Second Contact

by SpartanD014


Chapter 23

CHAPTER 23


Adam frantically looked around the courtyard, trying in vain to locate Princess Celestia. Finally, through the constant movement of battle, he spotted her all the way at the other end of the courtyard, relentlessly firing blasts of magic from her horn into the invading crowd of griffons. Already the bodies of the winged beasts were beginning to pile up, and, despite everything, the battle in the courtyard was seemingly going in favor of the ponies. Adam hastily began pushing through the crowd of ponies, trying to make his way to the princess. If her sister was in danger, she needed to know it. As he pushed closer to the solar diarch, Adam began to notice just how much damage she was taking. Her once beautifully crafted suit of armor was now riddled with dents and holes from crossbow bolts, and her once-determined expression was now replaced by one of exhaustion. In-between the fight with the dragon, and the endless waves of griffons sacrificing themselves just to make a dent, she had been using her magic non-stop. Even for a powerful alicorn such as herself, that had to be taking a toll. Adam was just about to reach Celestia when suddenly, a stray crossbow bolt fired from a griffon somewhere in the crowd of invaders spun right toward the princess, impacting her in the shoulder. She took a step backwards, grunting in pain. Adam broke into a sprint, now pushing violently through the ponies, in order to get to the princess. Another two bolts suddenly came into existence, landing themselves below the first one, and in her chest. Her pupils shrunk, and she let out a gasp of air as she collapsed to the ground in pain. Adam finally reached her and deflected the next few bolts with his shields.

“Princess!” he yelled, struggling to get her attention. “Princess!” But she did not answer. Rather, she stared endlessly at the cobblestone floor of the courtyard, her breathing shallow.

“Princess, answer me!” Adam demanded, shaking Celestia by her uninjured shoulder. Finally she snapped out of her shocked state, and looked up to Adam.

“Adam?” she asked, her voice quiet.

“Princess…” he said. Adam then stood and began looking around the crowd. “Medic! Medic!” He frantically waved to a combat medic at the back of the crowd, who was treating a wounded pony. When the medic noticed that it was the princess who was injured, she lit up her horn, and an instant later she was teleported right next to the Spartan. She then leaned over the princess, and looked her right in the eyes. She examined her pupils and breathing then, satisfied that they were not too bad, set to work on dulling the pain.

“Princess, can you hear me?” she asked, not taking her eyes off of the crossbow bolts embedded in the diarch. Celestia did not speak, but she nodded and blinked several times.

“Alright, can you use your magic?” Celestia closed her eyes and seemed to focus. A few moments later, her horn sparked, but nothing happened. She then quickly opened her eyes and began gasping for air.

“Alright, that’s not good…” the combat medic commented. She then turned to Adam. “Can you carry her inside?” He nodded, put his assault rifle down, and gently lifted the princess, then, turning so that only his shielded back was facing the griffons, he began to maneuver through the ponies (who now kindly moved out of the way, seeing that their princess was injured) and towards the castle door. When they arrived, the combat medic opened it just enough for the three of them to enter, then slammed it shut behind her. Adam carefully placed the princess on the carpeted floor, then stood back up. The medic pushed between the Spartan and the alicorn, and set to work. Adam moved to the side of the medic, and leaned in close.

“Princess, listen…” he said. “I saw General Daggerwing and two sentinels fly into the main tower…” At this, Celestia’s eyes grew wide with fear, and she stared Adam right in the eye.

“Go get her,” was all she said, before she fell back, unconscious.

“Go, I’ll work on her here,” the medic said. Adam stood up, then quickly broke into a sprint down the halls, running past the fortified positions, making his way to the stairwell that lead to the main tower. Finally he located it, and ran up the long set of spiral stairs, becoming very aware that time was of the essence. It wasn’t until Adam was almost to the top of the stairs that he realized he had left his assault rifle outside when he had picked up Celestia. All he had was a magnum with only two clips; not nearly enough to take down the shields of two sentinels, let alone destroy them. But he was not about to run all the way back down to go get another weapon, lest he risk the life of Princess Luna. Instead he equipped the handgun and continued up the stairs, reaching the top in only a couple of minutes. When he reached the top, he pushed the reinforced door open, tearing it off of its hinges. In front of him was a short hallway, with two doors on either side, and a window at the end. He noticed with horror that the window had been shattered, and there were the corpses of two guards outside one of the doors. Activating his camo unit, Adam crouched up to the door and stacked up on it, leaning in a bit to get a better view. What he saw was not good. Standing on one end of the room was Princess Luna, who was backed up against a wall. Across from her were Daggerwing and the two sentinels, with Daggerwing holding… a magnum? Where did he get that? Adam thought. Magnum or not, it didn’t matter. The General was threatening Luna’s life, and he had to stop him. He spun into the doorway, deactivating his cloak, and pointed the weapon right at Daggerwing. The general noticed the newcomer and, with incredible speed and reflexes, he soared towards the princess and grabbed her, holding her in front of him with the magnum to the side of her unarmored head. The two sentinels turned to face Adam, and began to light up their beam weapons.

