Twilight stared with pure annoyance at the monitor. How could a download take so much time? She has been sitting on that chair for hours, and she could surely feel that her computer was heating up. Well, her and Spike's computer. The aforementioned person was already fast asleep, while Twilight remained up to see when the download would achieve completion.
"Damn you, Rainbow..." Twilight tiredly muttered, rubbing her eyes to keep herself from sleep’s sweet embrace.
It was under Rainbow's insistence that made Twilight try the newest game on Vapor, EquestriaSide 2. This, and her constant comments on it whenever she hung out with their friends. Twilight was quite impressed with the fact that Rainbow managed to get Rarity into the game too, though the fashion designer barely played it.
A long sigh escaped her lips as she gently rested her forehead on the keyboard, not even caring about removing the bulky headset from her ears. She gazed at the nearby water bottle with great interest, and then rolled her eyes around to find something worthy to look at. That is, until she heard a sound coming from her headset.
Twilight quickly raised her head from the keyboard. On the EquestriaSide 2 patch window, a large and greenish 'Play' button grabbed her attention almost instantly. A devious smile crept up on her face, and she breathed in victory.
"Thank Celestia... let's see if this game is worth the time it took to download..." She whispered to herself and clicked on the 'Play' button.
If not immediately, the screen turned black for a second, then changed to one showing the loading screen. It was an artwork showing all of the three factions soldiers and some of their vehicles on the background, a large 'EquestriaSide 2' resting on the upper middle of the image. Twilight skeptically raised her eyebrow at the monitor for a second.
When the loading bar reached 100%, the game officially started. Now, all that she needed to do was to create a character, and select the server. She took a brief glance at a small piece of paper that Dash had given her weeks ago. Her rainbow-haired friend had written on it the faction that she joined, and the server in which she played.
"Huh... she plays on this 'New Conglomerate' faction. Quite obvious why. But this 'Vanu Sovereignty' seems interesting too..."
After she selected the faction, Twilight proceeded to create her character. She quietly groaned at the lack of shown hair for her soldier, but was simply satisfied with being able to make a female character. When asked to insert a name, she quickly wrote 'TwilightSparkle45'. Once this was done, she just needed to choose the server. 'Waterson' was its name. And she had to admit that she was starting to enjoy the music playing in the background.
She gave a loud yelp when the ‘Vapor chat notification’ sound came in and assaulted her unsuspecting ears. Twilight took a more comfortable position on her chair and held a hand on her chest, trying to calm down her rapidly-beating heart. Taking long breaths to recompose herself, she went to the in-game Vapor menu to check on whatever that sound was. It seemed to be a message from Rainbow. It read:
"Heya, Twi!"
"Rainbow!! Do you want to kill me?!?" Twilight angrily typed back.
"Nah, thanks. So, wanna play some ES2?"
"What's ES2?"
"The game, Twi. The game."
Twilight's hand hit her forehead faster than she thought when she realized how dumb she sounded there. At least Rainbow couldn't see her.
"Oh! Okay, Dash. I'm just going to press the 'play' button, and then I'll join you."
"Just make sure that you joined the right server, egghead."
As she hovered the cursor over the button, she couldn't help but to feel some eagerness inside her. She was never into shooting games, but this one felt... different, for some reason.
One brief loading screen later and she was already at the tutorial level of the game. Instructions popped up on the HUD, teaching her step-by-step the basic controls. The game's graphics felt beautiful too, specially the reflections on the weapon and the surroundings. Details being taken into account, she continued with the tutorial, smiling to no one else but herself.
*10 minutes later…*
"Hey, Dash. I just completed the tutorial. Should I join in?" Twilight happily typed to her friend, a strange excitement to experience an actual battle building up inside her.
"Heck yeah, you should. HELP US!"
With that, Twilight followed the instructions on the screen to be instantly deployed at the hottest battle around on the game. She was not aware of how she would be deployed though...
"All soldiers assigned to Amerish, standby for deployment."
"Three..."
"Two..."
"One…"
"Drop pods launched!" A robotic voice announced as multiple pods were rapidly detached from the capital ship orbiting the planet of Auraxis. Within seconds, they reached the atmosphere.
