaurant and she opened the doors with a kick. I looked around and saw all manner of alien creatures just staring at me and Celestia as we walked in. Some of them looked human like while others looked like floating jellyfish or squids. I just kept looking at them out of a mixture of curiosity and wonder. I definitely wasn’t in Kansas anymore.  I just stayed close to Celestia as I followed her to the counter. She looked up to the bartender of the place, a rather orange skinned humanoid, with pointed ears and silver hair.  It was wearing some kind of shirt and pants as he asked something in some strange alien language and Celestia responded in the same language. I looked at Celestia and asked, “Umm, how did you do that?” “Do what?” Celestia asked. I replied, “Speak to him, I couldn’t understand a thing he was saying.” Celestia’s horn started to glow as she touched my forehead with it and all of the alien languages seemed to audibly change into English. I could hear the orange skinned bartender say, “So what will you have?” I only just looked at him/her/it and says, “Umm, I’ll have what she’s having?” as I pointed at Celestia, sort of unsure what they exactly had as the bartender went to make the drinks. As I looked around at the various aliens conversing, I then heard a clink of glasses as the bartender placed the drinks in front of us.   As I looked at the drink; it seemed to bubble and glow with a red color, with what appeared to be steam coming off of the top. I saw a small drop of it fall on the counter and it sizzled away with a hiss similar to a drop of water hitting a hot skillet. I looked over to Celestia as she drank the whole long glass of it. After she swallowed the whole thing, she belched and I could have sworn I saw an orange-red flame come out of her mouth. She then covered her mouth after that as she sighed, “Ah! That sure hit the spot!”         I just couldn’t believe she drank all of that in one huge gulp. I stared at the drink as I slowly took it to my lips and taken a sip of it. The moment it had hit my tongue, it felt like someone stuffed my mouth full of habanero peppers and placed a ghost pepper for good measure in there. I coughed as I drank my first sip and put the drink down, hoping that the burning sensation would go away.         As the Aliens looked at me, almost seeming to judge me. I picked up the glass again, took a deep breath and started to swallow the rest of my drink. It felt like someone poured hot lava into my mouth and I swallowed it as fast as I could. I felt a bubbling sensation in my stomach as I belched and a similar flame to the one Celestia did came from my mouth.           I blushed as Celestia smiled at me, “See? You’re already fitting in!”          As I was relaxing, I heard the doors as if something kicked them open. I turned around and I saw what appeared to be some kind of muscular, tall humanoid wolf. He had silver fur on him as well as black dreadlocks on his head and a goatee on his muzzle, face, whatever it was. He appeared to be dressed as a biker too, with his right sleeve on his coat torn off and had a skull belt buckle on his belt.         I just turned away as the aliens began to murmur about one topic or another when I saw the shadow of the large wolf loom over me. The large wolf said in a gruff voice, “You’re in my seat.” I stared up at the large wolf and with just a bit of fear in my reply , “Oh, this is your seat? I didn’t know.” I slowly got up, trying to leave. Before I could, Celestia stopped me with a hand on my shoulder. She then spoke, “I believe we were here first.” The wolf yelled, “No one treats Silverwulf like that!”. I looked around wondering what to do, when I saw someone throw a bottle at Silverwulf and it hit his head. The large wolf looked around and said, “I’m gonna give you all 10 seconds to tell me who threw that before I frag everything in sight!” I looked around for an opening as another person threw something at this Silverwulf and before I knew it, there was one hell of a bar fight on our hands. There were aliens throwing punches with their fists/tentacles/whatever. Celestia and I crawled out of there while Silverwulf was distracted. We ran back to her bike as I asked, “Who was that guy?” Celestia replied, “Silverwulf, one of the most ruthless bounty hunters in the galaxy.” I said, “Well, I think we need to get out of here.” as we both got on the bike. As we put our helmets on, Celestia quickly left a few golden coins in the payment slot of the machine. Celestia started the engine. however at that same moment,Silverwulf got out and called for his bike. Just at that moment we took off from the space station as the magi-technological shields of the hoverbike went up. We sped away from the space station as we noticed a few more hoverbikes chasing us. I watched the space station slowly disappear from sight as the four hoverbikes with Silverwulf leading the group, still followed us. I muttered to Celestia, “We've got company.” Celestia said, “Take the bars, I’ll get them off of our tail.” She did a momentary spell and with a golden flash we suddenly swapped positions. I took the handlebars and said, “I suppose now is a bad time to tell you I've never ridden a motorcycle before?”. I was definitely in a slight panic, used the handlebars to turn to the left a bit. I saw a laser blast speeding towards us, thankfully it missed us by a few feet. I even remember my thoughts from that moment very clearly, “Oh crap, they are shooting lasers at us, I suppose they weren't too happy about that bar fight, but we didn't start it. Why are they chasing us?”. Of course at the time I didn't know who threw the bottle and I suppose I’ll never know. I looked back as Celestia threw out her hands and a glowing orange-yellow energy appeared from her hands; her horn glowing with the same aura. As the auras around her hands intensified they changed shape into what appeared to be glowing chains made out of solar plasma. I looked ahead trying desperately to keep the bike on a straight path, while Celestia spun her chains around and launched one of them towards the hoverbikes. I glanced over in the mirrors and saw Celestia swing her flaming solar plasma chains around, hitting a few of the other bikes. The apparent heat of the chains melted the engines and parts of the bikes, causing them to either stop or explode.  