“Let her go!” Adam yelled, aiming down the sights of his magnum. The griffon general simply responded by pushing the magnum closer to Luna’s head. She discreetly tried lighting up her horn to teleport herself to safety, but Daggerwing noticed and wrapped his free claw around it, causing the princess to scream in pain.

“I said let her go!” Adam repeated, still holding his magnum at the ready, his eyes constantly switching between the three hostiles in the room.

“This has to be done…” the griffon hissed in response. “For the future of Equis… the ponies must be destroyed…”

“Do you really believe that?” Adam asked, never moving the magnum away from the griffon. “Just because some machine tells you, it’s true?”

“It is not just a machine!” Daggerwing yelled angrily, spit flying from his mouth. “It is a remnant of a time past! From a race of beings more powerful than any of us can possibly imagine!”

“And where do you think they are now?” Adam asked, trying to distract the general.

“They are waiting,” Daggerwing said, smiling sadistically. “They know it is not safe here. And when we cleanse the world of the pony threat, they will visit us, and they will empower us. Equis will belong to the griffons…”

“Really…” Adam deadpanned. “What if I told you that they were dead? Long gone, destroyed, thousands of years ago…” At this, the griffon laughed loudly, and Adam noticed happily that he was beginning to let his guard down. Already the magnum was no longer pressed against Luna’s head.

“You must be joking…” the general replied, still chuckling to himself. “They cannot be destroyed… The ponies, however…” The griffon now was beginning to put some distance between himself and Luna, distracted by the Spartan’s questioning. Adam sighted in on his heart, waiting for his chance…

“Are you so sure about that?” he asked, preparing to take the shot. “If they were powerful enough to build these machines and all those ruins you love so much… Are the ponies really a threat to them?” The griffon gulped, trying to think of something to say.

“It is as… the oracle said…” Daggerwing finally said, his magnum now pointed almost completely at the ground.

“Face it, General,” Adam said, beginning to apply some pressure on the trigger. “You’re fighting for nothing more than scrap metal. They’re gone.”

NO. THEY’RE. N-

BANG.

A single shot rang out, and General Daggerwing looked down at the new, bleeding hole in his chest.

BANG. BANG.

Two more holes appeared, not far from the first, and more blood began to pour out of them. The griffon stared endlessly at the wall behind Adam for a second longer, before he slumped to the floor, dead. But Adam did not allow himself a victory, not yet. He still had to deal with the sentinels. Quickly, he sprinted towards the closest one and grabbed the front of its wings. The shields were only tuned for fast-moving projectiles, so he had no trouble gripping the machine with his hands. He then spun it as hard as he could and threw it against the wall, causing the marble bricks to shatter, and the machine to sputter to the floor. The second one was preparing to fire on Adam, so he jumped out of the way and centered his magnum on the machine, firing off the rest of the magazine. When the clip was empty, and the shields were still up, the Spartan realized that this plan was not going to work. He began looking around for something blunt, which he found in the form of a small bust of a pony on a shelf, then grabbed the bust and threw it at the sentinel. It connected with the machine, damaging it greatly and causing it to lose stability. In its confusion, Adam reloaded his magnum and fired off the remainder of the second clip into it, finally destroying to machine. He was about to turn to assist Luna when suddenly, he heard her scream behind him…


Princess Luna watched the scene unfold before her as if it was in slow motion. One moment the claw of a griffon was around her horn, the next there were three bright flashes of light from Adam’s weapon and General Daggerwing fell to the floor, dead. Luna stared down at the body of the general, her expression a mix of horror and relief. As the beast stared up at the ceiling, lifeless, Luna began to feel pity towards him, which honestly surprised her. Here she was, staring at the corpse of the individual responsible for so much death and destruction of her subjects, and she was feeling pity… It was likely that the general had been indoctrinated by 401 Lamenting Chorus, and was not even aware of his actions. All of these griffons were under the command of an insane machine, not the general…