"What is going on?!" One of the soldiers shouted from inside. She wasn't able to move due to the numerous metal bars holding her in place. The tight internal chamber shook violently, and the temperature rose rapidly. Drops of sweat came down her face and her grip around the metallic bars keeping her in place tightened.
Finally reaching the clouds, the drop pods had their free-falls halted by a considerable number of thrusters placed on the underside of the pods. The frightened trooper hyperventilated as her ears caught the deafening sound of a battle. Much to her desperation, the pod seemed to have hit something, landing hard on the unknown surface. All of the bars restraining her movement went up, and three doors opened. She was suddenly propelled forward by something.
Twilight rose up from the dirt surface frantically, barely dodging the incoming beams of red and white. She didn't understand what was going on, and lowered herself once again, covering her ears. Until a familiar voice called for her.
"TWILIGHT!! OVER HERE! GET AWAY FROM THE GATES!!!" It was Rainbow Dash. She was crouching behind a low barrier, accompanied by a few more soldiers. They all wielded long, heavy firearms, a few stripes of both gold and blue passing through the metallic machinery.
Twilight barely heard her friend's yell. Her senses were numb from the ear-shattering explosions and gunfire surrounding her. All that her eyes could see were men and women being sent flying away by massive vehicles in the distance. Strange airships battled up above, sending small projectiles rocketing each other. She could swear that she saw tiny flares of fire falling from the sky.
"C'MON TWILIGHT!! GET TO COVER!!" Rainbow shouted once again, this time loud enough to catch her disoriented squadmate's attention.
The scared girl shakily jogged to the barrier, suffering with the severed surface below her unexplained armored feet. That is, if a well-aimed bullet didn't hit her in the head. Twilight lifelessly fell to the ground, her body disappearing into a cloud of black smoke after a tank shell hit the dirt surface. All that Rainbow did was let out a loud groan.
"I died already?!" Twilight furiously stated, frowning at the screen. "What kind of game throws a beginner head-on in a battle?"
"And that, Twi, is EquestriaSide 2. Enjoyed your first 20 seconds of gameplay?" A scratchy voice came from the headset, followed by laughter on the same tone.
"And now this thing has voice-chat? Well, nice to hear your voice out there, Dash."
"Heck yeah, Twi. Now please, aid us in defending this, will ya?" Rainbow pleaded.
The battle map screen wasn't a strange to her. She had watched several videos on it, and accessed multiple sites on the internet to get some pre-advice on the game. Not before doing some deep research on the setting and the factions. But she didn't imagine that the game would promptly throw her directly into a massive battle. Her heart was still beating like mad from the intense moment she experienced in game. Still, it felt so real...
Without a word, she pressed the 'Deploy' button, now slightly more ready for whatever the game would throw at her.
A short guitar sound played inside Twilight's ears as she appeared inside a small chamber. Taking a few steps, she passed through the blue field that guarded the chamber and took a look around: she appeared to be in a room full of bright blue and gold monitors. A few figures, clad in bulky armor colored in the same pattern as the room, rapidly left the room before she could ask a question. Twilight then proceed to examine herself; in her hands, the same machinery that laid in Rainbow's hands rested on her arms. This gave her a vision of some kind of steel plates placed on her forearms, painted in a blue pattern with golden stripes coming down. Her eyes widened at the sight of more of those plates placed all over her chest and legs. She also noticed that her face was confined by a tight metal wrapped around her head, a thin line of glass giving her a vision of the outside.
"Come here, Twilight! We need help!" Rainbow Dash's voice rang in the room as her own armored figure came in. Most of her face was covered by a helmet, but a few strands of her hair were escaping from the helm's tightness. A seemingly thick glass protected the exposed part of her face.
"Rainbow! What's going on?" Twilight confusedly asked, taking a few more curious looks around the futuristic station.
"We're being attacked! We can't lose this station! C'mon, they need reinforcements!"
Even though Rainbow's brief words were confusing, Twilight rearranged the rifle in her hands and jogged to her friend's side. The look on Dash's face was one of concern and utter worry. The sun was high above, showing that it was already midday. The situation for the New Conglomerate troops wasn't the best. As they ran to the ever increasing sounds of a battle, they came across numerous dead and wounded soldiers. Those who were in near perfect condition were the medics, who tried their best to heal the wounded with small, pistol-like items.
"What's the situation, Dash?" Twilight asked, showing a faint trace of fatigue in her tone.
