//------------------------------// // Names and Dates // Story: Titanfall: New Horizons // by Necrogen Lord //------------------------------// Twilight was looking out of the cave as the creatures began to seemingly swarm about the now dead Hydra that tried to eat them, and could only stare with so many thoughts. What were they? What did they do? How could they speak? Will we survive this? With so many questions bombarding through her mind, she barely noticed her bleeding friend next to her. She turned to see Fluttershy and Applejack tending to Dash's wings, and cringed at the sight of the blood. Dash was almost fully out of it from dizziness and pain, but still refused to give in. Twilight then noticed her friends' attention shift to the exit of the cave and felt her heart almost stop. One of the creatures was right at the entrance. Staring into them with it's star-burst-like glowing eyes and strange green and orange skin. It lowered itself down to their eye-level and spoke. "It's safe now. Come out." At that, it motioned one of it's forehooves from them to the exit with a strange motion of digits at the end of it, apparently signaling them to come out. With little amount to debate on this, Twilight did the only thing she could think of. She responded. "What are you? Who are you? What do you want?" \\\\\\////// At this response, Joshua almost jumped out of his suit in surprise that the beings understood him, let alone spoke English. He shuffled a bit on his knees and licked his lips, trying to think of something to say. "We're just uh... lost, right now and trying to find something to fuel our ship while we're stuck here. We heard you scream from our landing zone and came here to help. Looks like we came just in time, though," he said pointing to the blue one's bleeding back, "if you come out, we can stop the bleeding or at least move you somewhere safer," he said while extending his hand to them. The purple one looked to his helmet and at the hand again, and gulped loudly. When she finished, though, she stood up and walked over to him, slowly and steadily. It raised itself and looked towards the others and motioned for them to follow. "Come on girls," apparently she said, "we don't have much choice here, so let's at least give them a chance." At that, the others in the cave began to lift up from the ground, the orange one hauling up the blue one, trying to keep her from falling. They all slowly approached the exit to the cave as one of the Grunts came up to Joshua. "Sir, area's clear. That thing's down now, but scans show a type of regenerative tissue all over the neck. It could come up at any second." He turned and nodded to the Grunt and motioned for him to return to the rest of the group. Joshua then turned towards the new batch of aliens and spoke again. "First off, we're not here to harm you or anything of the sort, so no need to worry about that. Second, your friend here's hurt badly. So, real quick, Johnson!" A Grunt in lighter green and orange armor with a red-cross insignia on his shoulders came up to the group and gave a crisp salute to Joshua, before standing still. "Sir?" He pointed to the blue one that was bleeding and ordered. "See what you can do to stop the bleeding." "Yessir!" With that, Johnson went over to the group and crouched down to give a proper medical evaluation of the situation. He then addressed the creatures. "Okay, tell me what needs to be done." The orange one let the blue one down as she responded. "Ah'll show ya what ta do. Here, she's got some mighty deep cuts, and we need ta stop the bleedin'." He pulled out a med-kit and began to spray the area, cleansing it from bacteria, as he reached for gauze. Johnson wrapped around the appendage as he was walked through the process of wrapping by the hatted alien. After the procedure, he assisted to haul up the blue one on top of the orange one and addressed Joshua. "She'll be fine for now, sir, but I recommend we move fast. That seal won't last too long and there might be more of those things around here. Plus, I don't know if anything we have will save any of them if they get injured again." Joshua nodded and turned to the six aliens. "If you know a way out of here, we'll follow, make sure it's safe. If not, we can air-lift you out of here with our dropship. Which will it be?" he asked. They all looked to each other and then to the yellow one in the back who was cowering slightly. She trembled forth towards Joshua, Smith, and Juarez, and stopped just shy of comparison between heights. She took a deep breath and began to speak softly to the trio of Militia soldiers. "U-uhm... there's a... path over there... by that rock over there... that goes to my, um... my cottage. If, that's okay with you..." Juarez and Smith exchanged looks and looked towards Joshua for some direction, to which he motioned for them to form up. "Hold on a second, we need to talk." With that he turned around and turned the suit's speakers off and turned on a private local chat with Smith and Juarez, to which Smith spoke first in a hushed shout. "The fuck was that!? The hell is wrong with them!?" To which Juarez responded to first. "Because, asshole, they're probably