Suddenly, her attention was taken off of the body when she heard a buzzing noise in front of her. Slowly, a sentinel that was lying against a shattered wall (which no doubt was of Adam’s doing) began to regain control of itself, and slowly started to hover back into the air. When it was stable again, it began hovering over to the princess, the beam weapon on its underside beginning to glow a dull red. Only a moment before it fired, she managed to put up a force field with her magic, but it was too late. The field wasn’t at full strength when the beam connected, and it soon shattered the magical shield and connected with her chest, cutting straight through the ancient armor and burning into her chest. The beam began navigating around, drawing the beam across her to maximize damage. Suddenly there was a dark gray blur, and a large, heavy object connected with the sentinel, instantly cutting off the beam and sending it to the floor. The object, which in her blurry vision appeared to be Adam, then began swinging punches onto the object until it erupted in an explosion of blue plasma. The princess then slumped on the floor, the edges of her vision beginning to grow black.

Over the ringing that was in her ears, she thought she heard someone frantically calling her name. The last thing she saw before falling completely unconscious was a reflective gold faceplate, granting her once last look at herself before falling into blackness…


As soon as Adam heard the scream, he spun around and saw the sentinel he had previously incapacitated firing its beam weapon at Princess Luna. The dull red beam cut straight through her armor and impacted her chest, burning across it horizontally. Acting as quickly as possible, Adam deployed the two jet engines hidden in the back of his armor, and fired them forward, sending him rocketing towards the Forerunner machine and slamming him into it, which instantly took down the devices shields. With the sentinel now on the ground, Adam began relentlessly punching it, until it finally exploded in a brilliant blue light, which drained his shields almost fully. With the sentinel eliminated, he stood up and ran over to the princess, looking her straight in the eyes. She was still conscious, but did not seem responsive.

“Princess!” Adam yelled, trying to get her attention. “Princess!” She briefly seemed aware of the Spartan standing over her, before her eyes rolled back and her dark blue eyelids closed shut, signaling that she had just fallen unconscious. Adam quietly cursed under his breath, then looked around. He stepped out of the room, and walked to the end of the hall, where he took a look out of the shattered window. He craned his neck to try and see the courtyard from this high perch, but it was mostly hidden by other towers. However, he could still see the front of the courtyard, where it appeared as though griffons were pouring in through the breach in even greater numbers. Adam quickly lifted a hand to his ear, and activated his radio.

“Kevin, this is Adam, do you read me?” he said urgently. There was a pause, before finally the fireteam leader responded.

“I read you, Adam!” Kevin shouted back, gunfire going off in the background. “The griffons are coming in even quicker now, where are you?”

“I’m at the top of the main tower, Princess Luna has been critically injured,” Adam responded. “I need to get her help. Is Princess Celestia conscious yet?”

“That’s a negative, Adam,” Kevin said after another brief pause. “Listen, we can try to hold them off. Get the princess to Infinity. Go!” Adam withdrew his hand, then looked down. Directly below this window were the castle gardens, and still landed inside of them was his pelican. Quickly, Adam ran back into the room and, as carefully as possible, he picked up Princess Luna. He then slowly walked back into the hall and, trying not to touch her wounds, approached the window. Adam took a deep breath, then leapt out, and quickly he spun himself around so that his back was facing the ground, and Luna was held above him. He called up an altimeter onto his HUD, and tensely watched the number as it became lower and lower. Finally, halfway down to the ground, he fired his jetpack and slowed them down just before they reached terminal velocity. Every few seconds, just as they were beginning to gain speed again, he would fire a quick burst from his jetpack, until he was just a foot off of the ground. At that point he deactivated the pack and they folded back up into the backplate of his armor. They fell the remaining distance and Adam landed with a thud onto the ground, then made a run for the pelican. Carefully he strapped Princess Luna across several of the seats, careful not to wrap any harnesses around her injured chest. With that task done, he ran into the cockpit, closed the back hatch, activated the engines, and took off into the sky. Only a few moments later, his radio activated.

“Adam, this is Commander Lasky aboard Perseus,” Lasky reported. “We’re detecting your pelican taking off from the castle. What’s happening?”

“Princess Luna was critically wounded by a sentinel who attacked the main tower with General Daggerwing,” Adam answered, keeping an eye on the altimeter.

“Daggerwing!?” Lasky shouted. “He was able to get to the princess?”

“Yes, sir,” Adam said. “But don’t worry… he’s dead.” There was a brief pause, then Lasky spoke again.