"The Equestrian Republic forces are literally clustering us inside through the northern gate! We're lucky that our tanks pushed back the Sovereign troops, but we're still suffering heavy losses!" Dash replied seriously, not even turning her head to look at Twilight.
As they walked through the innards of the facility, the explosions and gunfire seemed to get louder and louder. Rainbow led Twilight inside a small building and took cover behind the doorway leading to the north gate. She signaled with her armored hand to make Twilight stop. She pressed her back against the wall and slowly walked towards the doorway, noticing that the heat of the battle was still high. Rainbow tucked her head out to see how the defense line was going.
Suddenly, a hyper-sonic bullet was shot at her head, She managed to duck back to cover in time, a large cut through her helmet's visor. Dash groaned loudly.
"Damned sniper! C'mon Twilight! We're doing a run for it! On the count of three!"
"What? Can't we wait a bit more?" Twilight worriedly shouted back, the grip on the rifle instinctively tightening.
Before she could even react, Rainbow's arm pulled her into the chaos. Bullets and lasers wheezed around them. A fellow squadron emerged from the remains of an exploded tank, only to be launched into the air by an incoming shell. Rainbow fastened her pace and brought Twilight closer, nearly making her fall to the ground. She caught a glimpse of their destination: a long barrier made out of steel placed right after the actual gates, filled with armored men and women behind it. Their situation seemed to be hopeless.
Throwing herself on her knees and sliding through the dirty surface, Dash finally reached the barrier in which a relevant number of soldiers from the New Conglomerate were crouched behind. With a loud boom behind her, Twilight was briefly launched into the air and landed hard by the side of the troopers, who didn't care about her harsh arrival. Rainbow quickly got her back to her feet, and turned to a rather big man that blindly fired against the overwhelming Equestrian horde.
"Big Mac! Where are those tanks that I ordered?"
"Their advance was interrupted by Vanu Magriders! It was a trap, ma'am!" The quiet man spoke up, pushing his rifle back to cover and replacing the empty ammunition magazine.
"Those freaking spandex idiots! But are they still alive? Are they on their way to this outpost?" Rainbow yelled at Big Mac, standing up for a second and throwing a grenade at a random location. Screams of pain was her reply.
"Eeyup. They're arrivin' here in a few minutes."
With this, Big Macintosh diverted his gaze to a wounded mate who just got shot in the stomach and immediately began attending to him. Rainbow let out a long breath before standing up with her heavy light machine gun and heroically emptying her ammunition drum on the ever-advancing offending forces. Her efforts were useless, as she achieved no kills with her act. She brought her hand to her head and pressed a nearly invisible button. Twilight herself only listened to her words, her hands quivering unconsciously.
"Eagle Wing one, come in!"
All that she got in response was a loud shriek followed by what sounded like numerous gatling guns firing at the same time. The transmission ended with a loud explosion.
"Starlight! Do you copy me?!" Rainbow yelled more directly now, raising her rifle to blindly hit any Equestrian soldier who dared to try and cross the line of defense.
"Yes... Argh... Yes, ma'am! We're suffering heavy losses up here, sergeant! I require immediate reinforcements!" A feminine voice came through the nearby soldiers helmet radios. A warning siren played together with the pilot's speech.
"Celestia damn those Mosquitoes! I'll try to contact base then. Just stay alive, for our sake!" Dash replied to the pilot's briefing. A quick glance to the skies, and she was able to spot all of the remaining Eagle Wing fighters, trails of black smoke coming from their engines.
Twilight looked surprised at the fact that Rainbow was the possible sergeant and leader of the ground squadron of which she was made a part of. The rainbow-haired girl turned to her with a weak smile.
"C'mon, Twilight. Make good use of that rifle!"
Twilight quickly realized that her friend had in fact gave her an order. Sheepishly placing the barrel over the steel barrier, Twilight laid eyes on the iron sights. This gave her a large overview on the other side of the battle: A dangerous line of tanks shot constant shells towards the weakened station. Snipers hid in the bushes of the forest, some even standing on treetops. Troopers desperately rushed towards the ravaged barrier, screaming and aimlessly emptying their magazines at their targets.