terrified. They're friend there's hurt real bad and they've nearly been eaten by a massive... thing, and now they've got to trust an unknown alien military group to bring them home safely. How the fuck would you react, again?" "Lock it down, both of you." Joshua commanded with a gesture to both Grunts. They waved each other off as their commanding officer spoke to them. "We've got no idea how anything on this planet works and we've just saved six civies from being eaten. If their higher-ups hear about this, then we'll probably have a better shot at this whole First-Contact scenario, right? So focus on the mission at hand, which is as of now, to escort these six to their closest residence without harm. Now, can I trust you two to get this shit done, or am I going to have to call in another squad?" They looked to each other again and nodded in tandem. "Understood, sir." "Aye, aye." Joshua nodded. "Good. Mission begins... now." With that, he turned off the private speak and went over to the group in question, ready to move out. "Okay. We're ready. Lead the way, and we'll follow." The yellow one nodded slowly and began to walk past the rocks, instead of cutting the path by the dead Hydra for some reason. Joshua signaled the rest of the troops to follow and they began to wade through the forest along a dirt path. They heard some noises every now and then along the bushes, but they ultimately were just ignored by the groups until they arrived at a small wooden cottage at the edge of the tree-line. At that point, the yellow, orange, and blue ones went straight for the door as the other three remained with the Militia troops, trying to keep them occupied as their friend was helped on their own. They stood there waiting, until the purple one spoke up again. "Um... thank you for helping, but why are you here, again?" Joshua looked down to see the little creature shaking a little, anxious about the visitors. "We're just here to get some food and see if we can salvage anything as fuel for our ship. We won't eat your kind, seeing as how it'll be morally unjust eating sentient creatures. No, we're gonna stick to looking through that forest for now." "Oh, um... I wouldn't recommend that. The Everfree Forest is way too dangerous. That Hydra was only one of the dangers that hide behind the shadows of the forest. There's a lot more dangerous things back there." "What would you recommend, then?" "Well, since you say you're from a ship, where exactly are you from?" "We're from space." "... What?" "Space." "Space?" "Space." "From a Spaceship?" "Yep. We came here by accident, and we need to get back." "Why?" "I'd rather not say. You don't need to be dragged into this." "Into what?" "You ask way too many questions." "Sorry." He looked out to the house at the edge and decided to make one of his most powerful decisions as the commanding officer. "So, is this your first contact? First time meeting extra-terrestrials?" "Oh, yes! That's right! This is First Contact!" "No, it isn't." At that point, she practically froze over. "What?" "At least, not yet. We'll have to meet with your leaders and such, so..." "Oh, you mean the Princesses. I can send a letter to let them know that you saved us. And that you don't mean any harm. What time would you like to meet them?" "One week. We need to see about what other species are dominant on this planet. No offense, but we need to make sure that there will be no ill intentions at any kind of event you might plan." "I understand." "What's your names, anyway?" "Oh, I'm Twilight Sparkle, and we're known as ponies, just so you know. I'm an alicorn pony." she pointed to the pink and white ones, "That's Pinkie Pie and Rarity. Pinkie's an Earth Pony and Rarity is a Unicorn Pony. And the ones inside are Applejack, Fluttershy, and Rainbow Dash. Rainbow's the one that was bleeding, by the way. She and Fluttershy are Pegasus Ponies, and Applejack is an Earth Pony as well." "I see. Name's Joshua. You already know Smith, Juarez and Johnson. We're from the Frontier Militia of the Human race." "Nice to meet you, Joshua." "Same to you, Twilight Sparkle." He looked over to the Grunts and noticed that the Goblin Drop-ship was hovering in the distance, picking up the scavenger teams by the drop-site. Joshua then tapped the comms in his helmet and contacted the operator. "Goblin 19, come in, over." "This is Goblin 19, ready at the call, sir." "We're ready for extraction, but be cautious. We've got civies over here. I repeat, civilian population confirmed. Species name: Ponies. Status: Friendly. When can you pick us up?" "On the way now, sir." He dropped his hand and looked back at Twilight and the others. "Alright troopers, ready for extraction. Twilight, it's been a pleasure, but we need to go." "Alright. See you in a week. Bye!" With that, the three went over to the cottage as they talked to each other. As they did, the roar of the drop-ship came closer, until it was hovering above them. It dropped down several ropes for the Grunts and opened up a bottom section for Joshua, which he then used his jump-suit to reach in seconds. The doors closed and sealed as their views faded from the planet, returning to orbit once again.