“Understood, Adam,” he said. “That is good news. I’ll let our troops on the ground know, but listen… you need to get back quickly. We need your-.” Lasky was cut off as something suddenly struck the pelican, sending it spinning to the right. When Adam finally got the pelican back upright, a fair amount of smoke was filling the cockpit, being emitted from several consoles that were sparking and flickering on and off. The smoke was filling the cabin quickly, so Adam closed the cockpit door to isolate it to him only, then activated his life support. The GEN2 Mjolnir Mark VI armor didn’t have as large an oxygen capacity as the original Mark VI reserved for Spartan-II’s, and it could only keep him alive in toxic environments for half an hour. He would have to make this-

Adam’s train of thought was cut off again as the ship rocketed to the side again as something hit it. Realizing that he was under attack (though knowing not by what), he began to perform evasive maneuvers, which, considering his injured passenger, was not easy. In-between barrel rolls and other moves to throw off his attacker, Adam would take peeks out of the front window, trying to pinpoint just what was assaulting the dropship. And when he finally saw it, his heart immediately skipped a beat. Flying only a few hundred meters from the right side of the pelican dropship was the dragon lord who had attacked them at Manehattan.

Adam immediately banked left, trying to lose the dragon in the cloud layer. He still was several minutes from escaping the atmosphere, which was plenty of time for the leviathan to obliterate his small craft. It gave pursuit and let out a roar which, even through the thick titanium plating of the pelican, Adam could hear perfectly. Sensors then showed that his hull temperature was rising dramatically, nearing the levels that it reached when exiting the atmosphere. Adam assumed that the dragon was making use of its fire breath, which, considering just what his pelican was capable of, seemed ineffective. That still didn’t mean the razor-sharp claws were; he had seen firsthand what they were capable off. The dragon seemed to realize that his attack was ineffective, as only a few seconds later, the sensors indicated that hull temperature was dropping again. Adam quickly checked the altimeter, and saw that he was now less than a minute from breaching the atmosphere, where the dragon lord would definitely not be able to follow him.

Just before the time came for him to activate the main thrusters and escape the atmosphere, Adam jolted forward in his seat, his helmeted head hitting the display, as the small craft shook violently to the right. Quickly bringing up a diagnostics screen, Adam checked to see what the damage was, and found that the left engine pod was flashing red, a sign that it had been critically damaged. Suddenly there was another, though less violent, jolt and the lights in the pelican began flickering. The display cut on and off, and Adam could hear the sound of the engines coughing as they struggling to stay on. The ship finally made its decision, and all power went out as the dropship began to plummet back to the surface.

“Come on, come one…” Adam said quietly to himself as he flipped switches, trying desperately to restore power. As he fell through the upper cloud layer, green, rolling hills became visible below him as he plummeted ever closer to the ground. Out the window, the dragon lord dove down below the pelican, only to swoop back up and grab the dropship in his large, powerful claws. He then threw it to the ground, sending it hurtling at much faster speeds and it tumbled to the plains below. Struggling to stay conscious against the overwhelming g-forces, Adam hit several more buttons, and suddenly full power was restored. Adam immediately fired the balancing thrusters, trying to get the ship stable once more. Once they were done firing, he angled himself back up, and ignited the main engines, firing back up into the sky. Adam could clearly hear the dragon lord as he roared in anger, and no doubt once again began pursuit of the small pelican.

Adam knew he couldn’t keep this up forever. One archer missile had managed to injure the creature, what hurt could twelve pelican rockets do? Activating the rear camera, Adam targeted the dragon lord which was getting closer ever moment, then flipped the safety switch on the weapon systems. He did not hesitate to press the button, and the pelican vibrated as twelve of the lock-on missiles shot ahead of the pelican, then spun around to go behind it. Adam once again activated the rear camera to watch his damage. The twelve missiles impacted, one after the other, one the dragon lord, creating a massive cloud of smoke and fire in the sky. There was a pained roar as the powerful explosives impacted both upon the hardened scales and fleshy stomach of the dragon, and, to Adam’s content, a fair amount of blood fell from where the missiles had hit.

It wasn’t enough, however, and a few seconds later, the dragon lord burst from the smoke cloud, now boasting several new injures. The scales which had maintained their red color after the archer missile attack were now blackened like the rest, and there were multiple flesh wounds along the softer stomach which were dripping blood. Adam sighed in annoyance as his plan had failed. As he flew back up to the upper atmosphere, he began to weigh his options. He had just expended the pelican’s entire complement of missiles, and if they weren’t sufficient, then the 70mm nose-mounted autocannon definitely wouldn’t be. There was only one thing that he was absolutely sure could eliminate the creature…

Deciding to try communications again, Adam put a hand to his ear.