Rotating her rifle to the left, she spotted a sniper whose aim was particularly set on her. Her heart beat faster at the thought that the marksman could press the trigger and end her right there. Squeezing the trigger frantically, Twilight was abruptly pushed back by the gun's recoil. She recomposed herself by adding more pressure on her knee and assumed the same shooting stance as before, spotting the sniper's lifeless body in the distance.
"Great job taking that snipy out, Twi! Keep up the good aim!" Her friend shakily said while laying down suppressive fire on the Equestrian Republic forces.
Twilight grimaced shortly at the compliment, and then quickly turned her eyes to the glistening iron sights which reflected the sun's bright light. A loud gunshot was heard, and Twilight fell on her back. A scream of agony escaped her lips as she held her shoulder tightly. She shortly removed her hand from it and groaned loudly, seeing a crimson-red liquid staining her black gloves. Rainbow and Big Macintosh noticed her wound and quickly came to her aid.
"ENEMY SNIPER! GET DOWN!!" She ordered, just in time as a fellow trooper who had been bravely holding the barricade for hours was struck by a bullet in the head.
"Calm down, Twilight. This ain't gonna hurt ya." Big Mac stated with his usual calm tone as he kept his head low to dodge enemy fire. He took the same healing tool used by the medics back at the station's innards.
He aimed the tool at Twilight and pressed the trigger. A green beam of light came out from the presumed barrel of the pistol-like machinery, and everything that Twilight felt was relaxation spreading through her body. She yelped and closed her eyes as she felt the wound on her shoulder close with a fleshy noise. Shooting her eyes open in surprise, she blinked repeatedly at her fully-healed shoulder. Twilight also felt renewed, all of her fatigue suddenly seeming to fade away. It was an interesting effect. She quickly got back up to her feet, resting her back on the barrier once again.
"No trouble, Twilight." Big Mac said with a rare grin of his own.
They both took their positions back at the barricade, the intensity of enemy fire increasing above their heads. Twilight herself thought that the situation was starting to get hopeless. She had been stuck at the same place for a long time now. How many of the attackers still stood up?
Rainbow's mind wandered about their situation, too. She has been defending the same place for one full day, and yet no success. Would she order them to retreat? No, she would fight until the last man falls.
All of her doubts went away with a terrifying roar in the distance.
Every single soldier defending the barrier diverted their gazes to the the source of the sound. The ground trembled abnormally, the engine-like noises getting closer by each second. Finally, the supposed cause of that sound emerged from the station's main road.
The reinforcements. An entire platoon of Vanguards, the New Conglomerate's main battle tank, all of them lined up in an intimidating formation, revved their engines in anticipated triumph. They slowly moved to the the gate's width, scattering away the defending troopers. The platoon smashed the barricade and aimed their cannons towards the distant line of hostile Prowlers. Their cannons all released their shells at the exact moment, reducing the once feared line of Republican tanks into nothing more than burning carcasses. All of the drivers shouted in unison as they gazed at their scorching enemies with pure delight.
The Equestrian troopers took immediate notice of the NC's reinforcements, and ordered a mass retreat, rapidly forming a red ocean of running figures in the distance. Rainbow Dash saw this as an opportunity of vengeance. She ran to the middle of the now empty gate, and raised her voice:
"C'mon, people! Let's get our payback on those reddies!" With a wave of her arm, she mobilized the whole squadron to follow the tanks. The men and women who tirelessly held back the oppressors followed suit, with newfound vigor in their steps.
The drivers noticed their approach. Without a word, all of the tanks lowered their speed to help their allies climb up and give them some transport. Most soldiers didn't want to fight anymore and rested their sore bodies against the warm turrets of their powerful tanks. Rainbow Dash and Twilight Sparkle were the only ones standing up, though, observing as the road led them through a thick forest surrounded by tall, rocky cliffs. Amerish was indeed an exotic continent.
The Vanguard's gunners were precisely gunning down the fleeing ER troopers, being assisted by the sitting soldiers on top of the tanks. Some of the rebels happily unloaded their magazines upwards, screaming in anticipated victory. Rainbow Dash let out a wild shriek and finally sat by Twilight's side.
"That was a hard battle against the Republic. But they would never win. Freedom--"
"Over Oppression," Twilight completed, smiling innocently at her friend.
"You betcha, Twi! Now, we're going to raid their base; only to make sure that they won't come back at us."