I saw her chains hit one of the riders on the face, which created a chain shaped burn on his face. I noticed her flinch a bit as if she didn't intend for that to happen. I noticed Silverwulf get closer to us as he yelled out, “You’re not getting away from me you blinatch!” A blast of his laser pistol flew above us, just missing us by mere inches. Celestia hit the gun with the solar plasma chains and they went through it as if it was a hot knife going through butter. I heard the wolf cry out in pain, must have been the chains burning his hand. As I tried to keep the bike going I asked, “Celestia, got any ideas on how to get out of here?”. Celestia just yelled, “Just get us to a distant planet!” I looked at the holographic controls and tried to figure out what to do, seeing how I couldn't read her written language. I tried to remember what she pressed for the navigation earlier and pressed it. By complete accident I got up to what appeared to be a holographic image of a planet orbiting around two suns; one of the suns being smaller and orbiting around the larger main sun. I pressed the button below that and we sped back into the wormhole. After the wormhole dissipated around us,  we soon appeared over the planet as I tried to angle the bike as best I could while we entered the atmosphere of the alien world. I saw the details of the forested area get closer as we noticed snaking rivers as well as small lakes. We made quite a rough landing as we crashed into a few trees, thankfully the shields were holding as we stopped. I got off of the bike and kissed the ground saying, “Oh thank God we’re safe.” I then stopped as I realized something, “Smart move there Wes, you just kissed an alien soil that has God knows what kind of alien microbes that could kill you.” Celestia got off of the bike, putting a furred hand on my shoulder as she spoke, “This certainly is a nice place isn’t it?” I looked around at the alien landscape in front of us. It was a thick jungle of blue and purple leaved plants with two shadows on the ground due to the twin suns in the sky. I just looked at her and answered, “Yeah if you enjoy jungles I suppose.” I looked down at the soil for a moment and asked, “Celestia I’m in no danger of getting infected with some kind of alien microbe am I?” Celestia laughed and asked, “Wow, are you always this much of a worry-wort?” I said, “Well yes, when it’s about something reasonable like my life!” Celestia just smiled, “Then don’t worry your little head. I already magically enhanced your immune system before we left Earth, you’ll be fine.” I looked at Celestia and said sarcastically, “Oh gee, thank you for tampering with my body without telling me or telling me about the risks.” I got up and looked around, noticing the two suns starting to set. I really was on an alien world. The thing I’ve been dreaming about for all of my life was to stand on an alien soil and now I am. At the same time I was wondering where exactly are we going to stay for the night. I looked around our surroundings and I noticed a cave in the distance. We both walked to the cave, with Celestia bringing her bike in tow with her magic. I watched the first stars come into view as the twin suns set behind us. The constellations looked nothing like they did back on Earth. Soon after we entered the cave I went to the bike’s saddlebags and unzipped it, taking out my backpack. I took out and unfurled the sleeping bag and place it on the ground as Celestia started to take her bed out of the saddlebag. I glanced over at her bed and it appeared to be a somewhat simple Queen sized bed. I watched as Celestia started to take off her clothes but then looked away from her wanting to give her some privacy. I walked outside to look some more at the stars of this alien sky. Here I was, on the most amazing journey anyone could ever ask for with an alien biker babe. I mean it’s like something out of a cheesy sci-fi story. Yet, as I looked up at the stars, I kept wondering why exactly she chose me and why she was so secretive. She still didn’t tell me anything about herself or where she came from. Why didn’t she trust me with that information and how can I trust her if she doesn’t trust me? Yet, why did I go with her in the first place? Maybe it was because I finally had someone who I could talk to and someone who no one else in the entire world could even dream of having; a real alien from another world. There was just something about Celestia that made me entranced by her. I always thought that aliens would be either strange well “alien” things with many eyeballs or strange non-humanoid bodies, but Celestia was something else. Those equine features mixed with the beautiful humanoid shaped body she had and she just oozed a kind of radiance and grace that sort of seemed out of place for a biker babe. Of course if she’s a horse, would she be a biker mare? Anyway, once I had my fill I walked back inside and looked at Celestia as she was crawling into bed. She apparently had put on some kind of night gown and her biker clothes were nowhere to be seen. She smiled at me as she said, “Aren’t you going to come sleep next to me, Wes?”.  I blushed and said, “No, no, I’ll be fine sleeping in my sleeping bag.”. I crawled into the sleeping bag after changing into my “Pajamas” basically a pair of running shorts, a white undershirt and white socks. I adjusted my position and put my head on the pillow and said, “Good night, Celestia.”. Celestia made a magical shield appear over the cave’s entrance apparently to protect us during the night. She then smiled at me and said, “Good night, Wes.”. I closed my eyes; questions still abound in my mind as I drifted to sleep...