Infinity, this is Adam D-014, do you read, over?” he said. There was no response. “I repeat, Infinity, this is Adam D-014, do you read, over!?” Once again, no response.

He was about to simply try and make a run for it (though that would likely end in his, and Princess Luna’s, destruction), when suddenly the radio crackled.

“This is Captain Del Rio aboard Infinity, we read you, Spartan,” came the voice of the captain through the earpiece. “How can we be of service?”

“I’m under attack by a dragon lord!” Adam shouted through the mic as he wove the pelican back and forth, dodging the dragon’s blows. “I need immediate assistance!”

“I can try to get some fighters down there,” Del Rio replied. “But it won’t be for-.”

“Negative, sir…” Adam said. “I’m sending you coordinates. Prepare orbital cannon on my mark…”

“Spartan, you can’t seriously be considering…”

“I’m far enough away from Canterlot, sir,” he interjected. “There are no cities or towns within 7 miles of my location. It’ll be fine.” There was a brief pause, and then the captain spoke again.

“… Coordinates received, Adam,” he said. “Waiting on your mark.” Adam watched his altimeter carefully, waiting for just the right moment. Finally, just seconds before reaching the outer atmosphere, he shouted into the mic.

“NOW!”

Adam pushed all the way down on the throttle, activating the main thrusters and allowing the pelican to reach speeds to escape the atmosphere. At the same time, there was an ear-shattering roar as a 9 meter long tungsten round was fired at 30,000 meters per second from Infinity’s MAC cannon, and sliced right through the dragon lord. The kinetic energy ripped through the dragon and effectively pulverized it, spitting the remains of scales, bones, and innards out into the air. The slug round continued down and impacted onto the ground, sending out a shockwave over the next several miles and creating a massive crater in the ground where the ferrous round impacted.

Adam sat back in the pilot’s seat, letting out a sigh of relief as the pelican exited the atmosphere of Equis. Only a few hundred kilometers ahead was Infinity, so Adam set the pelican on an automated docking path, then opened the cockpit door and pushed himself out into the troop bay to check on Luna. Miraculously, she seemed not to have moved all that much. However, without medical tools, there was no way he would be able to tell the kind of trauma she had endured. That would be for the medics on Infinity to find out.


“We’ve barely got a pulse, here!”

“Breathing is shallow!”

“Get new dressings on those burn wounds!”

Adam followed behind several medics as they carted Princess Luna away on a large gurney, constantly checking on her vitals. So far, they did not look good. There was a chance that his journey to Infinity had taken too long, and it was too late to save her. And without Princess Celestia to use her magic to heal her, the medics told him there was a good chance that she wouldn’t make it. As soon as he had boarded, Adam had requested that Twilight Sparkle and Princess Cadance be made aware of the situation, to see if there was anything they could do. And only seconds after entering the large surgical suite, the two ponies ran inside, a look of worry plastering their faces.

“Adam!” Twilight yelled, worried. “What happened!? Is she going to be okay!?”

“She was hit by a sentinel beam,” Adam explained. “And I don’t know… I was hoping that you two might be able to help.” Twilight and Cadance both looked at each other, disappointed, then back to Adam.

“I’m sorry, Adam,” Princess Cadance said quietly. “Neither of us are adept in medical magic… That’s a difficult field to master, even for an alicorn…” Adam sighed, then walked over to the medics, who were working on placing Princess Luna on the surgical table.

“That’s a no on the magic…” he said quietly to the chief medical officer. The older man turned around and frowned at Adam.

“Understood,” he said. “We’ll do what we can. In the meantime, we need some space. You can stay in the observation room if you like.” He pointed up to a window that looked into an elevated room, which would allow anybody inside to look down upon the surgical suite, and oversee the procedure. Adam nodded, then motioned for Twilight and Cadance to follow him outside. Once outside, they entered into another door which lead to a small stairwell, leading up into observation. The two ponies and human watched as the medics stripped Luna of the rest of her armor, and tried their best to lay her totally flat on her back, revealing the burn wounds on her chest to several robotic arms on the roof.

As soon as they completed the task, one medic pressed a series of buttons on a wall-mounted computer, and the robotic arms on the ceiling came to life, articulating downwards and scanning the area around Luna’s chest. The door to the observation deck suddenly opened, and the chief medical officer stepped through, approaching the three observers.