"Seriously, Rainbow? Most of our soldiers are tired and wounded from the attack, and our fighters won't last long, considering their conditions. I would recommend resupplying at that base we were at moments ago, and then precisely planning an attack at their base."
Rainbow's eyebrow raised awkwardly at her friend's suggestion. She looked away, as if trying to find something to empathize her point in attacking the Equestrian Republic's base at that exact moment. She stared at her men: their armor was stained in blood and dirt. Their faces were stamped with pure fatigue, and most of them seemed to be at the point of giving up. The constant sound of the fighters' engines, accompanied by alarm sirens of critical damage and the worrying trails of black smoke coming from their innards, told her that she would easily lose the remnants of Eagle Wing if she attempted to assault. Dash groaned quietly.
"Okay, egghead. You got me. We're turning back, and doing whatever you plan to do." She firmly smacked the tank's hard metal to get the gunner's attention. "Hey, you. Tell the rest to turn back. We're heading back to base."
The gunner let out a long breath of relief and immediately alerted all of the tanks in the platoon to turn around. The line stopped for a moment, and a collective breath of relief sounded out throughout the formation in the quiet afternoon air, only muffled by the tank's lousy engines coming back to full throttle.
"Twilight, you better know what you're doing..." Rainbow said to her resting friend, whose rifle was laying on her lap.
"Don't worry, Rainbow. I know exactly what I'm doing." Twilight smiled widely at her sergeant.
As the platoon lazily moved throughout the hole-ridden road, no one seemed to notice the suspicious movement behind the trees. A group of shadowy figures hoped from tree to rock, rock to tree, as they followed the unsuspecting yet fearsome line of Vanguards. Whoever was following the platoon couldn't remove their eyes from them, watching their every move attentively. They eventually took the lead on the line of tanks and hid perfectly on the trees and bushes, waiting for their prey to cross their line. Mere seconds passed, and then the figures hopped out of their hiding spots.
"DIE, YOU FILTHY TERRORIST SCUM!"
Rainbow's eyes widened at the swarm of Republican light assault troops gathering before their eyes. They were all hovering with their jetpacks, their faces hidden by their dark crimson helmets. The one soldier who taunted the retreating group of the NC was the first to open fire, grinning widely as he painted one of the Vanguard's tank armor with the blood of a rebel.
"ER light infantry! Open fire, open fire!" Rainbow shouted to the exhausted troops, readying her machine gun for battle.
The heavy enemy fire rained down on the tired squadron, most of the rebels being killed as their dreaded nemeses briefly landed to recharge their jetpacks. Aside from the tank's engines and the gunfire, one could hear the throaty and agonized shrieks of death. The Vanguard's blue and gold colored plates were stained with blood, the NC troopers' bodies being left rolling down the road. Only a few survived, including all of the gunners who ducked in time, and Rainbow and Twilight, who took cover behind the tank's turret and few soldiers, their once vivid blue armors being bathed in their own comrades' blood.
The gunners, aided by Rainbow and Twilight, immediately unloaded their weapons at the swarming Equestrian jetpack-equipped soldiers. The results were disastrous; whenever a bullet hit the jetpacks, the soldiers were sent into wicked spins and circles. One particularly large group hit the ground a bit too hard, and erupted into one great ball of fire.
Much to Rainbow's worry and Twilight's desperation, one of the hostiles involved in the ambush dropped from the skies, ran through the ground briefly and hopped on top of the Vanguards. Using the available fuel in his gadget, he tackled Twilight harshly and took her to the skies above.
Twilight's heart skipped a beat as she felt her feet leaving the surface. A quick glance downwards was enough to make her panic. She desperately tried to kick the soldier who just grappled her, but instead, she smacked her newly discovered jetpack. The futuristic device was now damaged enough to use all of its fuel in one thrust. Now, even the Equestrian Republic attacker could feel Death's cold arms slowly embracing him as they reached for the clouds in a insane speed.
"Get off me, you maggot!" Twilight yelled at the helmeted enemy with anger, uselessly punching his armored belly in a vain attempt of getting free of his grasp.
The light trooper from the Equestrian Republic replied with a strong kick to the gap between her legs. Twilight's face contorted in pain as her own grip around his body loosened. The soldier grinned at her loss of consciousness, but his grin faltered as he realized that her jetpack was still up and running; not to mention that they were both on the same level as the NC jet fighters wing: Eagle Wing. He took a quick look around and noticed a particularly damaged fighter jet travelling at a quite slow speed.