“Mrs. Cadance?” he said. “I’m Doctor Evan Hallman.” He extended his hand to shake. The young princess took it with her hoof, and shook. She then looked at the doctor nervously.

“What is her condition?” she asked.

“Not good…” Hallman replied, sighing. “While the most prevalent wound is the large burn created by the sentinel beam, the intense heat that melted her armor also embedded several shards of it within her chest cavity. From what our scans tell, they’ve already started to cause internal bleeding. We have to extract them as soon as possible, before she bleeds out.” Cadance nodded in agreement, gulping nervously.

“I… I understand,” she said, sounding as though she were on the verge of tears. “Do… do it.” Hallman nodded, then exited the room. A moment later, he reentered the surgical suite and pressed several buttons on the computer, and the robotic arms got to work. The first arm to descend was holding an electric razor, which began trimming down the thin blue coat on her chest in a square around the wounded area. Once only her pale flesh was exposed, an arm equipped with a small spray bottle sprayed a clear substance onto Luna’s chest. Another syringe-wielding arm injected the princess with an anesthetic. The first task done, the three arms receded back to the ceiling, and the others took over. One arm illuminated her chest with a green square, upon which was a grid. An arm with a scalpel descended and cut a long line across her chest, careful not to directly cut any of the burn areas. Twilight’s legs became a bit wobbly at this, which Adam noticed when the lavender unicorn almost fell over. But she kept standing, only to see an arm with spreaders descend and open the incision up wide, revealing the affected area of the princesses chest cavity. At this, she promptly fainted onto the floor. Cadance carefully picked her up with her telekinesis, and laid her on a couch at the back of the room, then continued watching. The scalpel and spreaders moved out of the way for a team of the medics with flashlights on their glasses to step forward and look into the wound. Several arms then descended from the ceiling, each holding a tray with various surgical tools. The medics grabbed the tools they needed, then set about the painstaking task of identifying and carefully removing the armor shards.

“You know, this could take hours…” Adam said. “There’s no telling how much shrapnel is in there…”

“You should get back down to Equestria,” Cadance replied. “They need you down there. I’ll stay here and keep Twilight company, then be here when Luna is okay.” Adam nodded, then swiftly turned and exited the observation room, and began to head back to the hangar.


Adam navigated his pelican down through the cloud layer, knowing that when he came out he would be right over a warzone. At his request, the hangar crew had completely rearmed his pelican, so that he could be of some use to the humans and ponies on the ground. A shrill alarm sounded in the cockpit, signaling that he was about to come out of the cloud layer. Adam shut it off, then braced himself for whatever was on the other side.

As soon as his small craft dropped through the white blanket, he was forced to make evasive maneuvers to avoid hitting several sentinels firing upon one of the frigates. In his absence, the small machines seemed to have taken many losses, which Adam attributed to the fact that several broadsword fighters had entered the battle. They fired their expansive complements of missiles at the automatons, which seemed to be effective at first neutralizing their shields, then the machines themselves. As his pelican neared the castle courtyard, Adam craned his neck to check on the situation. As soon as he gained a view of the area, his heart sank. Where once the hundreds of ponies had stood strong in holding off the attack, the courtyard seemed to have been completely lost. The heavy reinforced door leading into the castle had also been ripped open at some point, and streams of griffons were pouring in. However, Adam occasionally caught sight of an explosion in not far down the corridor, a sign that the ponies and humans were keeping them from getting further into the castle.

Deciding that he should lend a hand, Adam opened the safety covers on the missiles tubes, and prepped all twelve of the high explosive rockets to fire. He selected several highly-populated locations in the griffon horde, then pressed down on the trigger on his throttle, firing all twelve of the ASM’s at the mythological creatures. They exploded on impact, creating large explosions that wiped out large groups of griffons at once, clearing out much of the area in the courtyard. Adam then spun up the chin-mounted rotary cannon, and fired into the advancing griffon lines, shredding them to bits and, if only temporarily, stalling their approach. The griffons who wielded crossbows or some other form of ranged weapon began to fire at the pelican, the crude bolts doing nothing to stop the dropship. They seemed to notice this, as they stopped not long after, and a familiar horn sounded. Adam recognized it as the horn that had been used earlier to summon a dragon. Firing his engines, Adam stopped pressing down on the trigger and soared away from the front lines. It was not long before he heard a loud roar from somewhere behind him, and another jet of flame engulfed the pelican, though it did nothing more than stain the heat shields. Adam suddenly put all power into the forward thrusters, coming to a complete stop and sending the confused dragon soaring ahead of him. Immediately after, the Spartan put power back into main engines and gave chase, spinning up the rotary cannon once more. Adam pressed down on the trigger, and the salvo of 70mm rounds soared towards the dragon, only some actually managing to hit. Those that did, however, had little trouble puncturing the less-thick scales of the average dragon, causing it to roar in pain. This caused a momentary lapse in the creature’s dodging, so Adam continued firing, dozens of the bullets embedding themselves into the back of the dragon, until it finally took the long plunge down to the ground, dead.