"I'm going to die today, you rebel scum. And you're burning together with me!" He gave a sick laugh and punched her in the face with his free arm.
The glass in Twilight's helmet was crushed by his brute force. A thin line of blood descended through the NC soldier's cheeks, her eyes threatening to give up. The Republican warrior took advantage over her weakened state to aim her body towards the critically damaged fighter he spotted earlier.
The pilot of that chosen fighter was, in fact, the leader of Eagle Wing: Starlight Shadow. The cockpit was starting to get smoky, considering that most of the systems were fried up. All of her attention was put into keeping the aircraft into the air, and hoping that the quantity of fuel was sufficient enough to reach the nearest NC base. Starlight was completely unaware of the incoming human rocket.
"Loyalty Until Death, Strength In Unity!!!" The Equestrian loyalist shouted out before hitting hard against the Reaver's cockpit.
The bulletproof glass on the cockpit was shattered to pieces by the harsh impact. Starlight herself quickly lowered her head as the Republican trooper's already dead body flew inside, forming an enormous dent in the aircraft. Twilight hit the jet with her back, deactivating her jetpack, but not halting her movement. She grabbed on the fighter's severed wing, using all of her strength to keep her hand strong on the metallic structure. She briefly shook her head to stay awake and noticed that the vehicle was about to hit the ground-nose on. Her heart was beating madly. This was her end.
Starlight struggled to keep her hand on the control lever and to remove the corpse from the aircraft. With one quick shove, the body was left flying through the afternoon sky. She let out a breath of relief that lasted shortly; one of the remaining monitors showed that she was losing altitude quickly. A loud explosion rang in her ears and she felt her jet lose an engine.
"Mayday, mayday! Something hit me! Systems have gone to Tartarus!"
The beeping of the already mad warning system now seemed to be frying up. The control panel was gone completely, and the handle didn't respond any more. Groaning loudly, Starlight made her decision:
"This is Eagle Wing 1, I'm bailing out. See you guys at the nearest base!"
"Good luck with ejecting out of your flying frying pan, ma'am. Hope to see you in one piece!" One of the pilots said as he gave a flyby on Starlight's flaming Reaver.
Starlight pressed the 'eject' button, being launched upwards together with an automatically strapped parachute. The latter was soon activated, and a blue and golden striped parachute appeared in the orange sky, slowly descending towards a cliff.
Twilight, on the other hand, took notice of the pilot's ejection. The remaining engine burst in fire and blew off the right wing, the vehicle soon started to spin around frantically. Seeing that she was too nearing the ground way too fast, she let go of the left wing in hope that her armor sustained the fall. A sudden sensation of freedom scoured through her sore body as she could see trees and rocks passing rapidly beneath her eyes. But she wanted to get out of this alive.
Summoning all of her strength, she raised her left arm towards her malfunctioning jetpack, and pressed the right button. The device used what little fuel that it had stored to break part of her fall. Alas, it was not enough.
A dashing figure finally struck down one of the groggily moving New Conglomerate tanks on the road below with a loud *clank*. The driver immediately stopped his vehicle as he noticed that whatever had hit him made his tank bounce shortly, and added a considerable dent on his armor. The only remaining soldier on top of the Vanguard jumped out from it and raised her hand in order to stop the following tanks.
"Wait a minute there, boys. I think that I found... wait, Twilight?!" Rainbow's voice went an octave higher as she recognized the face of her friend.
"I... survived..." Twilight muttered out while grabbing a handful of dirt.
"Sweet Celestia... What happened to you, Twi?" Dash asked more worriedly as she saw the numerous bruises on her face. Her friend's eyes closed as she gave one last, long breath.
Rainbow grabbed her friend's unconscious body with her armored arms and hefted her on top of the Vanguard on which she traveled. She looked down at the injured Twilight with concern, and roughly punched the tank's turret.
"Come on driver. Someone here needs medical assistance! Head us back to base!"
"Yes, ma'am!" All of the platoon's engines revved together as the main driver replied.
And then, the once resistant platoon of tanks disappeared in the sunset, uncertain of what was going to happen next. The battle in which they waged would last long, but who will end up on the victorious side?