Unfortunately, Adam’s engagement with the dragon had used up the last of his ammunition, so he decided that it was time for him to land. The gardens still seemed untouched, so the Spartan set down in his usual spot, grabbed an assault rifle from the restocked weapons rack, and ran into the palace, ready to rejoin the fight. He ran through the familiar hallways, working his way to the front entrance. It was not hard to find; all he had to do was follow the sound of gunfire. As soon as he rounded the final corner and came into the entry hall, he was swept up in the chaos. While his diversion had allowed the friendly soldiers to rearm and regroup, the griffons were now continuing their costly attacks against the castle. Spartan Fireteam Vector was, as Adam expected, in the front lines, firing an endless barrage of bullets into the advancing griffons. Adam pushed his way up to them, then kneeled down beside Kevin, and began to fire.

“Kevin!” Adam shouted over the noise. “What’s the situation!?”

“Not good!” Kevin replied, pausing to quickly reload his assault rifle. “I estimate that, through it all, we’ve only taken down a third of their forces! We can’t hold them off for much longer!” Adam nodded in agreement, and kept firing into the griffons. There was no way they could win this conventionally. Even the powerful Spartans would eventually lose in a war of attrition. They needed another plan… Suddenly, a thought popped into his head.

“Where’s Princess Celestia!?” Adam asked, still having to shout.

“Back in one of the safe rooms, being guarded by Night Flyer and a squad of ponies!” Kevin shouted back. “Why!?”

“How much longer can you hold them off!?”

“How long do you need!?” Adam smiled, patted Kevin on the shoulder, then stood up and ran back down the hall, working his way down the route to the safe rooms. They had been placed in the lower levels of the palace, which had been built directly into the side of the mountain. That way they could only be accessed through the main doors, and could not be breached from outside.

Only minutes later, he found himself at the hallway that lead to all of the safe rooms. Each room had a large amount of pony civilians in it, but the one at the end was reserved for the princesses. They had initially denied staying in there, so as not to appear weak to their ponies. Of course, in Celestia’s weakened state, they had been able to bring her here anyway. Adam opened the door, which was flanked by two pony guards, and entered into the small room. On one end was a bed, upon which rested Princess Celestia. She seemed to be fully conscious now, though the bags under her eyes betrayed just how exhausted she still was. Standing next to her and checking her pulse was the same medic from before, and standing on the other side was Night Flyer.

“Adam?” the pony guard asked, confused. “What are you doing here, shouldn’t you be outside?”

“I’ll explain in a minute, Night,” Adam replied, approaching the princess. She slowly turned her head up to regard the Spartan.

“Adam…” she said weakly. “How is my sister?”

“You… you don’t worry about her right now, Princess,” Adam said. “She’s in good hands. Right now, Canterlot needs you…” Celestia stared at Adam, confused.

“What do you mean?” she asked.

“How much magic can you use?”


Adam ran back through the hallways, working his way back to the main entrance. Fifteen minutes was all he needed. Fifteen minutes before his plan could be put into action. The two frigates were ready, and Princess Celestia was preparing herself. But first they needed to hold the griffons off for fifteen more minutes. What was normally regarded as a small amount of time sounded to Adam like a century. Against the seemingly endless griffon hordes, fifteen minutes might as well have been one. But it was their only option. It was either this, or fail.

Finally reaching the entry hall, Adam worked his way back to the front lines, and once again knelt down by Kevin. He began firing into the griffons, then leaned over and shouted to the fireteam leader.

“We need to hold them off for fifteen minutes!” he reported.

“Why!?” Kevin shouted back. “What are you planning!?”

“You’ll see!?”

Kevin turned his head to Adam as if to show his discontent with not being kept in the loop. The humans and unicorns continued firing into the griffon soldiers, who were simply replaced with more the second they fell. Curiously enough, Adam noticed that the griffon lines seemed to be thinning… It was almost as if they were making way for something…

A loud roar proved him right as a dragon, the fourth of five, landed in the courtyard outside and stuck his scaled head in through the door.

“GET DOWN!” Adam yelled before dropping himself to the floor. Not a second later a long jet of flame flew from the mouth of the dragon, and began to cook the air inside the entry hall. Wooden barricades were set alight, and, to Adam’s horror, a cache of explosives, including rockets and grenades, were directly in the path of the flames.

“EVERYONE MOVE!” he shouted, and began crawling as quickly as he could away from the cache. Everyone else in the hall seemed to notice the danger as well, and began working their way away from the entry hall. Just as Adam thought they were all going to make it, there was a deafening boom and the explosives cache detonated. Adam was flung further into the palace, where he impacted a wall and fell to the ground, dazed. As he shakily stood up, he realized that no one else had fared much better than him. The survivors were slowly standing up and preparing their weapons, ready for the inevitable horde of griffons that were about to come pouring through.

“Michaels!? Michaels!?” the voice of Kevin shouted desperately. Adam shakily walked over to the Spartan, then put a hand on his shoulder. Kevin whirled around quickly, but settled down once he saw who it was.

“Adam, we can’t keep this up!” he said. “I just lost a man, and who knows how many others we just lost!”

“I know, Kevin,” Adam said. “But we only have to hold out for ten more minutes, so let’s do this…” Kevin sighed, then grabbed his assault rifle off of the ground and joined the newly-formed front lines. The smoke from the explosion cleared, and revealed that, ironically, the explosion from the weapons cache had spread outwards into the courtyard as well, and completely engulfed the dragon, killing it. That meant there was only one left…

There was no time to contemplate on that, though, as the griffons who were also affected by the explosion began running back into the hall, now making it much further without the barricades or ponies getting in the way. The ponies were still unprepared for the attack, and even though the Spartans were able to hold some off, many lighter-armored griffons jumped into the air and flew forwards, flying behind the super soldiers and engaging the ponies in combat. In close-range, the griffons had an inherent advantage due to their size and strength. Adam and Kevin both turned around and began firing at the griffons, though they were much more careful with their aim, so as not to hit any ponies. The dead griffons were only replaced by more as they ran en masse through the corridor and pushed further in, now pushing the ponies back much further. It seemed that they were able to figure out where the princess was being kept, as Adam recognized that the route they were being pushed back through was leading them right to the safe rooms.

“Do not let them get to the princess!” Adam shouted of the din of battle. “Our victory hinges completely on her!” This seemed to give the ponies more drive, as they stopped backing up and began to push forward, moving closer up to the griffons and slaying them with their human-provided weapons. Many of them were able to take down several griffons before they themselves were slain, but it did nothing to push back the griffon advance. Rather, it simply stopped it as they were both caught in a stalemate in the middle of the hallway. Adam once again checked his chrono, checking to see how much longer they had to do this. It read that only five minutes remained. Hopefully the princess would be ready…

Adam’s train of thought was interrupted as a sharp blade impacted his visor, the force of the blow taking his shields down to half strength. Adam spun around to face his assailant, and came face-to-face with a particularly large griffon. It reacted quickly and hit the Spartan one more time, taking down his shields and knocking the human back several feet. Adam brought his assault rifle to bear and made ready to fire, only to be met with a clicking sound, indicating that the magazine was empty. He threw down the spent weapon and unsheathed his knife, then rushed at the large creature. It swung at the unshielded Spartan and managed to catch him on the inside of his unarmored elbow, slicing through the black bodysuit, and managing to draw blood. Adam winced in pain, but managed to dodge the next attack, and embedded his knife deep into the griffon’s left side. It screamed in pain, and Adam ripped the knife out, then brought it up to slice the griffon’s neck. It met the attack midway and deflected it with his own blade, then punched outward with a talon. The blow was surprisingly strong, and pushed him back once more, knocking the breath out of him. Desperately, Adam looked around for Kevin, and found that he was engaged with a similarly sized griffon. Adam then felt another blow to his sparsely-armored stomach, followed by an incredibly sharp pain as the griffon drove his blade into the Spartan’s gut, then twisted it. Adam screamed as the pain threatened to overtake him, but he managed to get one more look up at his chrono.

5… 4… 3... 2…

“EVERYBODY DOWN!” he shouted as loudly as he could. Very briefly, the fighting stopped, and every human and pony fighting in the hall dropped to the floor. The griffons stared at one another, confused, when suddenly hundreds of explosions rocked the city as the two frigates hovering above fired their complement of archer missiles into the streets. As the griffons all fell over one another from the force of the explosions, Adam closed his eyes, and sank into unconsciousness…